Alton 62pts, Farnborough 5pts

WHEN Alton last played Farnborough, away in the league, they were beaten 43-24, although the result had been in doubt until the final 10 minutes.

Saturday’s return fixture, with both teams locked together at the top of Hampshire 1 on 60 league points, was a clearly a crunch game for both sides – but there was to be no repeat of that first fixture as Alton blew their title rivals apart.

The pitch-side atmosphere created by Alton’s largest home crowd for some seasons gave the team the boost they needed to deliver the best possible result in a high-stakes game.

The visitors, in their words, “never got into the game”. They simply weren’t allowed to.

Alton’s precision passing and domination of scrums sat Farnborough back on their heels and it took Alton only three minutes to score, winger Ryan Bale finishing off a move which started from an Alton scrum fed efficiently down the back division to allow him to finish off in the corner.

The second try followed 12 minutes later when centre Cameron Wickes ran onto a kick ahead by stand-off Joe Gwyther to touch down in the opposite corner, and four minutes after that Bale scored his second try, again following a flowing move. This time he touched down under the posts to make Gwyther’s conversion attempt easy as Alton romped into a 17-0 lead.

Farnborough were rocking and Alton’s other centre, Oli Fielder, scored the bonus point try on 23 minutes, which Gwyther again converted to pad the lead to 24-0.

Not to be outdone, the Alton pack decided it was their turn and flanker Matt Sellstrom finished off an interlinking move by the forwards with an outrageous dummy and a try to ease Alton into a 29-0 lead.

Just before half-time Farnborough did score a try of their own from a maul, Alex Stewart finding the try line to save his side from total embarrassment.

But any flickering hopes Farnborough may have had of mounting a big comeback were extinguished within five minutes of the second half as Alton ran in two more tries – first, a jinking run by replacement scrum-half Oli Burden gave Gwyther the chance to take the score to 36-5, which he duly did, then hooker Luke Parratt added to Farnborough’s woes scoring from a forwards’ drive, a try which Gwyther again converted to leave Alton out of sight at 43-5.

The visitors were now totally defeated, and Alton settled down to enjoy themselves in the rapidly-deteriorating weather conditions and further tries came from replacement winger Mike Robson, who collected a pin-point kick ahead by Gwyther following a 15-metre drive by the pack; Jez Powell who was set free by No8 Tony Hopkin when Parratt took a strike against the head, one of many; and finally prop Nick Stoffel, who finished off yet another drive from a lineout.

Gwyther converted two of the three tries to round off an emphatic win.

* On Saturday, Alton travel to face Surrey 1 side Old Mid-Whitgiftians in the quarter-final of the London & South-East RFU Junior Vase.