Joke's on us as Leeds legend Dom Matteo comes clean on April Fool's gag

But Manningham West Riding County Amateur Football League side Campion FC later revealed they had enlisted Matteo for an elaborate stunt.

Development team manager Mark Palfreeman went so far as to take a picture of the star player with a Campion shirt.

But a tweet at lunchtime disclosed: “As you may have guessed...Dom Matteo is NOT playing for Campion tomorrow. He was a willing participant in our April Fools Day joke.”

Matteo later tweeted: “Happy to create a bit of publicity for this local team - good luck tomorrow boys.”

He had been quoted earlier as saying the prospect of playing for Campion was “a massive challenge, perhaps one of the biggest in my career”.

Matteo, 41, wrote an autobiography in which he told of running up more than £1m in gambling debts.

Towards the end of his career, he took up racehorse ownership. In recent years he has worked as a TV football pundit, newspaper columnist and as director of Rock Bar, in Call Lane, Leeds.