HARROGATE'S future off the field may be bleak, but they can do no wrong on it at the moment.

Their 45-22 home win over Nottingham on Saturday kept them firmly on track for promotion from National League Division One.

The club have already sold their Claro Road ground to housing developers, but their hopes of switching to a new location on the outskirts of the town have been blocked.

The move brought plenty of objections and last week the club's planning application was rejected by the government, leaving Gate facing the prospect of being homeless by 2009.

Despite the mess, Ralph Zoing's team continue to impress and were too good for Nottingham, partcularly in the first half.

They led 38-3 after keeping the ball alive at all costs in a vintage display of fluid running rugby in the opening 40 minutes.

However, the power of their pack was also in evidence, particularly close to the visitors' line.

Harrogate's forwards starved their Nottingham counterparts of possession and opened the scoring after 12 minutes when James Tapster's break set up scrum-half John Newton with a fine try. After Nottingham replied with a penalty, Newton quickly added a second try as he nipped over from a maul.

Mike Worden went over from a close-range scrum and Harrogate's superiority up front led to the sin-binning of visitors' centre Alan Royer for killing the ball.

Newton followed his forwards to snap up his third touchdown after another rolling maul and skipper Worden went over for his second as Harrogate continued to dominate.

The blitz continued when Harrogate were awarded a penalty try after Ed Smithies was illegally stopped when he was chasing after his own chip ahead.

He was fouled by full-back Ben Murphy, who was shown the yellow card by referee T Russell, but Harrogate could not cash in on their extra man.

As Harrogate eased up Nottingham ran in three tries and winger Matt Callaghan was sin-binned after a brief period of Nottingham pressure.

But ther home side had the final word when centre Johann Visser's pass put full-back Smithies over the line.

The result leaves Harrogate in second place, just two points behind Sedgeley Park, who scraped home 32-28 at Stourbridge for their tenth win in 11 games.

Harrogate now have a four-point cushion onver third-placed Doncaster, who pipped Moseley 20-18.

The Doncaster match was marred by a knee injury to Moseley's former England forward Steve Ojomoh, who was stretchered off with what could be a career-threatening injury.

Wharfedale lost ground as they were beaten 30-16 at Rugby.

Updated: 09:58 Monday, December 08, 2003