TOM Annear stepped into the gap left by his younger brother Jordan on Saturday as his hat-trick helped Porthleven to a superb 8-1 win over Perranporth.

The Fishermen’s skipper was pushed upfront for the South West Peninsula League West clash with his sibling jetting off to Texas for the Dallas Cup as part of Truro College’s team.

He made the most of the opportunity as he rifled in three goals during the game which would be the third in a row to be won by Port.

After the match, Annear said: “I was pleased to get a chance to play upfront and getting my first senior hat-trick makes it a lot better.

“Everyone will say that we were playing the bottom of the league side and we should have won no matter what, but we didn’t let Perran have time to get the ball and we had some very good team goals.

“We all worked hard for each other which is pleasing and over the last few weeks, we have all been enjoying our football, which I think you can tell by the results we are getting.”

Alongside the younger Annear brother, Port also had to make the trip to the division’s bottom side without right back Chris Wormington who was also flying out to the USA for the tournament.

Jed McCardie and Josh Hall were both unavailable too meaning Rob Hoskings, Jack Coleman and Dan Greet were all brought into the side.

It took a while for Port to settle into the match and by the time they had, Perranporth had taken the lead.

With seven minutes gone, Chris Woods managed to get past the defence and slotted the ball past the oncoming Benji Bryant.

Perran nearly went 2-0 up a couple of minutes later, but in the 20th minute Port got an equaliser when Liam Hunter’s ball found Greet who hit a crisp volley into the net.

Ben Allen-Bassett should have made it 2-1 not long after as he smashed a shot onto the crossbar before hitting his rebound over.

Annear then started directing the show 11 minutes before the break as he showed a great turn of pace to latch onto Freddie Williams’ pass before coolly stroking the ball in.

He then turned provider on the stroke of half time when his pass found Allen-Bassett, who rounded the goalkeeper and scored with an open goal in front of him.

Life had now well and truly been sucked out of Perran at this point and in the first attack after the break saw Greet break down the left before finding Hunter, who cut into the box and fired home.

Williams added a fifth just before the hour mark and in the 62nd minute Annear grabbed his second of the match after being played in by Greet.

With five minutes to go Williams finished a superb move to make it 7-1 before his captain completed his treble just before stoppage time.

Porthleven now have a weekend off before their big derby clash with Helston Athletic on Good Friday at Kellaway Park, kick-off 2pm.

PORTHLEVEN: Bryant, Hoskings (J Greet 86), Hunter, Coleman (Allen 73), Tarrant, Winnan, Best, Allen-Bassett (Orchard 73), Annear (c), D Greet, Williams.