BROMSGROVE blew bottom of the table Longton away as they overwhelmed the Staffordshire side 82-5 in Midlands One West.

But Bromsgrove head coach Dan Protherough was left highly miffed after the match referee brought the game to a halt seven minutes early.

Protherough confirmed: "I spoke to the referee afterwards who claimed he was being 'empathetic' with the game.

"He was a young ref and I told him that you don't blow up early in league rugby.

"I can understand games being cut short in schoolboy and under age rugby when there is a 50 points difference, but in league rugby, you play to the bitter end.

"I hope those seven minutes don't come back to bite us this season, because we were scoring at will when the ref called a halt and I wanted to get to 100 points.

"We should have scored 50 points in the first half alone as we missed a couple of easy chances to score.

"But in the second half, our finishing was excellent. For the first 10 to15 minutes, it was just bang!, bang!, bang! as we put the game to bed before going off the boil a bit. They'll be much harder battles to come."

Full back Josh Holt led Bromsgrove's try spree be scoring four times while wingers George Amphlett and Tom Sadler both crossed the line twice.

Loose head prop Jamie Atkin, centre Ed Spalding, openside flanker Hugh Lockhart and No.8 Drew Harper also got in on the act.

Scrum half Will Harris and fly half James Upton shared the kicking duties as they despatched 11 conversions between them.

It proved a good week for Bromsgrove with the second XV trouncing Moseley Academy 38-5 while the thirds lost narrowly to Ludlow seconds.

Bromsgrove travel to Malvern this Saturday and Protherough said: "It's a potential banana skin and we have to make sure we go with the same attitude and keep our foot on the gas."