Top girls Heworth have won the Connexions Girls' Football League under-17 title for the first time since its formation.

Heworth lost just one game all season to close rivals Poppleton Tigers to topple York City from the winner's podium for the first time and finally go one better than their usual second place.

But even though the Tigers got the best of Heworth 1-0 first time round, the eventual champions showed them who was boss in the reverse fixture in which the hosts came out 4-1 victors and then went on to win every other game of the season for 14 points out of a possible 16.

The biggest wins of the campaign came against Pickering Bluebirds (8-0) and Brayton Belles (7-2) and masked a tough season which had seen the 'B' team withdrawn from the league.

To cap the winning season off, Sarah Wellar, Emma Willits and skipper Sam Knight all earned their county spurs for the North Yorkshire Schools' FA under-16s team.

Sarah Cammidge and Laura Layton are both leaving at the end of the season and manager Sue Wilkinson said: "This title win makes it very special to the whole of the Heworth team and without the very determined efforts and hard work by those two, it could well have been 'Poppy' or York who lifted the title this season."

Updated: 08:38 Friday, May 21, 2004