DOWNTON got their league campaign off to a great start with a 3-1 win away at Folland Sports.

The home side scored after just 11 seconds which the Robins, Ben Vincent was caught out from the kick off and Follands capitalised and made no mistake in smashing home the opener.

This sparked the Robins into action, with Declan McGregor and Shaun Prentice, causing problems for the Follands defence.

Some neat play by Robins could only frustrate the home side into making rash tackles only to see there captain sent off for a second bookable offence.

From the restart the Robins turned on the style and continuously peppered the home side, Prentice terrorised the home defence with his trickery and pace and was eventually brought down inside the box and the referee awarded a penalty.

Downton’s joint top scorer from last season Ben Smith stepped up to thump home to level game.

Declan McGregor was again at the top of his game linking players in and it was only a matter of time before the Irish hitman set up the second with a pin perfect pass into the feet of Tom Aldridge who made no mistake with a hard low drive into the bottom corner.

Downton were then in full control , tireless work from skipper Craig Tyson and Matt Cox gave Follands no chance of breaking the Robins down.

McGregor helped created the third goal he linked up with Prentice and Cox who opened up the defence and saw Sam Howe go thru with pace and on the half volley make it 3-1 Robins.

Joint manager Ben Smith spoke to JournalSport and said:

“It wasn’t a great start, but an excellent final result.

“It makes you feel that all the hard work and training during pre season is really worth it.

“We were without five regular first team players so a huge credit to the lads who stepped in.

“Everyone celebrated every goal like we won a cup final and the comradery within the lads at the moment is great and that’s such a big part of playing football.”