Dan had to stay home because mother and new baby son were arriving back from his hospital. Liam Bailey stepped up from the bench to take over Dan's shirt, and promptly got the afternoon off to a great start when he scored the first try after 15 minutes.
It followed an excellent opening spell from West who attacked down both flanks spreading the ball as wide as they could on the narrowish 3G pitch.
Burnage had the wind at their backs, but weren't helped by the loss of skipper Ralph Lawson after five minutes and scrum half Tom Blaney shortly after.
Stu Waites added a simple penalty, but Burnage battled their way back into the game and presure in the West 22 saw a number of penalties conceded and a yellow card for Stephen Stockdale.
The home side seized their chance. First they slotted a penalty, and then Tony Lynn finished off a catch and drive to make it 8-8 at half time.
Burnage's best weapon was proving to be the rolling maul, and they went ahead for the first time when Phil Edge emerged triumphant form a melee of bodies to make it 13-8.
Stu Waites reduced the arrears with a long range penalty only for Adam Knight to extend the lead t 16-11 with ten minutes left.
That was the prompt for West to lay siege to the home line . They finally got the their reward when the defence was stretched to allow Andrew Cheslin to go in at the corner to make it 16-16.
Up stepped Stu Waites to attempt a difficult conversion from the touchline and his unswerving accuracy proved to be the matchwinning effort inflicting a very rare defeat for Burnage on their own plastic patch.
Burnage: James Knight, Chris Mort, Chris Korneckie, Adam Knight , Andrew Dowdall, Sam Jennings, Tom Blaney, Lonzo Al Hassan, Peter O'Sullivan, Chris Keane, Phil Edge, Alex Bowen, Anthony Lynn, Ralph Lawson, Oliver Hewitt. Reps: Zac Hammonds, Gareth Moore, Jonny Scholes.
West: Stu Waites, Scott Butcher, Luke Watson, Gav Robinson, Andrew Cheslin, Gareth Foreman, Andrew Foreman, Jon Norris, Andrew Dixon, Adam Coates, Andrew Davies, Gareth Eddy, Liam Bailey, Michael Taylor, Stephen Stockdale. Reps: Alex Barker,Greg Edwards, Colin Cheslin.