ED Jackson was left to lament an error-strewn performance after Newport Gwent Dragons struggled to a 13-0 Guinness Pro12 victory against Zebre.

The hosts won a poor game at Rodney Parade with number eight Jackson scoring the only try after showing good strength to cross from a driving lineout.

The summer recruit from Wasps was named as man of the match after making 17 carries but even he was guilty of making handling errors against a Zebre side thrashed 61-13 at Cardiff Blues last week.

The Italians, who stayed in Wales this week and trained at Llanwern High School, showed a lot more steel but the Dragons still wasted a golden opportunity for a bonus-point win.

“We knew it was going to be a tough ask because they were going to be disappointed with how it finished against Cardiff the previous week,” said Jackson.

“Inevitably there was going to be a bounce back and we felt that but we got a win at home and closed the game out.

“There were a lot of unforced errors which is something that we are going to have to clean up moving forward because we are just not going to come up on the right side of the result for the rest of the season if we keep making that many errors. Hopefully if we brush up on that we can get on a roll.”

The Dragons now face a three-week break until their next fixture away to Leinster.