The Wildcats opened the scoring and went into the break level, but were put to the sword by a rampant second half performance

Durham were heavily beaten by top five chasing rivals Everton Ladies 6-1 at home.

The Wildcats had opened the scoring and had gone into half-time with level, but fell apart in the second half and conceded a further five goals as the Blue Girls ran rampant.

The home side had taken the lead as early as the second minute, Nicki Gears scoring in her second consecutive league game, Jordan Atkinson worked the ball down the right-hand side and the striker nipped in ahead of the defence and putting enough on the ball for the goalkeeper not to keep it out, but were pegged back nine minutes later after Kelly Jones had equalised.

But the floodgates opened in the second half, as Everton skipper Michelle Hinnigan and Jones took it in turn to score.

Hinnigan volleyed home not long after the restart and Jones got her second of the game shortly afterwards before the skipper doubled her tally before the hour mark after a cross into the box went straight in.

As a contest the game was over, but there was still late drama as the Blue Girls scored twice more in second half injury time.

Substitute Chantelle Boye-Hlorkah notched from close range before Danielle Turner scored direct from a corner to add further misery for the Wildcats.

Goalscorer Gears doesn’t want to rest on her laurels after the performance and is already looking forward to the next.

She said: “We played a good first half and created a number of scoring opportunities.

“We stayed compact defensively and even though Everton looked threatening going forward we managed to keep them to just one goal.

“We were definitely pleased with the score at half-time.

“Our second half performance wasn’t good enough to compete with Everton on the day and they punished us for that.

“We’ve had a run of good results and good performances so we don’t want to let this game affect us too much.

“Everton were probably disappointed with their first half performance as they created lots of chances to take the lead.

“They came out fighting in the second half and were clinical with their chances unlike the first half.

“They continued to grow in confidence as the game went on and were the better team for the second 45.”