A CROOKED football fan's prayers were answered yesterday - when he was given the chance to watch the biggest match in his team's history.

But Darren Russell - who has convictions for 158 offences over 22 years - was warned by Judge John Walford not to use a stolen car to reach Cardiff's Millennium Stadium for Hartlepool United's League One play-off final.

Teesside Crown Court was told that Russell, who was facing a possible jail sentence, was desperate to see the crunch match against Sheffield Wednesday at Cardiff a week on Sunday.

Judge Walford, himself a Middlesbrough fan, deferred sentence for six months after Russell, who now has a job as a jig welder, pleaded guilty to handling a stolen £9,000 Peugeot 307 estate car.

He told him: "Presumably, if you're in work and earning decent money you don't need to thieve as you continue supporting the Pool.

"We have all been heartened by the glory that the football club have brought to Hartlepool this week, but there is another side - and the trouble is that it's this side of Hartlepool that lets down the glorious side of Hartlepool.

"The trip to Cardiff will certainly be worthwhile as long as it's not in a stolen Peugeot."

Hartlepool made it through to the play-off final - and the chance of promotion to the Championship for the first time in its history - after beating Tranmere in a tense penalty shoot-out on Tuesday night.

The court heard how the car, with false registration plates, was found outside Russell's home in Hartlepool, on August 10, while he was in prison serving a two-and-a-half year sentence.

The 32-year-old, who handed himself in on his release, said he bought the Peugeot for £300 two years ago after it was stolen from the garage forecourt of SG Petch, in South Church, Bishop Auckland, County Durham.

He told police: "I knew it was doubled up, which means that the number plates put on it were from the same kind of car so it does not get detected by the police because it's stolen."

The car was originally X-registration but it was found with V-registration plates taken from a similar model on a Sainsburys' car park, said Stephen Constantine, prosecuting.

Paul Cleasby, mitigating, said that Russell, of Selby Grove, Hartlepool, now had a job and did not want to miss the chance of going to Cardiff to cheer on Hartlepool United.

Russell was granted bail after the judge deferred sentence for six months.

The judge said: "If, in six months' time, you have still got the job and you have committed no further offences, then I will say well done, and it will be a community order of some sort, whichever seems appropriate at the time."