Preston North End is an English football club in Preston, Lancashire which traces its origins to a local cricket club formed c.1863. This club moved to Deepdale in January 1875. They started playing football as a winter activity in 1878 and, in May 1880, took the decision to focus on football. Progress was rapid and the club became professional in 1883. They were a founder member of the Football League in 1888 and won the first two league championships in 1888–89 and 1889–90. Their team in 1888–89 also won the FA Cup and so became the first to achieve "The Double" in English football. In addition, the team was unbeaten in all first-class matches played that season and are referred to as "The Old Invincibles". Preston have had a chequered existence since 1890 and have won only one more major trophy, the 1937–38 FA Cup, when Bill Shankly was a key member of the team.
Tom Finney was Preston's player who joined the club as a teenager in 1938. His first team debut was delayed until 1946 by the Second World War but he played for Preston until he retired in 1960. He made 76 international appearances from 1946 to 1958. A year after Finney retired, Preston were relegated to the Second Division and, since then, have not yet returned to top flight English football.
Preston had a memorable season in 1963–64 when, managed by former player Jimmy Milne, they reached the 1964 FA Cup Final and finished third in the Second Division. They were first relegated to the Third Division after the 1969–70 season. Although they won promotion again immediately, the team have spent 28 of the 49 seasons since 1970 in the bottom two divisions, including a span of nineteen seasons from 1981–82 to 1999–2000. The club experienced a near-terminal decline in the 1980s which brought about the very real threat of closure, the nadir being the 1985–86 season when they finished 23rd in the Fourth Division and had to seek re-election to the league. They recovered and won promotion back to the Third Division only a year later but it was a false dawn as the team spent another three years in the bottom division from 1993 to 1996. The club finally began to recover and move forward after a takeover by BAXI in 1994 but their ownership ended in June 2002. The team was established at second tier level through the 2000s but more problems arose at the end of the decade with an Inland Revenue winding-up order in 2010 and relegation to the third tier in 2011. The taxation issue was resolved by local businessman Trevor Hemmings, already a shareholder, who bought a controlling interest in June 2010. The team were promoted again in 2015 and have been placed in the EFL Championship since then.
Deepdale has been a football venue from 1878 and is the world's oldest football ground in terms of continuous use by a club in a major league. When BAXI took control, they embarked on an investment programme which had the main goal of upgrading Deepdale into a modern stadium. The old ground was demolished and rebuilt in four stages and the last of the new stands was opened in 2008. Part of the redevelopment was the original National Football Museum which opened at Deepdale in 2001, though it closed in 2010 due to funding issues and was relocated to Manchester in 2012.
Early days (1863 to 1886) Origin as a cricket team The club's origin has been traced to a cricket team that was founded c.1863 in Preston and was linked to the Wellfield Road School. At first, this team played on a strip of land called "The Marsh", on the Ribble Estuary at Ashton-on-Ribble, which is now a suburb in the western part of the town. In 1863, some team members proposed a move to Moor Park, where Preston Corporation had opened new playing fields. This caused a split but those in favour of the move went anyway and formed Preston North End Cricket Club, so called because Moor Park is on the north side of town. The first club president was George Howarth. On 3 August 1867, William Sudell, then aged sixteen, became a member.
Foundation of the football club The club had ongoing financial difficulties but managed to keep going and, in spite of their problems, decided on 21 January 1875 to take lease on a field at Deepdale Farm. Partly to try and earn extra income and partly to have a fitness activity through the winter months, the club formed a rugby team in 1877–78. This was not a success and they turned to association football in 1878–79. Their earliest known match took place on 5 October 1878 against Eagley F.C. and Preston lost 0–1. It was played at Deepdale which has thus become the world's oldest football ground in continuous use by a major league club (the second oldest is Turf Moor, first used by Burnley on 17 February 1883). Preston's team in the match against Eagley was: W. Sudell, W. Turner, J. Sefton, T. Charnley, T. Wadeson, J. Wadeson, C. Miller, T. Parkinson, J. F. Dodgson, R. Green and H. S. Carmel (captain).
In May 1880, aware of the success of other Lancashire football teams, team captain Harry Carmel proposed the formal establishment of the football club. Support was unanimous. The new club is known to have played ten games in the 1880–81 season, including one on 26 March 1881 against Blackburn Rovers in which Preston were beaten 10–0. The club continued to play cricket in summer but the members were in no doubt that football was the club's future.
Professionalism (1881–1886) Over the next few years, Deepdale gradually improved its facilities and increased in size. Football had become a major attraction in the town and Sudell, who was now the man at the helm of the club, had a vision of how to make Preston North End the best team in England.
