IN 1949, three-year-old Keith Lampard and his family left their Orford home for a new life in the USA.

Twenty years later, he hit the peak of his Major League Baseball career when he hit a match-winning home run for the Houston Astros.

Living on Dorothea Street with his parents Gordon and Lillian and sister Carol, the family decamped to Oregon when Keith was three years old, with his dad having visited Portland while serving in the Royal Navy during the Second World War.

Born Christopher Keith Lampard, he began to go by his middle name as his first grade teacher wanted to avoid confusion with a classmate who was also called Christopher.

First picking up the bat at the age of eight in a church league for a team called the Neophites, Keith worked his way through the little leagues until he was drafted by the Houston Astros from the University of Oregon in 1965.

An outfielder and pinch hitter, Keith spent nine seasons in professional baseball, hitting more than 100 home runs in the minor league and playing 62 times for the Astros in Major League Baseball in 1969 and 1970.

He names the highlight of his career as his walk-off home run against the Cincinnati Reds in only his fourth major league game in 1969.

Keith remains only one of only 32 Major League Baseball players to hail from the UK, while only five have appeared since his stint with the Astros.

Now 71, Keith lives in Gleneden Beach in Oregon having worked as a coach and counsellor in public education for 25 years following the end of his career.

He has not been back to Warrington since he left town the best part of seven decades ago, and is unsure whether he still has family in the area.

But the sporting gene must run in the family, as his distant cousin is none other than former Chelsea and England footballer Frank Lampard.