PAUL Masters spoke about wanting “a reaction” from Winchester City in the wake of their shock FA Vase exit – and, boy, did he get one!

The Citizens powered back to winning ways with a 7-1 trouncing of below-strength Brockenhurst in the Sydenhams Premier Division with Warren Bentley and Mike McEnery plundering a hat-trick apiece and Zach Glasspool bagging the other.

It was a 3-0 defeat away to Brockenhurst that turned City’s world upside down just under three weeks ago with Masters’ predecessors Tim Cole and Danny Robinson resigning in the immediate aftermath.

And though Brock boss Pat McManus felt the loss of five key players, including skipper Harry Jeffries, contributed to the scale of Saturday’s defeat, he admitted Winchester were good value for their win.

The Badgers hit back through substitute Jamie Betteridge and Tom Hill’s last act before bowing out with a groin injury was to have a penalty saved by new City ’keeper Gareth Barfoot, who had taken down Braiden Hamilton.

“I was impressed with Winchester,” said McManus. “They were set up properly and they coped with the (wet) conditions a lot better than we did. They looked like a team with something to prove.”

Winchester boss Masters had a feeling in his bones that a decent result might be brewing. “We’d trained well on Thursday and sometimes you can just sense the attitude of the players before the game,” he said.

“Me, Glenn (Burnett) and John (McFarlane) have been here two or three weeks now and we’re starting to implement the things we want in the team.

“Pitches aren’t the best now and we want to be playing a lot more in the opposition half than ours. We’ve got some skilful players and when they receive the ball 18 yards out, they cause damage.

“I had a chat with Mike McEnery about stamping his personality on the game because it was passing him by a bit and he did really well wide right. He’s a big, physical boy and, at this level, he should be doing damage.”

The result leaves Winchester seventh, 12 points adrift of leaders Whitchurch with three games in hand, with a trip to bottom club Totton & Eling beckoning tonight, weather permitting.

“It’s all about consistency now,” said Masters. “The league’s wide open and it’s down to us to get on an unbeaten run. If you do well from November through to February, the league’s not won but you can put yourselves in a good position.”

McManus, who leads his sixth-placed side to table-topping Whitchurch on Saturday, smiled: “I had quite an amusing text from (Winchester director of football) Dave Malone saying that now they’ve played us twice he hopes we’ll go on and win as many games as possible!

“I won’t be losing sleep over Saturday’s result because personnel-wise we didn’t resemble the team that beat Winchester 3-0. If we had, we wouldn’t have lost 7-1.

“The Winchester job might be a difficult one but, based on playing personnel and club infrastructure, it should be easy. We can’t carry a squad of 25 players at Brock and we don’t have a reserve team, so we will get difficult days – and Saturday was one of them.”

Brighter news for Brock is that striker Hamilton, recently back from Sholing, has turned down a move to league rivals Fareham Town.