Bill Henderson left his home-town club as a teenager for a career in England that would involve going to and fro between the Football League and the Southern League. He didn’t get a look-in at First Division Everton and soon moved on to Reading. They were not doing a lot in the Southern League and, after four seasons there, he joined Southampton, who had just won that League for the fourth time in five seasons.

After a mid-week warm-up in the Western League, against Portsmouth, the right-back’s position in the Southern League side was Bill’s until – the cricket season over – CB Fry put in an appearance. It is only a slight exaggeration to say that the great amateur all-rounder, with other commitments, such as playing for the Corinthians, reserved his performances in a Southampton shirt for Christmas and Cup-ties. His seven successive games in October-November 1901 were the exception to that “rule”. But, then, when that uncharacteristic flurry was over, the League place was pretty much Henderson’s, only for Fry to re-appear for each of the Saints’ Cup matches, all the way to defeat in a replayed Final. It is little wonder, then, that Bill sought more regular first-team football elsewhere: returning to both Everton (getting some games, this time) and Reading; captaining Clapton Orient in Division II in 1907-08; and ending up, back in the Southern League, with New Brompton.

(Following his Western League debut v Portsmouth in 1901, Bill Henderson had clashed in the “return”, a week later, with ex-Saint, Arthur Chadwick. Regrettting both “the foul play of Henderson” and Chadwick’s “retaliations”, the Portsmouth Football Mail expressed concern about such “ill-feeling”, reasoning that the two clubs “have the reputation of Hants to maintain and must always remain friends.”)