Related Research Articles
Linfield Football Club is a Northern Irish professional football club based in south Belfast which plays in the NIFL Premiership – the highest level of the Irish League. The fourth-oldest club on the island of Ireland, Linfield was founded in 1886 by workers at the Ulster Spinning Company's Linfield Mill. Since 1905, the club's home ground has been Windsor Park, which is also the home of the Northern Ireland national team and is the largest football stadium in Northern Ireland. The club's badge displays Windsor Castle, in reference to the ground's namesake.
Cliftonville Football & Athletic Club is a Northern Irish, professional association football club playing in the NIFL Premiership – the top division of the Irish League. The club was founded in September 1879 by John McAlery in the suburb of Cliftonville in north Belfast. It is the oldest football club in Ireland and celebrated its 140th anniversary in 2019. Since 1890, the club has played home matches at Solitude. Cliftonville contests the North Belfast derby with nearby rivals Crusaders, and also has local rivalries with Linfield and Glentoran. The club has won the Irish League Premiership five times outright including one shared title, the Irish Cup nine times the latest coming against Coleraine on the 4th February 2023 in a penalty shootout and the Irish League Cup six times.
Lisburn Distillery Football Club is a Northern Irish intermediate football club who are based in Ballyskeagh, County Down. A founder member of the Irish League, they currently play in the NIFL Premier Intermediate League, the third tier of the Northern Ireland Football League. The club was simply known as Distillery Football Club from 1880 to 1999.
The Irish Football Association Challenge Cup, commonly referred to as the Irish Cup is the primary football knock-out cup competition in Northern Ireland. Inaugurated in 1881, it is the fourth-oldest national cup competition in the world. Prior to the break-away from the Irish Football Association by clubs from what would become the Irish Free State in 1921, the Irish Cup was the national cup competition for the whole of Ireland.
Belfast Celtic Football Club was an Irish football club. Founded in 1891 in Belfast, it was one of the most successful teams in Ireland until it withdrew permanently from the Irish League in 1949. The club left the league for political reasons, as the team and its supporters were largely Catholic and Irish nationalist and its players had been violently attacked by a mob against its main rival Linfield in December 1948. Belfast Celtic was one of four clubs that attracted the biggest crowds in the Irish League, the other three being Linfield, Distillery and Glentoran. Belfast Celtic played its last match in 1960.
Royal Albert Football Club are a football club, historically based in the town of Larkhall, Scotland but currently playing in the nearby village of Stonehouse. Formerly a member of the Scottish Football League and the Scottish Junior Football Association, West Region, they now play in the West of Scotland League Fourth Division.
John Reynolds was a footballer who played for, among others, West Bromwich Albion, Aston Villa and Celtic. He was the first player to represent both Ireland and England internationally.
Robert George Milne was a footballer who played for the Gordon Highlanders, Linfield and Ireland during the 1890s and early 1900s. Born in Scotland, Milne was stationed in Ireland with the Gordon Highlanders and played seven games for the regimental football team as they won the Irish Cup in 1890. He subsequently signed for Linfield and played 43 games and scored 19 goals for the club in the same competition and winning a total of 39 honours over 20 years.
Thistle Football Club was a 19th-century football club based in Glasgow. The club was briefly a member of the Scottish Football League Division Two, and has been described as the most insignificant and least successful to have entered the league. They played at Braehead Park during their Scottish League season.
Ulster Football Club is a defunct Irish association football club that was based in Ballynafeigh, Belfast.
North of Ireland Football Club is a former Irish rugby union club that was based in Belfast, Northern Ireland. It was the first rugby club formed in what is now Northern Ireland and only two other clubs - Dublin University and Wanderers - were formed earlier anywhere else in all Ireland. It was founded in 1868 by members of North of Ireland Cricket Club. NIFC also played in the first recorded rugby game in Ulster when they played a 20-a-side match against Queen's University RFC.
