Darlington Mowden Park await fitness reports on Tasi Tuhana, Tony Irwin, Ian James and Mark Bedworth in the build-up to next Saturday's Senior Knockout Cup fourth round tie at home to Manchester.

Despite scoring five excellent tries, the 29-20 home win against National Three North's bottom club, Bedford Athletic, was not the best of preparation.

There were long periods when little happened in a disjointed game, but the win kept Mowden in third place, just behind third round cup victims Dudley Kingswinford, who won 42-10 at West Hartlepool.

Mowden scored an early try after Kevan Oliphant and Steve Jones broke from their own 22. A penalty was awarded ten metres out and they opted for a scrum, No 8 Darren McKinnon picking up and linking with Richard Woollam, who sent full back Kevin McCallum over on the blind side.

Bedford replied from a catch-and-drive, but from another McKinnon pick-up McCallum sent a flat pass to Jones, who stretched to hold it and went over in the corner.

Just before half-time Chris Strong missed out centre partner Jonny Golightly to send Chris Mattison outside the full back on a 30-metre run to the line. Oliphant's conversion made it 17-5.

Bedford landed a penalty before Mowden sent on Mick Kent, who had a big impact, breaking through the middle from his own 22 before Golightly's sleight of hand launched Jones on a 35-metre diagonal run to the line.

As Mowden relaxed a Bedford centre burst through to score under the posts, but victory was assured when Jonny Marston won a line-out and hooker Matt Hall went through for the fifth try.

Bedford created an overlap to score again with five minutes left.

West Hartlepool restricted Dudley to 15 points in the first half, but the visitors quickly scored two more tries and a penalty before West enjoyed ten minutes of pressure.

The scored through winger Andrew Lilley but conceded two converted tries before more late pressure resulted in Jon McNeish touching down.

Blaydon moved into sixth place with a 42-12 win at home to Whitchurch with full back Gareth King scoring two of the six tries and having a hand in others.

The visitors scored first before King replied, and he also scored early in the second half when he started and finished a length-of-the-field move.

King made the initial break from defence which led to the first of centre Vinny Bell's two tries, while prop George Donaghue and replacement scrum half Andy Foreman also touched down. James Lofthouse added three conversions and two penalties.

Tynedale suffered their second successive narrow defeat, coming back from 22-6 down to lose 22-18 at home to Liverpool St Helens after the visitors had a forward sent off for lashing out at veteran prop Richard Parker.

Injury-hit Middlesbrough dropped to second bottom in North One when they lost 43-6 at Aspatria, while Darlington's 26-23 defeat at Macclesfield saw them slip to sixth.

Macclesfield dominated the first half and Darlington the second, although both sides scored one of their three tries against the run of play.

Coming back from 26-13 down, Darlington had the gap down to three points with 18 minutes left.

But Rob Stewart was stopped just short then Simon White followed a kick to the corner but could not get downwards pressure on the ball.

Darlington's only foray into the home half in the first 20 minutes put them 7-6 ahead after Paul Lee broke up the left and they won a line-out from which Dan Miller drove over.

It became 17-7 at half-time before the penalty count began to favour Darlington and David Glendenning landed two.

But then came a costly error when Mark Butler tried to kick the ball dead and left it half a yard short, allowing Macclesfield to touch down.

It was all Darlington after that and Stewart went over from a quickly-taken penalty before the ball was moved left from a free-kick for winger Frankie Coulson to score. But the winning try just wouldn't come.

In North Two East, Stockton slipped to mid-table when they lost 27-11 at home to Morpeth.

After recovering from a groin injury, player-coach Alan Brown went on for the second half but Stockton were outgunned up front.

A try by flanker Phil Austen had them level at 5-5, but otherwise they managed only two Dave Turner penalties as they were outscored five tries to one.

Redcar moved up to second with a 23-9 win at Bridlington.

Hooker Martin Challenor scored two tries, full back Greg Unthank also touched down and Gareth Foreman added two conversions and three penalties.

In Durham and Northumberland Division One, the Hartlepool Rovers front row scored three tries in the 50-0 home win against Winlaton. Hooker Kevin McMorris touched down twice and Stuart Langston and Neil Winn once each. Graeme King and Chris Nicholson (2) got the other tries.

* Darlington hooker Joe Osleton and lock Richard Snowball are in the North Under 21s team to play the Midlands at Burton-on-Trent tomorrow