n an exciting encounter, full of incident, Tynedale stumbled with a minute to go, conceding a converted try and with it their first league points of the season.

The Centurions had four debutants in the side, youngsters Ollie Haxton and Ben Turnbull fitted in smoothly at scrum-half and centre showing much promise. Young prop, Oliver Wall, came on at half time, scrummaged well and produced some aggressive running and tackling around the field whilst Tom Kirkup was voted player of the match with a fine all-round performance in the back row.

Despite the numerous team changes the Centurions got off to the best possible start when Jason Armstrong caught the kick-off and drove powerfully over half-way. Rhys Loughead then brushed off defenders, fed Jake Sloan who timed his pass to set Haxton free. The scrum half skilfully rounded the full back to touch down under the posts. Spencer Tolley's conversion attempt crashed against the cross bar.

Stung into action Ashington, who were always strong and well organised, began to take control and were helped by a lack of discipline in the Centurions defence. Numerous unnecessary penalties were conceded and four of these led directly to unconverted tries as these mistakes were severely punished by the alert visitors.

Had it not been for the hard work in the tight and loose by the front five of Ed Weir, Rory Craney, Lewis Sparke, Steven Blair and James Crosby plus, multiple try-saving tackles by Darwin Currie, Ian Charlton and Adam Barnett, the game could have been over by the interval. However, an unusual strike against the head, saw number 8 Rob Earnshaw break, link with Haxton, and the ball was moved slickly via Tolley, Sloan, and Turnbull to the speedy winger Dan Heppell who finished with aplomb.

Ashington again responded with two converted tries immediately before and after the interval as they cleverly used turn-over ball to give the home-side a mountain to climb with the score at 10-34.

Skipper Jake Sloan had made several positional changes and used his bench at half-time and the Centurions began to gain the upper hand.

A fine tackle from behind by Heppell saw Sloan juggle with the loose ball, gather, then sprint in from half way. Heppell then darted over from close range after Tynedale had confidently elected for the scrum after a penalty award. Another penalty was quickly taken, Martyn Hutton made ground, drew two defenders and was still able to feed Heppell who completed his fine hat-trick as he again out ran the defence. The unlikely come-back was almost complete when good work by Jonny Pape resulted in a turn-over and the ball was released to Sloan who again ran in from half-way. Haxton added the conversions to these last two tries to leave the score at 34-34 with only a few minutes to go.

To their credit Ashington re-doubled their efforts and pressed hard for the victory. Ethan McCleod bravely stopped a move down the left wing but the recycled ball was chipped over, gathered by Currie who was swamped with little support. The visitors retrieved the ball, and despite a despairing tackle by Pape retained possession and scored the winning converted try.

There was too little time left for the Centurions to respond before the final whistle but they can claim to have engineered an excellent fight-back that just failed at the end of an entertaining encounter.