NTFC Trust

Saturday 13th April 1996 saw Northampton Town travel up to Lancashire to take on Preston North End at Deepdale. Preston were top of the League and needed 3 points to guarantee promotion whilst the Cobblers were upper mid table, eventually finishing 11th.
This was a memorable day for our bus load of Earls Barton Cobblers starting with a lunchtime stop at one of our favourite places, the Ford Sport & Social Club in Halewood, Merseyside.
On to Deepdale and a crowd of 11,774 were there to watch the Lilywhites clinch promotion, or so they thought. But Ian Atkins team had other ideas and a hattrick from Neil "Larry" Grayson put Preston's celebrations on hold, with a 3-0 Cobblers victory, which is our only win at Deepdale. The PNE fans were not too happy and we had a police escort out of Preston, whilst all the other coaches got on the M6 we headed up the A59 across the Pennines for a night out in Masham, North Yorkshire which is the home of the Theakston's and Black Sheep breweries. Masham was a regular destination for us, for a few years, whenever we were "up north". We stayed in Masham till closing time, arriving back in Barton around 3.30 a.m. a great day out!!
The Cobblers team that day was Andy Woodman, Dave Norton, Ray Warburton, Ian Sampson, Danny O'Shea, Chris Burns, Roy Hunter, Dean Peer, Gareth Williams, Jason White and Neil Grayson.