No cold comforts

Blue Star's Albany Northern League ground, barely half a mile from Newcastle Airport, the height at which planes pass every few minutes over the bottom goal graphically illustrated in a well remembered Northern Echo photograph - Blue Star v Guisborough Town - taken in 1990.

The club have also signed Chris Waddle, though not necessarily the high flier.

This is the sausage seasoner's 21-year-old nephew, from Washington, and he's not yet made an appearance.

Among the game's highlights, at any rate, was the calf injury to a Blue Star defender which, it was considered, might benefit from an ice pack. Such cold comfort temporarily being unavailable, they found a dead rabbit - shot nearby and frozen a little earlier - and applied that to the injury instead.

Medicine having taken its course, the unfortunate creature was presented to the League chairman who, anticipating rabbit pie at the weekend, returned gleefully to the hutch.

Who says there are no perks in this job? Newcastle Blue Star 0 Brandon United 4.

Among last night's arrivals behind the bottom goal at Blue Star were the six spring-heeled heroes from the Deerness Valley Gymnastics Centre at Ushaw Moor who (Backtrack, August 3) represented Britain in the world championships in Japan.

"The top six would be brilliant," coach Karl Wharton had said.

The "four" - 18-year-old Barry Hindson from Belmont, Durham, 17-year-old Brandon lads Scott Patterson and Stuart McKenzie and David Scott, 14, from Washington - finished fourth, after long holding third place.

The "pair" - Carl Morritt, 19, from Ushaw Moor and 14-year-old Chris Jones from Framwellgate Moor - were sixth.

"It's a simply fantastic achievement for all of them," says a lady admirer, who asks not to be named.

Word is that a party's planned at the Deerness Valley centre tonight - but only after a training session first.

Wretched coincidence, we hear of another match on Tuesday evening with a direct line to Newcastle Airport.

Matt Palmer, 16, was playing for Trimdon Juniors against South Moor when, after a quarter of an hour, he suffered a serious ankle injury. The referee refused to allow him to be moved and after the ambulance had left abandoned the match.

At 10 o'clock that evening, Matt and his family were due to leave Newcastle for a holiday in Spain. As he recovers from surgery at Hartlepool General, the holiday has been cancelled.

"Matty is a very promising player and it looks like a very bad injury" says Trimdon chairman Owen Willoughby. "He was literally going straight from the match to the airport. Obviously it's very distressing for all concerned."

Long scoured by the indomitable Owen Willoughby - 82 and still scouting for Spurs - the Trimdon area has produced many players for Football League clubs.

Many, no doubt, will be featured in the book with which Stephen Chaytor seeks our help.

Steve originally planned a "Where Are They Now" of all the south Durham lads who've played League football since the war, decided it would be a lifetime's work and has refined it to those from what is now Sedgefield Borough - Trimdons, Shildon, Spennymoor, Ferryhill and Newton Aycliffe.

Many have already been traced, including the chap whose League career lasted just 45 minutes, during which time the referee collapsed and died. "He made his mark," says Steve, from Sedgefield.

Particularly, he'd now like to hear of the following, mostly one-hit wonders:

Eric Oliver, born in Spennymoor, kept goal for West Auckland and twice for Darlington in 1963; Joe Roddom, another Spennymoor lad, six games for the Quakers in 1950; Arthur Sewell, born in West Cornforth, made a single Bradford City appearance in 1954.

Dennis Walker, Spennymoor, single substitute appearance for Luton in 1967; Geoff Wardle, Trimdon boy, Sunderland's books and one game for Lincoln City; Arthur Bell from Sedgefield, played for Hylton Colliery and was a Barrow boy, once only, in 1950.

Once that gang are traced, the set's complete and the book will be ready for publication. Steve's on (01740) 621737.

Long awaited, much delayed, The Story of Crook Town FC is finally - they insist - about to make an appearance. Launch date is set for September 5 though like similar events at Cape Canaveral, it may again be postponed.

