Paul Hodgson has given us permission to reproduce his book "When Push Comes to Shove"

Here's the latest chapter, which covers April 1999.

Here's the previous chapter: 

  Another month, another game, this time at home to Rotherham. Instead of frequenting our usual watering hole the Dalesman, we decided to meet in the Pennyweight for a change. The pub is in the market square.

 Mike brought a revised manuscript of Flipper’s Side with him. It was now in our fifth draft. Ian, who had read the other versions, said that he would take this one home and give us his verdict at the next home match.

    After a couple of pints, we left the Pennyweight and headed to the Centre Spot where we met Steve Keeney who predicted that Darlo would win 2-1.

     I went into the pitch-side disabled area with Ian, while Mike went with Steve into the East Stand seats.

    Darlo resorted to high and long balls to combat the bobbly pitch, which was totally unsuited to our normal passing style of play. The Millers, however, scored after only six minutes and we went in at half time 1-0 down.

The second half witnessed a spirited Darlo fightback, but although we dominated former keeper Mike Pollitt managed to thwart our attacks until the seventy-second minute when Paul Heckingbottom crossed into the box and Marco Gabbiadini equalised. However, six minutes later a free-kick was deflected past David Preece to give the visitors all three points. Both Ian and I were gutted and thought that Darlo had deserved at least a draw.

   After the match, I went with Ian for a night out in Catterick.

We took things at a sensible pace. We started off in the Colburn Lodge – I always enjoy going in there because everyone is really friendly. After a couple of pints we ordered a cab to take us to Catterick Village.  We ended up in Louis Bar which is a pub that stays open until well after midnight.  The place was pretty quiet, so we went back to Ian’s house.

The following Saturday, I went to Peterborough on the half past nine train.

Once on board, I found myself sitting opposite yet another single mother called Alison with whom I soon struck up a conversation.  She had three children – two girls and a boy. She told me that she was studying for an Open University degree in Business. I revealed to her that I had an HNC – at which she seemed quite surprised. Her reaction seemed like another example of judging a book by its cover. 

Alison went on to tell me that her children had different fathers and she didn’t get any financial help from any of them. She was therefore reliant upon Income Support.

    She was quite attractive with nice mannerisms and even bought me a coffee. She also gave me her phone number but I knew that I wouldn’t ring her.

I arrived in Peterborough at a quarter to eleven and was met by Stephen Lowson, John Wilson, Mark Trenhome and Karl from Colchester.  We had a drink in the Great Northern Hotel near the station, which was very plush inside with an upright piano, rugs, and potted plants. Then we headed to Charters Bar, which is actually a boat moored on the river Nene, where the five of us had our dinner.

We met John (Earl Gray) in the Cherry Tree which is near the ground and discovered that he’d caught an earlier train than me. When he heard me mention his new nickname that I had given him for the first time he said, “I’m not a f..... tea bag.” The nickname has stuck ever since.

At half past two we headed for the ground, purchased some programmes and then went in the disabled area. That is Stephen and I did, the rest of the lads went into the away end.

We talked to some Peterborough fans about Martin Carruthers. They said that he was a workhorse kind of player who wouldn’t score many goals.  

    Darlo played really well and deserved their 1-0 win.  Once, again, Marco Gabbiadini scored the all-important goal.  Marco was by now a cult figure with all the Darlo fans and was one of the most feared strikers in the Third Division.

After the match, Stephen and I headed for the station. We had a few drinks again in the Great Northern Hotel then he put me on board the seven o’clock train back to Darlington.

I bought four cans of lager from the buffet and got chatting to the woman behind the counter. She said I was “Brave” for travelling on my own. I responded by saying, “b...ocks, I’m normal!” I then asked her if all GNER passengers are brave. I also said that all Virgin passengers must be and she laughed her head off at that remark.  She then took my lager back to the table for me still sniggering at my comments.  I then cracked open one of the cans, sat back, and read my programme.

I arrived in Darlington at half past nine and ordered a taxi to take me home, using my mobile phone.

    Our next match was at home to Torquay United.  For this game Ian, Mike and I reverted back to the Dalesman for our pre-match drink.

