At the start of the 20th century Saints were one of the top teams in the land, if you don't believe me then read on.

Back in the Victorian era the Football League was formed mainly by Northern teams,Birmingham being the most Southerly point in it in 1902 aside from a team called Woolwich Arsenal, who struggling would later move North of the river.

The top teams in the South played in the Southern League and Saints were the dominate team along with Tottenham Hotspur and in 1902 we reached our second FA Cup final in three seasons.

The first one had not gone well, Bury had beaten us 4-0, but now were were back at the Crystal Palace again to meet Sheffield United.

During the earlier rounds we had encountered Football League opposition, Liverpool then the Division One title holders had been beaten 4-1, as had Bury and Nottingham Forest in the semi final.

The top teams in the South were more than a match for those in the North.

We therefore went up to London with confidence, Sheffield United were a mid table team in League Division One and were not considered better than the three teams we had already eliminate.

Saints prepared for the game by training at Chilworth at the Clump Inn and only travelled up to London on the morning of the game, a number of special trains were taking Saints fans up to the Capital and the Saints party had reserved two carriages of one of these trains that left the Docks Station at 9am.

Saints had the great athlete CB Fry in their ranks and he would be the first amateur to appear in the final since 1893, he was described as the greatest cricketer in England, the greatest athlete and the most popular footballer, perhaps suggesting that he was not quite as good at Soccer as he was everything else, he would later be offered and turn down the throne of Albania.

The Crystal Plalace ground, not to be confused with Selhurst Park and the football club of the same name had 76,914 packed in and many climbed trees overlooking the ground for a better view.

Sheffield United opened the scoring shortly after half time through Alf Common, Saints left it late to reply, Harry Wood the Saints scorer was in an offside position but the referee deemed that the ball had hit a Sheffield player and he was played onside.

The game finished 1-1 and the replay was set for the following Saturday.

But there was drama after the final whistle, Sheffield United goalkeeper was Billy "Fatty" Foulke who weighed in at over 20 stone, he was known for his temper and would often pick up opponents who annoyed him and hang them upside down by the boots.

This time he left the dressing room after the game stark naked to loo for the referee who managed to lock himself in a broom cupboard whilst FA Officials pleaded with Foulke to stop trying to wrench the door from it's handles.

These days Foulke would be banned for a long time, back then he just took his place as normal for the replay on the following Saturday at the same venue.

For some reason the attendance was officially stated as 33,068 for the replay, less than half the crowd for the first game, why the sudden drop is unclear, perhaps in those days the cost of a trip to London for both Saints and Blades fans twice in a week was just too much.

In the first game Saints had worn their red & white stripes, but now it was the Blades turn and we wore white shirts, but within two minutes we were a goal down, however we regained our composure and we had the majority of the chances, but the United goal seemed to have a charmed life, however with the size of Foulke there was not much room left to shoot at.

On 70 minutes we equalised with a goal by Albert Brown and it looked then that the Cup was coming South as we pressed and pushed forward and Foulke making a string of saves, but our hearts were broken with just two minutes to go when Robinson in the Saints goal missed a cross and Barnes who had not played in the original game was able to walk the ball into the net.

We had one last chance through CB Fry who blasted high over the bar and the cup was lost again for the 2nd time in three years.

With grateful thanks to the book Match Of The Millenium published by Hagiology books in 2000, without the Hagiology authors we would be completely unaware of large chunks of our history.

Photo: Action Images

underweststand added 16:06 - Apr 19 For those nerds amongst us who like stats. and club history ..Hagiology has produced a long series of publications ..(I think I have most of them) which has give some real perspective into the club and it's high and low points. IN THAT NUMBER is a work of art in itself and I often wish there had been a follow-up that took us beyond the bad old days of the relegation to L1, and onto the glory of the JPT win at Wembley and back up into the Prem. and our sojourns into Europe. I often wonder if any other league club has so much published history about themselves.

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