With four new faces in their side in winger Josh White, prop Jim Early and flankers Joe Maw and Andy Brown together with No.8 Peter Dent on his return from Westoe, they secured the outcome in the first half by leading 20 – 0 but were made to defend for long periods after that by a resilient Ryton side who refused to lie down.

City led from the 6th minute, stand-off and captain Paul Armstrong kicking a simple penalty to capitalise on early pressure and 10 minutes later, after centre Richard Knowles was held up over the line when he crashed through and a try seemed certain, they got their reward from the scrum that resulted, Dent picking up at the base to score under the posts and Armstrong converting.

A second Armstrong penalty after 34 minutes confirmed their control and whilst Ryton did exert pressure in their half for several minutes, they met solid City defence and some good counter-attacks from depth, the final one of the half producing an excellent try after White chased a kick on the left, gathered and took play to the Ryton 22 before the ball was moved the other way from the breakdown for full-back Rob Smith to break and send Dent over for his second try. Armstrong converted for a 20 – 0 interval lead.

But they certainly didn’t have it all their own way in the second period. Ryton came at them , had far more of the game in terms of territory, eventually scored a try from a quickly-taken penalty through centre Cameron Toole after 51 minutes while City centre Arnie Stevenson was off the field having been yellow-carded. Stand-off Lewis Barr converted to reduce the arrears, but a third penalty by Armstrong from 35 metres kept City well ahead.

Rarely thereafter did the home side look likely to breach the visitors’ defence and when City re-asserted themselves in the last 10 minutes to apply some heavy pressure to the home line, it was Ryton’s turn to demonstrate their defensive qualities.

Final verdict on City – a decent start but room for improvement!

CITY: Rob Smith; Chris Metcalfe, Arnie Stevenson, Richard Knowles, Josh White;
Paul Armstrong (c), Will Paxton; Jim Early, Mike Hay, Benny Parkinson, Tom Baty,
Matt Sayer, Joe Maw, Andy Brown, Peter Dent.

Replacements : Kyle Wilson, Jack Bengochea, Alex Tunstall.