ENTERPRISE NATIONAL LEAGUE NORTH. SATURDAY, 10th OCTOBER 2026.

Sloppy Work by Shrimps at Worksloppy Worksop.

By ‘eck, it’s a long time since we lined-up against Worksop Town in a league match and it was last century when their most recent meeting took place in any competition. (Morecambe won 2-3 away in an FA Cup game in 1995.) But before I get too misty-eyed about The Good Old Days, let’s have a look at the bare bones of the club’s history:

Worksop Town claim that their founding in1861 qualifies them to claim to be `the fourth oldest football club in the world’.

I first heard of them over a hundred years after this apparent birthday when they were founder-members of the Northern Premier League with Morecambe in 1968. I then saw them play for the first time on a genuine birthday of my own, as we shall see. But not only had I no idea that the club claimed such antiquity, I frankly had no idea where Worksop even was: I had never heard of the place before. Perhaps there is a reason for this…

Worksop can be found 135 miles south of Morecambe on the edge of Sherwood Forest in Nottinghamshire. It is known as `the gateway to the Dukeries’; meaning that it had lots of posh houses and estates owned by the aristocracy all around it. Eat your heart out, Robin Hood!

The town itself is not known to be frequented by gentry, though. It has an unenviable reputation for being a pretty rough place with a much higher than average crime rate: a massive 36% to 52% higher than the Nottinghamshire and East Midlands average, depending on whose figures you believe. Critics may say that at least the town didn’t come third – or even feature – in the book Crap Towns which listed the fifty worst places to live in the UK over twenty years ago. Morecambe – the town I was born in and which hosts the club I have always supported – did.

But I suspect that – given a blank map of England and asked to mark the spots where Morecambe or Worksop could be found – most people would get within at least fifty miles of our location on the west coast – or much nearer. It would be interesting to see if the same people have a better idea these days than I did almost sixty years ago as far as where Worksop lurks.

Whatever, Worksop Town was founded – according to the club – in 1861.

Wikipedia, however, claims there is no evidence to prove it played prior to 1875.

I’m sure these things matter to someone somewhere but I am confident that no eye-witnesses exist to attest to the accuracy of either claim.

Whatever, Worksop was definitely competing in the Sheffield & District Football League by 1892. 

It then featured in the Sheffield Association League before eventually settling on the Midland League. 

After the First World War, the club merged with Manton Athletic – Manton is a parish in the town – to become Worksop & Manton Athletic.

The Lost Non-League Grounds website takes up the story at this point:

“The football club’s supporters during the 1920’s were also witness to what has been known for decades as The “Great Betrayal” by the club directors at the time. An event described by Tigers supporters as “one of the most catastrophic and irredeemable betrayals made in footballing history”. In 1923, Worksop Town were drawn away to play Tottenham Hotspur in the FA Cup at White Hart Lane. The players had travelled to London by train and played out of their skins to come away with a 0-0 draw in front of 21,000. A replay at Central Avenue was anticipated and hundreds of fans had gathered at the Town’s Railway Station late into the evening after the match to greet their returning heroes. The players never arrived. The club’s directors had made the decision to accept Spurs’ offer of playing the replay at White Hart Lane with the Worksop Town players staying in London.. Two days later the replay saw Spurs win the tie 9-0. The betrayal felt by the fans at home in Worksop was felt for decades and is still talked about to this day.”

This club was disbanded in 1930 when it also withdrew from the Midland League. 

A new iteration of Worksop Town then lasted another ten years in various local leagues before again being wound-up during World War Two. Worksop Town Athletic then came along to replace them and by 1956, this version of the club was back in the Midland League. 

They left this in 1968 to join Morecambe and other leading northern non-league clubs to form the Northern Premier League but came bottom in the inaugural season and were relegated straight back to where they had come from.

(Personal note: the first NPL game I ever attended under my own steam at Christie Park – I’d cycled there from Bolton-le-Sands – was against Worksop. Town were already bottom of the table and the Shrimps were doing very well towards the top. I assumed – in my adolescent brain – that it would be an easy win. And surely these no-hopers wouldn’t dream of spoiling my fourteenth birthday – would they?

