Percy Park 24 - 5 Durham City
Durham City travelled to Preston Avenue on the back of 3 consecutive league wins and had won convincingly 55 - 0 in the earlier encounter between the sides at Hollowdrift.
The early signs for the home supporters were good with an evenly contested game which remained scoreless for the first 25 minutes.
It was City who drew first blood with a try by Darren McKinnon finishing off a well executed line out which was driven to the Park line. The visitors were able to field an almost unchanged side from the previous encounter whereas Percy Park made no fewer than 8 changes with 5 of them being in the pack.
The home side struck next with after a period of sustained pressure on the City line. Park were awarded a scrum inside the Durham 22, and the recent changes to the forward pack meant greater stability to the scrumage. The ball was picked up at the base of the scrum by Brett Sylph who off loaded to scrum half Baldwin feeding David Griffiths who crashed over to score under the posts. Without the usual goal kicker Marcus Rutter, who was out following a tonsillectomy ( admitting later that it was more painful than the fractured skull he sustained last season) No 8 Brett Sylph stood up to take the conversion to make the score 7 - 5.
Park continued to pressurize the Durham line and when another try seemed likely an interception was taken by centre Atkinson who ran almost the full length of the pitch only to be stopped yards short by a try saving tackle by James Walton. It was City's turn to put pressure on the home side but a bizarre minute saw the visitors press the self destruct button with a complete lack of discipline, firstly giving away a penalty for dissent then being marched back several times by referee Andy McDonough for repeated back chat. The game was stopped; the referee spoke to Durham lock Kevin Showler before producing a yellow card. As he walked off he obviously said something else to the referee who produced a red card and ordered him from the field shortly before half time.
After the break, with wind advantage Park stretched their lead with a Sylph penalty, and although the home side had a man advantage the City defense remained resolute, but were unable to put any great pressure on Percy Park kicking away much of their hard won possession. With 5 minutes plus injury time to go the visitors decided to chase the game and run from their own 22, but Liam Blackburn capitalized on a loose pass and took the interception to score under the post. Brett Sylph converted to make the score 17 -5.
Durham now threw caution to the wind, and after another spell in their own 22 again decided to attack, but No8 Howard Johnson's chip kick over the Park defensive line was picked up by Mark Walton who intercepted the kick to control the ball and scurry over the line in injury time to score a try which Sylph again converted.
The final score was 24 - 5 to Percy Park to break the run of defeats in the league. With no 1ST XV game next week everyone will be looking forward to the Boxing Day encounter against Whitley Bay Rockcliff, and hope this new found confidence can be taken into the derby game and on into the New Year.