THERE wasn't a dry eye in the house ten years ago this week when Sir Bobby Robson was presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award in the BBC Sports Personality of the Year awards.

The former Newcastle United and England manager, who has spent the previous two years battling cancer and a brain tumour, received the award – one of the biggest honours in British sport – at Birmingham's National Exhibition Centre.

The presentation, which was in recognition of Sir Bobby's 57-year contribution to football, was preceded by a guard of honour formed by players from England's 1986 and 1990 World Cup sides, and members of the 1978 and 1981 Ipswich Town teams that Robson led to the FA Cup and Uefa Cup respectively.

Sir Bobby, born in Sacriston, County Durham, has been awarded a CBE and a knighthood for his contribution to the football, and has been made an honorary freeman of Newcastle. However, he said the Lifetime Achievement award was one of the proudest moments of his life.

Greeted by a prolonged standing ovation from the 8,000 strong audience, and accepting his award from Sir Alex Ferguson, he said: "It is a terrific honour and I am totally flattered and privileged.

"Nobody wins anything on their own and this award is really an extension and opportunity for me to say thank you to everybody who has supported me."

Meanwhile, a plaque was erected at Quakers Lane in Richmond to commemorate the lives of two men killed in the Second World War.

Flight Lieutenant William Hunt and Flight Sergeant Harold Gysel, died in December 1942, minutes after their plane took off from Scorton.

The Beaufighter plane had been scrambled at 8.30pm to intercept a handful of German planes that had been spotted over the North-East.

Witnesses recall the Beaufighter flying extremely low over Richmond, almost knocking two look-outs off the keep of the town's castle, before crashing in nearby fields.

About 40 people attended Saturday's ceremony, including Flt Lt Hunt's nephew, Don Rogers, who unveiled the plaque, and 82-year-old Ray Thornton, who was one of the first on the scene on the night of the crash.

Also that week, speculation continued to mount about where canoe man John Darwin spent his missing five years.

A former workmate of Darwin told police he had seen the supposedly drowned canoeist outside his Seaton Carew home.

A week earlier, Darwin turned up in a London police station saying he could not remember where he had been, sparking a major police investigation.

Anne was arrested after flying back from Panama, where the couple had planned to start a new life together, and her husband was charged with fraud. Both were later jailed.

And, just as she is this year, Darlington's Pop Idol star Zoe Birkett was preparing for panto in her home town. In 2007, she was playing the title role in Snow White at Darlington Civic Theatre. In 2017, she is playing the wicked queen in Snow White at the same venue, newly renamed as Darlington Hippodrome.