FOR more than a hundred years, thousands of fans have visited the original home of Darlington Football Club, eager to watch their local heroes play.

Now, 18 months after Feethams hosted its last match, it seems only an untraceable security guard has access to the ground.

Last night, confusion surrounded the location of the keys to Feethams.

Even Darlington Cricket Club, the stadium's landlord, cannot get inside the ground.

The club's chairman, Brian Johnson, said a locksmith might have to be brought in to force entry to the ground.

He said: "It may well come to that if we cannot locate keys for the existing entrances. Obviously, if it is our property, we have a right to be in it."

The Northern Echo tried yesterday to solve the mystery, but uncovered only confusion.

Mr Johnson said he asked Quakers' manager David Hodgson to get him the keys, but had instead been given the name of a security guard, who he had yet to locate.

Mr Hodgson said last night: "I never had any keys. The only people who have keys are the security. They go in at weekends."

The security staff were put in place by Wilson Field, the court-appointed administrator brought in after the Quakers plunged into financial crisis in 2003.

But David Field, from Wilson Field, could not clarify the situation. He said: "The cricket club asked me for the keys and I told them I do not have the keys.

"The football club has got the keys. I have got no access to it. I do not have a problem with them the cricket club having access at all; they own the ground."

A Darlington Football Club spokesman said: "It has nothing to do with the club. It is the administrators that are responsible for security, and presumably would be the people who have the keys."

The security guard is watching over the main East Stand, which the administrator believes it owns as an asset of the football club.

Darlington Cricket Club dismisses that claim, believing it owns the stand as part of the fixtures and fittings of the ground.

Mr Johnson said: "I think it is fair to say that nobody really admits to knowing where the keys are."

£3m row - Page 1