Darlington produced an encouraging performance in their last home pre-season friendly, a 1-1 draw with against Sunderland under-23s.

Alun Armstrong’s side had more of the play in the first half with Luke Charman prominent, and they nearly scored after 20 minutes when Kevin Dos Santos crossed from the left, the ball hitting Junior Mondal and landing in the goalkeeper’s hands.

Sunderland took the lead on 36 minutes with a low shot by former Darlington youth team player Vinnie Steels, the ball flashing across Darlington goalkeeper Tommy Taylor into the bottom corner.

It gave Quakers a wake-up call, and they nearly levelled when Jack McIntyre went full length to save from Charman, then an attempted lob by Mondal from a Lexus Beeden through-ball was held by McIntyre.

Just on half time Quakers levelled when skipper Will Hatfield surged through from midfield and found Dos Santos, who turned quickly and beat McIntyre with a right foot shot into the bottom corner.

After Quakers made four half time subs and changed their formation, Dos Santos nearly put them into the lead with a quick turn and shot from the corner of the box that McIntyre saved low down.

Sunderland’s Caden Kelly struck a powerful free kick that rebounded off the post with Lucas Martin beaten.

Quakers gave a ten-minute outing to trialist defender Omar Sanyang, who has been at Tadcaster, Bradford PA and Scunthorpe.

Darlington’s final pre-season friendly is at Whitby Town on Saturday.

Darlington: Taylor (Martin 75), Griffiths (Hedley 46), Beeden (Smith 63), Storey, Hope, Hatfield (Ravenhill 46), Mondal (Nelson 68), Wheatley (Sanyang 80), Rivers (Purver 46), Charman (Cassidy 46), Dos Santos (Kiernan 68) Sunderland: McIntyre, Scott, Almond, Wilding, Jessop, Richardson, Idowu, Harris, Wearne, Dyce, Steels. Subs: Newell, Gardiner, Kelly, Cachosa