DAN Miller will be a marked man if the two Darlington clubs meet again in the Durham Cup this season.

While there is no video evidence that the Darlington prop inflicted Richard Arnold's nasty facial injury in last Saturday's derby, he is the one getting the blame.

Miller was sin-binned after the 20th minute incident on the intervention of a touch judge who was 50 yards away, while Arnold trudged off to have more than 20 stitches around an eye.

Despite the clubs again going through the motions of amalgamation talks at the start of this season, incidents keep cropping up which knock back attempts at bridge building.

One option is for Darlington to suspend Miller to take the heat out of the situation, but he hasn't been found guilty of anything, nor is he likely to be.

Both clubs videoed the match, but the Mowden cameraman followed the referee, who at the time of the incident was running to the posts to award Darlington a penalty try, which he later ruled out. The home video is inconclusive, partly because of the difficulty of operating the camera in the gale.

Darlington will visit Mowden in the cup semi-final, probably on a midweek date in mid-April, assuming both clubs win their first round ties.

That will not be a foregone conclusion for Darlington, who are sending a weakened team to play last year's beaten finalists Westoe tomorrow, while Mowden's match at Stockton looks likely to be on April 7.

It could be Mowden's turn to experience a warm reception when they visit Liverpool St Helens for their rearranged National Three North match tomorrow.

The Merseysiders were not happy when Mowden were unable to travel four weeks ago because six of their players couldn't get into town to catch the team bus because of snow.

Liverpool need a win to keep their survival hopes alive and their opponents will have Tony Irwin as well as Arnold missing from the back row.

Irwin injured a shoulder early in last week's match and it was a turning point when he retired early in the second half. He will be out for at least two weeks.

There are also slight doubts about front row men Danny Brown (hamstring), Tasi Tuhana (ankle) and Dave Sinclair (flu). But Mowden will travel come hell or high water.

They hope to include both their Tongans, with Kelekolio Paino slotting into the second row to allow Jon Dye to switch to blind side.

Paino apparently conducted his own fitness test last Saturday morning and ruled himself out, but then shocked the Mowden management by announcing that Suka Hufanga was fit.

Hufanga, who had been troubled by a hamstring problem since arriving from Pertemps Bees, scored Mowden's try but there is still a question mark over his fitness.

Blaydon will field a full-strength pack at home to West Hartlepool in their Durham Cup semi-final, and also hope to have centre Peter Kilburn back.

West have several injury doubts, while fly half and goal-kicker David Tighe has gone to Paris for the international and Tim Sawyer is away with the England Deaf XV.

It could be the last match of the season for Andrew Davies if his disciplinary hearing goes against him on Monday.

He was sent off at Westoe last month, but the hearing has been delayed by his request that the Northampton-based referee should be present.

Davies was involved in an altercation with the Westoe touch judge, and after being sent off several times in his career he could face a lengthy ban.

Stockton have a friendly away to Otley seconds and following injuries to centres Mattie Oates and Graham Kell they bring in Paul Underwood and Dan Taylor. With Alan Brown still absent, they give a chance in the back row to Nick Atkinson, who is back in action after a knee injury kept him out for 18 months.