On November 11, 1923 Aston Villa footballer Tommy Ball was shot dead outside his back garden. The killing remains officially the only time a top-level English player has been murdered. Ball's wife Beatrice heard the shots and was a key witness in the subsequent trials. And yet her account of what happened does not add up.

This episode explores the events leading up the killing and its immediate aftermath, according to Beatrice Ball. You'll hear how a miner from the north east of England swapped his cramped and precarious life for the prestigious world of professional sport. There are the details of his final night out on the town with his wife and then the fatal circumstances that led to a completely unanticipated confrontation. Most sensational of all, according to Beatrice's testimony to police, the killing almost evolved into a double murder. The episode ends with the prospect of a third death- the execution of the man who fired a converted German military rifle into Ball's chest at near point blank range.

The episode relies heavily on research by Colin Brown, author of The Armistice Day Killing: The Death of Tommy Ball and the Life of the Man who Shot Him.

Post production by Istorias Media, sound editing by Sasha Sadikov.