Hard-earned victory for Morpeth rugby at Durham

Considering the week's appalling weather it was a fine spring afternoon as the teams made their way out onto the heavy but impressive Hollow Drift ground.

City started the brighter, and with recycled ball and retaining possession they involved both forward and backs that resulted in a converted try on five minutes. 7-0.

Morpeth were struggling to get a foothold in the game, but on 30 minutes they got on the scoreboard thanks to a fine 40m penalty by centre McKay for 7-3.

Then on 35 minutes Morpeth took the lead with a slightly fortuitous try assisted by another Telford break. The ball eventually fell to McKay who kicked through and just won the race to touch down, inches within the dead ball area. An excellent conversion followed for 7-10.

The final minutes of the half saw Morpeth desperately defending before City got their just reward with penalty to make the scores level, 10-10 at halftime.

The second half began with an excellent Morpeth score. Good ball retention with scrum half Elliott sniping, as they went through the phases before releasing McKay again, to score wide out for 7-15.

With the lineout beginning to function Morpeth turned up the pressure, and although McKay missed an opportunity he was back on the money on 50 minutes with a converted penalty to make the score 10-18.

Yet the home side were never out of the contest and applied further pressure resulting in a converted penalty to reduce the deficit to 13-18.

Moving into the final 15 minutes the match could have gone either way but Morpeth just about had the edge to hold out for a hard fought victory.

Another good win for Morpeth consolidating sixth place in the league. It really was a team performance. The scrum worked well with Moody, Grieves and Gavaghan to the fore. Telford and McKay stood out in the backs with skipper Elliott as combatant as ever.

Scoop’s’ Men of the match,’ The backroom staff of coaches and to all those who regularly support..