How Pickford and Burn played Darlington’s Arena as youngsters

Careers which started 4,000 miles away in south Durham when both players took their first big steps up from youth football into the professional game, and they did so in the toughest of conditions at a club that was on the brink of collapse in a team that was prone to heavy defeat…

Dan Burn makes his first appearance in The Northern Echo in July 2008 winning the national finals of a Coalfields Regeneration Trust competition with Blyth Spartans (Image: NQ staff)

 WHEN Darlington signed Dan Burn on a Youth Training Scheme in July 2009, he was a 17-year-old trolley boy at Asda in his hometown of Blyth. When he left 19 months later, he had transformed into a central defender ready to play at the highest level of English football.

Burn had fallen out of Newcastle’s youth system aged 11 and Darlington spotted him playing for Blyth Spartans while studying sports science and collecting trolleys.

Dan Burn in the Darlington youth team at the start of 2010-11 season (Image: NQ staff)

Darlington youth team in April 2010 managed by Craig Liddle, left, and with Dan Burn standing head and shoulders above everyone else on the back row (Image: NQ staff)

He took two trains a day to travel to Darlington, which must have been deeply depressing experience as the club, riddled with debts, was losing its senior players and sliding out of the Football League.

Dan Burn makes debut for Darlington in a 5-0 defeat at Torquay United on December 12, 2009 (Image: NQ staff)

But this also provided him with his opportunity. With no defenders left, manager Steve Staunton gave the 6ft 7in youth his debut, as a substitute away at Torquay on December 12, 2009 (a 5-0 defeat) and then gave him his first start on March 6, 2010, at home against Torquay (a 3-1 defeat and the Quakers’ fifth defeat in a row).

Dan Burn rising above a Torquay player at the Darlington Arena on March 6, 2010 (Image: NQ staff)

Echo reporter Craig Stoddart made Burn man of the match, giving him six out of ten and saying that although he was at fault for Torquay’s first goal, it was “an otherwise solid first start”.

At the end of Burn’s first season, the Quakers were relegated into the Conference National league (now called the National League), and it wasn’t until midway through the 2010-11 season that new manager Mark Cooper gave Burn his chance.

Dan Burn uses his long legs to thwart Crawley striker Matt Tubbs (Image: NQ staff)

He played him in a 4-1 FA Trophy win over Bath that January, and then said: “He was outstanding, especially for a young lad. He’s calm with the ball, he’s aggressive in the air and he’s not a slouch. Based on that performance, he is better than I thought he was.”

Cooper quickly persuaded Burn – whom the Echo began referring to as a “starlet” – to sign a two-and-a-half year contract, but knew he would not stay at the club to see it out.

After a 1-0 home defeat to Gateshead, Cooper said Burn was “a million miles the best player on the pitch”, and added: “If I was a Premier League manager I’d sign him straight away. He’s 6ft 6in, he’s a left footed centre back and they don’t grow on trees.”

As Darlington played their way through to the FA Trophy final at Wembley, The Northern Echo Arena was besieged by scouts from the top clubs wanting to sign the starlet, and he made it into Scott Wilson’s North East team of the season.

“He might only have made 11 senior starts, but teenage defender Dan Burn has already done enough to establish himself as one of the most exciting prospects in North East football,” said Scott.

Dan Burn being fitted for his Wembley suit when Darlington reached the FA Trophy final in April 2014, but he wasn’t allowed to play by Fulham who had signed him for a record £350,000 (Image: Unknown)

Burn was fitted with an extra-long suit for Wembley, but never made it onto the pitch. Instead he signed for £350,000 – a Darlington record – for Fulham, who insisted he had a minor knee operation rather than mess around in a trophy match.

And so, after 19 appearances for the Quakers, in April 2011 Burn was on his way to the top flight, leaving behind a club that was peering deeper and deeper into an abyss of debt…

England’s Dan Burn at the World Cup (Image: Bradley Collyer)

JANUARY 17, 2012, was a day of drama unlike any other in Darlington FC’s 129 year history. With unresolvable debts of £1.8m, and a millstone of a 25,000 seater stadium hanging around the necks of the 2,000 fans, a midday deadline for additional funds expired, and so the club was terminated.

It ceased to exist. The Quakers had died.

Temporary manager Craig Liddle told the 10 remaining players that the game was up and their contracts had evaporated, and administrator Harvey Madden prepared to make the final, official, public announcement of the club’s demise.

At “the 13th hour”, two men – Shaun Campbell and Doug Embleton – screeched up to the stadium in a silver Peugeot 308.

