IT IS all looking a little too easy for Darlington at the moment and the watching Mowden Park players would have been struck by the growing gulf between North One and National Division Three.

Mowden's match against Broadstreet was off because the visitors' bus broke down near Nottingham and as both had a free day coming up they arranged to play next Saturday.

After the previous week's 42-0 win at West Hartlepool, Darlington avenged their defeat at St Helens with such comfort that they were able to ease off after going 43-5 up midway through the second half.

Darlington moved into third place and now have the best points difference in the division, which should be considerably improved over the next three weeks as they entertain Driffield then play bottom club Sandal home and away.

If they are promoted, at least Darlington can look forward to some competitive fixtures. They will certainly find it more physical, although they are not shy of fighting back and this time it was flanker Martin Howe who was despatched to the sin bin, along with an opponent, after ten minutes. Howe is still good enough to step up a level, and so is No 8 Bryan Dixon, although whether it would be wise to do so at 41 only he can tell.

If they continue their impressive development, the young front five deserve their chance of national league rugby, with Dan Miller and Richard Snowball particularly catching the eye here.

Wingers Paul Beattie and Mark Butler scored two tries each, while full back Kieron Thompson landed three penalties and three of the seven conversions.

Rob Stewart returned from injury to play the last 20 minutes in place of David Andrew and there is now a tough choice of half back partner for skipper Paul Lee, whose classy handling was involved in most of the tries.

Ironically, one of his rare fumbles led to the first after 12 minutes as he had to settle for setting up a maul, which was driven ten metres to the line. Amazingly it was Beattie who came up with the ball for his 14th try of the season.

Andrew showed he will not easily be dislodged from the team by twice stepping off his left foot to evade tackles and score from a ruck 24 metres out.

Beattie had a simple run-in for the third with Thompson providing the link after a superb long pass from Lee.

It was 25-0 before West Park broke out from their own 22 after 36 minutes, with centre Tom Gray racing 75 metres to score.

Another good pass from Lee allowed the powerful Butler to hand off two opponents on a 25-metre run to the corner shortly after the break. He then found himself unmarked to grab his second before Lee was again involved in giving flanker Del Lewis a clear run to the corner.

At 43-5 Darlington went off the boil and the visitors scored twice in the last 15 minutes either side of Miller being driven over.

Result: Darlington 50 West Park St Helens 15.