Artur Krysiak gifted Rovers the win in the 23rd minute with a real howler - a carbon copy of striker Eliot Richards' winner in the reverse fixture last September.
Midfielder Norburn fired in a low shot from 25 yards, but former Poland U-19 Krysiak let the ball slip through both his hands and legs to leave him red-faced ... again.
And full back striker Lee Brown sealed the win in the 82nd minute with a 22 yard scorcher that gave Krysiak no chance.
To be fair to Krysiak, he did make two good saves ion the second half - one from Richards and a superb touch over the bar from striker Ryan Brunt's overhead kick.
John Ward returned to Rovers for a second spell as manager in December and said:
"I've said to the players that's the best result we've had so far against one of the best three teams in the division. It was resolute and organised and we didn't get too fazed when they had the ball.
"I've been really, really pleased with the players' discipline. We respect other teams, but I've told the boys they have nothing to fear.
"The first goal was fortunate, but if you don't take the shot you don't score. There was nothing fortunate about the second goal."
Exeter boss Paul Tisdale said:
“They didn’t deserve the first goal, and that changed everything. For the first 20 minutes, both sides were average. I thought we looked okay – we perhaps didn’t show enough ambition going forward, or didn’t have enough quality in our build-up in those attacking areas, and they showed little ambition either.
“The goal came out of nothing really – up to that point I was comfortable, because I knew we could pick it up and that we could engineer the game to give ourselves a chance. But it was a shocking goal to give away and at that point; their resolve intensified and the purpose of their game became very clear for them and our game became muddied.”
My clipping from this morning's paper
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