County Ground

King's Cross is buzzing - elderly couples in beige and taupe are waiting for the steam excursion to York whilst more colourful young trendies and luvvies await their train to take them to the fringe at Edinburgh.

As I scan the departure board to check all is well on the route, I bump into London-based Quaker Steve Wilkinson on the concourse. We used to see Steve quite regularly on our trips to games but in recent seasons he seemed to have lost his mojo.

However the thrill of the conference has obviously tempted him out of the woodwork for our opener against Newport County - not that he is anything but his usual cynical self in respect to our chances this season.

I pop off over the road to Da Vinci for breakfast - Martin is already ensconced - and I tuck into the first official fry-up of the season. As good as ever though the waitress has obviously still not been to her "Smile Nicely At The Customers" training course - she's never impressed when Martin orders "just a tea".

(left) Hmmm, I see they do them in DAFTS-sized packs now

The journey is uneventful - the only excitement is when I get a glimpse of the Darlington-built Tornado pulling the excursion to York - and we arrive on time at Bank Top.

The town centre is very busy today as there's an international market in town - there is a stall with giant sacks of pork scratchings but I resist the temptation and go straight to the Quaker.

Most of the gang are already there - Tony and Ray Waters, Trevor R, John W and John B - and I peruse the choice at the bar: Titanic White Star, Kelham Island Red Corvette, Derwent Brewery Late Summer, Mordue Pale Ale, Idle Brewery Idle Bodger, Captain Cook Slipway, Elgoods Cambridge Bitter, Blindmans Icarus and Jarrow Rivet Catcher.

Brian and Colin join us after a while and Tony passes out season tickets to some and match tickets to others whilst we discuss future away days. Wrexham away is one fixture no one seems keen on so alternative trips are on the cards that day with York and Sheffield looking more tempting.

We pop up to Number Twenty-2 in dribs and drabs - in addition to the usual suspects there are some good guest beers on today - Dark Star Hophead, Taylors Ram Tam and Goose Eye Over and Stout in particular catch the eye.

It isn't often that you see Ram Tam these days so I tuck into a couple of pints before moving onto the Goose Eye which seems to be a semi-regular here and deservedly so as it is has all you want in a stout.

We're joined by our old chum Doug Embleton who has brought along Mission Impossible editor, Steve Harland, who is now involved with the Redcar Bears speedway team. They're currently bottom of their division - must be just like watching Darlo.

(right) Brian points out a typo

Down at the ground, we find that the club has underestimated the number of programmes and they've all sold out. To his delight, Brian finds a poster of the programme cover showing a glaring grammatical error. He gets his excitement where he can these days...

Now that we're in the Conference I've been able to get a licence to take photos and as such will be helping out the club's new PR team with action shots for the programme. I've just got the one camera with me today but it's nice to be back out on the touchline and closer to the action. It probably means it is also a little less sweary at the back of block 11.

Although the team is mainly made up of new players, there are a few notable returnees - Sam Russell, Liam Hatch, Tommy Wright and Richard Offiong.

And it only takes Hatch - sponsored by the Capital Quakers - a few minutes to reaffirm his popularity with the fans as he heads Darlo into an early lead following a cross from Paul Arnison. Hopefully it's not a case of PTE (Peaking Too Early).

Darlo continued to apply pressure on County but fail to add to the lead - gradually the Welsh outfit start to get a rhythm going and look less shaky than they did but it remains one-nil at the break.

In the second half, it's a slightly different state of affairs as Newport are proving to be a very decent side - let's not forget they won the Conference South by 28 points and are certainly no slouches - they more or less constantly harry our defence who are only just managing to repel most of their forays.

When County do break through, Sam Russell - sponsored by this very blog - pulls off some wonderful saves and prevents Newport from scoring what we fear must be an inevitable equaliser.

(left) Sam points the way home for Newport County

Darlo fail to make much headway in reply - subs Tommy Wright, Chris Moore and Michael Smith are brought on to bolster our attack but make little impact.

The ref blows the final whistle to the collective relief of the Darlo faithful and the matchday sponsors adjudge Hatch to be the man of the match. He played very well but the majority of those in attendance would give it to Russell.

It's not an emphatic win but it is three points we would have given away last season and it offers an element of cautious optimism...