The match was preceeded by a minute's silence for the club's late Honorary President, Roy Tait, who sadly passed away on the morning of the match.

However, the current crop of Reds - led by Garry Cockburn - did Tait proud and took the match to their visitors in the opening stages.

A powerful forwards move saw the Reds pile over, and it was skipper Cockburn who emerged with the ball to claim his fifth try of the season.

Nick Bell's conversion was wide in difficult conditions, but the Reds had made the perfect start at 5-0.

In driving wind, the match was dominated by the referee's whistle as both sides struggled to string together any continuity.

The hosts were guilty of infringing at the breakdown on a number of occasions and soon felt the wrath of the referee, as he sent prop Phill Smith to the sin-bin.

Livingston dominated the rest of the half, with their big pack winning good ball at the breakdown despite the work of Champion and Spence, and the imperious Mike Legget.

Although down to 14 men, the Reds' defence held firm for the remainder of the half and they turned to play into the wind with a slender advantage.

HALF-TIME: Haddington 5-0 Livingston

If the hosts started the first half in perfect fashion, their start to the second stanza could not have been any worse.

The visitors scored twice inside the first 10 minutes of the resumption to put themselves in front.

The first came from a well-crafted overlap that exploited a gap in the Haddington defence, while the second came off the back of a well-won lineout.

Playing into the wind, and 12-5 down, the Reds had it all to do.

However, the squad never gave in and got their reward on the hour when James Ferguson broke clear from a great offload by Euan Herkes, and the young full-back fed replacement winger Alex McCutcheon who sped clear to score.

They struck again moments later, as a break by Ferguson and quickly recycled ruck ball allowed Legget - who had a magnificent afternoon in the second row - to race clear and score underneath the posts.

At this point, the match looked like it was there for the taking and the Reds might have been sensing a bonus point.

Any thoughts of that were put to one side when the visitors scored again, to level the game and set up a tense finale.

However, victory was assured when Herkes broke the line and brilliantly stepped the covering full-back to score and allow Bell the easiest of conversions to seal the deal.

FULL-TIME: Haddington 24-17 Livingston