A year in the life of Backtrack

WINNERS

FORMER Darlington and Sheffield United defender Gary Innes, 32. playing Arngrove Northern League football five weeks after an operation to remove a tumour behind his eye.

"They went up through my nose so there's be no scars to spoil my good looks," he said.

FORMER plumber Stewart Hume from Crook, the first disabled angler to be chosen for England's full fly fishing team.

THE Feversham Cricket League, 50 per cent membership rise in two years. Now they have six.

SIR Alex Ferguson, who personally arranged for Darlington railway track accident victim Stuart Adams to be buried in a Phil Neville shirt, signed by the rest of the players.

STEVE Harmison, despite dashing from the Edgbaston test victory to see his cousin Ben make his Durham debut - just in time to see him out first ball.

FORMER Leeds United men Eddie Gray, who ran the London Marathon in a Sunderland shirt after being sponsored for £1500 by Sunderland chairman Bob Murray - "one of the most generous men alive."

THE Grey Horse, Bank Top, Darlington - UK 5s and 3s champions as usual (and good lads, too.) The George and Dragon, Heighington, who won the "Combinations" title.

GARY Pratt, persuaded as a nine-year-old to make up the numbers for Grub Street Casuals against the City of Durham and starred, even then.

LOSERS

DARLINGTON RA FC, whose four defeats in 2004-05 were all refereed by Billy Kehir. Manager Dave Woodcock took it well.

"After the fourth I shook his hand, thanked him, and said that if I saw him again I'd string him up from the crossbar, " he said.

RUSSELL Muse, returning to Whitburn CC third team after an eight year absence, stumped by a 6ft 6in one legged wicket keeper off the bowling of a 39year-old mother-of-four.

Spennymoor United.

JOHN Armstrong, 60, broke his ankle when felled by a flying sight screen playing cricket for Etherley II at Shildon. "You expect sometimes to be hit by bat or ball, " he said, "but not wiped out by the sight screen."

JARROW Roofing manager Richie McLoughlin, 55, the oldest player to be sent off in an FA competition.

REDCAR racecourse, slagged off in The Times. "It's hard to believe that anyone would want to take their holidays there, " it added, unnecessarily.

HEBBURN footballer Stuart Patterson, who arrived for a vital Cup match on Humberside only to find that the carrier bag which he thought held his kit actually contained two onions and two bananas.

HOLE in the Wall FC (president: Backtrack). Reached the final of the Darlington Invitation Cup without so much as playing a game, and then lost it.

MALTON trainer Mick Easterby, brown boots with his morning suit when Royal Ascot came to York.

NORTON housewife Terry Dunn, 57, broke her leg after falling from Swilkin Bridge on the first day of a trip of a lifetime to watch the Open at St Andrew's. "On a scale of 1-10, the pain was 150, " she said.

NIGEL "Inchy" Foster, suspended indefinitely after playing for Barnard Castle in the Over 40s League when only 39. "Thirty nine and seveneighths, " he protested.

OLD FAVOURITES

GEORGE Todd from Darlington, at 95 the oldest living former Football League referee. Started in 1943 in cut off trousers - "My wife said we weren't wasting any clothing coupons on referee's regalia."

JOHN Short, 79, still rowing three times a week on the Wear at Durham, helping recovery from a major stroke.

SARAH Turnbull, 99, still attending (and winning) at Thirsk Racecourse.

IAN Barnes, UK Over 70s 1500m champion, marking 50 years with Darlington Harriers.

STEVE Davies, 52, Darlington insurance broker who won gold, silver and two bronze medals at the World Masters cycling championships.

ARTHUR Puckrin, 67 (right), Middlesbrough barrister and iron man extraordinary.

K R Hopper, at 72 still opening the batting for Haughton (it's part of their youth policy.)

JACK Watson, former Durham and Northumberland cricketer, now 84 and scouting with boyish enthusiasm for Hibernian.

BULLDOG Billy ("I've not been in your column for so long that people think I'm dead) Boss Hogg (ditto), the Beardless Wonder, Kip Watson, Martin Birtle and many others to whom thanks are due, as ever.

