It was always going to be an exciting experience playing in a stadium, in an evening kick off under floodlights with an amazing travelling support. Due to injury and illness, we arrived at the Darlington Arena with 11 players. DMP were unbelievably supportive, accommodating, and determined to get this game on, and they gifted us a couple of players who played their hearts out against their own team.

The lads got changed in the first team changing rooms, and warmed up on pitches to the rear of the stadium. Then, they returned to the changing rooms, before taking to the pitch like professional players.

We'd been working for weeks on our defensive line, working as a team to stifle attacks and stop teams getting over the gain line, and that hard work really paid off tonight.
From the first to last whistle the lads were absolutely phenomenal in both defence and attack. We were ferocious around the ruck, retaining all our own ball, and often nicking Mowden’s ball through effective jackaling (Oliver John amazing at this), and strong counter rucking.

Mowden are a strong team, with some quick and strong runners, but the lads really fronted up, putting huge pressure on their back line, and tracking attackers to put strong and effective tackles in.

We asked for a team performance, and boy did we get it! They played for each other, supported runners, and defended in numbers!

We were actually a try down at half time, but the lads felt really good and knew they were playing well. We'd had lots of territory, and one of DMP’s tries was a break away try that was really unfortunate.

It was the first time this season that I saw all our players really fronting up and playing with confidence. I expected them to continue in the same way in the second half, but they exceeded my expectations and went up a couple of gears. Continued hard work around the breakdown, turned defence into attack and there were numerous strong forward runs in attack to get us up the pitch.

Tries were scored by Leo, Olly, Riley G, Eliott and Oliver J, but they were created by the team. Lovely to see some creativity with Finley, Oliver and Riley developing their kicking games.

I'm still a little overwhelmed writing this report, I've always had the utmost faith in this group and set high standards, but the lads surpassed that tonight playing with passion and confidence. Amazing, amazing performance, so proud!! Heroic performances from all players.

It was hard to choose a player of the match, but it went to Nicky who is a different player this season. He just goes about his business, making so many hard yards, phenomenal around the breakdown and a true team player.

Our season has started!!!!