Reds coach Ewen McKenzie felt his team's performance at the scrums and breakdown contributed greatly to their commanding 40-10 Super Rugby pre-season victory over the Western Force in Perth on Thursday.

The five tries to one affair was the perfect lead-up to the Reds grudge match with the Waratahs in Sydney next Saturday, February 25 - the opening round of the Super Rugby season.

Digby Ioane, James Horwill, Greg Holmes, Jono Lance and Luke Morahan all scored tries during an entertaining 80 minutes of rugby in Perth.

Ioane and Horwill have now scored tries in successive matches, after the duo crossed the tryline against the Brumbies in the Reds 27-20 trial victory in Cairns last weekend.

In their only two trial games of 2012 coach Ewen McKenzie's squad has now scored nine tries, while conceding just two - one to Brumbies flank Michael Hooper and the other to Force No.8 Ben McCalman.

"We improved in the areas we targeted for this game and I was pleased with how we performed at the breakdown and with our effort in scrums," McKenzie said.

"They're both key areas that are focused on heavily in the opening part of the season and we made progress in both aspects in this match.

"We also had no injuries to come from the match and that is a huge positive."

The Force were first on the scoreboard to lead 3-0 in the opening minutes before the Reds charged to an 18-3 half-time advantage, before hitting top gear in the second half to score 35 unanswered points before conceding a late try.

Flyhalf Mike Harris finished with a personal individual tally of 15 points - courtesy of three conversions and three penalties - while lock Rob Simmons, scrumhalf Will Genia, blindside flank Eddie Quirk and wing Digby Ioane all produced standout performances.

Simmons and Quirk were enforcers in producing superb defensive efforts in both contact and at the breakdown while vice-captain Genia sparked numerous point scoring raids with his agility around the ruck.

Ioane continued his dominant pre-season form and was dangerous with almost every touch of the ball, scoring the opening try of the match before setting up two others to Holmes and Morahan.