    As promised, Ian brought back the manuscript of Flipper’s Side. He said that apart from a few tweaks here and there in his opinion it was now the finished article.  I now knew that we were on to a winner because if Ian liked it, then anyone would.  In hindsight this made us think that we might have been premature in sending it to Hamilton & Co. back in July.

So all the hours that Mike and I had spent working on it had been worthwhile. All we had to do now was to find a new publisher.

    Eventually, the three of us left the Dalesman and headed for the Centre Spot.  There were rumours going around that Mike Peden was on the verge of resigning and also that the players hadn’t received their wages yet again.  By this time the club was heavily in debt and everyone knew that something would have to give sooner or later.  The new stand (so we heard) had been mortgaged to the hilt and now the club was struggling to keep up the repayments.  As I mentioned earlier, I had had my doubts regarding the club’s finances, now if the rumours were to be believed I had been correct all along.

    Anyway, this time I sat in the disabled area with Mike while Ian went up to the seats in the East Stand.

    Darlo were absolutely terrible that day and we were beaten 2-0 by a very ordinary looking Torquay United team with Paul Heckingbottom receiving a red card. It was very disappointing, especially after witnessing such a good performance the previous Bank Holiday Monday at Peterborough. 

After the game Mike Peden got some stick from the fans, and left rather hurriedly. Mike and I didn’t stick around and went to the Dalesman for tea whereas Ian returned straight home to Catterick.

    We stayed in the Dalesman until around eight o’clock.  After such a shocking performance, neither of us were in the mood for drinking so we headed home – sober for a change – in a cab.

    The following Wednesday I went to Scarborough with Ian in his car. He picked me up from work at a quarter to five and then we were on our way. Since neither of us had had any tea, we stopped at Leeming Bar Services and bought some sandwiches, which we ate en route.

     We arrived at the McCain Stadium in Scarborough just before the kick-off and went straight in the disabled area of the away end which was really good with an excellent view.

    The recently departed Darren Roberts was in the Seadogs' team but he had a poor game.

    Darlo won the match 2-0 with goals from Martin Carruthers (his first for the club since his transfer from Peterborough United) and Marco Gabbiadini.  In reality it could have been a lot heavier scoreline as both Lee Ellison and Gabbiadini hit the woodwork. 

 Both Ian and I were more than happy with the scoreline and the performance. Interestingly, the defeat left our neighbours Scarborough bottom of the league and they were eventually relegated at the end of the season, whereas Darlo had gone four away games unbeaten.

    With being a bit rushed for time before the match, I broke with tradition and bought my programme after the match.  Luckily they still had some left as the attendance was a poor 2,125.

   We arrived back in Darlington well after closing time.  This meant that Ian and I had gone to another game without a pint but the score made it worthwhile.

Our next match was at home to league leaders Cambridge United and for this game I met Mike and Ian in Darlington Cricket Club. To my surprise, there was some decent food on sale behind the bar. I therefore opted for pie and peas and Mike and Ian had the same.

    Roger Martin turned up after us and said that the pitch was again in a sorry state. According to him it was rock hard and totally uneven underfoot.

    Roger also said that two of our youngsters had been training with Celtic over the past week, the players in question were Craig Skelton and Graham Liddle. Unfortunately for them, nothing materialised and they remained at Feethams.

    The four of us eventually left the Cricket Club and headed for the Centre Spot where the topic of conversation was again the state of the pitch.

    I went in the disabled area with Mike and we had the misfortune to see a dire 0-0 draw.  The nearest we came to scoring was a disallowed effort by youngster and former youth team player Paul Campbell in only his fourth appearance that season.  We both agreed that Campbell looked an excellent prospect. Also, in the last minute Mario Dörner missed a glorious chance when clean through on goal. His goalbound shot hit the Cambridge keeper’s trailing leg and was deflected away from goal.

    In the Centre Spot after the match everyone was moaning about the referee’s leniency in not punishing deliberate handballs and tackles from behind, but that was scant consolation for dropping a valuable two points at home.

