NATHAN Minhas scored for the sixth successive game as Ascot United defeated Windsor 4-2 at the Racecourse Ground on Saturday.

The young goal-machine bagged a brace to take his season's tally to an impressive 28, by far the highest in the Hellenic League scoring charts.

Minhas, who will be switching to National League South club Billericay next season, has also now made it into the Yellamen's all-time goals list, joining Matt Jones in ninth place. But, while Jones made 71 appearances, Minhas has played just 26 games.

Minhas also helped set up Ascot's opening goal on Saturday for Jean-Claude Etienne, which came inside the opening two-and-a-half minutes following Chris Ellis’s long throw-in from the right touchline.

And two minutes later the hosts went further ahead with Etienne again the scorer, this time from a Jonny Denton corner.

It was an astonishing start as Windsor had not conceded a goal in their previous four Premier Division games and were unbeaten in seven league and cup games since losing 2-0 at home to Ascot early last month.

But the visitors were not stunned for long as they pulled a goal back when George Gould got on the end of Paul Coyne's corner in the seventh minute and at this stage, the crowd of just more than 100 must have thought they were going to witness a goal fest.

However, neither side managed to create many further chances during the remainder of the first half, with Windsor looking slightly the more dangerous.

Former Ascot player Coyne shot high and wide from 25 yards as well as setting up a half-chance for Andy Ingram which keeper Lee Allen saved, while Minhas was way off target when he left fly from 20 yards.

Ascot made two changes at half-time with new signing Elliott Carey and Dan Price replacing Luqman Kassim and Dom Sullivan, and within three minutes of the resumption, they had regained a two-goal advantage.

Keeper Hugo Sobte made a hash of his attempted drop-kick clearance and Minhas lobbed the ball over the embarrassed shot-stopper into the net.

Yet he was not alone in handing out gift goals as Ascot skipper Louis Bouvers, who otherwise had an excellent game, saw his sliced-clearance punished by Victor Ocansey in the 64th minute to bring Windsor back in the game.

Their hopes of earning a point ended shortly before the final whistle when a swift counter-attack led to Minhas racing through to coolly place the ball past Sobte.

The hot-shot had scored a similar late goal in United's 5-0 hammering of Reading City on Tuesday last week, when Etienne, Harry Laflin (2) and Kassim were also on target. It was the Yellamen's first league win since they had defeated Windsor.

A delighted manager Jamie Tompkins said: "We needed these last two results after our recent dip in form. The players have reacted well. But this was a really tough game as Windsor were fantastic. They played with high intensity.

"They came with a game plan and caused us a lot of problems, testing us tactically.

"We felt they were having too much space in the middle of the pitch to play balls in behind our full backs and that was causing us problems, so we had to change things at half-time.

"In the second half, they were unable to break us down. They had only one style of playing and we denied them doing that."

Ascot remain third in the table, eight points behind leaders Brackley Town Saints having played a game more.

Tompkins added: "We are in a good position. At this stage of the season, it's better to be chasing rather being on top and we are in that pack. It's all about consistency now."

This Saturday, the Yellamen visit Abingdon United in the third round of the Bluefin Sports Hellenic Cup before returning to league action next Tuesday against Virginia Water at Stag Meadow (7.45pm).