MARLBOROUGH are the early leaders after the opening weekend of action in the new South West One East season after running in 10 tries amid a dominant 66-13 victory at home to Salisbury.

The visitors opened the scoring with an unconverted try off the back of a driving maul after 10 minutes but the home side soon hit back as Jake Kane ran in his first try for the club and Will Grant added the extras.

An attacking lineout in Salisbury’s 22 then set up up a driving maul for Lemeki Moala to touch down, although Grant’s kick was missed.

The visitors cut the deficit with a penalty but Marlborough grabbed the next try as Mitieli Vulikijapani beat several defenders with a superb 70m break before offloading to James Farrell to finish the job, converted by Grant.

Just before half-time, Marlborough lost Ashley Horner to the sin-bin and Salisbury scored from the penalty to cut the gap to 19-13 at half-time.

The hosts upped the tempo in the second half and it did not take Vulikijapani long to score a superb individual try, which Grant duly converted.

Salisbury then had a sustained period in the hosts’ 22 but a well-drilled defence held them at bay.

After finally turning the ball over, Marlborough broke and Amori Nailgo won the ball to score as Grant’s kick moved the lead to 20 points.

The home side were now dominating the game and Vulikijapani completed his hat-trick after another impressive individual run, although there was no conversion.

Two minutes later, Farrell collected the ball from just outside Salisbury’s 22 and beat three players to score, this time converted.

Marlborough continued to press and three more tries arrived in the last 10 minutes as Jimmy Adams, Rhodri Campbell and Nailago all dotted down to take the touchdown tally into double figures, with Grant converting on each occasion.

Elsewhere, Royal Wootton Bassett also began the campaign in scintillating fashion with a five-try bonus-point win away at Old Centralians.

The Ballards Ash side did the brunt of the damage in the first half as they built up a 17-5 lead before firmly holding on in an even second period to claim a 39-24 success.

Simon Anderton, Joe Pettit, Chris Paterson, Gavin Ougan and Sean Marsden all scored tries for Bassett, with Troy Cusack adding 14 points with the boot.

Head coach Alan Low admitted there had been slight concern over Bassett’s preparations for the new campaign, so was delighted to see no ill-effects of that.

“It was a positive start,” said Low.

“We’d had a bit of a mixed pre-season in the sense that we didn’t quite get where we wanted to over our fixtures, so we thought we might be going into the first league game a little bit under-cooked.

“To come out with the result and the performance we got was fantastic.”

Chippenham also began the season in winning fashion as they beat Sherborne 41-33 at home.

The hosts put pressure on from the off and Tyler Lewis grabbed the first try following a scrum close to the line, and Tom Douglas converted.

In response, Sherborne strung together some good phases and caught Chippenham napping with an unconverted try before a penalty pushed them 8-7 ahead.

Tom Fogerty’s touchdown off the back of a quick tap penalty got Chippenham back in front, again converted by Douglas.

Koto Kotobalavu then took advantage of poor defending from the visitors to score a fine solo try after a 60m surge to the line. Oli Alcorn took over kicking duties and duly split the posts.

However, the hosts slackened off before the break and a Sherborne penalty trimmed the gap to 21-16.

The game opened up after half-time, with both teams trading blows.

Gareth Angell scored a try for Chippenham, swiftly followed by two for Sherborne. None were converted, making the score 26-26.

Alcorn then broke the parity with a penalty before a moment of magic from Joe Thomas followed, with his crossfield kick allowing Charlie Parsons to dot down.

Chippenham had hit their stride and more good phases allowed captain Matt Dickens in for a score to push his side’s lead to 15 points.

Sherborne responded with a final converted try of their own but Chippenham were not to be denied their win.

Trowbridge were unable to make it a clean sweep of victories for Wiltshire sides, although they had the consolation of picking up two bonus points amid a 34-38 loss at Beaconsfield.