A MYSTERY of early North-East football – how a seemingly obscure church team became the inaugural winners of The Northern League - may have been solved.

The Darlington St Augustine’s Football Club team, or Saints, that won the second oldest league in the world in 1890 was ‘recreated’ and the side played a match against a fans’ Sunderland as part of a family fun day on Saturday.

Researchers into the origins of the league discovered there were allegations that Saints may have broken the rules to bring in professional players from Scotland to win the title.

During the fun day at St Augustine’s Parish Centre on Larchfield Street, the granddaughter of William Nolli, the Scotsman who founded the Saints club, came forward to shed light on the mystery.

Elizabeth Hick, 87, known to all her friends as Bunty, had newspaper clippings about her grandfather, who was landlord of Darlington’s Dun Cow. They told how he had previously played for Edinburgh Hibernians, founded in 1875, when he came to Darlington in 1882.

A Northern Echo report said that Mr Nolli, finding there was no team in the town, bought a ball from Saddlers Wells store, and went down to play on his own in South Park, possibly wearing a Hibs strip.

The report said: “He brought hundreds of people to the park, the rumour spreading that a Scotsman with bare legs and an Irish shirt was running amok.”

Enough interest was eventually generated to found a team in 1883 and by 1889 Mr Nolli’s brother, Jack, had also come down from Edinburgh to play for Saints, which may explain the ‘Scottish professionals’ rumour.

The recreated match against ‘Sunderland’ at Beechwood Avenue resulted in a 4-2 victory for Sunderland, Saints' forward Dominic Webber missing a penalty in the closing stages.