HOCKEYIW 20, Lavant 1
A DEVASTATING display by the IW earned them their biggest victory since 2003, as their domination of Hampshire 6 continues.
Lavant only brought ten players with them to Smallbrook but they battled well throughout and almost took an early lead, but Stuart Allen defended well to stop them.
This initial warning was what IW needed and from there, they were ruthless.
Stephen Woodford opened the scoring in the seventh minute, before goals from Rob Forrest, Colin Simmonds and Tom Gould put them well clear.
Simmonds and Forrest both scored another two each to complete their hat-tricks, before Woodford got another to make it 9-0 in the break.
Even after a player reshuffle the IW were in no mood to stop scoring, with Simmonds taking his tally to four and Woodford adding a quick-fire hat-trick to take his personal tally to five.
Allen then broke through and smashed home to score his first goal for three years, before Forrest picked up another two to also take his total to five.
Also joining the five-goal club was Simmonds, before goals from Richard Reynolds — marking IW’s 100th goal this season — Allen and Simon Butler completed the rout.
Lavant, during this period, did enjoy a series of penalty corners, one of which was converted to deny Tom Speer a clean sheet, but it was a tiny blip on what had been a ruthlessly brilliant performance.
Tomorrow (Saturday), IW travel to City of Portsmouth before they host higher-league opposition Basingstoke in the League Cup on Sunday.
The game gets underway at Smallbrook at noon.