Neil Winskill's young side fell behind when Michael Mellon and Sean Etaluku struck early on at the Magpies’ Academy.

But in what was a breathless first half, United fought back, with Michael Ndiweni's brace bringing the hosts level by the 20-minute mark.

And just a minute later, Jay Turner-Cooke completed the turnaround, making it 3-2 to Newcastle.

But Etaluku's second of the contest levelled matters on the stroke of half time, and the scoring continued after the break, with Tremaine Eastmond and Mellon netting to restore the visitors' lead.

Tony Philiskirk's charges then pulled away with three further strikes inside a frantic final seven minutes, with Joe Smyth Ferguson's double sandwiching a George Walters effort to put the result beyond doubt.

After an encouraging few weeks of friendlies, which included wins over Nottingham Forest, Spennymoor United, Doncaster Rovers, South Shields and Sheffield United, Winskill admitted that defeat in their first competitive outing of 2021/22 "took everybody by surprise" after such a promising pre-season.

"It was a bit of a shock for the staff as well as the players, because we didn’t see that coming at all," he said.

"In the second half, there was a bit of naivety on our behalf. We lost a bit of our discipline. From a tactical and shape point of view, we looked raggy. We were eager to try and score, and left ourselves vulnerable to counter attacks. When we got into those situations in one-v-one duels, we didn’t do well enough.

"The group are full of character, work ethic and endeavour, and they’ve shown that right the way through pre-season. It just ended badly - the game ended badly. That’s something we’ve got to show them and put right. You’ve got to keep fighting right until the end, and the game can’t run away from you as easily as it did."

United's will now get set for a trip to Wolves on Saturday (11am kick-off).

And Winskill, who oversaw the integration of a number of first years into the under-18s' squad this summer, wants his players to respond in a positive manner and "show a bit of character" as they look to pick up their first three points of the new campaign.

"We haven't got to get too despondent by Saturday, but we do have to learn from it quickly," he said. "I'm expecting to see that they'll come back determined and they'll bounce back and show some resilience, which is what we want from our players. 

"There's going to be ups and downs during the season as we know any team has. It's a shame that it’s happened like that in the first game, but there's a long, long way to go. I'm hoping to see a much improved performance on Saturday and hopefully that'll start with training tomorrow and the lads getting back to basics.

"We can't forget that they’ve done a lot of good work so far and they're good players. We just have to show a bit of character."

Newcastle United Under-18s: Steven Bessent, Josh Stewart (Joel Green 78), Josh Nicholson (Callum McNally 46), Ciaran Thompson, Harry Barclay, Jamie Miley, James Huntley, Ben Parkinson (Lewis Miley 63), Jay Turner-Cooke, Kyle Crossley, Michael Ndiweni.

Subs not used: Piotr Banda, Nathan Robertson.