Aldershot Town continued their positive pre-season preparations with a rare and comprehensive win over Basingstoke Town.

In a reversal of their two previous friendlies, all the goals came in the first half as The Shots ultimately eased to victory with two goals for Marvin Morgan and one for Danny Hylton, to celebrate the birth of his first son on Monday.

Basingstoke started the strongest and made the visitors’ defence look decidedly shaky in the opening ten minutes with several dangerous crosses from Gary Frewen. Soon, though, Aldershot demonstrated their class in seizing control of the game. Tardif made an excellent point-blank save to deny Hylton, from Brown’s teasing low centre, and the very next minute, they were ahead.

Harding intercepted a loose pass on half-way and strode purposefully forward. His lay-off to Morgan wasn’t perfect but, having neatly adjusted his footing, he drilled a crisp shot past Tardif.

Little exemplified Aldershot’s neat passing and intelligent approach play, and when his deft pass sent Morgan free behind the Basingstoke defence, he was able to skip past the goalkeeper and walk the ball into the net. Another superb reverse pass from Little put Hylton free, but after he was able to pick up the rebound from his own shot, which hit the post, he rather lazily curled the ball wide.

The scoring was complete on 39 minutes, as Hylton made amends, passing the ball into the net after a wayward ball across his own box by Lewis Christon.

Predictably, the second half was something of a non-event, losing much of its early competitive edge as The Shots struggled to keep their shape. Debutant trialist Jake Hyde struggled to display the poacher’s instinct and impressive strike-rate he displayed at Barnet last season, but right-sided former Crystal Palace youth graduate Michael Abnett showed glimpses of quality playing in front of Ben Herd.

Connolly wasted Aldershot’s only chance of the half – seeing his shot smothered by Tardif when he should have done better – but, once again, Kevin Dillon was pleased with his side’s progress on and off the field.

Dillon is hopeful that midfielders Little and Stewart will sign contracts in the next few days, and remains keen on both Fortune and Hyde, with another new trialist due to join training later this week.

With a behind-closed-doors against Reading arranged for next Wednesday, Aldershot’s preparations are gathering pleasing momentum.

ATFC (1st half): Young; Herd, Jones, Saville, Vincent; Stewart, Harding; Hylton, Little, Brown; Morgan

ATFC (2nd half): Young; Herd, Jones, Fortune, Vincent; Stewart, Panther; Abnett, Guttridge, Connolly; Hyde