MALVERN Town maintained their place at the top of the West Midlands League Premier Division table, following a scintillating first half display at Smethwick on Saturday, which saw Town race into a 6-0 interval lead.

SMETHWICK ST 0, MALVERN TOWN 6

Scott Morris should have opened the scoring in the first minute when he headed wide from point blank range. The result was never really in doubt once some superb build up play between Craig Williams and Lee Hooper set up Des Cox, who finished brilliantly, to put his side in front after only five minutes.

Five minutes later Tim Jenkins marked his first start for Town with a slightly fortuitous second goal, when an attempted clearance rebounded against the Town midfielder and wrong-footed the helpless home goalkeeper, who could only watch the ball roll into the net.

After 16 minutes Cox registered his second goal and Town's third, after which there was a bit of a lull in the proceedings, until Adam Baldwin put his side four up with a shot from the edge of the box in the 39th minute.

This heralded another torturous spell for Smethwick as the prolific Cox added two more goals, to take his personal tally to four, in the five minutes prior to half time.

Despite appearing down and out at the interval Smethwick, to their credit, did not throw the towel in and reorganised in the second period, limiting Town to only a handful of chances, the best of these fell to Luke Willetts, who, on both occasions, was denied by the home goalkeeper.

Town though were always in control during the second period and keeper Dave Alden was a relative spectator for most of the time. He barely had a worthwhile save to make during the entire 90 minutes.