Blackpool end their home campaign in style with an emphatic 5-1 victory at Bloomfield Road.

Nearly 9,500 watched Pool demolish promotion chasing Bristol City with four first half goals and a John Hills' fifth after the break.

Tangerines boss Steve McMahon said before the game that he wanted this game to be a benchmark for next season. After this performance, the Seasiders have set themselves high expectations.

McMahon also afterwards that he wanted to give the supporters a professional performance and that was evident in his team selection. The Blackpool boss named arguably his strongest team, something that has been lacking in recent weeks. Phil Barnes was back in net with a defence of Chris Clarke, John OKane, Tommy Jaszczun and Brian Reid who all stood strong throughout the match. The midfield quartet of Wellens, Bullock, Dunning and Hills were also excellent and the 3 goals scored by the partnership of Walker and Murphy speaks for itself.

Despite the scoreline it was the visitors who surprisingly started the better team. City bombarded the Blackpool goal in the opening 5 minutes as they obviously looked up for game which. if won, could see them grab a chance to sneak into the playoffs. But all the corners Bristol won counted for nothing as Pool opened the scoring on the 8th minute. Walker was the scorer, following fine work from John O'Kane and John Murphy. Just four minutes later Murphy grabbed a goal himself, latching onto an overhead kick by Darren Dunning to beat the offside trap and fire home from 12 yards.

Blackpool continued to penetrate the nervy City defence and it seemed every time they attacked the ball found itself in the back of the net. Murphy got his second just before the half-hour mark after being played in by Walker and Bullock completed an amazing half of action when he ran onto Murphy's header to fire confidently past a stunned Mike Stowell in the City goal. Thats 19 for the season for Murphy, one more and he will equal the departed Brett Ormerod as top goalscorer.

Pool could have easily added more before the break with Murphy guilty of missing a host of decent opportunities. But that didnt matter when John Hills sealed the win with Blackpools fifth just after half time. Hills celebrated his Player of the Season award with an unstoppable left footed drive into the bottom left hand corner.

It wasnt all Blackpools way though. City substitute Tony Thorpe grabbed a consolation for the visitors with a rising drive past Phil Barnes after 62 minutes to give the 3000 travelling support something to cheer about.

But that wasnt going to ruin the day for Blackpool and the game ended in the tradition Bloomfield Road pitch invasion. The win puts Pool on a respectable 56 points for the season, a figure they will want to improve upon next season with a few new faces.

Blackpool 5-1 Bristol City

Walker (8), Murphy (12,27), Bullock (34), Hills (49)

Thorpe (60)

Att: 9333