After weathering some early Gateshead pressure in the opening five minutes, Stockton came back into the game and strung together some promising plays with newcomers Jack Aldus at Number Eight and Jonny Horner at fly half showing some nice touches.
(And the answer is YES if you are wondering of they are related to Stockton Stars of yesteryear !) .

Winger Dan Phinn came close but just had a foot in touch and then on the half hour prop Mark Conway opened the scoring with a well taken try after several phases of play .

However Gateshead hit back to take the lead 7-5 wirh a converted try after 35 minutes which was scored in a similar vein to Stockton's.

Just before half time Stockton were attacking strongly but lost the ball in contact and Gateshead counter attacked with a kick and chase from which they scored and the half time score was 12-5 .

After half time Gateshead had a purple patch when they scored four tries in ten minutes. The first came down the left when the winger outsmarted the red defence and then from the kick off Gateshead ran the ball straight back and the Stockton defence appeared at sixes and sevens and the score was 24-5 and the game was slipping away from Stockton.

From a quickly taken short penalty Gateshead raced through the hesitant Stockton defence again and the final try was from another kick ahead and chase with the Stockton defence outpaced the final score was 38-5 to Gateshead.

Stockton's opening half an hour showed the potential of the side and when they become more match fit the defence must hold up for the full 80 minutes.

Next week Gateshead visit Stockton in a league game so we have the opportunity to atone for the disappointing second half performance