Unfortunately's City's cook had fallen ill during the week so Richie's wife Caroline stepped into the breach to save the day, and we were provided with an excellent pre match lunch.
Having myself, several other guests, sponsors and players to feed on the day had provided the sight of club president and county representative Tony Howe sat in the club house bar peeling bags of potatoes, carrots and turnips late into Friday evening.
One of the other guests on the day was the former Durham City and West Hartlepool prop Eddie Bell who is now Lord Mayor of Durham.
The leaden skies and continuous rain meant that the flood lights had to be used from the start of the match. Despite the terrible playing conditions both sides attempted to play some open running rugby.
Morpeth were the first to score when the ball was worked wide for the right wing to score a try in the corner. The difficult conversion kick falling just short. Durham responded with a try of their own from a driving maul, with the ball being touched down close to the posts for a simple conversion.
Morpeth kicked a penalty to re gain the lead.
Halftime 7 – 5
Due to some very good defence from both sides and handling errors becoming more frequent as the condition deteriorated there were no more tries to be scored in the second half. Morpeth added three more penalty kicks to make the final score 7 – 17.
Durham will feel a little disappointed not have salvaged a losing bonus point from this match as the score does not reflect the closeness of the match.
The officials for this match could not have had a much wider range of experience. The referee Alex Mackinder, who had a very good match, was refereeing at level six for the first time, while running touch for Durham City was former international referee John Pearson.