PICTURE: Taken after the players had been taken off the pitch and the game abandoned.

Morpeth Town chairman Ken Beattie has expressed his disappointment on behalf of the club’s supporters after the abandoned game at Sunderland RCA on Tuesday night.

With the Highwaymen leading 2-0 in the early exchanges of the second half, courtesy of Mark Davison’s 16th minute goal and an own goal just before the break, the officials took the decision to first delay the game for 20 minutes, due to fog, before eventually abandoning the contest.

Despite assessing conditions and starting the game, as well as allowing the second half to begin, the officials concluded that the game couldn’t continue. This decision was essentially taken by one of the assistant referees who told the referee – seemingly happy to continue himself – that he, inexplicably, couldn’t see to make the decisions on his side of the pitch.

“I’m very disappointed for the fans,” Beattie told the club website.

“We had an excellent turnout on a difficult, cold late September night. I’m so disappointed they have made this journey to support us and been short changed.”

Beattie went on to describe the decision as “illogical”, especially when considering that three other games in the area – Consett vs Ryhope, Thornaby vs Ryton and Crawcrook and Whitley Bay vs Billingham – were all played to a finale in similar, arguably worse, conditions than those presented at Meadow Park.

“The decision is illogical. Both sides agreed the game was playable from the start,” he continued.

“The referee agreed the game was playable from the start. Although it was difficult to see we managed fine in the first half. Then having gone 2-0 up, the teams came out for the second half and without warning, the assistant referee – despite the conditions improving considerably and those in the ground would acknowledge that – suddenly flagged to say he couldn’t see, stating that conditions had worsened when clearly they had not, giving the referee no option but to abandon the match despite what he may have felt personally.

“That is illogical when you consider the facts. They (the conditions) were improving the whole time. They had considerably improved at the time when he said he couldn’t see.

“If he couldn’t see then why could we see in the first half; we had no complaints in the first half.”

No new date has been set for the replay of the fixture.