Bishops come in from the cold

Back in 1955, Bishop Auckland took on Ipswich in an FA Cup tie, despite the country being in the grip of a big freeze IN from the cold, recent columns have recalled Bishop Auckland's exploits in the 1950s, not least the 30 FA Cup third round replay win over Ipswich Town.

Steve Smith looked it up in his Big Book of Giant Killers, or some such. The Backtrack column turned once again to the nonpareil newspaper files.

It was Wednesday, January 12 1955.

The front page was several feet deep in trapped trains, blizzards hitting 45 counties, roads blocked in Weardale and furrowed ploughs on the A66.

The back page had a thick covering of FA Cup replays, the three inches of snow on Kingsway considered of such little consequence that the match report was 500 words old before the weather even merited a mention.

There were no snow-go areas in the 50s. Litigation was a law unto itself, a solicitor one of those women on Hartlepool docks.

The Wind in the Willows made reference to something similar. "What's a little wet to a water rat?" Steve Smith's David and Goliath compendium not only notes that Ipswich manager Scott Duncan wanted the match postponed ? "He was told that for Co Durham the conditions were positively Spring-like" - but that a ground pass was more likely to form a snowball than an attack.

The book also quotes the Auckland Chronicle (RIP) that Bob Hardisty, a positive prelate in the house of Bishops, played in "nylon pants" to keep out the cold.

"I assume, " says Steve, "that these must be similar to the black leggings in which Ryan Giggs cut such a dash at Cardiff on Sunday." Someone in the 9,000 crowd - bigger had not boys at the adjoining King James I Grammar School been confined querulously to quarters - may more vividly be able to put flesh on those particular bones.

RAF man Frank McKenna put the Northern League side ahead after ten minutes - "his delighted colleagues bore him to the ground, so hearty were their congratulations, " observed the Echo - and scored again after 80 minutes. Jack Major hit the third three minutes later.

"Auckland's success was through the ability of their forwards to take their chances, " added the Echo simply; poor Ipswich just hadn't a snowflake's.

JUST 13 miles away that same wintry, windy AWOL afternoon, another 10,500 paid £1,320 to watch Darlington's third round replay with Hartlepools United, Feethams no less frozen to the quick.

Down on the English Riviera, perhaps a little balmier, Torquay were thrashing Leeds 4-0 while the tie at Stoke started eight minutes late after Bury's coach became stuck in the snow.

Though they changed on the bus and kicked off just two minutes after arrival, the match was abandoned, apparently coincidentally, with eight minutes of extra time remaining.

"A snowstorm made visibility impossible, " said Mr J G Williams, the referee.

Fred Richardson scored twice for Hartlepool, Billy Walsh and Harry Houlahan - formerly with Newcastle and Oldham, still in his native Coundon - for Darlington.

It was the fourth time in three weeks that the neighbours had met - "Darlington and Hartlepools United cling to each other like long lost brothers, " wrote Darneton in the Echo - the fifth the following Monday before a 10,891 crowd at Ayresome Park, Middlesbrough. Another half holiday, presumably.

Victory extended Hartlepools' unbeaten league and cup run to 18 matches, a club record, and a record 17,200 in the Victoria Ground paid £2,100 to see the fourth round tie with second division Nottingham Forest.

Adults, doubtless including the youthful Mr Ron Hails, paid half a crown, boys and older lads a shilling. It finished 1-1, thanks to a penalty from our old friend John Lochinvar Newton - long in Willington, 80 next month.

The replay went to extra time, Frank Stamper equalising and Jackie Newton, poor chap, missing a penalty.

Tom Wilson, Bedlington terrier, scored Forest's late winner.

"Defeat was very much less than Pools deserved, " wrote Stranton in the following day's paper.

Probably there were six inches of snow on the ground as well; it just wasn't a consideration.

WILLIAM "Tiddly" Murray played for Bishop Auckland, too - an amateur international after World War I - before spells with Derby, Middlesbrough, Hearts and, in 1935, Dunfermline.

" We've now heard from Dave Munday, not just Dunfermline's historian and archivist but a Darlington lad - Eastbourne primary - who crossed the border in 1963.

He'd been sent the column by his mate Doug Embleton, pictured (left) with Davie and Roger Greaves (centre) on the last day of football at Feethams.

"I haven't shown it to Mr and Mrs Stephens and the weans, " he says, plaintively.

The Pars, apparently so named because a former manager replied that Dunfermline were above par compared to Cowdenbeath, are having a distinctly below average season - fighting relegation from the Scottish Premier.

"Compared to the way we've been playing, " Says Dunfermline Dave, "a Bovril and a bride are something to look forward to, recycled paper or not."