    Interestingly, The Northern Echo in their match report the following Monday quoted one of the press corps as saying, “The referee, like the pitch, was uneven with bald patches.” In a similar vein, Roy McFarland, the Cambridge United manager, waded in with his own comments regarding the state of the Feethams pitch by remarking, “If anybody won, then it was the pitch…It hampered us, and I’m sure it hampered Darlington also.  It was diabolical.”

 For our next game away at Carlisle I went with Mike by train from Bank Top station. Earl Gray was there with some other lads including Roger Martin.

Whilst Mike and I caught the earlier slower train, John waited for the express.

We sat near a Chinese man and woman – who  had to make room for the wheelchair by moving a very heavy brown parcel on a wheeled trolley from the area where the disabled seating was and lifting it up onto one of the seats.  On the outside of the parcel there was some undecipherable Chinese writing. Mike and I just watched this spectacle in our bemused way.

When we got to Newcastle, Earl Gray helped to get me on board the Carlisle train. From the window Mike and I saw homemade pigeon crees along the line. Then the train stopped at the MetroCentre. Other stops en route were leafy Wylam and Prudhoe. As we got out into the countryside we came past fields of newly-born spring lambs. The idea of mint sauce immediately came to mind.  Following the course of the River Tyne, we continued on our way and passed through Bardon Mill and Haltwhistle before arriving at our destination.

The station overlooks the bright red sandstone of the city walls and castle. Mike pushed me into the city centre because he wanted to buy a few things. We then went for a meal in a pub called the Kings Head in the city centre. 

An old man who looked like Uncle Albert from Only Fools and Horses was sitting nearby. He was wearing a base-ball cap and had a long white beard.  When he learned that we were from Darlington, he immediately latched onto us and told us that he had a sister who lived in Carlton Moor Crescent in the town. Another drinker when he learned that we were Darlo supporters started to denigrate the current Carlisle team.  In his words, “Even if we bricked up the f.... goal, you’d still score against us!”

We then moved on to the Caledonian pub where we met Brian from Sheffield with his friend Glen and then headed for the Border Rambler.

The four of us then decided to get a taxi to the Beehive pub which is not far from Brunton Park. The taxi driver and another person on the rank looked and behaved like inbred country bumpkin types. Ian had previously said that the Beehive resembled a church but as we approached it we found that his description was well wide of the mark!   Luckily, the taxi driver knew where it was and dropped us off outside.

We had a few drinks outside in the warm sunshine then went the few yards across the road to the ground. The disabled area was right next to the home team dugout. It resembled nothing more than a brick-built hut with a makeshift roof where there was space for about six wheelchairs and also some tatty chairs for helpers to sit on. In front of this was an area covered by synthetic blue matting, which on my last visit to the ground had only been strewn with a layer of gravel.

As luck would have it Mike and I both got in for nothing, which considering the state of the disabled area was about right. It would have been against the trades description act if we’d have been charged!

When Darlo scored Mike was so excited that he leapt up in the air like a salmon, cracking his head on the roof of the dugout. It was only a matter of a few minutes before a lump the size of an egg appeared on his skull. Given the fact that he is almost bald it was unmistakeable. 

Nigel Pearson, the Carlisle Manager and former Middlesbrough player, was standing up during the whole game and obstructing my view and generally moaning about any decisions that didn’t go his way.  Eventually I could take no more of his bobbing up and down and told him to stay put and shut up. Unfortunately, this didn’t have the desired effect.  It was  almost as though he was deaf.

Things at Carlisle didn’t seem to be particularly rosy at this time as a lot of players had been sold and the club was near the bottom of the table. The focus of the fans’ anger was the Chairman, Michael Knighton. They kept up a steady chorus of “Knighton out” during most of the game.

After the Quakers went one nil up through Craig Liddle, and seemed to have the match under control, the game turned when a hotly disputed and controversial penalty was awarded to the home side. David Preece, the Darlo keeper, had the ball under control when the onrushing Carlisle striker Richard Tracey caught him with his studs. Preece retaliated by pushing the ball into the forward’s chest, whereupon Tracey rolled on the floor in agony as though he’d been punched by Mike Tyson! As a result, Preece was booked for ungentlemanly conduct and to our amazement, the referee David Pugh awarded a penalty which Scott Dobie duly converted.

