Devonshire Cougars 3 North Village 5Keishen Bean fired North Village back into the Premier Division title race with a poacher’s quadruple against rivals Devonshire Cougars at the Den yesterday.Cougars have now lost nine straight games against the Rams who remain five points behind league leaders Dandy Town and second-placed PHC.Bean, who has returned home for the festive period from his overseas studies, opened the scoring in the seventh minute after sliding the ball under the legs of outrushing Cougars goalkeeper Clyde Darrell.Village found themselves trailing within the space of two minutes, though, with Kwame Steede levelling for Cougars on 14 minutes when keeper Jason Williams’ weak punch fell invitingly into the midfielder’s path.Kori Goddard then put Cougars ahead after latching onto Kwame Steede’s through ball before showing defender Kofi Dill a clean set of heels and firing past Williams from just inside the area.Cougars were beginning to take charge of proceedings with Village finding it difficult to play their customary passing game on a heavy pitch at Devonshire Rec.However, the visitors drew level somewhat against the run of play on 36 minutes when Joshua Butterfield failed to clear Keishen Bean’s cross, with the ball finding Ralph Bean at the back post who made mistake with a neat finish.Moments before the interval, Village regained their lead when Keishen Bean stroked home his second after being put clean through by Vernon Tankard before powering a shot beyond the helpless Darrell.Tankard was again the orchestrator with another pinpoint pass for Bean’s hat-trick on 51 minutes which the striker neatly tucked away into the far corner with a left foot finish.Cougars’ defence seemed incapable of stemming the goalscoring tide flowing in the other direction, and it was no surprise when Bean got his fourth, and Village’s fifth, with a cool finish from the edge of the box.The hosts did manage to reduce the deficit, albeit fortuitously, when the flight of Darius Cox’s free kick just inside Rams’ half was completely misread by keeper Williams who had perhaps drifted too far from his line.Both side’s had chances during the final ten minutes with substitute Jason Lee going close for Village, and Cougars youngster Jawandy Smith forcing a save from Williams, but it was the defending champions who held firm to complete an important victory.“It was a vital win for us today in terms of keeping in touch with the teams above us,” said coach Shaun Goater, whose side lifted the Friendship Trophy on New Year’s Day after beating Somerset Trojans.“We had to follow our Friendship win because there’s always a danger the celebrations can go on for too long.”Goater praised Keishen Bean for his “deadly display” and said he was proud of Village’s fighting spirit.“It was always going to be a difficult game because the pitch was so difficult to play on; we knew it was going to be battle,” he said.“Obviously Keishen will take a lot of credit for his deadly display, he punished Cougars, but there was a lot of gritty performances out there from us,”Devonshire Cougars: C Darrell, J Butterfield, J Seymour, D Cox, K Franks, Moses Steede (K Tucker, 75), K Steede, T Steede (J Smith, 60), C Caisey, D Coddington, K Goddard (L Simmons, 80)Substitutes not used: K Trott, Z White, K Tucker, M Steede, C BrangmanGoals: K Steede, 14, Goddard, 15, Cox, 66Yellow cards: Moses Steede, D CoddingtonNorth Village: J Williams, T Burgess, D Grant, D Tankard (L Dill, 76), K Dill, J Jennings, S DeGraff, J Davis, K Bean (J Lee, 75), V Tankard, R BeanSubstitutes not used: J Briers, C Boyles, P SmithGoals: K Bean, 7, 41, 51, 60, Ralph Bean, 36Referee: M WyerMan of the match: K Bean (Village)