Thirty years ago last weekend: two John Hickton goals gave Jack Charlton's Middlesbrough victory at Leeds United, Darlington's home defeat by Huddersfield sounded the knell for manager Peter Madden, Geoff Capes - described as a "burly Cambridgeshire policeman" - lifted the European indoor shot putt title and in the Wensleydale League, Middleham beat Carperby 4-3. It's the last one that Jim Wilson remembers.

It was his first match as a referee. Three decades later he's still out in all Wensleydale weathers, still - he insists - enjoying every minute.

On Saturday, the league presented him with an engraved glass bowl. "He's part of local folklore, his dedication and his pre-match talks to his assistants are equally legendary," says league secretary Keith Jeffery, victim all those years ago of the tackle which resulted in Jim's first sending off.

A 55-year-old senior teacher at Wensleydale School in Leyburn, he has also refereed in the Teesside and Darlington and District Leagues and been a Northern League linesman. The Wensleydale League, however, is the one he had to come back for.

"It's a fantastic league to referee in, everyone is so committed, so welcoming and so friendly," he says.

"I've tried to stop refereeing a few times, but when it gets to two o'clock on a Saturday and you aren't at a football ground it just doesn't seem right. You get the shakes.

"As long as my legs will carry me, I'll continue. As one of my colleagues says, you're a long time retired."

On Saturday he had charge of the top-two clash between Leyburn and Bowes United, the dales weather so temperate that it didn't even start snowing until after half-time.

"For the Bowes lads it was absolutely tropical. Their old pitch alongside the A66 was the most exposed ever, worse even than Tow Law."

Keith Jeffery reckons that few have the temerity to question the big feller's decisions; Jim supposes that it may be because he's taught most of them.

"As a referee I believe you have to communicate with the players, let them know what they're doing wrong and the consequences of doing it wrong again.

"You have to keep talking to them, you have to be enthusiastic and you have to let the enthusiasm come over.

"You're never going to please two teams of 22 players, so my philosophy is to go out and please myself. If I can look in the mirror and say I've been fair to both sides, then I'm happy."

History repeating itself, the home side won 4-3 on Saturday as well. Thirty years on? "I think I probably did all right."

Still with the boys in black, former FIFA referee George Courtney told a splendid little gathering at Tow Law on Friday night how his career had almost been blown up.

It was the Northern League Cup final, Tow Law v Ashington, 1973-74. "I thought I'd done quite well," said the old Butcher's Dog. "When an envelope arrived in the familiar handwriting of the Northern League secretary, I thought it might be a pat on the back."

It wasn't. He'd let both teams play in black and white socks. "It hadn't seemed that important at the time but I was threatened with exclusion from the Northern League and all sorts," George recalled.

Twelve years later, the former Spennymoor headmaster officiated at the first of his two World Cup finals. This has been what's known in the trade as a stocking filler.

The following afternoon to Sunderland Nissan v Esh Winning, the number of vehicles in the car park far exceeding what's normal before Nissan's Arngrove Northern League matches. It turned out that there was a canine competition elsewhere in the social club. One man and a dog show.

Then there's an e-mail from "Stantheref" - 80-year-old Stanley Evans, president of Hartlepool Referees' Association - about the five-goal feats mentioned in recent columns.

Stan recalls Hetton-le-Hole lad Ernie Passmore scoring five in three successive games for Gateshead in the late 1940s.

The record books don't help, merely noting that Ernie hit 26 in 41 Third Division North games. He ended his football career at Shotton Colliery and died in 1988.

Martin Birtle in Billingham recalls Len Shackleton's double hat-trick on his debut for Newcastle United - a 13-0 win over Newport County on October 5, 1946 - Sunderland centre forward Nick Sharkey's five in the 7-1 thrashing of Norwich City on March 20, 1963 and Brian Clough's five for Boro against Brighton in the first game of 1958-59.

The Football League record remains Joe Payne's ten for Luton against Bristol Rovers in March 1936. Bunny Bell of Tranmere Rovers had hit nine against Oldham the year previously. Stoke City's Neville Coleman is the last man to score seven in a match, against Lincoln City 49 years ago.

The Northern League record is also ten - held by Jack Coulthard, Marske lad, in South Bank's 13-0 defeat of Ferryhill Athletic on May 2, 1936. He later joined the wartime merchant navy and was lost at sea.

Still with Sunderland's stars of the 60s, Martin Birtle also reckons that Johnny Crossan played with Mickey Spillane novels, instead of shin pads, down his socks. There must, supposes Martin, be a story there somewhere . . .

West Allotment Celtic's programme has a nice little competition in which press cuttings from a date in history are spread over several pages. Its readers are invited to guess the year.

It was February. More than 40 people were injured when a riot broke out at Motherwell v Celtic, the referee at the St Helens v Hull Kingston Rovers rugby league match had to escape out the back door while 3,000 angry spectators awaited him at the front, and Newcastle United beat Watford 3-0 in the FA Cup quarter-final.

Stockton were to protest after Dulwich Hamlet took to the bath after 90 minutes of their drawn Amateur Cup third round tie, precluding extra time, the "somewhat austere " Lawn Tennis Association was considering allowing shorts instead of skirts at Wimbledon, and in Walsall a woman patted a lion which walked into her front room, assuming it to be a child. Nothing unusual there, then.

What really caught the eye was another Amateur Cup third round tie - Ilford v Stanhope - and not even the locally near-omniscient John Shuttleworth has been able to unearth much more about it.

It was 1932. The Weardale village side, not even Northern League members, had won through all the preliminary rounds and beaten RAF Grantham and Rawmarsh in the competition proper before a trip to the capital in the last 16.

The crowd was 7,400, the gate £252. Stanhope's average gate was 16 shillings.

Though Stanhope lost 5-1, Bee was said to have had "a very fine game indeed". They also included Wilson in goal - any amount of Wilsons in Weardale - Coulthard (ditto), a couple of Finerans and a Tulip.

"We have had a most enjoyable time in London," club secretary Alan Thompson "cheerfully" told the Echo.

Coun Shuttleworth is still on the case. More information on that remarkable trail from the dales much welcomed.

And finally...

The four clubs who've reached the FA Cup final and been relegated in the same season (Backtrack, February 24) are Manchester City (1926), Leicester City (1969), Brighton (1983) and Middlesbrough (1997).

Fred Alderton in Peterlee today invites readers to name the country against whom, in 1971, George Best scored his only hat-trick for Northern Ireland.

We return, weather permitting, on Friday.

Published: 28/02/2006