The book's written by lifelong supporters Michael Manuel, Alan Stewart and John Phelan - who provides historical snapshots hereabouts and particularly hopes to have Fred Jarrie and Bert Steward at the do.

Fred, still pottering about in the dog walking orbit of Hails of Hartlepool, was goalkeeper in the legendary Crook team which won a twice replayed FA Amateur Cup final against Bishop Auckland in 1954. Bert, in Annfield Plain, was left back.

The reason John's so keen to see them again is that, when he was a Crook daft little lad, they both gave him 2/6d for his birthday. He was so chuffed - another day another half a dollar - he still keeps the money.

Pay back time? "I'll probably buy them a pint instead," he says.

There's also a call, another coincidence, from Alison Briggs - daughter of Ray Briggs, West Auckland's right-winger in the 1961 Amateur Cup final and still alive and kicking. Like many more, she wants a copy of the Northern League's millennium history - hadn't even heard of it until the other day. Richly illustrated, 430 pages, it's still available from Joe Burlison, 4 Carrowmore Road, Chester-le-Street - £8 99, plus £3 postage.

Bill White died this week, aged 75. Known inevitably as Tash, he was Bishop Auckland's goalkeeper in the 1951 Amateur Cup final but remembered no less fondly for his exploits in the Hartlepool and District League.

"A legend among Hartlepool oldies," says Ron Hails, who may well qualify for the accolade himself. Bill's funeral is at Stranton Grange crematorium in Hartlepool at 9.40am today.

"A man of 6ft 2ins and approaching ten and a half stones on a wet day with arms that could reach the angle of post and bar from the centre of goal," recalls Ron. "A lovely feller who never married but made friends wherever he went."

Uncle Albert Kelleher, Ron's partner in reminiscence, remembers Bill advancing on opposing forwards like a hungry spider, clapping his hands and shouting: "Here kidda, just put it here."

More often than not they did, says Albert. Whether hungry spiders clap their hands, however, is a point we may have to discuss some other time.

Bill played for Hartlepool Railway Athletic, alongside a muscular centre forward called Norman Wilson.

Albert recalls asking one summer which team he'd be playing for the following season. "Whichever one Norman Wilson's playing for," said Bill.

He was probably new to the Bishops, since the 'keeper in the previous season's Amateur Cup final - the oft-remembered 4-0 defeat by Willington - had been Jack Washington, still in Sunderland.

Ron Hails recounts the time that Tash failed to link up with the taxi sent to collect him from West Hartlepool - too engrossed in the 12.30 race - phoned the club and was told not to worry, they'd arrange something.

Two races later, a 35 seat coach pulled up outside his house. Ah yes, says Ron, David Beckham eat your heart out.

In the Amateur Cup final Bishop Auckland played Pegasus, a team of Oxford and Cambridge students formed just three years earlier, and surprisingly lost 2-1 after an injury to Scottish international forward Bill Anderson.

"I regret to say this," wrote Bill Reed in his club history, "but Benny Edwards should have won the game in the first five minutes, missing two very easy chances." Jimmy Nimmins hit Bishops' consolation with two minutes remaining, in front of the first ever 100,000 crowd for an Amateur Cup final at Wembley.

Bishops also reached the FA Cup first round that season, losing in a replay to York City, won the Northern League double and were finalists in the Durham Challenge Cup.

By 1953, however, Tash White's place between the posts had been taken by a 23-year-old Lancastrian called - but that's not so much another story, as a volume.

The six England internationals capped since 1980 whilst playing for Glasgow Rangers (Backtrack, August 21) are Terry Butcher, Chris Woods, Paul Gascoigne, Gary Stevens, Trevor Steven and Mark Hateley.

Brian Shaw, again, today invites the identity of three members of England's 1966 World Cup who never appeared in an FA Cup final.

The final word on Tuesday.