Tottonians 36 - Southampton 6

How unfair is this game of rugby? On the back of this result, Southampton enter the Christmas break propping up London Division 4 South-West, while Tottonians have opened up a six-point chasm at the top.

The result stands at: Tottonians 36, thanks to five unanswered tries, Southampton 6, courtesy of a mere two penalties from Tony Cador.

But this was no ordinary game and the visitors gave their hosts a mighty scare before they climbed away in the closing quarter.

There was always an air around the ground that this would be nothing but another victory for a Tottonians side that have lost just one first team game all season - and that in the Intermediate Cup at London 2 South outfit Thurrock.

No one expected for one moment that Southampton would take anything - not even Southampton - but if a complete stranger had walked into the Water Lane ground during the first half and did not know the respective positions of the two teams, he could not have told which was which.

It would be easy to say that Tottonians' first-half performance was woeful but Cador's side have to take some credit. They outplayed Totts, as they dropped, fumbled, fluffed and generally fouled up any kind of possession they enjoyed - and Southampton capitalised.

They did not do it to the extent of actually scoring a try, however. It was plain to see that they were lacking in the confidence with ball in hand to produce a try-scoring string of passes and had to settle for Cador's two penalties, although it should have been three but for a simple in-front-of-the-posts miss.

A call to arms from coach Bob Millard at the interval saw Totts emerge a different team - same players but a completely transformed mentality and game plan.

It was enough to cull any thoughts of the shock of the season.

It took just nine minutes for the collective Totts sigh of relief when, after Paul Goodall's incisive break from a lineout, Ali Ramus skipped through the tackles to open their account. Goodall's conversion put them ahead, in addition to his subsequent penalty.

As Saints' resolve began to weaken and the home side's laxness of the first half left them with juice in the tank, they were powerless to prevent the overwhelming league leaders from scoring four tries in the final quarter to give the scoreline an unrealistic look.

Paul Brading's first try, which came from deep in Southampton territory, showed what they had left and his second, after a long break that saw Cador stretchered off, rounded off a superb move that linked forwards and backs in unison.

As darkness fell and seeing became almost impossible, Ramus added a second, which was a carbon copy of his first while Chris Smith rounded off the scoring with the final move of the game.

The stand-in Totts skipper felt it was the archetypical "game of two halves", but praised Southampton's tenacity in the first half.

"They did not let us have a thing but, when we finally got our noses in front, the whole side let off a huge sigh of relief as it was a scare for a while.

"Once we did that, we were able to play rather than play catch-up rugby. It was exactly the same when we played at Test Park last month - a typical local derby, nothing given, do whatever they could to spoil the game.

"And the guys read their comments in the Daily Echo on Friday and maybe thought it was going to be easy. Everyone raises their game against us because we are top of the table and Southampton tried to drag us down to their level, which they did in the first half."

Cador, having recovered from his knock, said: "I was very proud of my side, but we did not deserve to lose by that margin in the end because for 60 minutes we more than held our own and in that first half were the better side."

With Farnham's abandoned game against Old Emanuel this weekend seeing Totts' lead stretch to six points and Cranleigh's close defeat to Petersfield enough to take them above Saints of points difference - that is how unfair this game is!