SINCE we are a pretty geriatric quintet – were the motive power to be in keeping with the age profile of the passengers, the train would probably be hauled by Locomotion No 1 – it is perhaps appropriate that the latest stop on the Railroad to Wembley is the oldest football ground in the world.

Hallam, reckoned the second oldest club after their neighbours Sheffield FC, have been on Sandygate Road since 1860.

Framed certificates from Guinness World Records ratify both the residency claim and that the handsome Youdan Cup, won by Hallam (against Sheffield) in 1867, is the game’s oldest knockout trophy. They treasure it still.

Were that not attraction enough, the Good Beer Guide confirms that Sheffield has 23 breweries, claims to be the “world’s best beer city” and in the Kelham Island Tavern boasts the only pub twice to have won Camra’s top award.

“That’s a funny name for a pub,” says Mr Gary Brand, who joins us from Cockney country and who clearly, as they say in those parts, is going a bit Mutt ‘n Jeff.

“What is?”

“The Calamari Tavern.”

We’re on the 9.13 from Darlington, time enough for an early doors livener in the Sheffield Tap, conveniently situated on platform 1b of the railway station. A recent census claimed that, on a given day, Sheffield’s pubs offered 385 different real ales.

Just 384 to go.

THE train’s quiet, not even the customary cackle of a hen party. Saturday morning’s Times has a 12-page supplement on the joys of Durham, city and county, and on page three of the main paper a major story headlined “Champagne mix-up blamed for Durham debauchery.”

That, of course, is a reference to the supposed goings-on at the Durham University Champagne Society’s annual extravaganza at the Hardwick Hall Hotel in Sedgefield.

Whether debauchery is a greater tourist attraction than – say – Durham Castle must remain a matter of opinion. But they’d be better sticking to the real ale.

SAID – like Rome – to have been built upon seven hills, Sheffield is England’s third largest city, much changed since its growth as the crucible of the steel industry. These days it’s said to have 250 public parks and gardens and around two million trees, four for each of its citizens.

It’s probably unsurprising, therefore, that Hallam is officially described as a “leafy suburb” – that most evergrey of clichés – though the place has more verdant claims to fame.

In 2004, 12 per cent of the working population earned £60,000 or more annually, the number of children officially classed as in poverty was the lowest in the land and the Hallamshire parliamentary constituency returned, as was its wont, the only non-Labour MP in South Yorkshire.

That was Nick Clegg – or Norman Clegg, as Mr Brand erroneously supposed – with 40 per cent of the vote. Labour's man returned 35 per cent, the Tory 13 per cent and the candidate recorded as Jim Stop the Fiasco Wild came eighth with 97.

Robin Hood is said also to have had his woodland roots that way, and clearly had rich pickings.

In the pub – the pubs – questions start flying, as usually happens after one or two. Who was the only female Womble, who the only footballer to appear in Glasgow, Liverpool and Manchester derbies? With which county – honest – does Northamptonshire have a border of just 62ft.

OK, that one’s Lincolnshire. Time to go to the match.

HALLAM play in the second division of the Northern Counties East League, that of Worsbrough, Winterton and Westella and Willerby. They’re facing Morpeth Town of the Ebac Northern League, winners of the FA Vase after a memorable final against Hereford Town last May.

Morpeth have brought the Vase with them, guarded if not by a ring of steel – as formerly might have been the case – then by a couple of lads who’ve probably been on the doors the night previously.

The ground’s 800ft above sea level, in the foothills of the Peak District, the pitch so vertiginously sloping that Hallam may make Tow Law Town appear members of the Flat Earth Society by comparison.

The debate’s warming when who should appear in the 1860 Lounge but Chris Waddle, Britain’s best known former sausage seasoner, whose own stellar football career began on the north face of Tow Law.

Someone asks him which pitch is the steeper. He’s inclined to favour Hallam.

No doubt there have been learned theses on the advantages (or otherwise) of kicking downhill and on whether it’s better to do so in the first or second half. Hallam have won nine successive matches, though none of them against a Northern League side. Morpeth, at any rate, win the toss and decide that it’s the second half which will be the downhill struggle.

Both the city’s Football League teams are having an international break. The crowd must be getting on for 500.

THOUGH it’s been a long time, Sheffield was once familiar to Northern League teams. Much the most southerly club in the league’s 128-year history, Sheffield United joined in 1891-1892 when the nearest opponent was Middlesbrough or South Bank and longer trips were to Newcastle East End or West End, on the verge of unification.

Back in 1891, the first home Northern League game attracted a 7,000 crowd to Bramall Lane for a 7-1 win over Darlington. The Blades included Ernest Needham, known universally as Nudger, who won 16 full England caps between 1894-1902 and hit seven first class centuries for Derbyshire.

The following season they joined the inaugural Football League second division, but retained a Northern League side – which attracted bigger crowds.

Two other United players, Henry Lilley and Mick Whitham, won full caps while still playing in the Northern League – the only men to do so.

How long the journey took from Sheffield to Newcastle, or how reliable the trains, is not recorded. Ours were spot on.

AT half-time it’s goalless, but by no means soulless. Notices around the ground urge “Gentlemen, no swearing, please”, wilfully ignoring last week’s much publicised survey that it’s the womenfolk who cuss for England, not the fellers.

Second wind, the holders take advantage of the gradient, four goals without reply in a thoroughly sporting encounter.

Since we’re not booked homeward until the 18.47, there’s time for one in the Fat Cat, another in the Rutland Arms. Only 378 to go.

The draw for the third round, last 64, will probably take us to Bottesford v Billingham Town. Wherever we end up, we’re Hallam Globetrotters now.