London Irish: (16) 19
Tries: Rautembach, Hodgson
Pens: Staunton 3

Newcastle: (0) 0

Shane Geraghty was in superb form on his return from a hamstring injury to orchestrate victory for London Irish.

The fly-half's superb sidestep split the defence to start the move that led to prop Faan Rautenbach's opening try.

Scrum-half Paul Hodgson then took the ball from the base of the scrum, kicked over the head of James Grindal and dived on the ball for the second try.

Jeremy Staunton scored three penalties, though he was only able to land two of his five first-half attempts.

Geraghty's hopes of playing for England at the World Cup were undermined by his hamstring injury and, with London Irish director of rugby Brian Smith keen to manage the 21-year-old's return, he was withdrawn after 44 minutes.

Newcastle were undermined by the absence of England World Cup players Jonny Wilkinson, Jamie Noon, Mathew Tait and Toby Flood.

And the visiting team struggled to mount a worthwhile attack for most of the match.

However, they might have scored a penalty towards the end of the first-half only for the team to kick for touch instead.

Fly-half Steve Jones failed to find touch close to the corner and the move petered out.

The only points after the break came from a penalty after Tom Dillon killed the ball in a ruck, for which he was despatched to the sin-bin for 10 minutes.

London Irish director of football Brian Smith:
"The changing room is happy with the win.

"But we are a bit disappointed because, after coming in with two tries at half-time, there might have been the chance to get a four-try bonus point.

"I thought it was an outstanding forward performance, they really did the job on Newcastle in the scrum and the lineout."

Newcastle director of football John Fletcher:
"They comprehensively beat us and deserved the win. We were lucky it was only 19.

"That was a disappointing performance. We just didn't play well.

"It isn't a lack of effort, it is a lack of composure. If we play like that against Harlequins next week then they will beat us."

London Irish: Delon Armitage, Topsy Ojo, Mark Ireland, Jeremy Staunton, Tomas De Vedia, Shane Geraghty, Paul Hodgson; Dan Murphy, David Paice, Faan Rautenbach, Nick Kennedy, Bob Casey (c), Declan Danaher, Richard Thorpe, Phil Murphy.
Replacements:Casey Dunning, Stuart Mackie, Tonga Lea'aetoa, Kieran Roche, Steffon Armitage, Warren Fury, Nils Mordt.