It was a day like no other for Durham in their final County game at Nuneaton as they went down by 44- 30 in a hard fought encounter with Warwickshire, who had been favoured by the draw for this was their third home tie having played Cumbria and Northumberland on the same ground on the last two Saturdays.

The game was to be marred for Durham with the unfortunate dismissal of flanker Martin Howe on his 35th appearance in a Maroon jersey.

Durham started well enough taking a lead after three minutes with a well struck Andrew Turner (Horden) penalty and minutes late Mowden's scrum half Andrew Foreman made a sensational 70 yard break before an excellent cover tackle brought him down. However the resulting ruck saw Martin Howe (Darlington) pick up from the scrum to feed Foreman who touched down for Turner to augment.

Warwickshire utilised a very effective rucking and mauling to hammer the Durham defence who stood up well but the Durham defence finally conceded just minutes before the half when in a 3 minute spell the home side effectively won the match.

Warwickshire scored a try through No 8 Simkiss , who was described as "Unattached" in the programme, and as Nuneaton scrum half Stoika prepared to convert the kick, an incident occurred between Simikiss and Durham No. 7 Howe which resulted in Howe being red-carded. Stoika's kick was successful but from the penalty restart Warwickshire scored wide out through Nuneaton's full back Peacock and then a minute later Earlsdon centre Steve Clark touched down, Durham 10-0 lead was now a 17-10 deficit but Turner reduced the arrears before Peacock added a further try try to make it 22-13 at the break.

Turner again reduced the deficit but as the second half wore on the numerical superiority told and Warwickshire were able to run in further tries from fly half Glacken (Nuneaton) which Stoika converted and two from Murphy (Leamington) to build up a 39-16 lead.

Durham never gave up throughout the half and were well rewarded when Durham City winger Toru Higuchi received the ball wide out to score for Turner to convert and though Peacock was again on target with another try, the City winger brought his side to within two scores of the home side when he brilliantly intercepted to race over and score for Turner to convert.

Although this brought the visitors to within two scores of a draw it was not to be and Referee Trevor Fisher brought matters to a halt with the final whistle and the score at 44 -30 to Warwickshire to give them a seeding for next season around No 8 and Durham at 12 in the Championship.