As I recall Northern were all set to move to Park Avenue at the council's request in 1973 but eventually the council got cold feet and the scheme never got off the ground, This was our disastrous Wembley appearance year when Fev beat us 33-14. In an earlier round we played Hull K.R. and I took some pictures thinking this could be the last cup game played at Odsal. I quite liked the idea of playing at Park Avenue, a pleasant, compact ground with more covered accommodation and back to our original roots. Half of the pitch is now covered by the the gym thus making any such move almost impossible .

I thought we'd been offered the chance to move but the club got cold feet. Whatever. Shame we didn't end up there. It looked like a tidy ground and much more at the scale we'd require.

Not sure about the scope for parking if we had moved in there. Good opportunity for a curry in Bharat or Mumtaz though.

The small car park that used to be there was at the Canterbury Avenue end and is now partially, at least, covered by buildings. There is little else, and whilst, 'back in the day', I can remember my father and grandfather both parking in the streets of the estate I'd hesitate to suggest that now given modern social attitudes (and the current lack of rozzers walking round in in twos). Of course, there were far more folk on the bus and even train back then, with a whole line of buses lining up before the final whistle, so parking wasn't the priority it is now.

Thinking about Park Avenue does remind me of one of the most unusual sights I've seen.

It was an evening game and I was walking down Little Horton Lane. As I turned the corner of Canterbury Avenue, high up above the ground, I looked down the road to see the top of the floodlight pylons sticking out from a pea-soup variety fog, down at the ground. It was quite surreal, you could actually see your feet disappearing into the fog as you walked down the hill and visibility was virtually nil by the ground.

I can almost hear the Hovis theme tune playing in the background