ANSELMIANS continued their unbeaten home record to beat Broughton Park 43-7 and stay top of the Regional 2 North West table.

On a cold Saturday afternoon Saints showed a fitting reaction to the previous week’s loss at Bowdon.

The home team elected to play into the strong wind first half as Broughton Park looked to turn the league upside down with a bright start to the game.

It wasn’t long before Saints managed to breach the visitor's defence when after 13 mins the returning Andy Cummings managed to pick one of his trademark lines to cut through Park's defence and score out wide for the first of his brace. 

The home teams set play was once again on point securing good lineout ball and feeding the eager Saints midfield with excellent possession.

On 17 minutes, Fred Clark managed to pick a ball up within the opposition 5m and with the line at his mercy nothing would get in his way as he crashed over near the posts. Dai Morley added the extras and the score was 12-0. 

Saints were now into the groove and began to carry strongly, making good yards and retaining possession. On 28 minutes, following sustained pressure, Saints fashioned an overlap on the left wing and Cummins managed to cut another successful line and score in a similar position to his first try to make it 17-0.

The bonus point was earned on 36 minutes following a strong run from the ever-impressive Ewan Nolan beating two defenders to score in the left corner to make it 22-0 at half time.

Pleased with their work in the first half against the elements, Saints started the second half with the wind at their backs.

Broughton Park competed as best they could with a gameplan for the second half to run everything from everywhere and when Saints were adjudged to have infringed, Park tapped quickly and attempted to gain good territory.

On 48 minutes, Saints lost Danny Salisbury with an injury with Harry Graham entering the play - moments later Clark found himself again within 5m of the opponent's try line and showed great determination to bust over the line.

Morley added the extras to make it 29-0. On the hour, Adam Bramhall latched onto a good backs' move that saw him go in at the corner - another successful conversion brought the score up to 36-0.

Broughton Park deserved to get on the scoreboard and after some sloppy defending on 65 minutes they went in under the sticks and successfully converted to make the score 36-7.

Saints were in no mood to allow their defence to be breached further, launching further attacks deep in Park's half and on 73 minutes, Clark went in for his third try of the day with another successful conversion bringing up the final score of 43-7 .