Jersey lose 8-0 to Union Sportive St Malo in friendly

Jersey have lost their last three Muratti games with Guernsey

An inexperienced Jersey were beaten 8-0 by French side Union Sportive St Malo in their first match of 2015.

The islanders were 5-0 down at half time having conceded the opening three goals in three minutes after Kevin Belloc gave St Malo a 13th minute lead.

Manager Jimmy Reilly played an number of younger players with some of the experienced members of the squad away.

"We had a lot of young lads out there and it was a good learning curve," said JFA chief executive Neville Davidson.

Florian Jegu scored a hat-trick for the French side while Arthur De La Lande scored twice and Nicolas Haquin and Gaetan Fevrier got one each.

St Malo play in the fourth tier of French football while Jersey have played just two games this season, both comfortable wins over 26th Army Regiment back in October.

"Nobody should hang their heads, we knew what we were up against, they were a good team that play at a good level in France," Davidson told BBC Sport.

"But we need this opposition and once you get this opposition you can learn from how they play.

"They want us to go to St Malo in the near future, so we hope to play them again soon," added Davidson, who is hoping to add more games to the island's fixture programme through the involvement of new director of football Brian Little.

The match was played in front of 131 fans at St Brelade's ground with Springfield stadium out of use as a new 3G synthetic pitch is laid.