Wanderers' Premiership stars passed up on a sunshine break in Spain to take part in outward bound team-building exercises - including toilet racing - in the Lake District.

And they were not disappointed.

"This was definitely the best," Anthony Barness confirmed after the squad returned from Windermere where they splattered each other in paint-balling games, raced on mountain bikes and got drenched on canoes and rafts on the lake.

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"It was discussed among some of the more senior players and the staff who weighed up the pros and cons and I think it was just decided that all the outdoor activities would be more beneficial whereas in Spain it would just have been a sunshine break."

Wanderers are fast building a reputation for off-beat antics which they believe enhances team spirit and gives them the edge over their rivals as they get to grips with the pressures of the Premiership.

They have staged a bizarre banquet at which their game for a laugh chairman, Phil Gartside, and other staff members tucked into stomach churning "delicacies" and, although the precise details of Nicky Southall's party-piece on a players' night out are not on offer for public consumption, the midfielder they call "Trigger" is reported to have been the star turn of that particular "bonding session".

"Team spirit has been one of the things the staff and the players have focused on since we came back for pre-season," Barness explains.

"We've had a couple of nights out together where players have to give a speech and once everyone starts having a laugh at each other, it brings you together.

"I can't go into details as to what it was but Nicky Southall's has definitely been the best." As Wanderers prepared for tonight's Worthington Cup clash with Nottingham Forest at the Reebok - nine days after suffering their second successive home Premiership defeat - Dean Holdsworth said the Lake District sessions had topped up the team spirit tank.

"It was painful coming back in after playing so well and still losing against Sunderland ," he admitted. "But the lads are itching to bounce back now.

"The ourward-bound thing certainly helped. It's not often you get a chance to race around a room on a motorised toilet!

"It was good banter and hard work - what you'd describe as "disguised running".

The team spirit was already there but this topped it up. It was a good idea to get away from the training ground for a couple of days to break the routine.

"Tonight we have a chance to put things right at home.

"The manager changed a lot of players round in the last round against Walsall and we got a win and he might use tonight to give some of the other lads a chance to come in and make a claim for a firtst team place.

"The important thing is that we want to win - and not just because we're at home. We want to win every game."