IT was the perfect way to secure promotion, a scintillating 7-1 win at Whitby Town, and in Graeme Armstrong Darlington could not have had a more fitting hat-trick hero.

Thursday’s remarkable display means, with today being the last day of the season, second-placed Blyth Spartans are five points adrift and can no longer catch Quakers.

Spartans are aiming for promotion in the play-offs next week, which is what Darlington achieved 12 months ago, though for Armstrong, the occasion was tarnished by serious injury.

In the dying seconds of the play-off final win over Bamber Bridge last season’s leading scorer collided heavily with opposition goalkeeper Lee Dovey, leaving the striker in excruciating pain and unable to breathe.

An eight-hour operation to repair his split pancreas and a month in hospital followed.

Today, however, at Rushall Olympic, where Quakers bring the curtain down on their fabulous season, Armstrong is able to look back with pride on successfully returning to the Darlington side, his season reaching its zenith with a ten-minute hat-trick against former club Whitby.

“I was substituted in the second half and when I came off I sat on the bench and got a bit emotional,” he revealed.

“I’m not that type of person normally, but you get a bit emotional thinking about everything you’ve been through.

“It is difficult to comprehend what happened last year. It was on May 2 and I was bedridden for a month – everything I had worked for over a year had been taken away from me.

“The fans were superb last year with their support, but I don’t think people realise what you go through mentally and physically, the hours I had to put in to try to get myself ready at the start of the season.

“Winning the title goes a long way to making up for it, because you look back to last year and at that point I would never have even thought about doing something like this when I was lying in a hospital bed.

“I know I haven’t had as big an impact this year because of that injury, but I’m going to enjoy this success all the same.

“Thursday was my greatest night in football.”

The first of Armstrong’s treble came in the tenth minute, a bullet header when it was already 2-0, Quakers making an electric start to a match in which a point would have been sufficient to take the title.

His second and third goals soon followed, and it was 6-0 by half-time, the team leaving the field at the break to a standing ovation.

“I was delighted just to get one goal, especially in such a big game,” added Armstrong, who is now on 13 goals for the season. “The second and third goals just dropped for me.

“I’ve got loads of time for my old team, they are a fantastic club, but you’ve got to come and do a job and I couldn’t have scripted it any better.

“There were nerves, but our record speaks for itself. That’s 14 wins out of 15, outstanding, and our squad has been fantastic over the past few months.

“Coming off the back of our form, and knowing that if we do the basics right we were always likely to score.

“We didn’t just win the game on Thursday, it’s been won over several weeks with the training and recovery we’ve done leading up to games.

“It was a formality for me, with them surviving relegation on Tuesday. We came to do a job and we’re so professional in how we do everything, so I fully expected us to win, but being 5-0 up after 20 minutes was something else.

“It’s a fantastic achievement by everyone.

“You can pick out individuals who have been outstanding, but every player has done a job. It’s had to be a squad effort because there have been so many games in a short space of time “Everyone has been outstanding.”