Shawn of nine regular squad members to some game going on at Wembley, Sunderland traveled to West Hartlepool with the bare 15 players. They battled bravely but were undone by a slow start that allowed the home side to race into a 19-0 lead after just 10 minutes leaving themselves too high a mountain to climb.

Four tries from Clayton Walker, Josh Wilson, Luke Park and Will Sopp were not enough to prevent the Ashbrooke side from going out of the competition, but the performance, spirit and discipline shown was excellent.

A high point in the game was a full eight man maul that drove the Hartlepool defence back fully 30 metres before Wilson's try. Credit to the pack of Luke Conway, Ewan Stalker, Will Sopp, David Handley, Lewis Snaith, Aaron Curle, Sean Quinn and Clayton Walker who all acquitted themselves very well in the face of a difficult opposition.

In the backs Matthew Douglass continued to impress at 10 while outside him Elliot Leslie put in a man of the match performance in an unfamiliar position, tackling and running himself to a standstill. Josh Wilson pushed Leslie hard for the man of the match award while the back three of Luke Phillips, Dom Hill and Nathan Penman all contributed to the never say die attitude. Luke Park, with his constant sniping, quick feet and even quicker brain constantly asked questions of the host's defence; fully rewarded when they fell for an outrageous dummy 5 metres out for a score under the posts.

We will have better and worse performances this season, but for a show of true grit and determination, this performance will be hard to better.