One for the older readers, perhaps, but John Wilkinson has a pub quiz question about his hometown football club.

“Can you name three England captains who have played for Scunthorpe United?” he asks. Now in the National League, England’s fifth tier, the team is nicknamed the Iron – a reference to the Lincolnshire town’s industrial heritage, and especially its links to the steel-making industry.

“When I was growing up,” the 54-year-old says, “there were three steelworks in the town, now’s there’s only one. Scunthorpe had around 25,000 steelworkers back then.”

Wilkinson started out as a trainee engineer at Clugtson in 1988, working and learning – finishing ONC and HNC qualifications during his time there – before later completing a construction management degree at Reading university in 2005.