WHEN FOOTBALL BEGAN

  Unplayable Shack  Manchester City 2 Bradford Park Avenue 8 Frank Swift is one of the greatest English goalkeepers of all time. A First and Second Division, FA Cup and Charity Shield winner with Manchester City, his only League club, he represented his country on 33 occasions between 1941 and 1949. Only once did Swift, who tragically died in the Munich air crash, concede eight goals when a Shackleton inspired Avenue overturned a first leg FA cup deficit by winning 8-2 at Maine Road in January 1946.  The following is taken from Mark Metcalf’s newly published biography on Swift.  Mark is a Sunderland fan based in Halifax who watches eight to ten Avenue matches a season. Following the end of the war, and with League competition yet to return, it was agreed that the 1945-46 FA Cup would be played over two legs. Having squeezed past Port Vale 3-2 on aggregate, Avenue was drawn against Manchester City, who only weeks earlier they had lost 6-0 to.  Pl...

  The Wind! Arsenal fans love affair for Fred Spiksley. During the 1889/90 season Gainsborough Trinity had been invited to play a club match against Royal Arsenal on the Invicta playing field, a great amphitheatre that could accommodate 15,000 fans. An 8,500 crowd saw Arsenal go ahead when Arthur Christmas scored. Spectators had been left thrilled by the speed and ball control of Spiksley and as he sprinted away from the home full back Peter Connolly and half back David Howat someone in the crowd bawled out “Oh, my goodness! Heruns like the wind!” On 75 minutes the youngster escaped from Howat and met a cross to spectacularly volley the equaliser. Arsenal quickly re-took the lead and then survived fierce pressure to win the match after which cries went up from the crowd “Bravo Trinity”. Rough working hands were employed by two men to hoist Fred on to their shoulders and carry him back to the pavilion where he was heartily cheered. Despite the defeat Gainsborough were absolu...

  On this day: 27 th January 1890 Bury’s glorious cup run begins at Burnley At the start of the 1899-1900 season Bury Football Club were embarking on their fifteenth football season. Established just three summers prior to the Football League kicking-off in 1888 the Shakers were set, following promotion in their inaugural season, for their fifth season in Division One. (Premier League today) Small crowds meant a constant struggle to survive, and the club had lost in April 1899 the services of the first Bury player to gain an International Cap when James Settle moved to Everton for a much needed £400. Bury ended the season in tenth place, from eighteen, but had shown fine form in cup competitions by winning the Lancashire Senior Cup, a much sought after competition at the time and finishing as runners-up in the Manchester Senior Cup.   On their day Bury was capable of beating any side, as shown by their victories at home that season against the top two in the League, A...

  On Tuesday, 26 January 1886, the SFA met in Glasgow. They 'decided not to play England in an international football match this year because England intended to send forth her full strength side by including professional football players in the team. The Scottish Football Association disapprove of there being professional football, and hold that when Scotland is willing to select eleven amateur players England should adopt the same course. England will not agree to this, and consequently there is a rupture between the Associations representing the two countries.' -  The Dundee Courier and Argus, Wednesday, 27 January 1886. Much of the objection came from the gentlemen-amateurs of Queen’s Park. England were due to meet Scotland at Hampden Park on Saturday 27 th March The England side was chosen on Friday 19 th March by the FA selection committee following a 6-1 victory against Ireland plus a series of trial matches. The side consisted of 10 amateurs and one...

  Having won titles as a coach in Sweden, Mexico, America and Germany, Fred Spiksley coached briefly at Badalona, just outside Barcelona and did well. The Club by The Coast Coaching at Badalona FC In 1903, four years after near neighbours Barcelona FC were formed in 1899, Badalona FC was founded. Now the third largest city in Catalonia, Badalona stands on the left bank of the Besos River and on the Mediterranean Sea. Playing near the beach, Badalona FC soon became known as The Club by the Coast. In 1929 Badalona FC competed in two league competitions. Before Christmas there was the local Catalan Championship, which was more often than not won by Barcelona. Those clubs finishing in the top three, which had never previously included Badalona, would qualify for Spain’s most prestigious knockout competition, the Copa del Rey. From late December Badalona would then compete in the newly-formed fourth tier of the Spanish National League. This offered the opportunity to work thei...

