Newcastle director of rugby Steve Bates was impressed by the efforts of his experimental line-up as they slipped to a 19-8 LV= Cup defeat to Harlequins at Kingston Park.

Former Falcons fly-half Rory Clegg added 14 points for Quins to Sam Smith's try on the half-hour to leave the north-east side winless from their two cup games so far.

Bates though took some encouragement from the performance however and said: "This has been a great opportunity for our young players to get out there and learn a bit about first-team rugby.

"It was a bit scrappy, they played better in the first half than we did but we did better as it went on and scored a good try at the end."

That touchdown came from Michael Tait with three minutes to go after Newcastle finally broke out of defence.

Bates felt Harlequins number eight Tom Guest was the difference between the sides.

"He was the outstanding player on the park and gave them a lot of direction," the Newcastle boss added.

In what was a below-par performance by both sides it was the Harlequins who always looked the more likely but the only real difference between them for much of the game was Smith's out-of-the-blue try after 30 minutes.

Nothing much had looked on when full-back Ross Chisholm broke over halfway, but when Smith chipped ahead the home defence were caught flat-footed and the winger easily won the chase.

The other major difference was the contribution of Clegg, making his first return to Kingston Park.

The youngster did have a couple of failures but his four penalties and a conversion provided the bulk of the Harlequins points.