KEVIN Betsy scored a 43-minute hat-trick to fire Wanderers up to second in the table.

The midfielder gave Wycombe a 3-0 interval lead with his first ever treble but the Blues were then left biting their nails as Mansfield came storming back with two second half goals to set up a nailbiting finale.

And, after the way Wanderers turned a 3-1 lead into an 8-3 defeat against Aston Villa in the Carling Cup last week, manager John Gorman was relieved to hear the final whistle.

He said: "I think it is becoming psychological with us.

"We should have been able to hang onto a 3-0 win or even made it 4-0. It is a crazy thing. In the first half we were immense, Kevin Betsy's three goals were sublime and it should have been a nice afternoon in the sun for us in the second half but they came right back at us and made it very uncomfortable.

"We knew we had to kill the game and be ruthless at half time but we got a bit nervy. They got a goal back and we got more nervous and we were glad to hear the whistle."

There was no sign of the drama which was to come when Wycombe took the lead inside 60 seconds with Betsy's first goal for the club.

Nathan Tyson escaped down the left and cut the ball back for Tommy Mooney to whip over a cross to the far post.

It looked as though Betsy had made a hash of it when he went up for the header with a defender but when the ball dropped back down Betsy reacted quickest to slam the ball home from close range.

Wycombe should have doubled their lead on nine minutes when Rob Lee split the defence with a diagonal cross from deep but Mooney steered his header wide of the far post.

It didn't matter though because Wycombe extended their lead on 15 minutes.

Matt Bloomfield threaded a ball into the box and Betsy went past Rhys Day, planted a second defender, Gavin Peers, on his backside with an outrageous dummy before stroking the ball past Kevin Pressman in the Mansfield goal.

Wycombe were now in complete control against a shell-shocked Mansfield outfit.

The Stags had knocked higher league Southampton out of the Carling Cup just five days earlier but they were being outclassed by Wycombe.

Only former Wycombe loanee Adam Birchall emerged from the first half with much credit for the Stags along with midfielder Giles Coke, whose goal had knocked out Southampton.

At the other end, Tyson was unfortunate not to be awarded a penalty when he was squeezed out by two defenders as he chased a long punt from his own goalkeeper Frank Talia while Stefan Oakes, who made the game look easy, whistled a 30 yarder just wide of Pressman's post.

The third goal was inevitable and it was almost a carbon copy of the second with the twinkle-toed Betsy latching onto another through ball from Bloomfield before dispatching the ball in the back of the net two minutes before half time.

With the Mansfield fans disappearing to drown their sorrows with a half time beer beneath the stands, Wycombe almost had a fourth.

Tyson used his electric pace to get on the end of a Lee ball into the area and was only denied his 12th goal in as many games by Pressman's outstretched foot.

Mansfield's caretaker boss Peter Shirtliff made a double substitution at the break bringing on Stephen Dawson and former Chairboy Gus Uhlenbeek and the duo were a massive part of the Stags revival.

But in the opening 15 minutes it was still Wycombe who looked the most dangerous.

Pressman stuck out a saving hand to pull the ball away from Tyson, just as it looked as though the Wycombe frontman had taken the ball around him.

The game turned though in an incredible 65th minute incident when Wycombe almost scored a fourth but ended up picking the ball out of their own net.

Stags' defender Gavin Peers almost own-goalled when he slammed the ball towards his own net as he tried to intercept a Betsy cross. It hit his keeper Pressman in the face and reared up onto the crossbar and, from the clearance, Mansfield broke away and won a penalty as Danny Senda took Simon Brown's legs away from behind.

Richie Barker slammed home the spot kick and Wycombe's confidence went with it.

And the visitors' nerves were shredded ten minutes later when Mansfield scored again.

Coke's daisy cutter from 30 yards was brilliantly saved by Talia low to his left but, as the Wanderers defence stood still, Brown stuck the rebound into the net.

Rhys Day and Dawson then both went close to firing equalisers for the Stags. But even though Wycombe lost Tyson and Bloomfield to knocks, they held on to claim back-to-back league wins for the first time this season.

Mansfield: Pressman, Talbot (Dawson 46), Day, Baptiste, Peers, Jelleyman (Rundle 85), McLachlan (Uhlenbeek 46), Coke, Brown, Barker, Birchall. Not Used: Buxton, Littlejohn.

Booked: Jelleyman, Dawson.

Goals: Barker 65 pen, Brown 75.

Wycombe: Talia, Senda, Easton, Johnson, Williamson, Oakes, Bloomfield (Stonebridge 68), Lee, Betsy, Tyson (Dixon 84), Mooney.

Subs Not Used: Martin, Williams, Torres.

Goals: Betsy 1, 15, 43.

Attendance: 3,237.

Referee: Jonathan Moss