We played the MK Dons last week, but the less said about the result of that game the better, although the encounter obviously brought to mind the issue of football franchising. Some will know, and some won't, but two teams that we have played in the last ten years have both been what you could call franchising depending on your point of view, those being Horwich RMI and Woolwich Arsenal. Horwich RMI were formed in1896 and were one of two football clubs founded at the locomotive-building works of the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway. Funnily enough their history didn't become as rich as the other side founded though, that's because they were formed at the Newton Heath works in 1878, and would become much more well known as Manchester United in 1902. Back in Horwich that side of the coin kept limping along on minimal crowds in the Northern divisions of the football pyramid, before the decision was made during the 1994-95 season that their ground, Grundy Hill, wasn't big enough to match the ambitions of the club. Grundy Hill eventually being sold for housing to finance the acquisition of Hilton Park from the administrators acting for Leigh rugby league club. Apparently moving the club seven miles from the town of Horwich to Leigh not only saved the Leigh rugby club from going out of business but enabled the newly named Leigh RMI to stay where they were in the pyramid and prosper. The Railwaymen actually finishing in a dizzy fifth in the 2000-01 Nationwide Conference season after they had been the runaway winners of the Northern Premier League the season before. This summer came a rebranding of the club thanks to 32-year old new chairman Dominic Speakman. Leigh Genesis, a new beginning, is the marketing slogan, team colours also having been changed from red to white and black. A new stadium awaits too this winter, to be shared with Leigh Centurions rugby league club, when they move from Hilton Park into Leigh Sports Village, although there should be plenty of room for the 150 or so Genesis fans in a 10,000 all-seater stadium. Somewhat further up the footballing pyramid come Arsenal, or Dial Square (the name of one of the factory workshops) or Royal Arsenal or Woolwich Arsenal, the club having had those three names in the first five years of it's existence since it was formed in 1886. The Woolwich Arsenal being the name that best represented the club with it originally being founded by the workers of the Royal Arsenal armaments factory in Woolwich. Plumstead Common, along with Woolwich, in the London Borough of Greenwich over in the far east of the capital was the first proper home of the club, although they played their first match in December 1886 on a field in the Isle of Dogs. They continued to lead a rather nomadic life until 1913 with games also played at the Sportsman Ground which was reputedly a pig field on Plumstead Marshes named after the local Sportsman pub. You'd hardly think of Arsenal as the club they are now but after the Sportsman Ground flooded they moved to the Manor field. That then renamed the Manor Ground, in a salubrious location that saw an open sewer running on the far side of the pitch and Army wagons on the touchlines to house spectators. The Invicta Ground on Plumstead High Street was another venue until an increased rent saw the club back at the Manor Ground. And if you think football hooliganism is a modern problem it is worth bearing in mind that they had to play two matches at neutral venues in 1895. Those games being at New Brompton (now Gillingham's) Priestfield Stadium and Lyttelton cricket ground, Leyton after the Manor Ground had been closed by the Football League for five weeks following crowd trouble at a match against Burton Wanderers. This nomadic lifestyle was hardly helping attendances and effectively bankrupt in 1910, they were then moved lock, stock and barrel to Highbury in North London three years later, the Woolwich part of the club name being dropped in 1914. Their last match at the Manor Ground in April of 1913 being a 1-1 draw against Middlesbrough watched by only 3,000 people. The departure of Arsenal from the Borough of Greenwich was the reason that another local league club was able to tap into a new fanbase of fans in the area though, that being Charlton Athletic who would turn professional in 1920. The now full-time Addicks only spending the one season in the Southern League before they were admitted into the Football League, where they obviously remain today. |