Wimbledon Hockey Club skipper Ben Hawes refused to get carried away after his side pulled off one of the results of the weekend.

Jack Waller, Phil Roper, Ali Brogdon and Henry Weir got the goals on Saturday that thumped the MHL Premier Division leaders East Grinstead 4-1 in their own back yard.

The scoreline was all the more impressive as Dons were missing the experience and influence of Michael Hoare and Johnnie Kinder.

However, despite the head-turning result, Hawes quickly pointed at the improvements that Dons – fourth in the table - must still make if they are to challenge at the top.

“We’ve said all along that we have the players to beat anyone, and we don’t line up against anyone fearing what they can do to us, more like the opposition look at us and fear what we’re capable of,” he said.

“But we need to work on our consistency, we had a dodgy start to the season and now we have set the bar very high for ourselves.

“The most important thing is to maintain that level of performance when we play Canterbury in a couple of weeks.”

He added: “We need to narrow the difference between performance levels from when we play well to when we don’t – that’s what the elite teams do.

“No team can play at 80 or 90 per cent every week, but the elite teams don’t drop their performance levels below 70 per cent, and that’s what we need to be doing.”

On the day, Dons could have been two up after five minutes and East Grinstead were on the back foot early on.

There were chances at both ends but it was no surprise when , on 19 minutes, Wimbledon’s Waller, on his debut appearance this season, followed up to clip a partly saved shot over the keeper to open the scoring.

The hosts were stung into action and levelled the score within three minutes through Tony Wilson - and it stayed that way to half-time.

After the break, Wimbledon’s Roper restored the Dons lead converting the only short corner of the match.

East Grinstead again looked rattled and the pace of Wimbledon told when two minutes later the ball was swept across the goal for Brogdon to ram home from close range.

The hosts are still a class act and the Wimbledon defence successfully repulsed attack after attack with keeper James Bailey in the thick of it, but increasingly East Grinstead were open at the back.

On 65 minutes, a lovely aerial ball from Hawes found Ben Marsden who swept into the D and teed up Weir for the killer fourth goal.