Darlington Under 18s suffered their first defeat of the season in the Durham County Under 18 league when they lost 2-1 at Ryhope on Saturday.

Darlington went behind against the run of play to a rebounded effort which came off the post and fell to a Ryhope striker six yards from goal. Darlington started very slowly but as the game went on they started to create more chances.

After the break Ryhope scored with a volley from the edge of the box to make it 2-0 Darlington had many clear cut chances which they failed to convert, until Darlington got one back when Pigg was brought down in the box. Nathan Stephenson took the penalty which was narrowly converted. More clear cut chances came for the Quakers but it wasn't to be.

[caption id="attachment_14396" align="alignnone" width="300"] Nathan Stephenson[/caption]

After the game manager Andrew Jinks said: “A mixture of the opposing goalkeeper’s efforts, our slow start and missed chances were our downfall today. Credit to the opposition, they fully deserved the win.  It's great when we're winning but let's see what types of characters we have In our changing room to come back stronger from that result”.

The setback was Quakers' first defeat in ten games.