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A cabinet maker from Southampton, Pennsylvania, Patrick Gresley popped in to the Moat Ground during his week long visit to London to research the history of his surname as be believes he may be a descendant of the historic Gresley family of South Derbyshire.

Patrick, 39 a married father-of-three, who also has relatives in Manchester and Belfast, carried out his research on the World Wide Web and believes it was his great grandfather's generation which lived in Gresley before the family crossed the Atlantic to the United States, before going their own different ways and unfortunately losing touch with each other.

Gresley Rovers commercial manager Penny Kelsey hosted Patrick on his visit to Gresley where he also met chairman Mark Evans during his whistle-stop tour of South Derbyshire. " I tapped my name into a Google search one day and it came up with Church Gresley", said Patrick "and so I thought I'd like to come and see the place for myself.

"I did some research on Sir Nigel Gresley and then found the Gresley Rovers website and got in touch with Penny and Mark.

"I love it here - it's a beautiful little place, much quieter than home and everybody is so friendly. I wish I had my brothers here, they would have had a great time seeing all the little churches and chapels.

"I'd like to come back on a little more extensive trip so I could really enjoy what's here. I've travelled a lot and I always make a habit of checking the listings in the phone book, but very rarely have I found another Gresley. There's not very many."

Mr Gresley was kept busy in South Derbyshire visiting Catton Hall and Netherseal as well as some of the area's cemeteries in search of headstones bearing the family name.

The Sir Nigel Gresley in Swadlincote, a pub named after the famous engineer who built the Mallard railway engine was his venue for lunch.

Mr Gresley has taken a Gresley Rovers team shirt along as other items of official club clothing back to his homeland as well as a host of photographs and happy memories.