ANDOVER Lions stayed rooted to the bottom of the Division One of the Hampshire Premier League after crashing to a 7-2 defeat to the hands of local rivals Broughton in what was their first League game for seven weeks.

The Lions started the game very brightly and should have been one up within the first minute when Casson Spencer broke down the right but Reynolds scuffed his shot when well placed to open the scoring.

On ten minutes Broughton took the lead when the Lions failed to deal with a free kick and France- Sergeant headed in the loose ball and within a minute the lead was doubled when Vidler burst through and clipped the ball past Baxter.

For the next 25 minutes the Lions battled well in the face of a strong wind that was keeping them penned back but just when it looked like they might get to half-time with just a two-goal deficit, Broughton again struck twice in a minute with Vidler and Rankin helping themselves to a goal apiece after two more defensive errors.

Andover started the second half brightly, albeit that the wind had disappeared, and Darren Paris pulled a goal back from the penalty spot on 48 mins.

The Lions then put some pressure on to the Broughton back four but on the hour mark any slim hopes of a comeback fell away abruptly as first off they were denied a second penalty when the referee missed a handball and within a minute Lewis Alderman added a fifth for Broughton with a bizarre free kick from all of 35 yards that caught the wind and ended up in the top corner.

A demoralised Andover then conceded a sixth as Vidler completed his hat-trick before Dadds pulled one back with a quarter of an hour to go.

Lang wrapped up the scoring in the last few minutes to complete a miserable afternoon for the Lions, who will have to return to Buckholt Road in a fortnight for their North Hants Intermediate Cup semi-final.

After the match Chris Paris was far from happy with Andover’s efforts.

“Credit to Broughton as they are probably the best team that we have played this season and they moved the ball around well and caused us problems at the back, but in a lot of ways we made it easy for them,” he said.

“The effort was very poor today and too many players went missing.

We made a series of errors at the back which were all punished, yet we did not punish them in similar circumstances. We will have to improve a lot in the next fortnight before we return for our semi-final, Broughton will be thinking they have a big advantage now going into that game.”