The Chronicle (South Tyneside and Durham)
‘Epic’ clash to play out 70 years on
THE two clubs were parted by just five miles, their three games even closer. Bishop Auckland v Crook Town, FA Amateur Cup final 1954, ran for 330 minutes and was watched by 200,000 spectators.
Now the 70th anniversary of this most epic of confrontations, which stretched over a Wembley showpiece and two replays back in the North East, is to be celebrated.
Plans are advanced for a mini reenactment of the final next month backed by a film show and special celebratory brochure.
Newcastle United’s double FA Cup winning skipper Joe Harvey was unexpectedly centre stage upon its dramatic unfolding. He coached eventual winners Crook long before he became a celebrated manager claiming the last trophy United ever won, the European Fairs Cup of 1969.
There was hardly a paper thickness between the two teams...2-2 at Wembley saw the scoreline repeated at St James Park in the first replay while a single goal separated noisy neighbours on the third attempt at Middlesbrough’s Ayresome Park.
Players were theoretically amateur and though talk of ‘boot money’ abounded all had day jobs. Ken Harrison who scored Crook’s two at St James Park was a schoolteacher, Ray Oliver who notched the Bishops goals a Cullercoats lifeboatman. Harrison claimed the single goal winner in the third match.
Wing-half Jimmy Nimmins, who earned his living at Consett Steelworks, broke his leg after just five minutes at Wembley, leaving Bishops to soldier on with 10 men. No subs in those days.
Referee Alf Bond who officiated in all three historic ties had lost his right arm at the age of 19 when working in a rubber factory. Two years later he took charge of the FA Cup final.
The matches were played over a 12-day period – April 10 at Wembley, April 19 Newcastle, and April 22 Middlesbrough.
Such was the golden era of the Amateur Cup that in a mass exodus from a small mining area 20 special trains and 200 coaches left the South West Durham enclave for Wembley.
Crook skipper and centre-half Bobby Davison revealed that they did so much running under the bark of Joe Harvey that “my legs were so tight and sore the next morning I had to go downstairs on my bum” while left winger Jimmy Mcmillan declared that Harvey’s tactical instruction was “kick the ball into the opposing corner flags” if Crook were leading with only a few minutes to play.
After an exhausting win third time of asking at Ayresome Park Joe Harvey’s battle weary warriors boarded a special train back home where 15,000 people from Crook and the surrounding pit villages were there to greet them. There was not much time to celebrate, however, with many of the players having work the next day followed by a league match at West Auckland Town in the evening before a rearranged Northern League Challenge Cup semi-final with Shildon the day after. And to think today’s pampered superstars, full time on thousands of pounds a week, complain of an over congested fixture list.
Maybe Crook were eventually victorious and admittedly they were always significant big hitters but Bishops were the recognised kings of the Amateur Cup. They won it for the next three years, the only ever hat-trick of victories, and claimed the trophy a record 10 times.
The Amateur Cup, which regularly in its glory days attracted full houses of 100,000 to Wembley, ran from the 1893-94 season until 1974 when the FA abolished the separation of professional and amateur football.
John Phelan, a former Crook player who was at Wembley with his family aged just four cheering on his team, is a major figure in the organisation of the 70-year celebration. He tells me a match between junior sides from Bishop Auckland and Crook will take place on Thursday, April 11, at Bishop Auckland’s Heritage Park. Just about bang-on the date of the original Wembley showpiece.
Newcastle United’s association with Crook Town and the Amateur Cup was to spectacularly continue. Eight years after Harvey’s involvement Crook won the trophy again also after a replay at Middlesbrough’s Ayresome Park when a young man called Frank Clark was their left-back.
The year was 1962 and Harvey promptly signed Clark for United where he went on to play an impressive 457 games all under the management of Joe.
Harvey, Clark and Crook, linked by a silver thread in football’s history.