SHEFFIELD United, and not many may know this, played Northern League football from 1891-93. Harry Lilley and Mick Whitham won full England caps while playing against the likes of Stockton and South Bank, but the sharpest Blade of all may have been Ernest Needham, known universally as Nudger.

He scored in United’s first home Northern League game, a 7-1 win over Darlington, captained the side for ten years, won 16 England caps and also spent 11 first class cricket seasons with Derbyshire.

His best mate, it’s roundly recorded, was the indelibly remembered William “Fatty” Foulke, a giant among goalkeepers.

We mention all this because a collection of Nudger Needham’s medals recently went under the hammer at Tennant’s in Leyburn, most of them bought by David Copland, a gaffer at Darlington Building Society.

“My main target was his England gold medal, but I missed out on that,” David reports. “No one seemed interested in the others, so I picked them up much cheaper than my bid.

Haul marked, he then began to receive offers from Sheffield United fans, and others, around the world.

“It’s been a thrill to handle medals won by a legend” says David – but, business being what is, the medal collection is now on its way to a new home in Los Angeles.

CLEARLY a man who knows what to do when given a medal, David’s also excited about a set of four won by Albert Coles, a director of Small Heath FC in the distant days before they became Birmingham City. “They were in a filthy state,” he says, terminology which appears to equate to the auction house description “good condition”.

What particularly pleases him is that the auction house from which he bought them was itself in Birmingham. “There are some wonderful things if you know where to look,” says David. Coles to Newcastle, as it were.

THE Crook and District League spreads ever further, Alston Moor among the season’s new arrivals. Alan Smith, secretary of our old friends at Darlington Hole in the Wall, views the prospect with some trepidation. “It’s going to be a hard 90 minutes,” says Alan, “and that’s just getting there.”

LAST week’s piece on Darlington cricketer Jon Barnes, among the game’s gentlemen, brought an approving note from Critics’ Corner at Feethams.

“To have Jonnie Barnes featured just when James Anderson has been in the news for aggressive and abusive sledging is quite apposite,” writes Malcolm Dunstone.

“Jonnie appears from the boundary to have a self-effacing, polite approach – and to get his wickets with guile and craft.”

Formidable bowler, useful bat, it transpires that he was also a very good footballer, still plays golf off a single-figure handicap and, all-round good egg, is the club’s deadliest dart thrower, too.

If all that weren’t enough, Jon’s also the second player behind Stokesley’s Andrew Weighell in the NYSD Fantasy League run by Normanby Hall scorer Neil Hutchinson.

Malcolm sends the fantasy league spread sheet, a note on the bottom familiar to many organisers of such fantastia.

“Twelve teams still to pay,” it says.

From Martyn Jackson, meanwhile, the recollection that the multi-talented Mr Barnes was just 17 when he won the town snooker final – “the doorman at the Navy Club wasn’t even going to let him in.”

There’s a PS. “He can’t swim or ride a bike,” says Martyn.

THE same column recalled the former distinction between Gentlemen, who were amateurs, and Players, who were cricket’s professionals.

Gentlemen’s initials preceded their name, players’ initials followed. Ian Reeve at the BBC recalls a familiar Lord’s PA announcement: “There is a correction to the scorecard. For FJ Titmus, read Titmus FJ.”

Ian also recounts a characteristically down to earth (shall we say) story about FS Trueman, in turn featured last week, but since it would be unlikely to pass the Look North censor, it had best not be repeated here, either.

IT was in recording another Fred Trueman story that last week’s column remembered the third test between England and India at Old Trafford in 1952 – and sought the identity of the to-be-familiar figure who made his England debut in that match.

It was Tony Lock, who not only claimed 4-36 in the second innings but – as Tony Herrington in Coundon, near Bishop Auckland, recalls – held a brilliant catch to dismiss the great Vinoo Mankad. “It was the first time he’d touched a ball in a test match.”

Today a little two-parter, with acknowledgment to the great Learie Constantine, featured opposite.

In Scotland, what occupation did a learfie follow and in North Yorkshire, which well-known member of the House of Lords is known to his neighbours simply as Constantine?

Enlightenment next week.