Oh, when the Heed went marching in!

Gateshead 0
Bolton Wanderers 1 Lofthouse

Gateshead team Bobby Gray - Bobby Cairns, Billy March, Jack Callender, Tom Callender, Billy Brown, Johnny Ingham, Ken Smith, Ian Winters, Johnny Campbell, Eddie Johnson. More details here.
Attendance 17,692 at Redheugh Park 


QUEEN ELIZABETH II was coronated, Sir Winston Churchill was Prime Minister, Dwight D. Eisenhower became US President, and Gateshead FC enjoyed the finest day in its history.

1953 is a year fondly remembered south of the Tyne, particularly a football match on 28 February.

For, on this day 60 years ago, the Tynesiders took on Bolton Wanderers in the quarter finals on the FA Cup.

Newcastle United were the defending champions from the last two years, having triumphed at Wembley in 1951 and 1952 against Blackpool and Arsenal.

But the Magpies bowed out early in 1953, leaving Third Division (North) club Gateshead as the only representatives from Tyneside left in the competition.

Almost 18,000 packed into the Heed's then-home ground at Redheugh Park to see the underdogs face First Division Bolton, whose side featured the late Lion of Vienna, Nat Lofthouse.

The centre-forward had earned his nickname following a virtuoso display in a 3-2 win against Austria, one of the strongest international teams of the era.

Lofthouse would also prove ultimately decisive in this tie, scoring a late winning goal in a tight tie.

This fantastic Pathe newsreel shows that Gateshead were far from outclassed in the match, though. Indeed, the Heed pushed their more illustrious opponents all the way, and the Tynesiders were more than a little unfortunate.

At 0–0 late on in the match, Bolton defender Eric Bell handled the ball inside of his own penalty area - an offence Bell later admitted - but the referee waved play-on.

Bolton broke away quickly and Lofthouse rose at the far post to send a bullet header past Gateshead goalkeeper Bob Gray to give the visitors a winning 1–0 lead.

Having survived the banana skin, the Trotters went all the way to the Final.

But, in that famous match at Wembley, Wanderers were beaten 5-3 by near-neighbours Blackpool in a contest which has been forever known since as the Matthews' Final.

England winger Stanley Matthews turned the Final around with an unplayable spell in which he produced two second half assists for Stan Mortenson and Bill Perry.

Centre-forward Mortenson can feel slightly hard-done by the Matthews name christening the Cup, given that he is still the only player to score a hat-trick in a Wembley FA Cup Final.

Frankly, though, any personal sense of injustice is nothing compared to what happened to the Heed a short seven years later.

In 1960, Gateshead had a poor league season and finished in a lowly 22nd position. At that time, the bottom four teams in what was then then the Fourth Division had to apply for re-election.

Gateshead applied along with Southport, who were seeking a reprieve for the third year running, and for the seventh time altogether.

Oldham Athletic were applying for the second year in a row, and fellow north easterners Hartlepool United, were applying for the fourth time.

Purely on the strength of southern clubs sick of having to travel so far north, the Football League failed to re-elect Gateshead. Ever since, the Tynesiders have battled in vain to regain league status.

Recent times have been kinder on the club as manager Ian Bogie and striker Lee Novak helped fire Heed from the depths of the Northern Premier League to the Conference Premier.

In fact, Gateshead almost made amends for their 1953 disappointment with a run to the semi finals of the FA Trophy two years ago.

Things were looking good for a maiden trip to Wembley when Nathan Fisher and Adam Rundle gave the Heed a 2-0 half time lead at Darlington.

But the Quakers hit back to win 3-2, and a frustrating 0-0 draw at home meant another Wembley dream on Tyneside died.

This season, Gateshead went on another Trophy run, but they were knocked out in the quarter finals by Cumbrian rivals Barrow.

Results in the league have seen the departure of much-loved boss Bogie and the Heed have been dragged into a relegation battle at the bottom of the Blue Square Premier.

What has certainly not helped has been the awful problems with the pitch with debilitating rain and snow so bad that only one home match has been hosted in NE10 since the end of November.

Of course, the games in hand mean that Gateshead still have a good chance of survival in the non-league's top division.

But, with the pitch at International Stadium effectively deemed unplayable, a plethora of games are now getting re-arranged at venues from Hartlepool to York - and even Blyth.

And so, despite admirable progress in recent years, the glory days of the 1950s - of Football League status and FA Cup quarter finals - still seem a long way off.