Rugby
Barnard Castle……………….. 3
Horden & Peterlee…………. 39
Once again Barney were without a few injured and unavailable regulars as they took to the field. The opposition were Horden and Peterlee, who had been newly relegated from the league above.
Traditionally, Horden have tended to be reliant on a heavyweight pack to drive them forward, but they soon demonstrated they have added some excellent young backs into the mix, delivering an impressive all-round performance.
The visitors fired a warning shot during the early exchanges, when slick handling saw their speedy left-winger making good yards.
An infringement by Castle gave Horden the opportunity to slot an early penalty for a 0-3 lead. They soon doubled their advantage with another well-taken penalty kick.
The visitors’ opening try followed shortly afterwards when a deft chip through by their fly-half saw the ball cleanly gathered and touched down in the top left-hand corner. With the difficult conversion added,Horden moved into a 0-13 lead.
Castle came to life as the half time interval approached, but promising moves had the habit of breaking down through mistimed passes and poor handling.
Finally, a promising chip-through by Rees Doyle resulted in a trip, a yellow card and a penalty to Castle, which James Barber converted to take the score to 3-13.
Another promising move by Barney, initiated by Sam Watson, once again broke down as once again the final pass went astray.
On the stroke of half-time, however, Horden extended their lead with an excellent try to go into the break with a 3-18 lead.
Barney began the second half brightly, but another excellent kick by the Horden fly-half resulted in a 50/22 and gave them the advantage at the lineout.
The ensuing catch and drive saw Horden rumble towards the Castle line, before they offloaded to their backs to run-in the try. The conversion saw Horden’s lead extend to 3-25.
By now the visitors were playing with real fluidity and confidence and then a yellow card saw Barney reduced to 14 players for ten minutes, during which time Horden added to their tally of tries, which were duly converted to leave the final score at 3-39 to the visitors.
This was probably Castle’s poorest display of the season, but taking nothing away from Horden who, most Barney spectators felt, were the most impressive opponents to visit the Demesnes so far this season.
Barney’s man of the match was flanker Ben Parker who again delivered an impressive and combative performance. Thanks go to match sponsor Percy World Ltd.
Next week Barney travel to Seaham and will hope to have players back from injury to help their cause.
Nick Raper
![A COUNTY councillor is backing a campaign to get a pedestrian crossing in Staindrop. Frustrated parish councillors in the village summoned their county council representative Cllr George Richardson to their latest meeting to discuss several issues, including the call for a safe way to cross the A688. Earlier this year their request for a crossing was turned down by the county council’s highways officers. Parish council chairman Jonothan Raper described the reasons for the refusal as “spurious” and called on Cllr Richardson to support their campaign. He added: “One of the arguments they made was there is no clear line of desire when they studied the village – well this isn’t a clear line of desire because there isn’t a crossing, people cross whenever they can. “When the lollipop person was there, one of the things I noticed was people would walk all the way down to the lollipop person to cross the road to go to the shop or to go to the school.” He added a problem of parking at the primary school is exacerbated because people are too afraid to walk their children across the road. Cllr Richardson said he had supported previous attempts for a crossing point with the first being made about 15 years ago. He added: “We went fairly well down the road with that and they looked into it. The only recommended place was where the bus stop is and to get the visibility splays, people on the other side of the road would lose their parking. “That didn’t go down well so it just died a death.” Cllr Raper said he suspected the real reason for the officers’ refusal was the cost of installing a crossing. He added that much of the cost could be recovered from savings made on not having to employ a lollipop patrol. Cllr Raper said: “A lollipop person only provides a benefit of crossing for three hours of the day. You are getting 21 extra hours of crossing time [with a pedestrian crossing].” Cllr Richardson said he would raise the issue with the county council’s cabinet member for highways, Cllr John Shuttleworth.](https://teesdalemercury.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/12/georgeR-120x86.jpg)