Carlisle then had the upper hand and scored again until we equalised through Martin Carruthers. The game continued to swing from end to end and Carlisle went briefly into the lead again only for Paul Campbell to net a well-deserved equaliser to make the final score 3-3. Mike and I couldn’t help thinking that we’d been robbed by the referee. Failure to win that game ended any lingering hopes we might have had of reaching the play offs.

 Instead of catching a taxi and having to endure the company of the local inbreeds, we decided to make our own way back into Carlisle city centre. In typical absent-minded manner, Brian completed most of this journey with his laces undone, somehow oblivious of the fact and managing not to trip up in the process. We then went to the Caledonian again and while I sat with Brian and Glen, Mike went for a kebab from the shop next door.

We caught a train back at about seven o’clock and when we arrived at Newcastle we went to the Forth Hotel which is in the nearby Pink Lane, only a few yards from the station entrance. In the bar we bumped into Earl Gray together with his entourage.

After a few pints we made our way back to the station, leaving Earl Gray to finish his pint.  By this time I needed to go to the toilet, but to my dismay I found that it was shut. Having no other alternative I used my bottle as discretely as possible and Mike emptied it on the floor over the bridge near the refreshment room.

When the train arrived, the toilet was too narrow for the wheelchair anyway, so it was a good job that I had relieved myself earlier and given the platform a bit of a wash!

 The fun and games continued on the train when we were joined at the last minute by Earl Gray and his companions the “Hammers” who are three brothers that normally follow West Ham but go to Darlington matches when they can.  Richard and John decided to bet one of them to climb along the luggage racks. Unfortunately, he failed miserably and ended up sprawled across the seats for his pains!

Not wanting to let the side down, he then decided to engage in some “extreme sports” as he dived into the seats from a great height. I too entered into the spirit of the occasion by blocking the aisle with my wheelchair as the ticket collector came towards us.

As the drunken, riotous behaviour increased in intensity Earl Gray and the rest of his companions broke into song. Upon arrival back in Darlington it was quite foggy and we went for a quick pint in the Dalesman and then booked a cab back home.

     Our final home match in April was against Brentford who were challenging for promotion. For this game I met Mike and Ian in the Dalesman, to be told by the latter that the club was about to be taken over.

    With it being a night match we only had a pint and then headed straight for the Centre Spot.  Once again rumours were flying around about an imminent takeover.

    I went in the disabled area with Mike.  To our surprise local millionaire and former safe cracker George Reynolds was sitting in the Directors Box.  Could he be the club’s next owner I wondered?

    Darlo opened the scoring with a goal from Gary Himsworth, his first since rejoining the club on transfer deadline day. A couple of minutes later Gabbiadini almost doubled the lead but his volley crashed off the post. However, a minute before the break Brentford grabbed a dubious equaliser when Lloyd Owusu appeared to handle the ball on the ground which then allowed him to play the ball through to Andy Scott to beat David Preece with ease.

    At half-time the referee was unable to continue because of a leg injury and was replaced by one of his assistants, which meant that our mascot, Mr Q took over as the fourth official.  At least he had the good sense to remove his costume I thought to myself!

    Against the run of play, Brentford took the lead in the 71st minute, but Darlo kept plugging away and got their just reward seven minutes from time when Marco Gabbiadini equalised.

    After the match Mike and I returned to the Dalesman with Ian going straight home. We reflected on what had really been a disappointing season so far and also the unexpected appearance of George Reynolds. We both hoped and thought that he would be the next owner of the club as Mike Peden was allegedly potless.

    Later we were joined by two Brentford fans who were staying in the bed and breakfast accommodation of the pub. One of them had “the Bees” tattooed on his forearm. The other wore red braces and was quite fat like Humpty Dumpty or a seedy city trader.

    They spoke of their hatred of their local rivals Fulham and used quite derogatory language to describe their chairman Mohammed Al Fayed.

    Later “Humpty Dumpty” asked the blonde barmaid, who by now had finished her shift, to go for a meal in the curry house next door. Much to our amusement she declined.  She was clearly way out of his league.

    As we left the pub they were still slagging off Fulham and their chairman.