TOM Morton blasted a brace as Salisbury Hockey firsts made a scorching start to the new year with a 4-1 victory at Southampton University.

The midfielder put the Lower Bemerton outfit ahead before the hosts restored parity

after the break.

But Salisbury later restored their lead through Martin Clarke, Morton and Dom Welman to secure their fifth win a row.

Salisbury's first game in a month was apparent as they made a slow start in the opening ten minutes.

But, as the game grew, they managed to find their stride and Rory Sheriff narrowly missed the target from a good ball into the D.

Having already made several good saves, Lewis Gunstone-Gray kept Salisbury at 0-0 with a brilliant stick save from a short corner.

This seemed to give Salisbury renewed energy to attack, leading to a penalty flick which Morton duly dispatched.

The second half continued at a similar pace, and an early short corner allowed Southampton University to level. It did not take long for Salisbury to take the lead once more, a long ball to Clarke saw him get the better of a defender before a cool finish from the edge of the D.

At this point, Salisbury’s play was getting back to their pre-Christmas form and Morton scored his second goal of the game before Welman made sure of the victory with a fourth.

Despite a yellow card for Jagjit Marwaha, pictured, Salisbury closed out the last 10 minutes of the game to move into second in Hampshire League 1.

Captain Andy Renshaw said: “We struggled a bit before the first goal but we were kept in it by some quality goalkeeping.

"We reacted really well to their goal and probably could have scored more than four.”