As good as we were in defence last week we were shocking on Saturday,’ he said.
‘Beckenham scored four tries in the first half through missed tackles, and when we should have scored with a two-to-one advantage, our players decided either to dummy his man or attempt to crash through instead of passing the ball.
‘In the first instance, in the first half, when we should have scored, the ball was driven up field; Steve O’Brien was penalised for a high tackle, they pushed the ball into the corner and from the line-out they caught and drove for an unconverted try.
‘We found ourselves 31-7 down at half-time because of our own poor play.’ Yet the game had started so well for Jersey, when back row player Richie Griffiths collected clean ball from the line-out after three minutes to brush aside half-hearted tackles to score a Darren Toudic-converted try.
After that Beckenham launched an all-out attack on the Jersey line but, while the 1st XV had dealt with a similar style of play last week, on Saturday their tackling, across the board, was poor.
With less than ten minutes gone their centre brushed away would-be tackles for a converted try.
Then, a few minutes later, another missed tackle allowed one of the Beckenham props to canter through under the posts for an easy try, converted by their stand-off.
Jersey were losing, and the home side were finding too many holes in their defence which meant that, after 20 minutes, their winger took advantage of a static defence to race over the line.
At 19-7 down, Jersey were reeling.
They were allowing Beckenham to bully the game, simply because too few big hits were being made; so when their No 8 brushed past five would-be tackles, to score under the posts, just after midway through the first half, Burton’s men were facing an uphill – or should that be downhill? – task.
‘Then we should have scored with that two-on-one situation, but we wasted it, allowing Beckenham to come away with the ball and score themselves, from the line-out,’ said a clearly exasperated Burton.
‘So the score at half-time was 31-7 to them when what should have been a seven-pointer to us turned into a five-pointer to them.’ Immediately into the second-half scrum-half Paul Nayar found half a gap and darted over to make it 31-12.
Toudic converted.
Nayar was to score again a few minutes later, partly through a Griffiths break, and Griffiths himself was to score late on in the game, after taking a quick penalty and darting beneath the posts.
But by now the writing was on the wall.
Poor defence and far too many penalties conceded by the visitors meant that, in the last 20 minutes, Beckenham had the game all sewn up.
They were soaking up the pressure, and profiting from it; which is why they scored again when a long, flat pass, from a Jersey attack in the home side’s 22 was seized on by Beckenham’s full-back who ran fully 70 yards to score an interception try.
Their pack scored another converted try to give their side 43 points before they wrapped up the game with two tries and one conversion late in the game; the last try coming when the ball bounced off a Jersey forward’s leg into a Beckenham player’s hands a yard from the line.
It was a gift; but then Jersey had been offering Beckenham ‘gifts’ throughout the game.
Gareth Jeffreys’s late try, courtesy of a grubber kick through by Toudic, was no more than scant consolation; although the Jersey stand-off did convert four of the five tries Jersey scored.
‘All week in training we’ve been practising using two players against one,’ said Burton afterwards.
‘Yet on Saturday, twice we ignored the basics, when we should, at least, have scored 47 points to their 55.
It wasn’t as if they had big, strong men, either.
We have to learn that you have to take your chances in defence as well as attack.
This was a poor showing, compared to how well we did last week, at St Peter.
Next time we score 33 points in a game, I expect us to win.’