WOMEN FOLK

VERA Selby, twice women's world snooker champion from Newcastle, plans to publish her autobiography entirely in verse.

Titania Hardie, white witch, unable to help Frome Town beat Jarrow Roofing in the Vase.

Joanna Howe, 22-year-old Sunderland teacher who became the first woman to referee a Durham FA final (and excelled) despite death threats in an earlier game.

Kendra White, Cleveland polliss aand mother-of-two, international cross country runner and cyclocross champion.

Sharon Gayter, Guisborough. Just runs and runs.

Sharon Watt, former equestrian champion back training winners at Richmond five years after breaking her back and being left completely paralysed in a horse box accident.

Hilary Maddren, widow of the late Middlesbrough manager, still spearheading fund raising for motor neurone disease research.

"Willie was just such a caring man, " she said.

Sandra Gordon, happily chairman aat Tow Law Town FC and her colleague Carol Hindmoor, the only woman finalist in the inaugural World Skilful Dominoes Championship.

OUTINGS

EDINBURGH, to talk to Ian Porterfield about Busan Icons December 25 Korea Cup final triumph. "It was certainly a different way to spend Christmas Day, " he said.

Ware (indeed!), with Bedlington Terriers.

PRESTATYN, for the world billiards championships (attendance, five. )

EDINBURGH (again, and on Burns Night), to catch up with Boro hero Tony Mowbray, in the manager's chair at Hibs - "a man," the column observed, "who probably thinks a haggis should be addressed via Princes Street Post Office."

DIDCOT, Oxfordshire, 20th in the Idler List of Crap Towns, but a good football team.

LEYLAND, Lancs, to compare notes with former referee Jim Parker, aka the Preston Strangler.

EDINBURGH (again and again) for ex-Hartlepool United chairman Garry Gibson's wedding to the lovely Gloria - "a man who has risen and fallen and risen so greatly, he could have been drinking in the last chance balloon."

BARRHEAD on the occasion of the FA Cup Final Escape Committee (and Scotch Pie Fest. )

TIPTON (through the tulips), v Jarrow Roofing.

AWARDS FOR ALL

Brooks Mileson, Cumbrian of the Year (and very much else).

Former Darlington goalkeeper Phil Owers, 50, (right) presented with pipe and slippers after a successful season between the sticks for Shildon Railway.

Dave "Jock" Rutherford, 60, lifetime's achievement from the Over 40s League (and a new knee from the NHS).

Tom Harvey, given FA recognition ffor 50 years service to football, especially in the Hartlepool area. Middlesbrough fanzine Fly Me To the Moon, voted Britain's best.

Esh Winning's chips, named the AArngrove Northern League's finest.

Long time ex-Northern Echo man Ray Robertson, 73, recognised at the inaugural dinner of the Middlesbrough Ex-Players Association.

QUOTES

"So long as they don't fall in, I'd recommend rowing to any of my patients" - consultant cardiologist Gordon Terry, from Durham.

"I still pull people in. Look what happened when I re-opened Marks and Spencers in Darlington" - former Quakers' chairman George Reynolds, after being billed as the DJ at a Sunderland pub.

"On the budget we're on, it's like Dunfermline winning the Scottish Premier League" - Sunderland legend Ian Porterfield after managing Busan Icons to the Korean FA Cup.

"Made in Scotland from recycled paper" - flyer inside Dunfermline's programme advertising Stephens' bridies.

"They can't settle" - note with a pair of tortoises brought from Dundee to find a good home with Gretna chairman and animal lover Brooks Mileson.

"I'd been a pro for 18 years and it was like a flogging a dead horse" - former world billiards champion Mike Russell, from Marske.

"We'll get through this season, but after that we'll have to regroup" - Spennymoor United chairman Benny Mottram.

"He must be the worlds slowest bowler. If he weren't 18 stones, he could field in the slips off his own bowling" - Keith Nicholson describes Whitburn's Russell Muse.

