Guernsey (in black) were missing around half of their first-choice XV

Guernsey Rugby Club suffered a heavy 48-10 defeat to London Irish Amateurs in London Two South West at Footes Lanes on Saturday.

The island side were without around half of their first-choice XV.

Player-coach Jordan Reynolds told BBC Guernsey: "Obviously I'm quite disappointed. I thought we could have done a bit better.

"It was a good performance in patches, but if you don't play the 80 minutes you don't get the game."

He said: "I thought all 15 of the Irish were absolutely fantastic, so my hat goes off to them.

"In the first, probably, 10 minutes we were camped in their 22 and there was an opportunity to score.

"If you can get a try like that and get a bit of a sniff then the game could be completely different.

Guernsey have lost a third of their 15 matches so far this season

"Once they got a sniff that was the end of it. They piled on loads of tries and I think a lot of our young guys got taught how to play rugby.

"We are missing some players, but I can't rely on that to be an excuse. We've still got to really push forward with the young guys that are coming through. If we can take anything out of the game it has to be our learning curve."

Before the match Guernsey were third in the table and the only side in the division to have two games in hand.

Reynolds added: "I think we'll still be third or thereabouts, it's still very early and in all honesty I knew this game was coming up and I'd be missing a lot of players.

"That's why those wins against Weighbridge and Guildford were so important to us. We knew we couldn't rely on this one to get us through.

"If we can aim to be around fourth by the last five games then I think we could take this competition easily."

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