Fan Colin Rowell leaves Bishop Auckland FC £300,000

Mr Rowell had been a supporter of the club for more than 70 years

A lifelong football fan has left his favourite amateur club more than £300,000 in his will.

Colin Rowell was an avid Bishop Auckland FC supporter and left the bulk of his estate to the club following his death in January at the age of 79.

Stunned officials said the bequest would help secure the County Durham club's future.

Mr Rowell, from nearby Cockton Hill, has no surviving family members and had been a fan for more than 70 years.

The Northern League Division One club has pledged to mark the gesture by scattering Mr Rowell's ashes on the pitch and naming a section of its Heritage Park ground after him.

Club chairman Richard Tremewan said the generosity was "unprecedented".

"Although we have received one or two bequests before, we've had nothing like this," he said.

The club has promised to scatter Mr Rowell's ashes on the pitch

Darren Brown, of Hewitts Solicitors, in Bishop Auckland, said: "Colin never married and he had no children so it was, perhaps, the natural thing for him to leave it to the football club that had given him so much pleasure over the years.

"After he died we found a drawer full of newspaper clippings about Bishop Auckland FC and the team's new ground at Heritage Park. Clearly, he followed them until the end."

He said Mr Rowell had stipulated the money must be used to improve the team's home ground.

Executor of Mr Rowell's will, Karen Eyre, said: "Colin loved sport of all kinds, but football, in particular.

"Shortly before he died, he said to me that his dream would be to have his ashes scattered on the penalty spot at the new ground.

"He would have been delighted to know that's what is going to happen."