EMBRACING the fashion of bringing on finishers off the bench paid rich dividends for Darlington Mowden Park as they overturned a 19-0 deficit at Moseley on Saturday.

Chief impact man, centre James Fitpatrick, scored with five minutes left and Garry Law's conversion sealed a 21-19 win.

With other powerhouses on the bench, such as Simon Uzokwe and Shaun McCartney, Mowden turned the game around in the last half hour.

They have lacked line-out presence this season, but it was Moseley who suffered in that area, losing six of their 14 throw-ins, including two five metres out.

Handling errors by Mowden contributed to the hosts' first two tries and when fly half James Williams scored his second after 50 minutes Moseley looked out of sight.

But they paid a heavy price for declining two easy shots at goal in search of the bonus point try and winger Adam Radwan continued his prolific form to start Mowden's fightback after 53 minutes.

Josh Bragman converted then Law took over the kicking when lock Jack Payne grabbed the second before Fitzpatrick surged over to complete the job.

In the battle to avoid the second relegation spot, Blaydon's lead over Hull Ionians was cut to two points when they lost 26-17 at Fylde after leading 14-0.

Ionians picked up a four-try bonus from their defeat at Coventry and are at home to bottom club Macclesfield this week, when Blaydon entertain Moseley.

Blaydon skipper Keith Laughlin is to captain the England Counties XV at Moseley on Friday night, with prop Trevor Davidson also in the squad.

Moseley have four players involved but have failed in an attempt to get the Blaydon match postponed for a second time.

Jason Smithson capitalised on forward dominance to score Blaydon's first try at Fylde and set up winger Dan Marshall to show his pace in grabbing the second, converted from the touchline by Brett Connon.

But when Smithson was sin-binned late in the first half it marked a turning point and Fylde scored twice to go in at 14-12.

A Connon penalty stretched Blaydon's lead, but they conceded two more tries and denied themselves a bonus point when they took a tap penalty near the posts to no avail.

Tynedale maintained their good form with a slick, six-try performance in winning 38-20 at home to Otley.

Billingham overturned a 21-15 deficit to win 39-31 at home to Morley, the third successive win lifting them into fifth spot in National Three North.

West Hartlepool hung on for a crucial 17-15 home win against Penrith to sit comfortably in the play-off place in North One East.

Zac Southern kicked a penalty and converted a close-range try by winger Rob Thorn for a 10-0 lead, but Penrith hit back with two quick tries when Sam Miller was in the sin bin.

After good work by Adam Coates, Andrew Rllins took a pass from Lee Maddison to score from ten metres, Southern converting.

Penrith landed a penalty, but when awarded a kickable one two minutes from time they opted to go for the corner, to no avail.

Durham City slipped to third bottom when a 3-0 lead became a 33-3 defeat away to leaders Pocklington. The next game is at home to West on March 4.

Barnard Castle continued their surge towards the Durham and Northumberland One title with a 52-12 home win against Hartlepool Rovers.

Full back Chris McTurk, always a threat, scored a hat-trick and fellow former Mowden player Sam Errington bagged 17 points from a try and six conversions out of eight. Doug Shaw, jack Worley, George Welsby and Adam Kicks also touched down.

Middlesbrough's slide continued with a 27-15 defeat in an entertaining game at Gateshead, who grabbed the four-try bonus in the last minute.

It was 3-3 at half-time, but the game opened up when Gateshead No. 8 Martin Pluskall surged through and passed to centre David Tate, who scored under the posts.

Middlesbrough hit straight back with two tries by left winger Ben Wood, new skipper Matty Todd converting the first. But the scores were level again at 15-15 when Chris Owen, who had started at scrum half switched to the right wing and scored Gateshead's second.

They continued to press and Pluskall added the third before full back Scott Cartner completed the scoring by converting left winger Adam Ridley's late try.

Stockton lost 24-3 at home to Horden, paying the price for the absence of four forwards and three yellow cards against a powerful pack.

Winger Steven Bartliff nailed a 40-metre penalty on the stroke of half-time to give Stockton the lead, but they soon began to incur the wrath of the referee with full back Dan Phinn, replacement winger Glen Cockin and flanker Tom Nelson all being sin-binned.

Horden scored a pushover try and Stockton conceded another after prop Lewy Gray retired with a neck injury and they were briefly down to 12 men with unopposed scrummaging taking place.

Horden crashed over again and added the bonus point try with the last play of the game.