Hawks set for FA Trophy clash against biggest club ever to be relegated to non-league football

It will never happen of course, but back in 1947 that’s exactly the story that shocked the footballing world. Tommy Lawton - the 28-year-old Chelsea forward with eight goals in his previous four England appearances - left the First Division to sign for Notts County, in the top half of the old Third Division South.

The Magpies had pulled off what was, and remains, one of the most amazing transfer coups in English football history. Possibly the most amazing one.

Lawton made the astonishing decision to drop down two divisions in order to be reunited with Notts’ recently-appointed manager Arthur Strollery, his former masseur and friend at Chelsea.

Signed on November 13, 1947 - a week after scoring for England in a 2-2 draw against Northern Ireland at Goodison Park - Lawton was in his prime, bagging four goals for his country in a 10-0 hammering of Portugal a few months earlier.

Six days after signing for the Magpies, Lawton netted again for England in a 4-2 victory against Sweden at Arsenal’s Highbury. The previous year, he had struck another four times in an 8-2 destruction of the Netherlands. In all, Lawton would score 22 goals in 23 appearances - the last four of which came during his time in the third division north.

Imagine Gareth Southgate picking players from the third tier these days?

Lawton’s arrival sent the black and white half of Nottingham into a frenzy. Attendances at Meadow Lane rocketed during his early years - 45,000 against Swansea on Boxing Day, for instance, with an estimated 10,000 locked outside. There were regular league crowds of over 40,000 - for third division football, lest we forget - and in 1949-50 the Magpies averaged over 34,000 as Lawton helped them win promotion to the second tier.

At a time when elite sport is being played behind closed doors, one cannot help but pine for an era where the terraces and stands were routinely packed out, even in the lower divisions.

The Lawton signing is just one fascinating story belonging to the oldest professional football club in the world. One of the 12 founder members of the Football League in 1888, the Magpies have won the FA Cup, played in the top flight as recently as 1992 - their relegation prevented them from taking part in the first ever Premier League season - and their black and white striped kit inspired Juventus to adopt the same colours at the turn of the 20th century.

In February 1994, I started a 15-month period of covering County home games for the Derby Evening Telegraph. In that time, they beat neighbours Forest 2-1 in front of almost 18,000 at Meadow Lane, just missed out on the second tier play-offs, humbled Ossie Ardiles’ star-studded Tottenham - Jurgen Klinsmann, Sol Campbell and Teddy Sheringham included - in the League Cup and suffered a shock relegation.

Oh, and they also won a European trophy.

They really did. I was at Wembley in March 1995 to watch them beat Ascoli in a near-deserted Wembley to lift the Anglo-Italian Cup.

Notts - managed by Everton legend Howard Kendall - had only won one game en route to the fina. Progressing from their qualifying group after one success and three draws, they defeated Stoke City on penalties in the two-legged semi-final after two of the dullest 0-0 stalemates it has ever been my misfortune to watch.

All those memories - including the Stoke ones - are a far cry from this coming weekend when I will be watching them at an even more deserted Westleigh Park in the fifth round of the FA Trophy.

Life is very different for the Magpies these days.

Arguably, they are the most famous club ever to be relegated into non-league football. Luton Town and Oxford United have both tumbled into the Conference/National League after reaching the giddy heights of the old First Division in the 1980s, but they don’t possess County’s history. For a start, they never signed a current England international when they were in the third tier.

Back in May 1950, as Pompey fans celebrated retaining the First Division title, Notts supporters basked in the glory of being top dog in their city - Forest having finished fourth in the same Third Division South.

Fast forward to May 1976 and County finished fifth in the old Second Division, three places and three points above cross-city rivals Forest. The Magpies, as they had been in 1950, were the pride of Nottingham.

The roles would be spectacularly reversed as, three short years later, Brian Clough’s side lifted the European Cup while Notts remained in the second tier, no doubt looking on in total shock. Has the balance of power in any English two-club town or city ever changed so rapidly and so extraordinarily?

The first Notts home game I ever covered, 27 years ago next week, was the derby with Forest. It was the 1993/94 season, Forest’s first outside the top flight since 1976/77 and their first since Clough had bid an emotional farewell the previous year.

Stan Collymore was banging in the goals and Forest would eventually win automatic promotion as runners-up to Crystal Palace. But on a chilly day at Meadow Lane, Charlie Palmer headed a late goal to give Notts victory. It was the last time the two clubs met in a league game.

Apart from humbling Ardiles’ all stars, that was as good as it got for the Magpies during my time in the Midlands; arguably, it has never got any better for them since.

Of course, they do not belong in non-league football. Last season’s average home crowd of over 5,200 amply illustrated that. But reputations, history and tradition count for little in the harsh world of professional sport.

Tell that to Luton, a top flight team throughout most of the 80s who were also relegated at the end of the final First Division season in 1991/92, thereby missing out on the Premier League riches they had voted for. My heart didn’t go out to them, or Notts, if truth be known.

It took the Hatters five seasons to get out of non-league football - one more than it took Oxford - but they are not alone in finding life tough outside the EFL.

Wrexham - a Second Division club in the early 80s - nosedived out of the EFL in 2008 and have never returned; Stockport County, who as recently as 2002 were beating neighbours Manchester City in a league game, fell even lower, into National League North.

Notts were close to making it just a one-season stay in the National League, reaching last summer’s play-off final only to lose 3-1 to Harrogate behind closed doors at Wembley.

Yet again, as a club of their size should be, they are challenging for promotion. But a return to the Football League would only be a small step on the road back to where I remember them.

It can be done - look at Luton Town now - but that’s for the future; the present takes them to Westleigh Park for the first time in their history and a truly fascinating tie which would surely have drawn a large crowd in a ‘normal’ season (remember what one of those felt like?)

Hawks have already pulled off one huge cup upset at Notts, 14 years ago in the FA Cup. Bearing in mind how few games they have played recently - this weekend’s is just their fourth outing since December 19 - another victory would deservedly take its place in the club’s pantheon of famous triumphs.

And then Hawks would be just two more wins from Wembley ...