Healthy rivalry in South Wales has seen two competing papers getting very close to the same story.

Readers of the Neath Guardian and the Swansea-based South Wales Evening Post may have noticed two versions of a tragic story describing tributes to two pensioners who lost their lives in a car crash.

Word on the grapevine suggests that the family spoke to just one of the publications, and handed over the only photo to its reporter.

Celtic Newspapers’ Guardian ran with the quotes:

And a picture:

Northcliffe’s Evening Post, meanwhile, carried the following quotes:

And managed to dig up this picture:

The accident itself happened on February 25.

The Guardian carried the tribute story (below) a week later.

And then the Evening Post ran its own tribute story (bottom) just hours after that…

Neath Guardian: 4/3/04 (am)

South Wales Evening Post: 4/3/04 (pm)