YET further north, a whimsical little note arrives from Stuart Laundy, long familiar in the Darlington and District League - Ingleton and Rockcliffe Park - but now news editor of the Orcadian.

North-East league cricket resumes tomorrow; on Orkney, where the weather's a bit more extreme, the football season kicks off.

Partly it's because winter nights can start at 3pm, partly because the pitches are forever waterlogged.

Last winter, says Stuart, was particularly stormy.

In the indoor league he plays for the Hudson Bay Company, who've just finished bottom of the league. In the great outdoors, they're hoping that the outfield may have dried by the end of May.

It was never like that at Ingleton.

JOHN Anwyll remembers the 1960s game at Feethams (Backtrack, Tuesday) in which two Darlington reserves were not only sent off for fighting one another but, so it's said, told never again to darken the Quakers' door. One was called Smith, we'd suggested, the other Duffy.

It was Jimmy Smith, says John, and not Jinking Jimmy, either - "an inside right, number eight in old money, quite aggressive and not much good.

"It was near the halfway line, attacking the park end. We never did find out what they were fighting about." He can't remember Duffy, though there was a John Duffy who made ten first team appearances in 1963. Where'd they sign him from? Dunfermline.

Backtrack Briefs...

DISAPPOINTED at the Stags' last minute equaliser last Saturday, Darlington fans were at least able to celebrate yet another win over the absurdities of train ticket pricing.

A day return to Mansfield is £50.90. By booking day returns from Darlington to York, York to Sheffield and Sheffield to Mansfield - all at Darlington station - a contingent of Quakers travelled for £34.40.

Our man in the black and white scarf admits that they play the system and is already making plans for the play-offs in Cardiff.

"We're working out how many different day returns it'll take, " he says. "At the last count it was six."

VERY late news: Dr Graeme Forster, colourful former manager of Evenwood, West Auckland and Tow Law in the Albany Northern League, rings from the pub at 11.45pm to report that he and Billy Barron - landlord of the Hamsteels Inn at Quebec, west of Durham - have won the pairs doubles in the Coors domino league.

It's the third time the Doc's called in an hour, on each occasion arousing the lady of this house from her slumbers. Coors blimey - "Tell him I'm going to kill him, " she says.

NOTHING if not consistent, our friends at the Hole in the Wall FC (president: Backtrack) have reached the final of the Darlington Invitation Trophy for the fourth successive season - and for the fourth season lost.

In 2002 they made it without winning a game, their semi-final opponents having fielded a wrong 'un, and this year repeated the feat.

A "mini-league" between the six remaining teams in the doomed Darlington and District League sent the top four into the semi-finals of another competition and the bottom two, unasked, into the Invitation final.

Grey Horse galloped home 4-1.

The same two teams met to decide bottom place in the 112th and last Darlington and District League season.

"Never have the stakes in a football match been lower, " says team secretary Alan Smith, sedulous but subdued.

Our boys were left holding the baby - and the wooden spoon - for eternity.

LAWRENCE Appleby, who combines running a fast food joint in Newcastle with being Hereford United's kit man, collapsed and was rushed to hospital at 1am last Saturday.

Doctors diagnosed exhaustion. "I'm not really surprised, " says his friend and travelling companion John Dawson, the king of the ground hoppers.

A former reserve goalkeeper at Hereford, Lawrence frequently works until the early hours, grabs a few hours sleep and is on the road before dawn to be at the match by 11 - and that's just home games.

John Dawson's sympathetic. "We all hope it'll serve as a warning.

He's very meticulous about the kit man's job but there's a limit to how much you can live in the fast lane." After a couple of days in hospital, Lawrence is now doing fine.

SUNDERLAND'S kit man is full time, of course.

Former England youth international John Cooke scored five times in 48 red and white starts between 1980-85, returning to Wearside in 1993 after a career which embraced Sheffield Wednesday, Chesterfield, Stockport County and Spennymoor.

Sunderland fan Pete Sixsmith in Shildon recalls that Cooke, who'll be 43 on Monday, was one of three Chesterfield players sent off by "Preston strangler" Jim Parker in the infamous FA Cup tie at Darlington (Backtrack, Tuesday. ) Pete appears for the defence. "John Cooke was an absolute gentleman on and off the field. It must have been one of those rare examples of Mr Parker over-reacting."

And finally...

THE only man to play in six post-war FA Cup finals (Backtrack, April 19) is Roy Keane - presumably about to make it seven.

Bob Foster in Ferryhill today invites readers to name the player who has been substituted the most times in the Premiership.

We're back on the bench on Tuesday.

Published: 22/04/2005