ALL good things come to an end - now Ealing must show they have the true pedigree of potential champions by showing how well they recover from setbacks.

For once, the green and whites were not at their best and their magnificent start to the season came to a halt against a determined east London side at Goresbrook.

There were no excuses from Mike Cudmore, the director of rugby.

“We did not play well and they did,” he said. “We only threatened them at the start and end of the game and had poor control in between.”

Defeat looked far from inevitable at the start, as early points left Ealing looking on course to make it 10 wins from 10 games.

Neil Hallett landed a penalty after only two minutes and flanker Karl Gibson crashed over from a driving maul three minutes later, which Hallett converted to make it 8-0.

With a strong wind behind him, Ben Ward was happy to pin Barking back in their own 22 with some well-judged kicks to touch and the forwards looked in charge as hooker Dinos Alexopoulos snuck over for the second try of the game.

Hallett's successful kick made it 15-0 to the visitors and all looked rosy.

But Ealing were guilty of giving away too many penalties throughout and their ill-discipline gave Barking a route back into the game - home flanker Liam Dwyer breaking through to score Barking’s first points of the game.

A penalty in the first move of the second half again had the Ealing Trailfinders side defending their try-line and after some patience in possession, fly-half Chris Ashwin danced his way to the try-line.

Ealing’s vulnerability grew even more when replacement back-row forward Liam Perkins was sin-binned for coming in at the side of a driving maul and Barking flanker Sam Reynolds made the most of his side‚Äôs numerical advantage when he caught the ball from the line-out and sprinted 20m to score.

Ashwin’s conversion gave the home side the lead for the first time (19-15) and a further Ashwin penalty for illegal entry at the ruck meant that Ealing had to score a converted try to draw level with their opponents.

Replacement winger Owen Bruynseels did manage to use all his power and strength to close the gap on the home side with Ealing's third try of the game, but crucially, Hallett's conversion was unsuccessful.