Was the aircraft full ?
If not, with a few empty seats, the crew could have re arranged the seating of the smelly fellas in a contained area and isolate them by a few rows from the rest of the clean travellers.
Seats can easily be changed, just get the crew to say that the aircraft is out of trim and ask the smelly gentlemen to sit at the back
Wouldn't have solved the problem but maybe contained it a little bit.