Somehow they had raised £50,000, enough to keep the club afloat for a fortnight in the hope that a permanent solution might be found. They presented evidence of the money to the administrator before he administered the final rites and so although the club, founded in 1883, was gone, the playing side gained a stay of execution.

This meant that from somewhere, manager Liddle had to rustle up at least 11 players to fulfil Darlington’s next fixture, on January 21, 2012, against the big spending “Cod Army” of Fleetwood Town.

The football family, particularly the North East clubs, responded to the Quakers’ predicament, and offered reserve players on loan.

Strict league rules prevented many of the players signing on, but the position of goalkeeper was regarded as a specialist and so Sunderland’s 17-year-old reserve keeper was allowed in.

He was Jordan Pickford, born in Washington, who had been on Sunderland’s books since he was eight.

March 17, 2012, a dejected Jordan Pickford kicks the ball out of the back after the net after Ebbsfleet had scored at the Darlington Arena, condemning the Quakers to a 2-0 defeat (Image: NQ staff)

He made his debut for the Quakers against Fleetwood in front of a crowd, swelled by the prospect of seeing the club rise from the dead like Lazarus, of 5,638. There had been queues an hour before kick-off at the turnstiles.

But Quakers lost 1-0.

Pickford was joint man of the match, being awarded seven out of 10 by a discerning Stoddart – one more than Dan Burn earned on his debut. Craig said: “A fine display for the youngster, especially considering the occasion and that he is only 17.”

Jordan Pickford in the Darlington Arena as the Quakers lose to Ebbsfleet on March 17, 2012 (Image: NQ staff)

Pickford was only meant to stay a month but Sunderland agreed to extend his loan until the end of the season as Darlington tried to find, and fund, a future as a community-owned club.

Pickford, who has been England’s first choice keeper since 2018, has recently said that this was “my first taste of first‑team football, in the National League at the age of 17… I played nearly 20 games for them and it was quality. I really enjoyed it, despite the team getting battered every week during what was a difficult time for the club.”

Jordan Pickford in the Darlington Arena as the Quakers lose to Ebbsfleet on March 17, 2012 (Image: NQ staff)

A masterful understatement on many levels. Suddenly, the 17-year-old had to grow up. This was real life, where players with families and mortgages relied on being paid by a football club every week, and where a club’s supporters had huge emotional investment in every twist and turn of the fortunes.

Pickford played 17 games for the Quakers, and it was an understatement that he was just battered because he was filleted as well: Quakers drew six of those 17 and lost the rest with Pickford conceding 39 goals.

Jordan Pickford catches the ball for the Quakers against Mansfield Town on February 21, 2012 – he let in five that day (Image: NQ staff)

But at least he had learned how to pick the ball out of the back of the net.

As Pickford returned to Sunderland, Liddle reckoned he would take heart from keeping two clean sheets in his last five games (conveniently forgetting he had conceded nine in the other three), and said: “He’s got a big future ahead of him if he continues to listen and learn, which he will because he’s got a good character as well.

Jordan Pickford catches the ball for the Quakers against Mansfield Town on February 21, 2012 – he let in five that day (Image: NQ staff)

“He was bossing the penalty area and that’s what we wanted him to do.

“He’s become more and more confident. There’s been one or two errors, but you’d expect that because he’s only young.

“I’ve known him for a lot of years, since he was in the under-12s at Sunderland I think, and he’s got a bright future.

“Sunderland are grateful for him getting first-team experience and pleased with his progress.”

And so in April 2012, with Darlington relegated, Pickford was away back to Sunderland. He spent another four years gaining more experience on loan to lower league sides before in January 2016 breaking into the Sunderland first team and then, 10 months later, being called into the England senior squad.

Jordan Pickford extravagantly punches clear in his last game for the Quakers on April 17, 2012, against Newport County (Image: NQ staff)

Darlington, though, had left the 25,000 seater stadium in which both Burn and Pickford had played in front oceans of empty seats.

For its financial sins, the club was relegated four tiers to the Northern League Division One and was forced to groundshare with Bishop Auckland FC.

England’s Jordan Pickford (Image: Bradley Collyer)

In January 2014, the fan-owned club was campaigning to raise £50,000 to move back into Darlington so it could play at the town’s rugby club’s Blackwell Meadows.

But on January 4, 2014, the club’s old boy, Dan Burn made his first appearance for Fulham’s first team, in the FA Cup against Norwich. This triggered a further £75,000 payment to Darlington.

Despite the windfall, the club carried on its fundraising but it can be said that, having set Burn on the road to success, he helped pave its way back into the town.