Leigh Centurions...30 South Sydney...8 IF THIS is a foretaste of things to come then the Centurions fans are in for a real treat.

Leigh's mix-and-match team of new recruits, up and comers and the usual old hands, produced a performance that will have the Hilton Park faithful drooling for more.

And just wait until head coach Paul Terzis is able to turn out his strongest side! Now there's a thought.

On Tuesday night there was no Chris Morley, Liam Bretherton, Willie Swann, Kieron Purtill or Dave Whittle. And how glad Souths must have been about that as they were ruthlessly dismantled in the second half.

Pre-season trial games are notorious for giving false impressions but given Souths' 14-all draw with a near full strength Oldham side on Sunday, Tuesday night's result is a measure of how much Leigh mean business this season.

With many of the big names missing it gave a great opportunity to some Leigh's new signings to make favourable first impressions. Neil Turley and Simon Svabic, who shared the full-back role, did what they had to in defence but linked up with great effect going forward. Just which of them will replace Stuart Donlan is anybody's guess.

Hooker Martin Roden showed great creativity and maturity in the dummy-half role while scrum-half John Duffy gelled well with first Radney Bowker and later Svabic.

Then there was Tim Street who ripped into Souths as though it were a grand final and Dave Bradbury who found himself sin-binned within two minutes of making his Leigh debut. These two weren't going to take backward steps.

From the first minute when Street cut a Souths ball-carrier in half, the match simmered before finally boiling over into three all-in punch-ups - Bradbury and Souths Darren Taffe being sin-binned at the end of one of them. But once the teams had cut out the niggle they produced a match of high quality given the foul conditions.

Leigh showed a willingness to move the ball at every opportunity and scored some classy tries but the abiding memory will be the mean defence which kept a dangerous Souths side out for over an hour. They could teach England a thing or two on how to play in the wet!

David Ingram and Andy Fairclough had both almost opened Leigh's account before a midfield fist-fight ended with Bradbury and Taffe binned and gave Craig Carrington the chance to kick Souths into a 2-0 lead.

Leigh consistently showed they were capable of breaking the Souths defence, particularly up the left through Simon Baldwin and Fairclough, but they had to wait until the 38th minute to get over the line. Adam Bristow's perfect pass found Paul Anderson at top pace, the centre bursting clear to slide in at the corner for a 4-2 lead.

Two tries early in the second half put Leigh on the road to a resounding victory.

Smart work out of dummy half from Roden gave Phil Kendrick the chance to fend off the cover and hurl himself over. Not long afterwards young Lee Sanderson's angled kick was fumbled by the Souths cover and Turley was onto it in a flash to mark his senior debut with a four-pointer. Turley added a conversion from wide out on the right and Leigh lead 14-2. Leigh's defence had looked watertight all night until the 66th minute when Robert Simms spun out of a tackle in front of Leigh's posts and put Lyndsay Munro in for a try converted by Carrington.

But just as Souths were thinking about snatching a second successive draw on their mini-tour, Leigh blasted them out of the water with three tries in the final seven minutes.

Fairclough's nifty footwork brought him the first of his double; Anderson's chip to the corner created another for Paul Wingfield and skipper Fairclough rounded it off by strolling over in stoppage time. LEIGH: Tries - Fairclough (2), Anderson, Kendrick, Turley, P.Wingfield. Goals - P.Wingfield (2), Turley.

SOUTHS: Try - Munro. Gls - Carrington (2).

HALF TIME: 4-2. FULL TIME: 30-8.

PENALTIES AWARDED: (Leigh 7, Souths 5).

SCRUMS WON: (Leigh 8, Souths 9)

SIN-BINNED: (Bradbury, Leigh and Taffe Souths)

ATTENDANCE: 1910

REFEREE: Ian Smith (Oldham).

LEIGH SQUAD: Svabic, Hadcroft, Fairclough, Anderson, Ingram, Bowker, Duffy, Street, Roden, Norman, Baldwin, Kendrick, Bristow, Bradbury, Leathem, Sanderson, Turley, Bourhill, Patel, C.Wingfield, P.Wingfield.