FOOTBALL CLUB NAMES

Not so long ago, I was challenged to give the full names of every club in the Football League, including the Premiership, that has a suffix appended to their more recognisable names. There are 23. I eventually got 21 of them. The two that escaped me were Rangers and Celtic. How can that be, you might ask, when Rangers and Celtic don’t have any name after their main name; besides they’re Scottish and don’t count. Well, yes and no, or should I say, no and yes. It is true, they are Scottish and don’t play in any English League, but my friend in trying to catch me out pointed out that their names are Glasgow Celtic and Glasgow Rangers, so you see ‘Celtic’ and ‘Rangers’ are in fact suffixes, not prefixes. (Further research on my part enabled me to get my own back. Rangers are properly called Glasgow Rangers because when they were first formed, they had no home ground and had to range around to get games. However, Celtic are simply named Celtic FC. No ‘Glasgow’ prefix there.) By the way, I do not count FC, or Football Club, as a true suffix. They are all football clubs – obviously. 

The 21 are:  

Albion, Alexandra, Argyle, Athletic, City, County, Dons, Forest, Hotspur, Orient, North End, Palace, Rangers, Rovers, Stanley, Town, United, Vale, Villa, Wanderers, Wednesday. 

Some names are more obvious than others. 

Albion: Brighton and Hove Albion, West Bromwich Albion, Burton Albion. This is an interesting one. From as far back as the 9^th century, written references to ‘Albion’ as the island of Britain can be found. Perhaps the name comes from the Latin word alba, meaning ‘white’, probably because the white cliffs of Dover can be seen from the continent. Hence the fact that Brighton first used it when the club was formed, with other clubs copying them. 

Alexandra: Crewe Alexandra. Opinions vary as to its origin. Some believe the club was formed over a pint in the nearby Alexandra Hotel. Others are convinced it was named after Princess Alexandra, the wife of Queen Victoria’s eldest son, the Prince of Wales. 

Argyle: Plymouth Argyle. The name is likely to be linked to the fact that the club was formed in a pub called The Argyle, or even that most of the founding members lived in nearby Argyle Terrace. 

Athletic: Charlton Athletic, Oldham Athletic, Wigan Athletic. Many football clubs originally started out as cricket and athletic clubs. Interestingly, no club called Athletic has ever won the top division in English football. 

City: Bristol City, Exeter City, Manchester City, Norwich City, Stoke City, Swansea City, York City. No need for any explanation here. 

County: Derby County, Notts County. Again, there is little need for explanation other than a desire perhaps for the founding members to appeal to a larger demographic than a mere town or city. 

Dons: Milton Keynes Dons. Now this one has a more recent history. In 2004, the controversial decision was taken for Wimbledon FC from south London to relocate to Milton Keynes, in Buckinghamshire, about 50 miles north-west of London, where it adopted its new name, badge and colours. The move was not at all popular with Wimbledon’s diehard fans, who decided to form a new club, called AFC Wimbledon, who play at Plough Lane, only 250 yards away from Wimbledon’s old ground, also called Plough Lane. 

Forest; Nottingham Forest. The ‘Forest’ in their name comes from the fact that the club played their first games at the Forest Recreational Ground in the city. 

Hotspur: Tottenham Hotspur. Tottenham in north London is where the club is situated, but why ‘Hotspur’? As every student of English literature will tell you, Hotspur is a character in one of Shakespeare’s history plays, Henry IV Part I, portrayed as a brave, hot-tempered, honourable knight. He was of course Sir Henry Percy (1364-1403), nicknamed Harry Hotspur, and when a bunch of schoolboys wanted to name their new football club, they lighted upon this dashing figure and his evocative nickname and adopted it. Quite possibly a shrewd move as the Percy family, the dukes of Northumberland, historically one of the most powerful families in the realm, owned land and property in Tottenham. 

Orient: Leyton Orient. Leyton is a town in east London, and the Orient refers traditionally to the East, often contrasted with the Occident, the West, so is there any connection with China? Sort of. It was taken from the Orient Shipping Company which employed many of its players when first formed. 

North End: Preston North End. Once again, purely a case of simple geography. The club’s ground is in the north end of the town. 

Palace: Crystal Palace. This one always confused me. Crystal Palace were our local team in south London – though I never supported them – and their ground, Selhurst Park, is nowhere near Crystal Palace. Research reveals to me that the company that was largely responsible for setting up the club – originally a cricket club – was Crystal Palace Company which owned the site on Sydenham Hill, the highest point in south London, where the great glass palace was relocated from its original site in Hyde Park, when it formed the central feature of the Great Exhibition in 1851. The football club was formed in 1905 and played at the stadium in the Crystal Palace Park where FA Cup Finals (and rugby internationals) were held, but they were forced to move after the outbreak of the First World War to their current home in Selhurst in the borough of Croydon. The name Palace stuck but every time I passed the ground on the No.68 bus, I was always struck how unpalatial the place looked. 

Rangers: Queen’s Park Rangers. No great surprise here. Most of the original team came from the Queen’s Park area in north-west London and they had no home, playing in 20 different venues, until they settled permanently in Loftus Road. It could be said – and was – that they ranged far and wide. 

Rovers: Blackburn Rovers, Bristol Rovers, Tranmere Rovers. A similar story to Rangers. These clubs led a peripatetic existence before eventually finding a home. 

Stanley: Accrington Stanley. The original club, Accrington FC, folded after six years to merge with another local team, Stanley Villa FC, thus becoming Accrington Stanley. 

Town: Cheltenham Town, Chesterfield Town, Grimsby Town, Huddersfield Town, Luton Town, Macclesfield Town, Northampton Town, Ipswich Town, Swansea Town, Swindon Town, and no doubt others I have forgotten. Obvious reason for their suffix. 

United: Carlisle United, Leeds United, Manchester United, Newcastle United, Oxford United, Peterborough United, Sheffield United, West Ham United. Once again, no explanation needed. 

Vale: Port Vale. Port Vale House was a 19th century residence in Burslem, Staffordshire, where the football club was founded in 1876, originally called Burslem Port Vale FC. It was in an area characterised by the canal industry, often referred to as the Valley of Ports. Port Vale Wharf was nearby on the Trent and Mersey Canal, so that would explain the reason for the word ‘port’ in the name, even though the sea is 60 miles away. 

Villa: Aston Villa. Villa Cross Wesleyan Chapel in theAston area of Birmingham first created a cricket team. In order that the players remained fit during the winter, a football club was formed. Based in Aston and coming out of the Villa Cross Wesleyan Chapel, it took its name as Aston Villa. But hang on one moment. On its official website, the football club tells a different story about its origins. Villa Road in Aston contained a large Georgian house, known as Aston Villa, which later became the Villa Cross pub, where plans were hatched to form a new football club, to be called Aston Villa. As in another context, it seems that recollections may vary. 

Wanderers: Bolton Wanderers, Wolverhampton Wanderers, Wycombe Wanderers. Whilst looking for a permanent home, some clubs would range, some would rove and others would wander. 

Wednesday: Sheffield Wednesday. Clearly the club could not call themselves Sheffield United as there was already a club in the city bearing that name. Like so many others, Wednesday started out as a cricket club who played on a Wednesday, because that was when their players had a half-day off work. When the football club was formed to provide sport and exercise for the cricketers during the winter, it seemed only logical to adopt the same name, Wednesday, as the cricket club. 

Why are they, Sheffield Wednesday, ‘The Owls’? Ah, well, that’s another story, another blog