But they did. The Tigers bit the Shrimps where it hurts and won. I can’t remember the score (0-1; 1-2 maybe or even 2-3) but the fact that my heroes had lost was a real shock. Lesson for life learnt at fourteen: never, EVER count your chickens before they’re hatched…)

The Tigers were back in the NPL by 1972 but by 1989 had been relegated to the Northern Premier League First Division and were playing in Gainsborough after being evicted from their Central Avenue ground. This was three-sided affair – in the style of the original Bramall Lane – which, like Sheffield United’s, was shared with the local cricket club. The latter still exists but the site of the football club has disappeared

After three years’ exile, Worksop returned to their home town in 1992 to play at the newly-built Sandy Lane stadium, where the use of – or even possession of – chewing gum has been banned.

I assume that this is because of the mess this stuff makes when carelessly discarded. But maybe it’s because Tigers only like Frosties. Who knows? But remember – if you’re travelling there – leave the chewing gum behind… (Oh – and, unusually these days, the club doesn’t have a mascot. Other clubs’ mascots often favour alliteration: Christie the Cat; Eyrie the Eagle; Hebby the Hornet and so on. So Worksop Willy or Worksop Wombat might fit the bill for them. But Wrigley Worksop or even Worksop Wrigley? With the chewing gum ban, I can’t see it really, can you?)

In 2004, Worksop joined the new Conference North but only lasted three years. Financial problems saw them lose ownership of Sandy Lane and the club were again peripatetic at grounds such as Hucknall Town; Ilkeston Town and Retford United for the next three seasons.

The club returned to Sandy Lane in 2007 but were soon in financial difficulties again.

They had to resign from the Northern Premier League during 2014 and start playing in the Northern Counties East League instead. 

They won this in 2019 to return to the NPL and then the National League North via the Play-Offs the season before last. Last time out, Worksop ended-up in sixteenth place.

Today, they were still sixteenth in the National League North. Town have won just two and lost four of their last six league games, most recently 4-1 at Chester. Last Saturday, they were humiliated by lower-league opposition in the shape of FC United of Manchester, losing at home by three goals to nil in the third qualifying round of the FA Cup.

At the same time, Morecambe were earning an away tie in the Fourth Qualifying Round in the so-called “Northern” draw of the competition over 200 miles away in Northamptonshire against the latest incarnation of former EFL club Rushden & Diamonds. The Shrimps were in eleventh position in the table on the back of four wins and a single loss in their last six league matches.

Prior to the match, Morecambe Manager Adam Lakeland expressed these thoughts about the game:

“It’s not an easy place to go. Obviously, it’s another artificial surface – no two of them pitches seem to be the same. They all seem to play a little bit differently which I think always gives an advantage to the home team. We’re obviously one of the biggest – if not the biggest – club in the league and we’ve probably got that little target on our backs. Teams probably see us as a scalp and – because of that, certainly from the start of games – you’re getting a better level of performance out of every opposition that you come up against. It’s just a fact of what we’ve seen in the first ten games of the season. But we know what Worksop do well and what we need to be prepared for. I expect (my) team and this group of players to win games. We’re middle of the road. We’ve done nothing. We’ve put a decent run together We’ve got to try and keep that going.”

He tried to do that by naming an unchanged starting eleven to that which eventually beat Darlington quite easily a week ago. Taelor O’Kane returned to the bench after a long-term injury but there was no place in the squad for Jake Cain because he has picked-up yet another problem which needs treatment.

The weather was pleasantly sunny in Nottinghamshire as the match kicked-off.

Isaac Buckley-Ricketts was fouled in the seventh minute on the Morecambe right. As he moved up the field in the suddenly pouring rain, home goalkeeper Max Dearnley left his line to challenge Isaac and possibly fouled him. But Referee Wilson was unmoved.

Morecambe – with Ruben Curley catching the eye again – had the best of things for the opening quarter of an hour. But the hosts caught the Shrimps on the break after 16 minutes as Oli Greaves set-up Kian Harratt with a low cross which the Tigers’ forward walloped just over the bar. Four minutes later, Lewis Leigh was caught in possession on the half way line and this time Centre-Forward Harratt made no mistake with a tap-in as Myles Boney was only able to parry an initial attempt by Greaves from the edge of the area to his left-hand side for the scorer to take advantage of.

Within two minutes, Worksop were two goals up. Morecambe were caught in possession again and – as Cameron Coxe appeared to be fouled – broke away once more and this time Greaves struck it under the body of a totally exposed Boney into the net as he tried to narrow the angle.

