Get the Lemonade Out - WB 's 200th Posting On This Site

And that does not count the first website! There you are - I love starting a sentence with and - what an almighty rebel.

If you are a local football lover, as well as an amateur historian, I thoroughly recommend  you to go onto the Durham County Schools Football Association website at www.durhamcountyschoolfa.org.uk . Over the years there have been several very local schoolboys donning the shirt of the full county schoolboy team and you can see their names on site if you look carefully.

One of them was Jimmy Dodds from New Brancepeth School. He played outside left for Durham against Northumberland in 1911. If I had only known, when I played for Durham and District Boys [selected from about 26 schools] that my great uncle Jimmy had donned the shirt of the full schoolboy county  team [in the same position!] I would have surely had a sense of history. Ofcourse playing for Durham and District was not quite the same feather in the cap as playing for the full county side.

Blow me at outside right was a lad called Vasey - this is weird. It could not be John because I am sure that he is not presently 113 years old.

There was a player in the 1911 match - playing alongside our Jimmy from New Brancepeth - that went on to be very famous - Warney Cresswell - on that day in 1911  he played right half for Durham. Later he earned the sobriquet 'the Prince of Full backs' . He won 7 caps for England as well as helping Everton to win the Football League Championship twice and the FA Cup.

WB