Welwyn Garden City's men got their hockey season off to a flying start with a big win in a derby.

Hertford were the visitors to the Hertfordshire Sports Village for an East League Division Two South West clash and they returned along the A414 with a 3-0 loss.

WGC had already beaten their neighbours in a pre-season friendly, as they did with St Albans, and they eased through the opening league encounter with similar style.

They were unlucky not to opening the scoring early on with good goalkeeping or shots narrowly missed being the reason for the lack of goals.

A knee injury to James Lutrario on 20 minutes looked to be a hammer blow to their chances but replacement Will Reilly gave his side a lot of forward impetus.

And they finally managed to find a breakthrough before half-time.

A break down the right by Nate Last ended with a shot at goal that was well saved. The rebound fell to Bryn Evans and although his first attempt was stopped, the second was slotted into the corner.

Last didn't make it to the interval as a hamstring injury forced him off and necessitated the return of the also hobbled Lutrario, who was moved into the unfamiliar role of centre forward.

Welwyn started the second half with great intent and Paul Marchant beat the full back on several occasions only for the finishing touch to go astray.


But they got their radar working from a penalty corner, duly dispatched with a mid height drag flick into the right side of the goal by Evans.

From then on it was total domination for the home side with goalkeeper Dan Klinger only needing to deal with a few clearing kicks.

And after several near misses, another penalty corner was slipped to the right and the push across the face of goal was steered home by Lutrario.

Welwyn remained in control until the final whistle with Reilly and Mark Skilbeck picking off the opposition of at will.

Next week the team head up to Shefford & Sandy.

The ladies' first team meanwhile had an equally good victory, beating St Albans 4-1 in their opening league game.