Tynedale veterans took the honours at Morpeth on Saturday in a closely fought contest that could have gone either way. Starting with only fourteen men after a late cry off from Craig Johnson the vets started reasonably well winning all their set piece play and driving around the fringes to good effect. Indeed the partnership between Angus Whitelaw, playing at prop but throwing into the line, and back row jumpers Ian Charlton and Graeme Yates won good clean ball that allowed the two scrum halves of Ian Lewis and Simon Clayton-Hibbott to release the well jelled centre partnership of Rod Wallace and captain of the day Scott Ferguson in a series of powerful runs which ended when Wallace broke through the centre and swerved over the full back to touch down for the first score, Hibbott converting.
The re-start saw a similar pattern of play with Fergus Mitchell and Colin Macdonnald adding their bulk to the attack, which ended when Morpeth were penalised for killing the ball, Hibbott kicking the penalty to move the score on to 10-0 and shortly after 13-0.
Morpeth then changed tactics and started playing the lines however excellent lineout work from Charlton saw Tynedale pinching ball and disrupting their set piece. On one such occasion flanker Nigel Wright cleaned up a loose ball and drove it up-field setting up a ruck. Prop Andy Murray arrived to clear out the Morpeth forwards and was caught by a stray boot that caused the loss of his two front teeth and a nasty split lip. Despite looking for them in the grass and toes of the Morpeth pack's boots they were not found so he trudged off to hospital toothless. One was later found stuck in the roof of his mouth and it has now been returned to its rightful position in upper front centre. The game went to uncontested scrums and with the put-in to Tynedale Lewis fed Hibbott who broke a few tackles to score himself taking the score to 20-0.
The second half saw a replacement prop courtesy of Morpeth don the vet's shirt and he was straight into the action when he fielded the kick-off. It became apparent very quickly that this chap would play at 100% for Tynedale when he set off on a bulldozing run up the touchline. He offloaded to winger Phil Oakenfold who sped away up field but as the ball was spun out Morpeth intercepted the pass to run in their first try.
After the re-start the vets discipline let them down and a series of penalties allowed Morpeth's second row over for their second try taking the score to 20-14. With the sniff of a victory the Morpeth backs ran hard at the vets defence but hard tackling and good cover kept them out, particularly from hooker Andy Purvis who found himself covering for full back John Eustace when the ball was hacked through. With two Morpeth backs in front of him he set off on route one. When he hit the first one he just picked him up and with ball in left hand and player over right shoulder carried on up field to the next one. Eustace supported and the ball was moved to the home sides 22 line. A classic catch and drive saw the try scored by pocket battleship Purvis after a little re-direction from Hibbott to close the game out 25-14.
The day ended with battle scarred "smiler" Murray arriving at the pub from the hospital sporting ten stitches in his lip and hoping that ten pints of real ale drunk through a straw would help reveal the whereabouts of the errant molar in due course. We await the results.