A rejuvenated Axminster Town started their 2021-22 season in emphatic form, slamming five goals past Newton Abbot Spurs on Saturday in their first match of the new campaign.

After struggling in the lower regions of the South West Peninsular Premier East Division in recent times, this was the performance that the Tigers' faithful following have been looking forward to for so long.

It left Tiger Way buzzing and looking forward to tomorrow (Wednesday) so see if they can maintain such a high tempo at home to Cullompton Rangers.

Axe started at a tremendous pace, forcing three corners in quick succession, and were far more adventurous in attack than their opponents.

Their early pressure paid dividends after 15 minutes when Charlie Wilson, who was causing mayhem down the right flank, opened the scoring with a 30-yard scorcher into the top corner, leaving the visiting keeper no chance.

The Tigers continued to dominate and increased their lead on 21 minutes when Wilson laid on a perfect pass for Josh Wadham to hammer home following excellent work by Ryan Andrews.

The Axminster keeper, Jason Hutchings, was called into action for the first time in the 28th minute, making a low diving save. Back at the other end, a Wadham shot was parried by the keeper, Chris McGrath went close with a head and another Wilson effort was parried for a corner.

The scoreline stayed at 2-0 at half-time but Axe came out for the second half full of confidence with Wilson still in the the thick of things, firing a shot over the bar and then providing an inch-perfect corer for Louis Rutter to head home at the far post to make it 3-0.

With one goal and two assists, at this juncture in the game Wilson was looking like man-of-the match contender, but unfortunately he limped off with a leg injury to be replaced by Richard Hebditch who, with his first touch of the game, laid on a beautifully weighed through ball which allowed Wadham to slot the ball home to make it 4-0 in the 69th minute.

Wadham, the former Tiverton Town and Taunton player, crowned a brilliant performance in which he seemed to cover every blade of grass on the pitch and in the dying seconds of the game completed his hat-trick after cleverly controlling the ball to complete the 5-0 victory and in doing so claimed a thoroughly-deserved man-of-the-match award.

Whilst new manager Dan Prettejohn was pleased with his squad's performance , he gave a realistic appraisal of such a brilliant start to the season.

He said: "I walked into the dressing room at full-time and of course the lads were buzzing, as indeed they deserved to be. So I guessed I sort of dampened the mood when I said to them that they had just set a standard that now needs to be maintain.

"We are not gong to win every game 5-0 and I don't think that we will play as well as we did against Newton Abbot Spurs, but the lads have put down a marker and what I was delighted with they all knew very well what they had just done actually sets them up for a fall and I doubt very much they will let that happen."

The first game of the season was sponsored by Axminster Nub News and after the game editor Philip Evans presented the man-of-the-match award to Josh Wadham.

• Axminster Ladies are to become the first Axminster team to play in the FA Cup. They will be making history on September 12 when they play their first game in the competition.