Lewes will not settle for consolidation as they mount a title challenge for the South premier division.

Until now, the club have insisted their aim for the season was to rebuild following a miserable three years which culminated in relegation from the National League.

Player-coach Luke Hurle said at the start of the campaign he just wanted to get smiles back on faces and that a championship challenge was not on the agenda.

But after registering their seventh win in ten games with a comfortable 4-1 defeat of Wimbledon on Saturday Hurle confirmed a change of tact.

He said: "There is a strong motivation to win this league now. Where that takes us after that, we will just have to see.

"Going for the title is something we have talked about recently. From my point of view, it is difficult to keep giving team talks on a Saturday without mentioning it "We are a competitive group of players and our challenge is realistic now."

Lewes won just one game last season but strengthened in the summer with a number of former players such as Hurle, Will Champness and Adrian Bettesworth who had not wanted to play National League hockey for varying reasons.

The concern about an immediate return to the National League is they will stop playing again and Lewes will be back to the same situation as last season.

Hurle knows that could be a problem but, with his side second in the table and with the chance to go top if they win their game in hand against Ashford on Saturday, it is one the club are prepared to address when it happens.

Against Wimbledon, there was never any doubt about the result even though the visitors went ahead on ten minutes.

Champness replied from a short corner within a minute, scored from another before half-time and completed a hat-trick with a penalty flick in the second half after Hurle had been fouled.

Kyle Black completed the scoring from another short corner near the end.

Champness now has 12 league goals for the season and is third top scorer in the league. Not bad for a defender!

As for Hurle, he knows there is more to come from his side.

He said: "We haven't played well for seven or eight weeks. We have played well in spells but we haven"t played anywhere near our potential. Hopefully we can do that after the Christmas break."

Just three points separate the top four sides in the league, with Brighton now up to fourth after becoming only the second team this season to win away to Oxford University.

Player-coach Craig Carolan scored four times, with Sam Rose also on target.

Carolan said: "They had the better of the first half even though we went in at 2-2. We changed our strategy in the second half, playing more defensively, and they didn't know what to do.

"If someone had said you would be three points off the top of the table at Christmas I would have taken it. After four weekends of the season we were second bottom."

Chichester remain top of division two despite having to settle for a 6-6 draw at home to third-placed Slough.

Richard Blakesley (two), Ben Barnes, Phil Ball, Will Blockley and Sam Beere were the scorers for Chi who fought back from 3-1 down and went on to lead three times before having to settle for a point.

In the Kent/Sussex Regional League, Flo Pietzsch and Graham Lester scored for fourth-placed Eastbourne in a 2-2 draw at BBHC.

Third-placed Worthing lost 2-0 at home to Sutton Valence, who are second.

Mid Sussex remain pointless after losing 6-0 away to leaders Maidstone. Mids continued to show improvement, with Jason Fitzpatrick going close.