NEW signing Robert Tobin was the class act for Team Southampton in their opening British Men's League Division 4 meeting at Abingdon.

The Basingstoke lad, who rose to national recognition last season as a member of Britain's 4x400m relay squad for the Athens Olympics, made an excellent debut.

Winning the 200m in a razor-sharp 21.2 seconds and finishing runner-up in the 100m in 10.9, he also contributed to sprint relay victory and ran a rapid split time of 46.6 to lift Southampton from seventh in the 4x400m and hand over a 15-metre lead.

Southampton, though, were lacking in several of the more technical events and it was only a late spate of victories that dragged them up from last position to sixth overall. Although they won nine events (compared to two from top club Southend), they scraped only 15 points combined from the 400m hurdles, long jump, triple jump, pole vault and steeplechase a disappointing weakness in the wake of the merger between Southampton City and Team Solent.

But co-manager Adam Richardson said: "Hopefully one of the things to come out of the combined Southampton club will be a better coaching structure to develop young athletes in the hurdles, jumps and throws, enabling the club to draw on a bigger pool of talent."

There were no such problems in the shot where British Universities champion Kieren Kelly claimed a comfortable 16.23-metre win. The Wiltshire lad's winter weight training has gone so well that he no longer fits into a Team Southampton vest and had to wear a t-shirt instead!

Ben Richardson, on a gap year before starting university at Cambridge, lowered his personal best to 15.1 seconds to win the 110m hurdles. Youngster Olly Jones set up an enthralling 5,000m battle, hitting the front with five laps to go and whittling the pack down from eight to two. He was outclassed down the home straight, but still finished second.

There was a nail-biting conclusion to the high jump with three athletes left in at two metres. Southampton's Dan Turner was the only one to clear and he went on to crown victory with 2.05.

Match result: Southend 319, Medway 303.5, Derby 281, Swindon 279, Swansea 274.5, Team Southampton 261, Kingston 252, Norwich 218.

Team Southampton performances:

100m: A 2 Robert Tobin 10.9, B 1 Will MacGee 11.0, 200m: A 1 Robert Tobin 21.2, B 1 Will MacGee 22.6, 400m: A 5 Darryn Campbell 50.9, B 6 Graham Filer 52.0, 800m: A 7 Russell Osborn 1.59.7, B 6 Alex Wall-Clarke 2.01.8,1,500m: A 7 John Beattie 4.16.4, B 7 Iain Robertson 4.20.8, 5,000m: A 2 Owain Jones 15.21.9, B 2 Gareth Klepacz 15.43.5, 110m hurdles: A 1 Ben Richardson 15.1, B 7 Adam Richardson 19.9, 400m hurdles: A 8 Ben Richardson 73.7, B 8 Darryn Campbell 67.9, 4x100m relay: 1 Team Southampton (Ben Richardson, Robert Tobin, Graham Filer, Will MacGee) 43.6, 4x400m relay: 2 Team Southampton (Graham Filer, Robert Tobin, Russell Osborn, Darryn Campbell) 3.24.7, high jump: A 1 Dan Turner 2.05, B 8 Darryn Campbell 1.40, long jump: A 8 Ben Richardson 5.64, B 7 Graham Filer 5.55, discus: A 1 Nick Iliffe 44.68, B 2 Adam Richardson 36.01, hammer: A 5 Adam Richardson 35.16, B 7 Nick Iliffe 21.95, javelin: A 4 Anthony Llewelyn 50.88, B 6 Adam Richardson 33.85, pole vault: A 8 Adam Richardson 2.00, shot: A 1 Kieren Kelly 16.23, B 1 Gary Sollitt 15.02.