A spirited performance witnessed the Dales see off St Francis comfortably 5-1 on a cold, windy afternoon at Wanstead Flats.

Despite missing a number of key players, the early surge of pressure saw the Dales take a very early lead in only the second minute when Richard Kingston won the ball on the left and crossed for JT to round the keeper and score.

St Francis hit back immediately though when a hopeful effort looped over the unfortunate Salmon Sayers and into the net.

The 100mph start saw no end however and just 3 minutes later the Dales were ahead again as JT got a glance to a long throw which nestled in the net for 2-1.

The fast start seemed to have really hit St Francis hard who had little answer the waves of pressure coming forward although they were able to get down field to win a couple of corners which came to no avail.

There was then a sweet moment for the returning Dave Richardson, back after long term injury which has seen him miss almost a year of football, rose tallest to a free kick and headed home for 3-1.

The fourth game came on the half hour as another set piece wasn't dealt with by the home defence and Ricky Reeves poached his first Saturday team goal to make it 4-1 and then, 30 seconds after the restart, Ricky stole the ball away from the last defender and crashed a fantastic effort past the helpless keeper to score his second and make the score 5-1 at the break.

The second half was somewhat more even and although the sixth goal should have arrived from a JT one-on-one, St Francis themselves created a couple of decent chances that the Salmon had to tip away.

The damage had already been done in the first half and there being no further goal action in the second half, the match finished 5-1.