Mowden turn to Taylor

9:11am Tuesday 3rd June 2008

DARLINGTON Mowden Park have signed former Barbarians and Harrogate lock Peter Taylor as their head coach.

gHe comes very highly recommended and wefre delighted to have him,h said chairman John Widdall. gPromotion to National Two is still our prime objective.h Mowden lost their promotion play-off by one point at Cinderford at the end of last season and have since lost several players following the break-up of their coaching team.

It was believed that club secretary Kevin Robinson was to take the head coachfs role, but he will be part of a team overseen by Taylor, who is based at RAF Leeming.

Taylor won 21 caps for the RAF and played twice for the Barbarians and for the Combined Services against Canada and Argentina. He was also in the Yorkshire team which won the County Championship in 1994 and 2000.

Since ending his playing career with Harrogate in 2005 he has had a stint as senior coach at Bedford Athletic and has been the RAF forwards coach.

Mowden have signed Scotland Under 20s scrum half Robert Green, while local forwards Danny Brown, Dan Miller and Luke Monument have pledged to stay, along with fly half Jon Benson.

Martin Lithgo is to return after spending last season on loan at Westoe.

Widdall is also hopeful that development of the new ground at West Park will start in September and be ready for use a year later.

The dispute with NEDL has been resolved after they agreed to put the power lines underground at their own expense.

Northumberland, led by Blaydonfs Dave Guthrie, claimed the County Championship Shield by scoring four well-taken tries to beat Cornwall 25-11 at Twickenham.

The Tynedale trio of Jack Smales, Gavin Beasley and Andrew Murray, plus Morpeth winger Peter Cole, all touched down, with Beasley adding a penalty and conversion.