ANDOVER Town’s long unbeaten start to the Sydenhams Premier Division season is over.

The north Hampshire table-toppers were well beaten 3-0 at Alresford Town last night, ending a near faultless run of 15 wins and a draw from their opening 16 games.

Incredibly, Alresford could have been 2-0 up before Aaron Blaxall opened the scoring just four minutes in.

Geoff Dunn spurned the first chance and then Chris Mason was denied by a brilliant block from Luke Dempsey.

There was some doubt, even in Alresford minds, that Blaxall’s bouncing header had actually crossed the line for 1-0.

But the goal was given and the Magpies doubled their lead on 20 minutes when Blaxall turned provider for the excellent Dunn to slot his seventh goal in eight games past his former AFC Portchester teammate Lloyd Thomas in the Andover goal.

The league leaders enjoyed their best spell of the game approaching half-time, but new Alresford signing Ben ‘Chalky’ White capped an impressive performance by making it 3-0 from a 58th-minute set-piece.

Promising 20-year-old midfielder Scott Munro crossed and White obliged with another glorious header, following on from his late winner at Newport IW on Saturday.

“Andover play a bit like the old Newcastle under Kevin Keegan – if you score, they’ll score more,” said Alresford boss Richard Luffman.

“But we just felt that if we concentrated, defended properly and kept the likes of Mike Gosney and Zach Glasspool quiet, we had enough to spring them on the break and punish them.

“Geoff Dunn’s on his best scoring run in Wessex football. We’re playing him high and we always felt he could get between the lines.”

Not only was Luffman chuffed with his team's performance, he was impressed with his opposite number Glenn Burnett too.

“I’ve got a lot of time for Glenn and he was very gracious in defeat,” he said.

“He told me it was the first time Andover had been outfought and outplayed like that since he’d been in charge.

“Andover are the best team in the league, no doubt about it, but we’ve had a night where we’ve shown what we’re about.

“If you try and go toe-to-toe with them, you’ll get done, but we made sure we played when wanted to play and kept them at arm’s length.”

Alresford, up to sixth, are at home again on Saturday against Bashley, while Andover - still eight points clear of chasing Blackfield & Langley - visit lowly Petersfield Town.