BALA TOWN captain Chris Venables has won the JD Cymru Premier Golden Boot for a fifth time.

Come the end of the 20/21 season, the Lakesiders skipper had scored 24 times in just 30 outings for the club - earning him his second successive Golden Boot and his fifth overall.

Venables previously won three top scorer prizes whilst at Aberystwyth Town between 2013 and 2016 before scooping his first for Bala last season having scored 22 goals.

And the 20/21 campaign was a significant one for the 35-year-old attacker as he surpassed the 200-goal mark.

The first of three goals he scored in Bala's 4-1 win at Barry Town United last month was the one which took him to that milestone.

In scoring his 200th JD Cymru Premier goal, he joined an elite and very talented club of goalscorers who have also passed that mark - those being Marc Lloyd Williams, Rhys Griffiths, Michael Wilde (currently with Connah's Quay) and Lee Hunt.

That convincing victory over Barry Town also confirmed Bala's place in the inaugural Europa Conference League for 21/22.

It will be the club's seventh European campaign and they will be looking to replicate the success they of the UEFA Europa League qualifiers earlier this season when they beat Valletta 1-0 away in Malta.

Venables was the hero that night too as he scored the only goal of the game to send Bala into the second qualifying round for the first time.

A former Shrewsbury Town trainee, Venables has also turned out for the likes of Caersws, Llanelli, Welshpool and Aberystwyth Town in Wales' top-flight. He joined Bala Town in 2016 and has been in unstoppable form ever since arriving at Maes Tegid.

Only the prolific Rhys Griffiths, now manager of Penybont who he scored two goals for this season, has more Golden Boots than Venables - with seven to his name.