Football star to present Ted with spare shirt

PRESTON North End hat-trick hero Jermaine Beckford has come to the rescue of South Failsworth Primary pupil Ted Dockray.

TV cameras captured eight-year-old Ted catching Beckford’s shirt when he threw it into the crowd as he came off the pitch at Wembley during Preston’s play-off clash with Swindon on Sunday.

The shirt was seemingly snatched by a woman standing nearby - 31-year-old Vickie Timbrell from Manchester - leaving Ted heartbroken.

Scores of people took to social media sites expressing their disgust and urging Miss Timbrell to give the shirt back to Ted, who had been at Wembley to watch his older brother Leo play in the Football League Kids Cup.

Beckford has now promised to present Ted with a signed shirt - his spare from the Wembley game - and take him on a tour of Preston’s stadium, Deepdale.

“If the shirt that Jermaine wore is returned to us, we will of course present this to the child in question instead,” said a Preston spokesman

Twitter and Facebook went into meltdown when images of an advert, offering the shirt for sale for £1,500, appeared on the Gumtree website on Sunday night. The ad was removed a few hours later.

Miss Timbrell, who quit Facebook following alleged threats, says she knows Ted’s family and the whole incident has been a misunderstanding.