Hendon climbed out of the Ryman League Premier Division relegation zone for the first time since mid-September after their fifth win in six matches, a 4-0 drubbing of fellow strugglers Hastings United. More importantly, in terms of avoiding relegation, four of those victories have come against teams in the bottom six.

Lee O'Leary's injury meant that Glenn Garner came into the starting eleven and Danny Dyer was on the substitutes' bench.

The first eight minutes were spent with the two teams trying to come to terms with the hard, bumpy pitch and the strong swirling wind added to players' problems.

However, from the first piece of inventive football, Hendon took the lead. Jamie Busby played a one-two with Sam Collins and ran into the penalty area. He miscontrolled the ball and had to go outside of Steven Elliott, rather than cutting in on goal.

It worked in his favour because, wrong-footed, Elliott fouled Busby. It was a very soft penalty, inasmuch as Elliott's contact was slight, but as it was on Busby's standing leg, the Hendon midfielder crumpled to the ground.

Busby picked up himself and the ball and walked to the spot and Hastings players accepted their fate without as much as a word of dispute. The spot-kick was not struck well and Greg Nessling guessed correctly, making a save.

The ball was quickly hacked clear by Scott Ramsay, but the referee had spotted, in his words, "about five" players - including Ramsay - encroaching. He ordered the kick to be retaken and Busby, offered a second chance, made no mistake blasting the ball into the net for his seventh goal in as many matches.

Hendon's midfield trio of Kevin Maclaren, Busby and Sam Collins were again in fine form and they made things very hard for Hastings, leaving them with the only option of knocking long balls forward. These were meat and drink for James Burgess, Craig Vargas, Mark Kirby and James Parker, who made William Viner almost redundant behind them. The goalkeeper had to come off his line a couple of times and gather a few crosses, but - apart from that - had as comfortable an evening as a goalkeeper could ask for.

The Greens didn't create a huge amount themselves, though Harry Hunt caused Danny Spice problems with his pace and control. Twice Peter Dean almost created chances, only to be denied by capricious bounces of the ball.

Then, in the 40th minute, Hendon doubled their advantage with a huge stroke of luck. Collins ran from midfield and tried his luck with a 25-yard shot. It was low and on target, but Nessling seemed to have it covered as he dived for the ball. Unfortunately for him, the ball struck a divot near the penalty spot and flew over the prone keeper’s dive and flew into the net.

There were no changes to either team at half-time, but Hastings brought on two substitutes in the first ten minutes of the second half, Ben Radley replacing Zac Attwood and Jack Dixon taking over from Marc Whiteman. Ramsay moved into the attack but he could not improve the Sussex team's fortunes.

Although Hastings had the better of the exchanges in the first 25 minutes of the second half, they did nothing with their possession and didn't create a single clear opening. As United pressed forward, they left increasingly large gaps at the back and Garner and Hunt almost reached through balls which were grabbed by Nessling.

In the 70th minute, a diagonal ball found Garner on the left wing. He was too fast and strong for Elliott as he cut towards goal and suddenly he had a clear sight of the target. Nessling came out to narrow the angle, so Garner hit the ball early and his drive bent just enough to find the side netting just inside the far post. It was a quality strike, who had worked very hard all evening.

Before play could restart, Haule was introduced at the expense of Dean. His impact was, to put it mildy, immediate and effective. Hastings lost the ball almost straight from the restart and Haule ran downfield in the hope of a ball from Parker finding him.

He got his wish, though the ball was struck a little too hard for comfort. Nevertheless, Haule backed himself to reach the ball before Nessling and his lob over the stranded keeper - a difficult skill made much harder by the conditions - was effected with consummate perfection. The ball flew high over the goalkeeper and bounced a yard from the goalline before bouncing into the roof of the net.

James Bent came on for Garner before play restarted and it was only in this final 20 or so minutes that Hendon began to play the type of football indicative of team brimming with confidence. In contrast, when Hastings player-manager Tony Dolby came on for the final ten minutes, his team was demoralised and was almost waiting for the whistle.

A brilliant save by Nessling denied Haule a second goal after 83 minutes and Hunt was inches away from reaching a through ball before he made way for Lubomir Guentchev in the final five minutes. With a just a little more composure, Hendon might have added to their impregnable advantage.

"I thought this was a thoroughly professional performance," said manager Gary McCann, "although I don't think we played as well as we have done recently.

"The midfield was excellent and the defence rarely looked in trouble. If we can go on from this, with so many teams close to us in points, we might even start looking at a top-half finish. But we have two very tough games in the next week and, if results go against us on Saturday afternoon, we could go into the game on Sunday back in the bottom four."