 In Fred Spiksley The Wednesday had signed in 1891 from Gainsborough Trinity a rare talent, despite Fred still only weighing in at just under eight stone. He had four seasons of professional footballunder his belt and had survived a broken leg and was now stronger than ever. Although the Football Alliance  was considered a stronger league than the one Spiksley had just won with Gainsborough Trinity there was not too much between the two leagues, especially the top teams, and Wednesday would have been excited by the prospect of signing a player who had played 126 times for Trinityand had netted 131 goals.  Despite his obvious raw talent there still would have been some question marks over Fred Spiksley and if he would fit into ‘the mould’ of his new team. Selection would have definitely been far more competitive than it was at Trinity. Arthur Dickinson had aspirations of gaining entry into the Football League,  which was more of a political challenge than an on-field ...

  The biggest Tees-Wear Derby decided relegation in 1928   The most important game ever between Sunderland and Middlesbrough took place on 5 May 1928 at Ayresome Park. It was the final match of the season and the visitors knew that anything other than victory would see them relegated and playing Second Division football for their first time since they had entered League football in 1890/91.     A failure by the home side to take at least a point from the game would mean a return to the lower tier that they had exited the previous season when - with George Camsell having then set a League record number of goals in a single season at 59 - they had captured the Division Two title.   Earlier in the season, Sunderland had beaten their near neighbours 1-0 at Roker Park on Christmas Eve. This had taken the Wearsiders up into thirteenth place and when Sunderland later drew 1-1 at home against Newcastle in mid-March, they rose to ninth position out of 22 team...

In the search for new players, football clubs today rightly like to keep things as secret as possible until they can make an official announcement... that was just so when football began but for different reasons.......... Ⓒ Mark Metcalf  Arthur Dickinson, the Sheffield Wednesday club secretary, later recalled in 1899 his search to sign new players in Scotland in the Lancashire Evening News: “In 1891 I went up to Ferguson of Arthrlie, and Richardson of Hurlford. Here it was that I had my first experience, for at Barrhead, where an agent and I had gone for Ferguson, we were tackled by a mob. They knew for what purpose we were there and set upon us with the heartiest goodwill. Their sense of appreciation of our presence was forcibly expressed by means of showers of stones. It was no time for argument, so we cut and ran, the mob after us. I never moved more rapidly in my life. Luckily we had provided for some such contingency by having a conveyance drive by as if his mother-in-law...

NO FOND FAREWELL  Ⓒ Mark Metcalf  In older days fans would riot as their star players secretly departed to a bigger club - Gainsborough Trinity/Burnley  On Monday 3 December 1888, three strangers with suitcases alighted from the Manchester train on platform 1 at Gainsborough’s Great Northern Station. Burnley had started the first season in the Football League (note – there was just one league consisting of 12 clubs) very badly and were bottom of the table. Non-League Gainsborough Trinity had transformed their season after they employed football agent John McCabe of Leith, Edinburgh who obtained the signatures of four players - Shamrock Coyne, an Irishman from Hibernian, and three Scots, William McKay from Hearts, Alec Brady from Sunderland and John ‘Jack’ Angus from Newcastle West End. Each player was paid double the match fee paid to local players.  Now, Burnley’s directors sought to boost their hopes of avoiding a re-election battle by obtaining the signatures ...

  Ernest Needham: Prince of Half-Backs A unique series of articles by Ernest Needham is out now at £10 “I shall always think that Needham was the finest footballer I have ever seen.” Herbert Chapman, the greatest manager of his era, in 1932. Chapman made 22 first team appearances for Sheffield United in the 1902-03 season. Whether Ernest Needham is Sheffield United’s greatest ever player has been previously evaluated in the programme. Chapman and many of Needham’s contemporaries thought so by bestowing on him the title of ‘the Prince of half backs.’ But with no one alive who saw him play and with only rare film footage we can only draw on the facts. They are that he achieved promotion to Division One with the Blades, twice captured the FA Cup and was our leader when the top flight title was won in 1897-98. He also collected an FA Cup runners up medal in 1901.   Known as ‘Nudger’ for his ability to nudge opposition players off the ball, Needham generally played at left ...