At the turn of the 20th century, Eastleigh Athletic was so often a launching pad to a professional career or a haven for those who didn’t quite make the grade – or both, even. So it was that Fred Haxton, a keen, untiring fellow with a reputation of being

“as hard as nails”,

left their care to stake a claim at The Dell. In the course of a season-and-a-half with the Saints, he succeeded in deputising for Bert Houlker, at wing-half, a couple of times and in winning a Hampshire Senior Cup winners’ medal with the Reserves. After which, he had a brief spell with Wolves, newly-relegated to the Football League’s Division II. Without getting a game at that level, he returned for a third, and final, spell at Eastleigh. In 1909, he broke that tie to head north, initially to work as a railway-fitter in Dukinfield. During WW1 he was a marine fitter at Swan Hunter & Wigham Richardson’s.