| Full name | Aston Unity Football Club | |
|---|---|---|
| Nickname(s) | Unity, the Unitarians [1] | |
| Founded | 1874 | |
| Dissolved | 1908 | |
| Ground | Trinity Road | |
Aston Unity Football Club was an association football club from Aston, now in Birmingham. The club was one of the first clubs in Birmingham and entered the FA Cup a number of times in the 1880s.
The club was founded by members of the Aston Unity cricket club, as a winter activity to keep them fit. The cricket club was founded in 1868, [2] and the cricketers started to play football matches in the winter of 1874–75, at the instance of Sam Durban, the cricket captain and motive force for cricket - and later football - in Birmingham. [3] In its first season, the club played home matches at Aston Park, had 39 members, and won 4 and drew 1 of the five matches in its first season. [4] At the time the club was called Aston Park Unity. For 1875–76 the club had a second team. [5] Before the 1876–77 season the club left Aston Park and changed its name to Aston Unity. [6]
The club was a founder member of the Birmingham & District Football Association and played in the first Birmingham Senior Cup in 1876–77, losing to Saltley College in the first round after a replay. In 1878–79 the club beat Aston Villa in the first round of the competition.
Unity's best run in the Senior Cup, at the time the second-most prestigious tournament for football clubs in the Midlands, came in 1879–80, the club beating Small Heath Alliance and St George's (the latter 9–1 away from home), before losing to Villa at the Aston Lower Grounds in the third round (in that year's competition, the last six). The club's only final came in the Wednesbury Charity Cup in 1882, Unity losing to the defending champions Wednesbury Old Athletic, in a replay held in torrential conditions; [7] Unity had come within three minutes of winning the original tie, only to concede a late equalizer in the final after a defensive mis-kick. [8]
In the 1882–83 season, Unity entered the FA Cup for the first time, and obtained a bye through the first round. The club beat St George's in the second but lost to Villa in the third at the latter's Wellington Road ground, in front of a crowd of 3,000. [9]
However, as the season progressed, the now-professional Aston Villa had built up a squad made of the strongest players in the district, while Unity stayed within the FA rules on amateurism. Villa outpaced Unity by such a degree that, six weeks after the close FA Cup tie, Villa beat Unity by 16 goals to 0. Ten of the goals were scored by Arthur Brown, who had left Unity for Villa the week before, and had persuaded a number of team-mates to join him. [10]
The club entered the FA Cup in the next four years, but suffered heavy defeats in the first round on each occasion. Its financial situation was such that it sold home advantage to Derby County F.C. in 1886–87, and lost 4–1, playing for 70 minutes with ten men due to injury. [11] Unity's last match in the competition was in 1887–88, losing 6–1 to Small Heath Alliance. [12] When the Football Association introduced qualifying rounds in 1888–89, Unity stopped entering senior competition; the club was "a cricket club first and a football club next", and had "great difficulty" in raising a football team "owing to the way in which the promising young players trained in the club have been snapped up by wealthier organisations. At length they have grown tired of acting the lion's [Aston Villa's] provider...most of the Unity football members have joined that club with the object of playing for the reserve team". [13]
The club continued playing football at a junior level until 1908, when the Trinity Road ground was closed, and continues as a cricket club to the present day. [14]
The club originally played at Aston Park, and in 1876–77 moved to Aston Lane, using the Witton Arms for its facilities; the ground was used for the first representative match between the Birmingham Football Association and the Sheffield Football Association. [15] As the Aston Lane facilities were not up to scratch, the club played at the Aston Lower Grounds in 1882, then the football club played at Pickwick Park in Balsall Heath for a season, while the cricket club used the Excelsior ground in Aston.
In 1884 both football and cricket clubs moved to a new enclosed ground at Trinity Road in Aston. [16] The Staffordshire County Cricket Club occasionally used it for matches as it was just on the Staffordshire side of the border with Warwickshire. [17]
The club's colours were described as "blue stripes" or royal blue and white, with brown stockings, until 1886, when they were described as red and black. [18]
The cricket club's colours are claret and blue, and the club claims that Aston Villa derived inspiration from those colours.
FA Cup
Birmingham Senior Cup
Wednesbury Charity Cup:
Biggest win:
Biggest defeat:
Arthur Brown, later Aston Villa's first international player
Tommy Green, Aston Villa's first goalscorer in the Football League
Jack Devey, Frankie Dawson, John Burton, Charlie Athersmith: all FA Cup winners with Aston Villa
Birmingham St. George's F.C. was a football club based in Smethwick, England. The club started as St George's FC in Aston, before moving to the Cape Hill brewery in 1886 under the name Mitchell St George's.
Long Eaton Rangers Football Club was a football club based in Long Eaton, Derbyshire, England, which, for a brief period in the 1880s, had a legitimate claim to being one of the best teams in the country. They were founding members of the second ever league, The Combination, in 1888, and when that folded, the Football Alliance in 1889.
The 1880s was a decade that saw Aston Villa F.C. go from a small club to one that could challenge most teams in the country at the time. It also saw their most significant contribution to the game across the globe, with William McGregor creating the world's first Football League.
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Witton Football Club was a football club from Blackburn in Lancashire.
Wednesbury Strollers F.C. was an English football club based in Wednesbury, Staffordshire which was active in the 1870s and 1880s.
Stafford Road F.C. was an English association football club founded in 1874, which now defunct. The club was connected to the Stafford Road railway works in Wolverhampton, then-Staffordshire.
Wednesbury Old Athletic, often referred to as W.O.A.C., was an English association football club based in Wednesbury, West Midlands. There were three clubs that had this name.
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The 1882–83 season was the fifth season in the history of West Bromwich Albion Football Club. This was the club's first season at their fourth ground, the Four Acres. The ground had been home to the West Bromwich Dartmouth Cricket Club since 1834, but the cricket club allowed Albion to play football matches there on Saturdays and Mondays. The club wore two different kits during 1882–83: as well as the chocolate and blue halves from the previous season, the club also sported narrow red and white hoops.
The 1883–84 season was the sixth season in the history of West Bromwich Albion Football Club. Albion played their home matches at the Four Acres during the season, and the team wore a chocolate and white coloured kit. The club competed in the FA Cup for the first time, losing in the first round. They did reach the final of the Staffordshire Senior Cup, but were defeated by St George's in the final. Albion also participated in the Birmingham Senior Cup, Birmingham Charity Cup and Wednesbury Charity Cup, but were eliminated at the semi-final stage of all three competitions.
St Peter's College, Saltley was a school and teacher training establishment located in Saltley, Birmingham, England. Today the former college building has now been refurbished and sub-divided into a multi-use facility, combining homes, offices and meeting rooms.
Birmingham Excelsior Football Club was an English football club with a claimed foundation date of 1874.
The 1887–88 season was the 10th season in the history of West Bromwich Albion Football Club. The club reached the FA Cup final for the third successive season and won the competition for the first time, beating Preston North End 2–1. Albion also competed in four local cup competitions, winning the Walsall Senior Cup and West Bromwich Charity Cup and finishing as runners-up in the Birmingham Senior Cup and Staffordshire Senior Cup. Due to a congested fixture list, the club refused to take part in the Birmingham Charity Cup.
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Southfield Football Club, occasionally referred to as Birmingham Southfield, was an English football club based in Birmingham, then in Warwickshire.
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Shrewsbury F.C. was a football club based in Shrewsbury, England. The club is recorded as playing its home games at Monkmoor Lane, Shrewsbury.
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