COLIN Richardson, among the most successful North-East football managers of modern times, has died. He was 71, led both Whickham and Bridlington to FA Vase success at Wembley and never, ever, forgot the thrill of it.

“I still say to people that all that standing around on cold football grounds, all the knockbacks, are worth it for that one moment of leading your side out at Wembley,” he once said.

Usually known as Rico – and unmistakeably curly permed – he played Northern League football in the 1960s and 1970s, best remembered for 10 years as part of a highly successful Spennymoor United side but also at Ferryhill Athletic and Willington.

They were the days of the shamateurs. The £9 a week he earned at Ferryhill, he once said, was almost twice what he brought home from the factory.

“A personable extrovert,” said the 1981 FA Vase final programme, adroitly adding that the volume of his encouragement said much for the state of his vocal chords.

He’d last featured hereabouts in 2010-11, after being struck by the flesh-eating disease necrotising fasciitis, undergoing two complete blood transfusions and several operations within ten days.

“He’s a bit dog eared,” said his brother Tom, memorably, at the time.

Colin was born and raised at Fencehouses, near Houghton-le-Spring, captained the Chester-le-Street boys side that included Norman Hunter and Alan Suddick, joined West Bromwich Albion as a 15-year-old and spent four years at The Hawthorns without making the first team.

Instead he became one of the Northern League’s best players and toughest opponents, a man who left his mark but who always reckoned he’d met his match in the late Doug Raine, of Stanley United.

“Doug was the hardest man I ever saw on a football field, him and Cyril Gowland. I could look after myself, no doubt, but those guys didn’t kick you from behind, they looked you in the eye when they kicked you. Lovely lad, Dougie.”

Whickham, a Tyneside club in the Wearside League, had been unfancied in the Vase. Two down in the final, they came back to win 3-2, the extra-time winner coming from big Billy Cawthra, formerly with Fort Lauderdale. Five thousand welcomed them back.

Colin and many of his players then joined Newcastle Blue Star, where the team won 29 trophies in nine seasons and in 1984 became the last Wearside League club to reach the FA Cup first round, losing 2-0 to York City.

He led North Shields to promotion, commuted to Bridlington from his day job as a sewing machine mechanic – “the day I find it a long journey to a football match is the day I’ll give up” – managed Spennymoor, Ferryhill and had two spells with Gateshead. Backtrack had caught up with him at the International Stadium in 2006 – the curls gone, the enthusiasm undimmed and Colin unhappy about the state of North-East football.

“We just aren’t good enough at every level. One of the most ridiculous things is all these big club academies, the biggest waste of time and money I’ve ever known in football.

“When you had youth teams, you’d expect five out of ten to make it through to the reserves at least. Now it might be one in 60 and we’re not getting the players from professional football.

“Newcastle United send us 18-year-olds who couldn’t kick my backside. The closest they come to intensity is when they run into one another.”

In recent years he’d been scouting, latterly back with West Brom. “One of the most successful managers not just in North-East non-league football but throughout the country,” says fellow scout Tommy Miller.

Understandably, inarguably, Tom Richardson agrees. “Colin’s knowledge of football was matched only by his enthusiasm for it. No one could hold a candle to our Colin.”

Funeral details have yet to be confirmed, but it’s likely that it’ll all be back in Fencehouses.

Ali Dia’s arrival at Gateshead may not have been Rico’s finest hour. “It was like having a front seat at a Mr Bean convention,” recalled celebrated Tyneside journalist John Gibson, then the Conference club’s chairman.

Dia, notoriously, had been signed in 1996 by Southampton manager Graeme Souness after a hoax recommendation from someone claiming to be George Weah, a Liberian who’d been FIFA’s world player of the year.

Given a place on the bench after just one five-a-side game, Dia – a student at Northumbria University in Newcastle – was called into action after Matthew le Tissier was injured on 32 minutes.

“He was probably the worst player I ever played with,” said Le Tissier later. “He was running round like Bambi on ice. It made the manager look very, very silly.”

Himself subbed after 85 minutes, Dia never again showed his face at Southampton – but turned up at Gateshead, scoring on his debut against bottom-of-the-table Bath City.

“I wouldn’t believe everything you read in the papers. Football is all about opinions and mine is that he’s very good,” said Colin.

Dia played a further seven matches, scored just once and after former Boro goalkeeper Jim Platt replaced Richardson as manager was again named as a sub and, in turn, subbed. It all seemed very familiar. He never played again.

The book We Just Love Football recalls that Billy Cawthra’s dad was Wembley-bound in 1981 when he fell into conversation on the train with fellow Geordie Brian Johnson.

Cawthra senior asked the younger man what he did for a living. Johnson said he sang with a group called AC/DC, of whom Billy’s dad had never heard.

“Any good, like?”

“Not bad,” said Johnson, with proper modesty.

Billy’s dad asked if they’d ever played Coxlodge Club in Gosforth and was told that, no, they hadn’t.

“Why ye canna be that good,” he said, “not if ye’ve never played Coxlodge Club.”

Back in 2010, Dr Neil Phillips emailed about his near-600 page autobiography. That it was self-published was, he said, “a sign of the low measure of my celebrity status.”

Doc Phillips was being modest. A Redcar GP, he was England’s team doctor throughout Sir Alf Ramsey’s tenure and at Middlesbrough between 1964-77 combined the roles of club doctor, director in charge of football and vice-chairman.

A Welshman, he’d been a wicket keeper on Glamorgan’s books. A promising rugby career was ended by injury at 17.

Now Dr Phillips has also died, aged 84. He’d long since moved to Worcestershire. Ray Robertson, his friend from Ayresome Park days, sends a copy of the book – particularly illuminating, says Ray, on Jack Charlton’s time at the Boro.

There’s too much to digest in a couple of days. More on Neil Phillips, Jack Charlton and the truth about the Bogota bracelet when the column returns in a fortnight.