IF fans are falling out of love with amateur football, a line- up of ageing but still energetic sportsmen added a final touch of romance to the story of the greatest non-league club in the world.

Half a century after they brought the FA Amateur Cup back to Kingsway in three consecutive seasons, players from Bishop Auckland's 1950s team walked on to the famous pitch one last time.

Ken Twigg was from an even earlier era. Now 85, he played in front of a Kingsway crowd in 1930, and even helped build the main stand.

In later years, legends such as Derek Lewin, Corbett Cresswell, Warren Bradley and Harry Sharratt performed in front of thousands as they filled the club's trophy cabinet season after season.

Today, their skills would have earned them good salaries, but back then they worked as teachers, dentists, railway workers, draughtsmen and picked up a few extra pounds, turning out for the love of the game.

Derek Lewin brought them together one last time to see Bishops lose 4-0 to Bradford Park Avenue in front of 452 loyal fans, double the normal attendance.

In the cricket club bar afterwards, Corbett Cresswell diplomatically blamed the pitch for the result.

"It was a terrible surface, but they were poor as well," he said.

Ex-goalkeeper Harry Sharratt, something of a Bruce Grobbelaar in his time, is sad that the fun has gone out of football.

He said: "We played because we enjoyed it and there was a great camaraderie between referees and players, which you don't see now."

Nothing sums up the club's glorious past like the dog-eared scrapbook brought by Ken Twigg, who drove from his home in Hartburn, near Stockton, to pay his respects. This was the stuff of true football history. The former draughtsman had recorded every FA Amateur Cup match during his ten years at Kingsway, starting in 1934.

Ken was an apprentice at Wilson's Forge when he worked on the new stand, erected by builder Harold Stephenson in 1939 after the old one burned down.

His first game at the ground was in 1930 for Bishop Auckland boys. He made his senior debut as a 17-year-old in 1934 when called up to stand in for players struck down by a flu epidemic.

An outside right, he played in a team which saw legend Bob Hardisty make his debut on November 5, 1938.

After the Bishops won the cup in 1939, earning enough money to pay for the stand, the team set off on a league run of ten matches in 15 days. Ken still has the fixture list, neatly typed by long-serving secretary Kit Rudd.

Born 100 yards away from Bob Paisley in Hetton, Ken played a season at Kingsway with the late Liverpool manager and looked him up many years later.

"I was driving in the area so I just called in. He said he did not remember me, but we had a few beers," he said.

As Ken's collection of old photographs showed, games went ahead even when the pitch was deep in snow.

A snowstorm just before the club's second round FA Cup clash with Coventry in December 1952 meant that the record 16,319 crowd was, in fact, even bigger, said Bob Robinson, one of a family dynasty of gatemen going back to the 1930s.

He said: "The match could not be called off so Harold Stephenson brought all his machinery to clear the pitch on the morning. His workforce all watched the game from the cricket field for nothing, so they were not included in the official figures."

Bob followed his grand- father Edward and father, also Bob, into the job and now his own son Peter and 16-year-old grandson Daniel are carrying on the family tradition. Daughters Susan and Helen have also done their bit.

Sports scribe Chris Foote Wood has been a Kingsway stalwart since 1964, reporting games for radio as well as newspapers, including The Northern Echo. He said: "There have been two of us, the late Derek Hebden and myself. I tried spells at Newcastle and Sunderland, but it was not the same somehow. I'd rather be here."

Former FIFA referee Pat Partridge took charge of a schoolchildren's penalty competition at half time.

He ran the line for the first time at Kingsway for a match with Durham City in 1957 and took charge of a Northern League game with West Auckland four years later.

"It is sad to see Kingsway go," he said.

After the final whistle, the town's MP Derek Foster presented commemorative medals to both teams, their managers and match officials.

"It is a sad day, but I hope it will also mark a new beginning and that the club will get its new ground and build just as distinguished a record in the future."

Ten years ago Bishop-born Keith Dobinson had scattered his dad Stanley's ashes on the pitch. "He would have loved to be here today," he said.

Club chairman Tony Duffy missed out on the chance to score the last goal at Kingsway, sending a penalty wide.

He said: "They put me in goal because I can't kick a ball.

"The team wasn't much better. It was our worst performance of the season. No one has done that to us, but Bradford are a very good side."

Results elsewhere - fellow strugglers Colwyn Bay and Hyde both lost - kept the Bishops out of the bottom three.

But they could still be demoted by Unibond League officials if their efforts to get their temporary home at Shildon up to standard do not pay off by the April 30 deadline.

Yesterday, seats and turnstiles were being stripped from Kingsway and taken to Dean Street.

In two years time, Bishops hope, they will be starting a brighter chapter in their story in a new stadium at Tindale Crescent.