Burnham started the New Year with an excellent victory over last season’s Gloucester Premier League champions Old Bristolians.

Burnham 35 pts

Old Bristolians 10 pts

BURNHAM’S first game of 2013 was against last season’s Gloucester Premier League champions Old Bristolians.

Playing in near perfect conditions, Burnham started the game on the back foot and early pressure resulted in a converted try along with a penalty to put the away side 0-10 up within 10 minutes.

Burnham replied with some strong phases which created two penalty chances, which Tim Piper slotted over to make it 6-10.

Burnham’s young forwards were at their dominating best and with the help of the backs, worked their way to Old Bristolians 22, where a succession of rucks led to Hayden Tuttiet to squeeze over to take the score to 13-10 with Piper adding the extras.

Not long after, a fine individual break by Tuttiet got Burnham into the OBs 22 and a neat offload to Ollie Streeter saw him power over into the corner.

Then came the try of the game, OBs were just outside their 22 and were going strong until Rich Muskett ripped the ball off his opponent in one movement and proceeded to run from 20 metres and score a great individual try. Piper converted to make it 25-10 at the break.

The second half was a more dull affair with most of the game played in the middle of the park. With 15 minutes remaining, Burnham welcomed back player coach and former Tongan international Elisi Vunipola.

Burnham settled into their rhythm and with the forwards dominating again, No 8 Bryan Webb scored following another break from Tuttiet. With the game coming to an end, Burnham secured the win with Webb going over for another try to make it 35-10.

Man of the match was Hayden Tuttiet.

On Saturday, Burnham are away to Avon, with the coach scheduled to leave between 11.30am-12noon.

Crewkerne 87 pts

Burnham 2nd XV 0 pts

THE seconds travelled to league leaders Crewkerne and were comprehensively beaten.

It was clear from the kick-off that Crewkerne were a comprehensive unit they were very fluent in their interaction between the two divisions of backs and forwards and were quick to exploit the deficiencies in the Burnham side.

The Crewkerne pack were instrumental in most of the emulating passages of play and provided Burnham with lots of learning accounts to take away from this game, albeit the Burnham side did not shirk from the task meeting them head on in all areas.

In the passages of play where Burnham got it together, Chris Lee and Will Conway stood out.