Trojans took what could turn out to be a major step towards staving off relegation and, at the same time, put a huge dent in Eastleigh’s promotion hopes.

The arch rivals met at Bishopstoke Road at the weekend on the back of a comfortable London 3 South-West away victory for Eastleigh earlier in the season.

Recent form indicated another success for the third-placed home side but Trojans, whose first XV had several experienced faces back in the fold, turned the tables in the hotly-contested derby.

The 39-20 victory means Eastleigh are now seven points off second-placed London Exiles, who walloped Old Mid-Whitgiftian, and a further point behind leaders Andover after their comfortable victory at Purley John Fisher.

Trojans went 3-0 down to a Phil Baldwin penalty not long after the start but Andrew Flack crossed the line off a maul on eight minutes and the visitors never looked back.

They were 22-8 up at the break following a touchdown from Elliot Culley who intercepted a pass and another from Fraser Moncrieffe, back in his family flanker position from centre. Dan Woods converted a couple of the tries and also hit a penalty.

Eastleigh’s first half try, on the half hour, came from flanker Rich O’Donnell.

Woods increased Trojans’ lead with another interception try three minutes into the second half to secure the bonus point, and made the conversion. But back came ’Leigh with tries from John Weatherall and Ian Scott, along with a conversion to get them to within nine points of their opponents.

Chris Hamp’s touchdown and another five points from Woods’ boot secured victory for Trojans.

Chairman Shaun Magill applauded his side’s all-round performance and picked out second row Simon Greenhalgh as man of the match, while acknowledging experienced heads such as Chris Boyd, Dave Linton, Steve Fitzgerald and Dan Corbett made the difference.

He said: “We put in a poor performance to Eastleigh at home before Christmas and needed to put on a good show and we did that.

“If we can keep this team together and get a couple more good results we can be hopeful of not going down.

“We closed the gap a little on Teddington but but still need them to lose to catch them.”

Eastleigh head coach Andy Boyes said: “We never really got our game going today. Three mistakes and a missed tackle gifted Trojans four scores.

“With other results going against us it will now be difficult to secure promotion without the top two teams slipping up in the remaining games.”

The only blot on the game was the sending off of a prop from each side after a scuffle – Mark Amey for Trojans and Eastleigh front row Paul Taylor.