Newport brought the curtain down on their European campaign with an entertaining victory over fellow strugglers Edinburgh at Rodney Parade.

Almost 6,000 fans were treated to 10 tries, five for each side, in a lively affair.

But Newport coach Richard Hill admitted his side's defending remains a worry.

The home side were under pressure to bounce back from their embarrassing 70-18 defeat at Toulouse last week and the strain showed as Edinburgh at one point rallied to level the scores at 32-32.

We still have work to do on our defence Newport coach Richard Hill

"On the attacking side I was very pleased with our performance," said Hill.

"There was a lot more pace about our game and our forwards produced a lot more quality ball, but we still obviously have work to do on our defence."

Newport raced into an early lead through two tries from Jason Forster and one from Canadian prop Rod Snow.

But Edinburgh weathered the storm and could have taken the lead before the break had makeshift outside half Chris Paterson brought his kicking boots.

Conan Sharman, Allister Hogg and Craig Smith all went over for Edinburgh but all three tries were unconverted.

It was a missed chance Edinburgh coach Frank Hadden

Newport's Jason Strange re-established the home advantage after the break with 13 unanswered points through two penalties, a try and a conversion for a 32-18 lead.

But once again Edinburgh forced their way back into the game as they rallied to level the score through converted tries from centre Tom Philip and replacement full-back Brendan Laney.

Moments from time Newport struck back through the boot of Strange and an injury time try by Ofisa Tonu'u to secure their victory.

Edinburgh coach Frank Hadden admitted his side had missed a "great chance" having hauled themselves level only to fade in the closing stages.

He said: "I thought our youngsters behind the scrum played pretty well and answered a lot of questions. It was a missed chance."

Newport: S Howarth; M Mostyn, H Luscombe, J Pritchard, L Nabaro; J Strange, O Tonu'u; R Snow, J Richards, A Garvey, S Raiwalui (capt), M Voyle, I Gough, J Forster, A Powell.
Reps: C Jones, P Young, A Garvey, M Veater, R Jones, S Williams, D Burn.

Edinburgh: D Lee, C Sharman, C Joiner, T Philip, S Webster, C Paterson, G Burns, C Smith, D Hall, J Brannigan, A Kellock, S Murray, T Blackadder (capt), A Hogg.
Reps: C Di Ciacca, R Mathieson, G Perrett, S Cross, M Blair, B Laney, A Dickson.

Ref: Christophe Berdos (France)