West Auckland Town F.c.

The Trophy was initiated by businessman and sporting enthusiast Sir Thomas Lipton , who wished to see a competition between the leading football clubs of Europe . The football associations of Italy , Germany and Switzerland duly complied, but The Football Association of England refused to nominate a club. West Auckland, a lowly amateur side of Coalminers from the Northern League were entered into the competition, although it has never been entirely clear why.

One plausible explanation for West Auckland's entry was that an employee of Sir Thomas Lipton's had contacts in the Northern League and put out an appeal for a team to take the English spot. An alternative explanation, popular in the town itself, is that Lipton had wanted to send Woolwich Arsenal to the Championship – an instruction to his secretary to "contact W.A." led to West Auckland being mistakenly contacted. However, a review of the facts casts doubt on this theory; at the time Woolwich Arsenal had only just been promoted from the Second Division and were not the famous club they are today, being relatively small and unsuccessful compared to many other Football League sides. In addition, there is no documentary evidence to suggest any sort of link between Sir Thomas Lipton and Woolwich Arsenal, so it is unclear why he would have chosen them ahead of any other English team.

West Auckland duly made the journey to Turin , where the first tournament was being held, many of the players paying out of their own pocket to do so. They beat Stuttgarter Sportfreunde in the semi-finals 2-0; in the final, on April 12 , 1909 , West Auckland faced Swiss side FC Winterthur and beat them 2-0 as well to take the trophy.

Two years later, West Auckland returned, and after beating FC Zürich 2-0, they ran out 6-1 winners in the final over future Italian giants Juventus . By the rules of competition, they were awarded the trophy to keep in perpetutity.

Upon their return home, the club was forced to pawn the trophy to the landlady of the local hotel, because of financial problems. It remained with her family until 1960 when a village appeal raised money to return the cup to the club. The cup was then stolen in 1994 and despite the best efforts of local police and a £2,000 reward it was never found. An exact replica of the cup now be found in a secure cabinet in the West Auckland Working Men's Club.

The story of the club's first success was turned into a Television Movie in 1981 – '' A Captain's Tale '', produced by Tyne Tees Television and starring Dennis Waterman .

The club still exists today. Although it has never quite reached the same heights it did at the start of the 20th century, it did win the Northern League in 1960 and 1961 , and were FA Amateur Cup runners-up in 1961 , losing to Walthamstow Avenue .

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West Auckland Town F.c.