Buckley-Ricketts was fouled again after 25 minutes in a situation where he could have had a clear run on goal – Liam Waldock’s name went into the Referee’s notebook as a result.

Curley was clearly fouled right in front of the match official then but the whistle didn’t blow before Harratt hit a savage shot from all of 25 yards which Myles did really well to tip over the bar. From the resulting short corner, the visiting goalkeeper produced another good save to keep out a shot by Lewis Whitham.

Buckley-Ricketts got away down the Worksop left after 38 minutes and slung over a cross which just the slightest of defensive touches managed to keep away from the inrushing Matty Daly.

And that was as good as it got for the Shrimps in the first half. They trailed off at half time two-nil down and without having had even one effort on goal which needed saving.

You had a feeling that the third goal would be critical in this match: if Morecambe were to score, it would be Game On; if Worksop got another, it would probably be Game Over.

The Morecambe Manager was forced into a change at half time. Liam Hogan had been hurt towards the end of the first period and Paul Lewis was moved back to take his place in central defence as Joe Garner came on to take-up the Centre Forward berth.

The visitors started in a lively manner with home keeper Dearnley forced to leave his penalty area to deny Buckley-Ricketts in the opening moments.

Leigh then struck the first shot which the home goalkeeper might have to save after 53 minutes but it just missed the target.

Although the game was generally pretty scrappy, the visitors were having the best of the play in the opening ten minutes or so as an increasingly blustery wind started blowing in their favour.

It took the visitors 66 minutes to finally trouble the scorers. A tremendous pass from Paul Lewis was met by Garner in the air and he did well to set-up leading scorer Daly to score his fifth goal of the season.

Garner then tried his own luck after seventy minutes with a shot which Dearnley saved relatively easily low down.  

Ben Williams then slung over a lovely cross from his left towards Isaac at the far post but it was marginally too high.

Substitute Teddy Collis then blew a perfect opportunity to equalise with his first touch of the game when he failed to connect properly right in front of goal with 75 minutes played and missed the target completely.

Then Daly had another golden chance with 80 minutes on the clock but the home goalkeeper did well to come off his line and frustrate him with his legs.

This was quite a scrappy and sometimes niggly game which was badly refereed throughout as the home team understandably wasted time at every possible opportunity after they went ahead – and were repeatedly allowed to get away with it. Morecambe were the better side in the second half and probably deserved more than the single goal they scored. But the game had already been thrown away by two poor pieces of defending – and equally weak officiating – in two disastrous minutes during the first period. No football team can expect to do this and end-up winning anything. Their second loss in nine matches saw the Shrimps slip to seventeenth place in the National League North. Worksop went up to fifteenth position in the table this evening – a single point ahead of us.

Time moves on and I don’t know what Adam Lakeland made of it at the end of the game – although I’m sure we can all guess. Once I do, I will update this report.

Thanks – as ever – for the excellent photographs to Neil Palmer.

Worksop Town: 1 Max Dearnley; 3 Josh Wilde; 6 Andrew Boyce (C); 7 Vaughan Redford (Y); 8 Aleksandrs Starcenko; 9 Kian Harratt (14 Chae Whitman- Brown 58’); 10 Oli Greaves (17 Ben Hatton 85’); 11 Lewis Whitham (Y); 12 Mason O’Malley; 18 Jordan Cropper (2 Deegan Atherton 45’); 25 Liam Waldock (Y).

Subs not used: 13 Josh Render; 15 Luca Cancello, 16 Sam Wedgbury; 23 Ben Tomlinson.

Morecambe: 13 Myles Boney; 2 Cameron Coxe; 3 Ben Williams (7 Teddy Collis 76’); 4 Liam Hogan (C) (9 Joe Garner (Y) 45’); 6 Lewis Baines; 8 Lewis Leigh; 10 Matty Daly; 11 Elliot Newby (18 Taelor O’Kane 86’); 14 Isaac Buckley-Ricketts; 17 Paul Lewis; 22 Ruben Curley.

Subs Not Used: 1 Joe Young; 31 Alfie Scales; 26 Lennon Dobson; 27 Adam Fairclough; 30 Corey Goodyear.

Referee: ? Wilson.

Att: 820 (An unknown number from Morecambe – 200 or so maybe?)