AS Nelson FC pull out of the Vodkat League, Matt Donlan – who was raised in the town – looks back on the history of a club that was formed in 1881.

THE demise of Nelson Football Club is nothing less than a tragedy as a glorious name from the past is now no more.

Okay, many people won’t know anything about the club aside from the weekly match reports we carry during the season...but next time you are in a pub quiz and the question comes around ‘Which was the first English team to beat Real Madrid?” don’t bother answering Manchester United, Liverpool or Arsenal.

Little Nelson FC were, excusing the pun, the Real deal back in 1923 when they downed the Spanish giants in their own backyard during a pre-season tour.

Yes, Nelson went to Spain – and they also beat Real Oviedo on a tour to remember.

They were also Third Division North champions the previous season.

The Admirals really can feel blue about their demise, which is so, so sad for non-league football in the area and so sad for the town.

Formed in 1881, a year before big neighbours Burnley, Nelson were founder members of the Lancashire League and then the old Third Division North in 1921.

But those days are all memories and sadly, ever so sadly, not enough people have been willing to head down to ‘Little Wembley’, the local name for Victoria Park used by and instantly recognisable to myself and generations of Nelsonians.

Yes, recent decades had been tough but Nelson has a proud history and the sort of club that is kind of always there, even if you forget about them for a while.

You always think they will play on and if it’s a nice day you may just have a wander down through Lomeshaye village to the game.

Even when Nelson dropped out of the North West Counties League a couple of decades ago, they didn’t go away and bounced back into the football pyramid.

Maybe they will return in the future. But that will only happen if the businesses of Nelson do the right thing.

Jimmy Hogan, who served Burnley so well in the formative years of the 20th century was a Nelson player, while former Blackburn Rovers winger Arthur Dawson actually moved to Burnley after a spell at Seedhill. Nelson was a good club.

Welsh international Dai Evans pulled on the blue shirt but by far the most famous name to appear for Nelson was Joe Fagan.

The Admirals signed Fagan from Manchester City as he was 30 and approaching the end of his fine playing career. He became player-manager.

The team built by Fagan romped to the title in his first season in 1951/52, though a catalogue of injuries throughout the team scuppered a repeat in his second and final season.

During these few years of success, Nelson tried – and failed – to gain re-election to the league, and financial issues saw him leave the club in 1953.

Joe was of course destined to go on to greater glory over 30 years later when leading Liverpool to a European Cup, League Championship and League Cup treble, having been part of their boot room team since 1958.

As Fagan was beginning his long association with the Anfield giants, Nelson’s fortunes were to move, quite markedly, in the opposite direction.

A third Combination Cup arrived in 1959/60, but a second place finish in 1960/61 was to be the nearest they came to winning the Combination title again.

The old Seedhill ground, nestled next to the cricket club at the edge of pretty Victoria Park beneath the M65 motorway, is long gone.

But back in the day, Seedhill games regularly drew crowds of 10,000 and more.

Naturally, the move across the park to Little Wembley and the drop down the divisions ruled out such numbers again.

But even last year chairman Alan Pickering, Nelson through and through, wanted to take the club back across the park to Seedhill, their true home.

Whether that move would have boosted the club we don’t know... but we can hope that Nelson FC will rise again.

And you can bet Joe Fagan will be hoping for just that as he looks down from the skies.