THE Reds went into the festive period on a high with Marc Williams grabbing a hat-trick as Eastbourne Borough were hammered 5-0 at the Racecourse.

Jefferson Louis and Neil Taylor got themselves on the scoresheet as well, both with fantastic finishes, and the visitors ended the game with just ten men as Darren Baker was red-carded for retaliation late on by referee Mr Davison.

Manager Dean Saunders was delighted to maintain the fine form that the club has shown since taking over:

"We played similar to that at Kidderminster and got beat 1-0, but I think that is the best that we have played since I got here," he said.

"I repeat myself in training every day, as does Brian and Terry, but today makes it all worthwhile as we played really well.

"I thought that they were all good goals and we could probably have scored eight or nine.

"We dominated the game from start to finish and they were hitting long balls, which was perhaps because they were a bit nervous, but it took us 40 minutes to score but when we did it was a great goal when it came.

"Sam Williamson put in a great cross and Marc just had to tap it in. Then Jefferson comes in and hits screamer just after half-time and that settled us down.

"After that it was just a matter of how many we were going to score.

"When the linesman gave Marc offside I thought that it was a good goal, and then Nathan Woolfe gets the ball in the middle of the goal just a few yards out and the keeper saves it.

"When you look on the other side of the coin, they had a great chance at 2-0 to score and how they have missed I don't know; that would have made it a nervous afternoon.

"Marc gets what he deserves, the hat-trick goal was a great goal, I thought that he had lost it four times and gets it back. He is one of them players that when he gets around the box he is one of those players who seems able to move the ball and his disguise is very good. He is hard to get the ball and you can't fault his effort.

"The players get a pat on the back but on Monday morning we're back down to earth and back to work.

"They (Eastbourne) are not a bad side but we have made them look really bad.

"It is nice to give the supporters something to sing about especially at Christmas.

"I am here to get the club out of this league; I know that everybody else keeps on winning but that won't last forever and they are in our sights. We can't do anything about that but we just have to keep going."