The Leinster Football Association (LFA) is the governing body for association football in the Irish province of Leinster. It is responsible for organizing the Leinster Senior Cup and the Leinster Senior League as well as numerous other leagues and cup competitions for junior and youth teams. It was founded in 1892 and is the oldest football association in what is now the Republic of Ireland. Outside of the United Kingdom, only the national football associations of Denmark and the Netherlands are older. It was originally affiliated to the Belfast–based Irish Football Association, but following the partition of Ireland in 1921, it seceded from the IFA and subsequently played a leading role in the establishment of the Dublin–based Football Association of Ireland. It remains closely associated with the FAI and even shares a headquarters.
Oldpark Football Club is an Irish former football club from north Belfast. It was founded in 1880 by members of the Oldpark Cricket Club. It was subsequently a founding member of the Irish Football Association in 1880 and the Irish Football League in 1890, but retained membership of the latter only for two seasons. The club reached the final of the County Antrim Shield in 1890–91 but lost. The club folded after the 1891–92 season.
The Big Two derby, also referred to simply as the Big Two or Bel Classico, is the name given to the Irish League football derby between Belfast clubs, Linfield and Glentoran. The derby is also sometimes referred to as the Belfast derby. They are the two most successful and most supported clubs in Irish League Football. They traditionally face each other on Boxing Day each year which usually attracts the largest Irish Premiership attendance of the season. They regularly play each other in the league, and have contested more cup finals together than any other two clubs. They also make up two of the three clubs that have competed in every season of the Irish League's top flight since its inception in 1890 – neither club ever suffering relegation.
Clarence Football Club is a former Irish football club based in the Belfast. It was founded in 1882 and was a founding member of the Irish Football League in 1890. The club resigned at the start of the 1891-92 season without playing any matches, having been unable to raise a team for its opening fixture. By the end of the 1891-92 season the club had folded.
Ligoniel Football Club was an Irish football club based in the then village of Ligoniel on the outskirts of Belfast. It was founded in 1881 and was a founding member of the Irish Junior League in 1890, before joining the Irish Football League for the 1891-92 season. The club was excluded for the 1892-93 season as the League was reduced to six members, but was admitted again for the 1893-94 season. The club was excluded again in 1894 and rejoined the Junior League. It remained a member of the Junior League until it folded in 1899, having lost its ground and been unable to procure a new one.
YMCA Football Club was an Irish football club based in Belfast, formed by the members of the Belfast YMCA. It was founded in 1883 and competed as a senior club in the Irish Cup. Its best season was 1888-89, when the club reached the final of both the Irish Cup and the first County Antrim Shield, losing to Distillery on both occasions. The club also competed that season in the 1888-89 FA Cup. Later in 1889, however, the club folded, with most players joining Cliftonville, in what was described as an "amalgamation". In 1891, however, the YMCA Athletic Club acquired the Enfield ground on the Crumlin Road with a view to reviving the football team for the 1891-92 season. The revival was not a success, however, and the team, bottom of the league, resigned before Christmas. The club appears to have folded in 1892.
The Northern Ireland Football League, known as the Irish League, is the national football league of Northern Ireland. The Irish League was originally formed in 1890, with the league in its current format created in 2013 to assume independent collective management of the top three levels of the Northern Ireland football league system; namely the Premiership, Championship and Premier Intermediate League.
Braehead Park, originally known as Hibernian Park, was a football ground in the Oatlands area of Glasgow, Scotland. It was the home ground of Glasgow Hibernian from 1889 until 1890, then used by Thistle from 1892 until they folded in 1895.
Black Watch F.C. is a British association football club. It is the footballing side of the 3rd Battalion, Royal Regiment of Scotland.
References
- ↑ Northern Ireland - Final League Tables 1890-1998
- ↑ Belfast News-Letter, 21 June 1892
- ↑ Ireland's Saturday Night, 26 June 1897
- ↑ Irish News, 12 October 1891
 | This article about an Association football club in Northern Ireland is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it. |