Hendon took over at the top of the Ryman League Premier Division on Monday night when they won 1-0 away to Chelmsford City at their temporary Billericay home. The Greens' stay at this lofty perch may be for only 24 hours as erstwhile leaders Yeading were due to play the first of their two games in hand on Tuesday night.

René Street returned from his weekend work duties and took over his place at the heart of the defence, allowing Dave Nolan to return to his right wing-back position, while Richard McDonagh came into the side, replacing the injured Will Davies. Martin Vrhovski dropped to the bench.

Chelmsford, who had struggled to achieve victories in the early going, had a number of new or returning faces in their line-up, including former Hendon hero Simon Clarke, back for his second spell with the Clarets.

It took less than five minutes for Chelmsford's problems to become obvious. They play an attacking and attractive brand of football, but their finishing is woeful. The once-prolific Andy Douglas has struggled to reproduce his goalscoring following the dreadful stabbing injuries he received a couple of years ago and he, plus Gary Ansell and newcomer Danny Hayzelden (on loan from Grays), all failed to beat an inspired Dave King.

At the other end, John Frendo was scythed down by Sammy Cooper, who would repeat the feat at the start of the second half, too, and manage to go the night without collecting a caution.

Defending is not Chelmsford's strength and they were nearly caught out by Frendo, Ofori and Mark Nicholls in the opening half-hour. And it was after some rushed defending that Hendon took the lead in the 31st minute.

Nicholls took a corner and passed it 25 yards to Wayne Carter, who was 22 yards from goal, almost level with the near post. Two defenders ran out to shut down a possible shot, but Carter returned the ball to Nicholls, who crossed first time. OFORI lost his marker and met the inch-perfect cross with a downward header that bounced past Jamie Lunan.

Little was seen of Nolan or Dave Sargent in attacking roles because they were too busy supplementing Danny Butler, Street, James Burgess, Carter and McDonagh in defensive duties. The septet did leave a big gap to the forward trio, but Chelmsford often over-committed to attack and Hendon's rapid counter-attacks could and probably should have brought some reward.

The second half pattern was little different to the first, except that the Chelmsford misses became more frequent and Hendon counter-attacks rarer but distinctly more potent. In the 56th minute, after a long spell of defending, Hendon broke free and Sargent's deep cross found an unmarked Frendo. At full stretch, the striker couldn't quite turn the ball into the net. A minute later Lunan turned an Ofori shot against the foot of a post, but an offside flag would have ruled out the effort anyway.

Dave Hunt replace Nicholls after an hour, but most of the action remained around the Hendon penalty area. Hayzelden shot wastefully after 62 minutes and Ansell was stopped in his tracks by a superbly-timed Burgess challenge two minutes later. With 15 minutes to go, the Clarets replaced Ansell and Cooper with Steve Butterworth and Steve Bennett, but they could not turn the game Chelmsford's way.

With six minutes to go, Douglas profited from a slip by Nolan and had a clear run at goal. King came off his line and Douglas almost got around him, but the goalkeeper took the ball off him with a tackle any defender would have been proud to make.

"I am delighted that we have gone top of the table," said manager Tony Choules. "Chelmsford are as good a team as we have played this season, but our defence was magnificent. However, I was not happy with our finishing tonight, it was abysmal."