HEWORTH opened the season with a 36-14 defeat against premier division newcomers North Hull Knights in the Yorkshire Men's League Forty20 Cup.

The Villagers, who included several youngsters, trailed 18-0 at the break but battled hard to contain a robust and experienced outfit.

Their efforts were finally rewarded with three second-half tries.

The hosts, formerly of the Hull & District League, started strongly and posted three touchdowns in the opening 17 minutes courtesy of hooker Calvin Foster, centre Billy Hutchinson and loose forward Joe Chambers.

All three were converted by scrum half Jack Tuttle.

Heworth responded by stepping up their defensive efforts and prevented any further tries in the first half to trail 18-0 at the break.

The Black and Whites gave themselves a glimmer of hope when loose-forward Joe Deighton crossed for an unconverted score in the first minute of the second period to reduce the deficit to 18-4.

But the Humbersiders soon dispelled any hopes of a comeback by registering a brace of tries from centre Craig McNee and prop Liam Price all improved by Tuttle to make it 36-4.

Heworth, however, were still not done and their persistence paid off after 68 minutes when scrum-half and player-coach George Elliott burst through the home defence on halfway for a fine individual try.

Second-rower Lewis Worthington followed up an Elliott kick, six minutes later, to go over in the corner and Deighton’s touchline conversion made the final score 36-14 to the Knights.

Deighton took the Villagers’ man-of-the-match award with Elliott and hooker Dave Hayes also prominent.