Football fans lay claim to place in history

United by a common passion, nearly 200 sports fans, collectors and dealers crammed into Bonhams' saleroom in Honiton, Devon, yesterday to bid for the largest single collection of football-match programmes ever auctioned. The colllection - being examined above by auctioneer Charles Lanning - comprised 14,000 individual programmes spanning more than a century. The rarest of the 572 lots on sale was the single-sheet programme from England's 8-1 win over Ireland in 1884, which was expected to raise up to pounds 1,000.

Photograph: Tim Cuff