THE day may not be too far away when Redcar will be the top team in Cleveland.

That's not saying a lot given the decline elsewhere, but it would have been unthinkable five years ago when they were struggling to get half a dozen out for training.

The progress begun under John Stabler was maintained under ex-Rugby League star Garry Schofield and now Redcar show signs of going up another notch with home-grown prop Paul Beal as player-coach.

They won't win North Two East, but as the only club to have taken a point off leaders Cleckheaton they could clinch the promotion play-off spot.

They might need to improve their back play as there was little evidence of creativity here, with four penalties from fly half Gareth Foreman lifting them into third place.

The amount of spoiling meant there was precious little quick delivery of ball and such a dour contest would have driven a first-time visitor to rugby to the nearby garden centre well before the end.

Stockton were outgunned up front in the first half, but battled back gamely and deserved a draw if only for scoring the only tries.

Their regular goal-kicker, 42-year-old Dave Turner, has been suffering from glandular fever and they left him on the bench until five minutes from time.

They paid the penalty as Lee Richardson failed to convert either of the tries, the second one from just to the right of the posts.

With Stockton always in a higher division, this was the first time the clubs had met for 12 years, when Stockton won 27-9 with scrum half Liam Turner among the try scorers.

"Happy days," reflected Saturday's programme notes, hinting that things are not quite so hunky dory now.

Turner was at centre for Redcar this time, while the No 8s Andy Cowell (Stockton) and Mark Poulson have swapped sides.

Although their front row colleague Jason Nicholas was sin-binned after five minutes, Beal and his former West Hartlepool teammate Martin Challenor give Redcar a solid base.

They used it to good effect in building a 9-0 lead during a first half in which both sides looked less likely than Romania to score a try.

Apart from a second half move up the right after Beal broke from a maul on halfway, most of what little enterprise there was came from Stockton.

They have two powerful wingers in Simon Crozier and Pedro Salahshouri, but Crozier had to go looking for the ball as the slow delivery and lack of crisp handling meant it rarely travelled along the line.

The notable exception came three minutes after the break when the gap was cut to 9-5 following a burst from centre Steve Thornton.

When he was stopped the ball was quickly recycled and moved left, with Richardson coming into the line to send Salahshouri over.

Without injured player-coach Alan Brown, Stockton lacked a dominant figure, but after being sin-binned a minute before half-time flanker Brett Wildridge returned to play a prominent part.

He scored the second try ten minutes from time after a 20-metre driving maul seemed to have been wasted through poor delivery.

But the backs got a second chance and Graham Kell took an inside pass from fly half Phil Shaw before handing on to Wildridge, who drove over.

Richardson's conversion attempt was not exactly struck with confidence and if he is to continue in the role he might need to practise with his brother David at Kingston Park