Bishop Auckland 2 Hebburn 3 - the south Tyneside club's best result for a decade and now unforgettable for different, more poignant, reasons entirely.

Last Wednesday's Durham Challenge Cup tie had been over 20 minutes when triumphant team manager Tony Robinson was told that his 100-year-old grandfather - a lifelong supporter who really did move Hebburn and earth - had died.

Jimmy Robinson's passing was timed at 9.15pm - the precise moment that David Baxter's last- minute penalty gave the Albany Northern League second division strugglers victory over a side three divisions higher in the pyramid. Hebburn had won just once previously all season.

"It was quite uncanny, really. Tony was naturally very sad, but his grandad could hardly have timed it better," says Hebburn secretary Tom Derrick.

The match was at Spennymoor United's ground, also the venue for Hebburn's 1992 Durham Challenge Cup final when Jimmy became so upset at the opposing manager running up and down the touchline that he ran up and down alongside him.

"The ref was going to have him thrown out of the ground," recalled Billy Robinson, Jimmy's 72-year-old son, on his dad's 100th birthday.

"When he realised he was 89, the ref bought him a pint and apologised."

Hebburn committee member Alan Armstrong recalls another 1990s game, against Durham City, in which the referee sent off Hebburn's Kevin Caizley, the former Newcastle United midfielder, for a relatively mild expletive.

"The referee was in tears of laughter after the game, recounting how he'd been confronted by two gentlemen over 90 years old, threatening him with their walking sticks."

Jimmy's funeral is today. "No question," says Tom Derrick, "the old lad would have died very happy."

Five divisions, insofar as football's jerry-built pyramid can be fathomed, separate Whitby Town from their neighbours at Fishburn Park.

Town were third in the Unibond Premier League - in which Bishop Auckland also play - Park second in the Teesside League. They were paired, also last Wednesday, in the North Riding Senior Cup - the first time since the seaside minnows' formation in 1947 that the teams had met competitively.

The weather - "a typical North Sea gale" observed the Whitby Gazette subsequently - may have been similar to that before Fishburn's first ever game, when the changing room took flight and was never seen again.

The crowd was 441, much the highest of the season. That the score was goalless after extra time - "nil-nil each" as the public address man put it - was due in large part to the weighty contribution of Fishburn Park goalkeeper Carl Scales.

Whitby won shortly before bedtime with the shoot-out's 12th penalty, the crowds expected to have returned for yesterday's annual match between the Goths (who last year included Brian "Killer" Kilcline) and the Gazette.

The goths, a sort of latter day Drac and White Minstrel Show, had long since booked every bed, and every breakfast, in town.

Predictably they play in black, and on Sunday had a new shirt sponsor. Step forward, solemnly, the Co-operative Funeral Service.

Long before his Tottenham glory years, the double for Bill Nicholson meant drilling squaddies at Brancepeth Camp, between Crook and Durham City.

Scarborough-born Nicholson, who died 11 days ago, spent six and a half years as a DLI PT instructor, rising to sergeant. He played wartime football for Crook Town and lived thereafter - both at home and at White Hart Lane - as if he'd never left the forces.

"When I've ironed his shirts he inspects each one," Nic's wife Grace once recalled. "If they weren't right, I'd have to do them again."

At Crook he became a team-mate of W H Park of West Road and several times subsequently met Mr Park's nephew, John Milburn, now in Chester-le-Street.

"He wasn't just a great manager he really was a wonderful man," John remembers.

Crook Town historian Michael Manuel recalls that Nicholson captained the side alongside the likes of Wilfred Boyes of West Bromwich Albion and Liverpool goalkeeper Cyril Sidlow.

The Army team which played at Crook was led by the legendary Dixie Dean, each man given 2/6d for turning out but still a player short for a key fixture.

"A local lad was on the ground and offered to play but the officer in charge refused to give him the same expenses so Dixie and the others threatened to go on strike," Michael recalls.

"It was one of the earliest examples of player power - and the volunteer soon got his half a dollar."

Michael Martin of Newcastle United's True Faith fanzine tells The Observer his plan for greater community involvement with the neighbourhood team. "I'd like to see local education authorities introduce corporal punishment for kids who don't follow their local football club," he says. Sadly, this appears not to be the Mick Martin who made 163 appearances in the black and white and now has a sports business in Swalwell, or somewhere. Not one to stick with, perhaps.

Sir Bobby Robson, local lad made very canny, was at Esh Winning FC's sportsmen's dinner on Friday to hand over a very special bit of kit.

Nigel Quinn, the Albany Northern League club's commercial manager, recalled his days with Langley Park WMC FC in 1979 when Sir Bobby - then managing Ipswich Town - handed over Town's entire UEFA Cup winners' strip to help his home village side.

"Each kit had a name on," said Nigel. "I recall telling Eric Gates years later that I'd had my hand inside his shorts."

Esh Winning had won a framed shirt signed by all the present England squad in a draw organised by the FA and Carlsberg, and an FA lady had come up with it from London.

"You know what the FA are like," said Sir Bobby, "they put her on the Tube."

The team, beaten just twice in 17 games, maintained the run on Saturday.

The shirt, which was to have been auctioned, will remain at the club after being bought and given back by the Esh Group.

"A very nice sum of money," said Sir Bobby. Sing when you're Esh Winning.

Small comfort for us still anguished Arsenal fans, but on the day that Manchester United stole our unbeaten record, the club's ladies' team lost 2-1 to South Durham Royals - FA Women's Cup - at the athletics stadium in Shildon. Were it possible to propose holy matrimony to 11 females simultaneously, the column would already have done so.

...and finally

The club for which Peter Shilton made his 1,000th senior appearance (Backtrack, October 22) was Leyton Orient.

Since we've been Hebburn sent, readers are today invited to name the Hebburn-born winger whose Football League career ended at Leicester City and Stockport but who made a then-record 500 League appearances for his first love. Manna, the column returns on Friday.

Published: 02//11/2004