Highbury on Saturday. Admission £3, pie, peas and gravy £1.20 and a structure marked Grand Stand in two-foot letters, lest anyone doubt its architectural pre-eminence.

It was not, of course, Highbury, London N5 - theatre of dreams to the more enlightened, and of occasional rude awakenings - not the all-seated extravaganza of marble halls and expansive busts, of North Bank bagels and eyrie executives.

This was Highbury Stadium, Fleetwood, where hot Vimto (another local delicacy) is 40p, where a flat-capped picture of Frank Swift proclaims the great goalkeeper to have been of "Fleetwood, Manchester City and England," and where another stand has Cove FC bright-blazoned on the beams.

Cove, when last heard of, were in the Highland League. The stand looked as if it had come in on the tide, assembled in their tea break by the remedial class of a pre-school playgroup.

Fleetwood, home of the Fisherman's Friend, is on the Lancashire coast and altogether more pleasant than Blackpool, in whose grim shadow the town is ineluctably marooned.

There is a fishing museum and an annual tram day, a ferry to Knott End on Sea and a competition to find Miss Wyre, doubtless more beautiful than she sounds.

Fleetwood Freeport, Highbury's alternative residents, are named after an "outlet village" - an American themed discount shopping centre - which is the club's main sponsor.

On Saturday they played Washington Ikeda Hoover, named for the same reason after a Japanese electronics company and clearly foreign to Fleetwood.

"Washington Ikea" it said on the posters round the town. Made of good stuff, these Northern League lads.

Whilst Arsenal park Porsches, Fleetwood had a notice about not leaving bikes in the clubhouse doorway; where the Gunners can usually drum up the Metropolitan Police band, Fleetwod's pre-match entertainment was provided by a curly haired little girl, singing Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush while eating cheese and onion crisps on the bar counter.

It was the FA Carlsberg Vase, preliminary round. More photographs on the clubhouse wall depicted an earlier Fleetwood club - this one was formed in 1997 - at Wembley in the 1985 final.

Around 150 were present, might have been more had not the Fleetwood Gazette said that Freeport were away - it would never happen in the Evening Standard - seating capacity enhanced by several shiny dustbins, lids chained down for reasons which probably can be imagined.

Had there been a visitors' end, its denizens would have numbered three, three and a half including the Albany Northern League chairman.

The teams emerged beneath a wire cage from which even Ronnie Bigss might have struggled to escape, a notice at one extremity welcoming them to Highbury Stadium.

Ten minutes had passed before a clinical pharmacist from Cheshire ambled up and asked if we'd heard that the North West Counties League (in which Fleetwood play) was considering a proposal that grounds should have capacity for 30 spectators to pee simultaneously.

"Extrapolated to the Premiership," he said, in the manner of clinical pharmacists everywhere, "it would mean that Old Trafford would need 13,000 urinals."

Like the other Highbury hosts, Fleetwood spent most of the time doing everything but score, denied frequently by a goalkeeper who resembled Fatty Foulke and (by all accounts) was every bit as agile. The cliches and the language are universal, however.

"Come on lads, be patient," urged the Fleetwood skipper. Had it been the other Highbury, the clock above the bottom goal would have shown that precisely 28 seconds had elapsed.

"Blinking ninny," or words to that effect, a Washington man called the referee.

"Don't be cheeky," said the ref.

Fleetwood finally took the lead after 33 minutes, back post header - Highbury's favourite route - inside the piebald post.

"What do you think of Canvey Island's results this season?" enquired the pharmaceutical groundhopper, perhaps by way of intended consolation.

Washington, creditably, equalised two minutes later, held out until the 75th, had a player sent off in the final minute for nothing more serious than trying to take the legs of a chap who looked likely to score the third and without even an admonition for being cheeky..

It ended 2-1, our lads' road to Wembley over before they'd even got on the tram. By no means for the first time, we left Highbury heavy hearted.

Befitting the organiser of the Darlington Away Fans Travelling Society - the ubiquitous DAFTS - Neil Johnson has been beside the seaside, too. The result apart, Southend proved disappointing.

Numbers were down, admission £12, a "meagre" pie and a programme £3.20 and the pre-match and half-time entertainment "puerile".

Neil's unamused. "The 'tweenage' dancers missed their cue and stood around in a peroxide huff for a whole track, the usually hilarious Shrimp mascot was a bore and even George was in poor form on his pre-match pepping up walkabout.

"The Northern League offers proper half-time R&R. Without the mock American atmosphere, you can have a good natter over a pint."

Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush is optional.

Fleetwood's programme carried the usual crop of misquotations from the famous - you know, like Mark Draper's classic about wanting to play for an Italian club "like Barcelona" - but is upstaged by Darlington Greyhounds FC.

The Greyhounds programme reports that because Mark Bunker was running late before the match against East End WMC, Dave Wilson rang to explain the delay.

"If he's not here by half-time," added Dave, "put him down as sub."

Rescued from someone's attic, the column a couple of weeks back carried a splendid 1943 photograph of Yorkshire cricketers - Verity, Hutton, Sutcliffe, Leyland and Smailes - in uniform.

Frank Smailes, we said, had taken 10-47 against Derbyshire - which chimed with NYSD League secretary Stewart Clarke, Guisborough lad and proud of it.

The ten-wicket haul came in 1938, when Derbyshire were skittled for 20 in the first innings and Jim Smurthwaite of Guisborough bagged five for seven in four overs.

Smurthwaite, says Stewart, had made his Yorkshire debut the previous season - not called upon to bowl, though Leicestershire smote them mightily. "It led to several questions being asked of the captain, Mr E B Sellars."

Until playing in the game, adds Stewart, Jim Smuthwaite had never so much as seen a first-class match.

Same era, we'd also recalled before vanishing for a week the quartet of North-East players - Brandon and Byshottles and elsewhere - in the 1939 FA Cup final, Portsmouth v Wolves.

David Watson from Leeds ventures a fifth with North-East connections - did Pompey left half Guy Wharton go on to captain Darlington, he wonders?

Quite right. Wharton made 39 League appearances for the Quakers in 1948-49, scoring twice. He was born, however, in Broomfield - and though the gazetteer lists several, none is north of Chelmsford.

THE link between both captains and both umpires in the 1980 England v West Indies Test match (Backtrack, September 1) was that Ian Botham and Viv Richards, Bill Alley and Ken Palmer had all played for Somerset.

Neil Johnson (19 Garthorne Ave, Darlington, for prospective DAFTS members) today seeks the identity of the last footballer to be chosen for England - at any level - while registered with the Quakers.

We shall again lie back and think of England on Friday