A SIX-PART drama series charting the history of one of the world’s first professional footballers and his move to Darwen FC is set to hit screens on March 20.

Written by the creator of Downton Abbey, Lord Julian Fellowes, The English Game turns the clock back to the 1870s when football was still in its infancy.

It tells the story of Glasgow stonemason Fergus Suter, who moved south in 1878 to play for Darwen FC.

He played for the Anchor Ground side amid industrial unrest, and the Netflix drama also explores how the game reached across the class divide.

Suter first played as an outside right, but subsequently became a full-back, in which position he established a great reputation.

He was in the team that won the Lancashire Challenge Cup in 1880, and later in the year moved to Blackburn Rovers where he was in the team that appeared in four FA Cup finals and collected winner’s medals in 1884, 1885 and 1886.

He was well-known for helping to introduce the ‘passing and running’ version of the game that we see today.

Fergus Suter is being played by Kevin Guthrie who also starred in Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald.

The star-studded cast also includes Kingsman actor Edward Holcroft, Line of Duty’s Craig Parkinson, Kate Phillips (Peaky Blinders) and Joncie Elmore (Downton Abbey).

The cameras of Nutmeg (42) Ltd filmed in the North West, crews using the football pitches in Stoneclough, near Bolton, and at Smithills Hall.

The series draws on the formation of Blackburn Rovers, founding members of the Football League along with Burnley, Accrington and Bolton Wanderers in 1888, and Darwen FC.

The series is directed by Birgitte Staermose, who worked on The Spanish Princess, and Tim Fywell, who has worked on Grantchester.

On retiring from football, Suter became the licensee at the Bay Horse, Blackburn, before moving back to Darwen to run the Millstone Hotel and later still the White Horse.

He died in Blackpool in 1916 and is buried in Blackburn Cemetery.