London Welsh head coach Justin Burnell hailed his side’s performance as “fantastic” following their 41-6 win over Cornish Pirates at the Kassam Stadium on Saturday.

“Today was about our performance and maintaining our position at the top of the league, and I thought it was a fantastic performance,” said Burnell.

“I was more pleased with the manner in which we played. “The Pirates are a very good side, fourth in the league, and this was our second home game off the back of two defeats in the B&I Cup.

“I’m not sure when the last time was the Pirates did not cross the line, but it was all about us scoring our five tries.

“They’re a very physical team, so that’s a mark of respect to Ollie Smith, our defence coach. “We didn’t allow them to get into areas.

“We looked after the ball a lot better than they did –- we ran through the phases.

“We missed three clear opportunities, but I’ll take the five tries. I’m happy with that.

“Today’s performance was clinical. Whoever we play, that’s the level of performance we’re looking for.”

Burnell picked out the experienced trio of Sonny Parker, Tom May and Gordon Ross (combined age 105) for special praise afterwards.

“The old Dad’s Army in the middle of the park played well. Daniel Browne is also playing well and Carl Kirwan was back to his best today,” he said.

It was a welcome return to winnings ways for Welsh after consecutive defeats to London Scottish and Pontypridd in the B&I Cup.

“It’s a very honest environment,” Burnell added.

“We were disappointed when we lost at Pontypridd and today once again showed the character which was shown at Rotherham.

“We’re an honest bunch of players and we don’t like people scoring tries. “It was about accepting the disappointment factor and really making that disappointment factor hurt, and hurt to a point where you don’t want to have that feeling every Saturday -Sunday morning.”