Poor decision making from Warlingham saw them lose their third game of the season on Saturday, 31-20 at home to Brighton in the driving rain.

Frustrated Warlingham coach Bill Maynard said: "We needed to make intelligent decisions at critical points in the game and a couple of wrong calls cost us dearly."

An early exchange of penalties settled the nerves but determined pressure from Brighton was rewarded with a converted try when Warlingham failed to clear their lines and kicked straight to a Brighton player.

From a scrum deep in the Brighton half Warlingham captain Mark Macaskill skillfully delayed his pass to centre Ryan Walsh who slid over for an unconverted try.

The visitors took advantage of their ascendancy and, despite missing an easy penalty, again punished a poor kick from defence to cross the line for their second goal.

The move was repeated to the opposite side of the pitch when Warlingham failed to learn from their kicking error.

At the half time whistle Brighton looked to have sealed the game.

However, Warlingham turned round with the elements and their pack took complete control by mauling and driving with aplomb.

Winger Jack Atkinson snuffed out a Brighton foray into the Warlingham half and the home team gradually tightened their grip on the match.

Forward rushes by Street, Freemen Kelly and Scott gained many yards and scattered the Brighton defence.

The ball came out to centre David Stamp who slithered through the middle ground to score under the posts.

James Griffiths added a conversion to his early penalty.

A Brighton penalty miss spurred on the home side and when prop Alex Nunn came of as replacement, his steadying influence gave Macaskill his chance for a captain's try.

With just one score in it Warlingham were desperate to get the final try to win and gain their first bonus point of the season. But it was not to be as the referee missed a blatant knock on by Brighton allowing them to take a five metre scrum from which they closed out the game with a well struck try when their pacy winger came into the line.

Warlingham's new President John Worsfold said: "We've been really unlucky to lose a couple of games on the turn of one phase of play but the lads stuck to it well and another five minutes could have seen us get right back into the game."

With several key players still recovering from injury Warlingham hope to change their fortunes this weekend when they entertain Old Dunstonians at Hamsey Green.