"If you'd built it next to a cricket ground 30-odd years ago I might never have left" - FA chairman and former Durham FA secretary Geoff Thompson opens the new DFA headquarters, overlooking the county cricket ground.

"I saw myself as another bloke from the north, overcoming his struggles" - Brendan Foster compares himself with Alf Tupper, the Tough of the Track.

GOODBYE TO . . .

LEN "the Leap" Watson, 90-yearold Trimdon lad and still world Over 75 long jump record holder. Went to his rest with the secret of Watson's No. 5, a noxious liniment. Aye, there was the rub.

DON Enrico Incisa, 70, Middleham trainer and banty hen keeper. "I'd rather be first in a seller than second in the King George and Queen Elizabeth stakes, " he once said.

STEVE Tierney from Hartlepool - weight 17 stones, age 32, magnificent goalkeeper and lovely man.

"Those who say there are no characters left in football could never have met the Big Feller, " we wrote.

DARLINGTON and District Football League, aged 112.

IAIN Dalglish, chairman of Gretna FC in Northern League days, died aged 74 on the day that the club won promotion to the Scottish second division.

LES Childs, familiar Darlington fast bowler and scorer of ten successive ducks. Though not expected to live after contracting double pneumonia as a two-year-old, lasted another 90 years.

Stanley United FC, aged 115.

BRIAN Dobson, headmaster, journalist, and reckoned the best leg spinner Darlington CC ever had.

JACKIE Keeler, 81, one of the best batsmen and nicest men to represent Durham County.

Nicknamed Chip - "after Keiller's Little Chip Marmalade" - and never left South Moor, Stanley.

RAY Clish, Durham police inspector and cricket umpire, on duty in the former capacity when a streaker known thereabouts as Dog Fox traduced the Aynsley Johnson final at Annfield Plain. "You just don't expect it, " said Ray later.

"Not in Annfield Plain."

GEORGE Best, remembered hereabouts for an entertaining night at the Barnes Hotel in Sunderland. "The only regret I have, " he said, "is that I missed a penalty against Chelsea."

KEN Raine, Gurney Valley lad who became a vice-president of the Welsh AAA - but more of Ken when the column returns in the new year.

TEN THINGS THAT NON-BACKTRACKERS MIGHT NEVER HAVE KNOWN

LONG before they went down Kit-Kat Crescent, York City played in chocolate and cream halved shirts.

A STEAM engine named Newcastle United lasted just ten days before its name was changed to The Essex Regiment. Arsenal were blamed.

BLACK shirt leader Oswald Mosley qualified for Britain's 1936 fencing team in the Berlin Olympics, but withdrew when outvoted on giving the Nazi salute.

WILLIAM Shakespeare bequeathed his wife his "second best" bed.

THE Germans bombed Tipton in Staffordshire when aiming for Birkenhead and, "mission accomplished", turned attentions upon Liverpool. Wednesbury suffered a direct hit.

NORTHERN Ireland international Phil Gray became the first footballer to player competitively at Roker Park, Sunderland and Roker Park, Stotfold (Bedfordshire.)

THE organiser of the British Pooh Sticks Championship was master of a 150,000 ton oil tanker.

THE difference between a camera and a spare sock is that one takes photos and the other takes five toes.

TRANSLATED, the West African country Bukino Faso means "The land of the incorruptible men."

THERE'S a house in Quarrington Hill called Aston Villa.

ANNIVERSARIES

DURHAM City Cricket Club 175, Hartlepool CC 150, Ushaw Moor CC 125, Bishop Auckland King James CC (led by "Captain Clipboard") 25.

Bishop Auckland Referees' Society 100, Crook and District Football League 50, North-East Over 40s League 25. The North Eastern Cross Country Championships, 100.

Spennymoor Boxing Academy secretary Paul Hodgson "entertained" on his 50th by a strippogram of about 5ft 2ins and 22 stones - "I've never had to work so hard since Courtaulds in 1979, " he said - and Charlie Walker, the doughty Demon Donkey Dropper of Eryholme, who marked his 65th rather more sedately.

Published: 23/12/2005