Not many of Carlisle City’s opponents this season will have a 6-1 victory over Juventus on their CV but tomorrow’s FA Cup opponents West Auckland do!
Admittedly it’s buried in the mists of time but it did spawn a TV drama in which the late Denis Waterman took a lead role – The World Cup – A Captain’s Tale.
Believe it or not West Auckland won one of the world’s first international footballing competitions back in 1909 – and successfully defended it two years later.
No doubt City players and officials we get a feel of that triumph of the last century when they are entertained in the West Auckland clubhouse after tomorrow’s tie.
The competition was for Sir Thomas Lipton Trophy. He was a self-made man, the company founder of Lipton Tea, merchant, philanthropist and yachtsman who lost five straight America’s Cup matches.
He was a football visionary who foresaw the attraction of international football competition and invited the FAs of England, Italy, Germany and Switzerland to send a side to an inaugural competition.
The latter three agreed but the English FA refused to send a club. The Italians sent a Turin XI drawn from clubs such as Torino and Juventus, Germany sent Stuttgarter Sportfreunde and the Swiss FA nominated Winterthur.
Deprived of an official participant from the FA, Lipton invited West Auckland FC, an amateur side made up of mainly of coal miners. The reason is still unknown although local folklore in West Auckland itself was that the FA intended to send Woolwich Arsenal forerunners of Arsenal FC before they moved to their current North London home, but West Auckland were invited instead as they shared the same initials.
The Durham club won the tournament, beating the Swiss team 2-0 in the final and defended it two years later, beating Juventus 6-1 in doing so. As successive winners, they retained the trophy.
However two trip to Europe had left the club in rather serious debt and the most valuable item in their possession was the Thomas Lipton Trophy. That was quickly used as security for a £40 loan.
Though the tournament didn’t live on after the initial two years the silver trophy certainly did and in 1964, a Mrs Lancaster, the former hotel owner who had provided the £40 loan kindly let the club take the trophy back for the cost of £100.
For the best part of three decades, the trophy took pride of place in the West Auckland Working Men’s Club trophy cabinet, Then in 1994 the trophy was stolen and hasn’t been seen since.
Fortunately Unilever – of which Lipton’s Tea remains a subsidiary – was kind enough to sponsor a replica, which remains safely in the possession of West Auckland FC.
None of that will have any bearing on tomorrow’s game and City manager Jim Nichols insists his side will be focused on the match and not the occasion as they enjoy the club’s return to the FA Cup competition after 42 years.
Nichols said: “We should be strong with the same squad that won at Thornaby on Wednesday. With seven subs for the FA Cup Ryan Swales will come back after injury and we will bring Jay Kelly back as well.
“Hopefully we can get the win or at the very least bring them back to Gillford Park on Tuesday for a replay.”
The winners will be at home to Goole or Consett in the preliminary round in a fortnight’s time.