Whatever occurs in three months' time, when Rod Stewart returns to perform at Brunton Park, it is fair to assume the build-up won't be dominated by the Carlisle United chairman in quite the same way as 1992.

Yes, this year has seen the offer of "some meat" by Andrew Jenkins to the old rocker, by way of thanks for his £10,000 donation to his flood-hit host city - but to date 79-year-old Pioneer Foodservice boss Jenkins has not used a newspaper column to compare his legs to Stewart's.

That was among the many gestures made by one Michael Knighton at a time when Stewart was preparing to bring his Los Angeles Exiles over-30s team to Carlisle for a charity football match in the thick of winter, 24 years ago.

While Stewart's arrival for a highly unusual afternoon was one thing, the Cumbrian public was also only just getting used to the grandiose, one-man publicity machine that was Knighton, the would-be Manchester United ball-juggling saviour who subsequently took control of the Blues that summer of '92.

The charity game involving Stewart was at the very outset of Knighton's turbulent, decade-long reign, and in the News & Star the showman turned the dial up to 11. "Not only does Michael Knighton believe he is a better footballer than Rod the Mod Stewart, but your beloved chairman also swears that he has Hotter Legs too!" he wrote.

"Personally, I can't wait for the crowd behind the Warwick Road goal to burst out with a chorus of 'Knighton, Knighton, Do You Think You're Sexy?' It'll make a change from the anodyne, though ever popular chart-topper, 'Knighton, Knighton, give us a wave.'"

On it went. "Can Rod Stewart claim to have watched as many video replays as Maradona's Hand of God goal against England as your cuddly chairman? I once attempted to find my way into the Guinness Book of Records by sitting through ten thousand replays of this singular event whilst simultaneously drinking double Scotches in an Edinburgh bar.

"Absolutely anything could happen at Carlisle United FC on [Sunday] and almost certainly will. For example, will Michael Knighton score another celebrated hat-trick or fall flat on his face in the Brunton Park mud?"

There was a great deal more of this, and it was tempting - not for the last time - to wonder who Knighton thought was the real star attraction that coming weekend.

Either way, it was already proving impossible to ignore the "cuddly chairman", whose style was the polar opposite of the sober local regime, headed by Jenkins, that had struggled to steer United away from the financial wall by 1992, their Football League future only preserved by other clubs going bust, their future so uncertain that they were that summer offering part-time contracts to some players, and all of this making Cumbria's only professional football club extremely vulnerable to Knighton's charm.

The first blocks of rebuilding the tired old business were in place when Stewart came to town. Knighton, having convinced Jenkins to sell up, duly turfed out manager Aidan McCaffery and drafted in the Northern Ireland stalwart David McCreery to oversee a new team, which had been assembled from trialists and the first wave of a promising youth system

Knighton had also unveiled elaborate redevelopment plans for a new "amphitheatre of leisure" that included a 30,000 all-seater stadium at Brunton Park, surrounded by a hotel, a multiplex cinema, a restaurant, a bowling alley, a tropical plant array and, most memorably of all, a "butterfly kingdom".

These plans, which would also be displayed in model form at the ground, met hostility from some residents and hoteliers, plunging Knighton into a battle for United's future that his vision was unable to win - other than the erection of the off-kilter East Stand which opened in 1996, a couple of years before his promising reign became engulfed by bitterness and confrontation.

The bad old days were lingering in 1992, meanwhile, with former manager Harry Gregg threatening to sue the club over his dismissal five years earlier, while a record low crowd of 859 for an Autoglass Trophy game against Hartlepool suggested Knighton's promise of good times, including Premier League football in 10 years' time, was not - yet - being believed by the masses.

Yet in public relations terms at least, in a period when country and county were limping out of a harsh recession, the new man had certainly lit a few fireworks, and into this curious landscape arrived Stewart and his posse, thanks to a connection between McCreery and his agent Bill McMurdo, whose filofax was full of showbiz names and who used to represent George Best.

The Exiles team, which had been founded in America in 1985, involved musicians and roadies and frequently toured to play in charity matches. At short notice the game at Carlisle was arranged, for the benefit of the National Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Children and the Spinal Injuries Association, and on Sunday, December 13, the world-famous singer who was then in the charts with Tom Traubert's Blues (Waltzing Matilda) pulled on his boots in a freezing Brunton Park changing room and jogged onto a pitch that was akin to a "cowfield", according to Carlisle youth coach David Wilkes, who played in the match.

An audience no bigger than 2,000 shivered on the terraces, proving, surprisingly, that middle-aged musicians playing football is not quite the same draw as musicians playing music. "There was absolutely no sense of occasion or glamour, just a small crowd wondering why they'd bothered," says one fan who braved the cold for this strange spectacle.

Among the All-Star team who lost 6-2 to Rod's Exiles were the legendary football names of Billy Bremner, Frank Worthington, Archie Gemmill, Jimmy Johnstone, Willie Johnstone and, naturally, a plump M.Knighton, who left the pitch for "a breather" 20 minutes into the first half but reappeared in the second half, almost grabbing a goal.

"Michael would go on the pitch at any opportunity," says Yorkshireman Wilkes, then a fairly recent addition to United's youth regime. "He weren't the most mobile! As long as you got it into his feet it was alright.

"It's a distant memory, really, although I do remember Frank Worthington getting a couple of goals - I'd played against Frank a couple of times before and he had that rock-star image as well.

"There were a few on the terrace, in the stand; a couple of thousand maybe, probably not as many as Michael had hoped for. Anything to raise profile, he'd be right into it. Creating publicity - that's what he was good at.

"Rod was a bit younger then of course. He loved his football and he had a bit of ability. Afterwards we went upstairs to the Sunset Suite and Rod had his electric blue suit on, with his entourage around him in a corner. I saw him signing a lot of autographs but I don't think there was a wild party, or anything."

If it appeared to pass quietly and sedately, with the Exiles heading off for another game at Partick Thistle the next day, there was still time for some old-fashioned and, at the time, sadly typical Brunton Park farce, as Stewart, having been substituted 15 minutes before the end of the game, plunged immediately into a hot bath, and failed to reappear at the end of the game for a scheduled public presentation of a trophy, involving England legend Nat Lofthouse.

It meant the ceremonial silverware had instead to be handed over in the dressing room, before the evening's champagne reception. "No-one told me there was going to be a presentation, so no-one told Rod," protested agent McMurdo.

Overall, though, the most famous man to grace Brunton Park for several years came and went with goodwill - as, no doubt, he will this June, when tradition dictates he will boot footballs into the crowd, milk the warmth of a community he has helped, and inform poor Maggie for the millionth time that he wished he'd never seen her face.

After the 1992 appearance, the News & Star 's front page also bade him a grateful farewell. It showed the 47-year-old, mulleted Stewart striding forward on that boggy pitch, the ball at his feet, resplendent in his Exiles kit. "He wears it well," this paper gushed, above a caption: "Wrinkly rocker still on the ball."

It was one of few headlines in that bold and bizarre United era that the other great performer, Knighton, failed to dominate.