Sudell's plan was to 'import' top players from other areas, primarily Scotland - which provided talent for many English clubs of the time in the form of the Scotch Professors. The identity of the club's first Scottish player was James McDade who "turned up in Preston and began to educate the locals". He travelled South from the Neilston area of Glasgow and was living in Preston in 1881. At the outset he was one of the club's best players, he turned out in the team against Astley Bridge in November 1880 and was a member of the team through 1881 and 1882. Since he was coming to the end of his career his main influence was as North End's first coach and strategist. Other Scots were to follow and they were to be rewarded by being paid match fees and being 'accommodated' with highly paid work in the Preston area, a practice which was not uncommon among the Lancashire clubs.
This led to accusations of professionalism from Preston's rivals. In 1884 for instance, Upton Park, who arrived at Deepdale for a FA Cup tie, complained to the Football Association that their opponents had fielded a team packed with Scottish professionals. North End withdrew from the tournament, but a threat from thirty-six northern teams to break away and form a rival football association forced the FA to legalise professionalism in 1885.
Halcyon days (1886 to 1893) 1886 to 1888 This period saw the development and supremacy of a team that became known as "The Old Invincibles". The players were mostly recruited from north of the border as was the case with Nick Ross, his younger brother Jimmy Ross, David Russell, John Goodall and Geordie Drummond. There were some local players, such as full back Bob Holmes and winger Fred Dewhurst.
During this time, Preston beat Hyde 26–0 in the first round of the FA Cup in 1887–88, which to this day remains an English first-class football record.
They played Hibernian F.C. in 1887 World Championship losing 2–1 in Edinburgh.
Champions (1888–90)
The Football League was founded in 1888; North End were one of the founder members and went on to make history. In the League's first season (1888–89), North End were inaugural league champions, achieving the feat without losing a match. On top of this, they completed the league and cup 'Double', winning the FA Cup without conceding a single goal, defeating Wolverhampton Wanderers 3–0 in the final. Preston were the first club to achieve the league and cup "Double" and they did so with a majority of their team being made up of "Scotch Professors" - as the professional Scottish players of the time were known.
In 1889–90 Sudell's team repeated the feat in the League, but it wasn't long before rival teams improved. Despite many close calls, North End would never match The Old Invincibles' feat by winning the Football League Championship again.
1890 to 1893 Despite the Old Invincibles team being gradually dismantled, Preston continued to perform well in the league, finishing runners-up first to Everton and then twice in succession to Sunderland. In 1892–93 a second division was initiated, along with the first ever promotion/relegation 'play-off' system. This meant that the top three in Division Two would each play a one-off 'test match' against a team finishing in the bottom three in the top flight.
In the 1892–93 FA Cup, Preston reached the semi-finals and were drawn against Everton, the tie to be played at Bramall Lane. It was a 2–2 draw and a replay was necessary. This took place at Ewood Park and was goalless. A second replay was arranged at Trent Bridge and this time Preston lost 1–2.
1893 to 1904 First Division (1893–1901) In 1893–94 Preston plummeted down the league to finish third from bottom (14th), requiring them to beat Notts County in the end-of-season test match to retain their top-flight status. This they did, defeating the Magpies 4–0 at Deepdale.
This era saw the transfer of some of the club's better players. Nick Ross signed for Everton, John Goodall went to Derby County and Thomson to Wolves.
However, two more significant events were rather more tragic for the club. First, in 1893 William Sudell lost his control of the club and it was established as a limited liability company.
Then two of the Old Invincibles died at early ages. Firstly, Nick Ross, who had returned to Deepdale from Everton after only one year, succumbed to Tuberculosis. Then, Fred Dewhurst died.
Second Division (1901–1904) North End were finally relegated in 1901. They were Second Division champions in 1903–04 and gained promotion back to the top flight.
1904 to 1915 Deepdale was enlarged to accommodate larger attendances as football nationwide increased in popularity. Among Preston's players at this time were centre-half Joe McCall, Peter McBride (who is second only to Alan Kelly Sr. in the list of North End's record league appearance makers with 443) and winger Dickie Bond.
1904–06 Preston finished as runners-up to Liverpool in 1905–06.
1906–11 Preston dropped down the First Division table and their best performance in this period was finishing tenth in 1908–09.
"Yo-yo" seasons (1911–15) Preston were relegated in 1911–12 but immediately bounced back by winning the Second Division championship for the second time in 1912–13. They were still not good enough for the First Division and were immediately re-relegated in 1913–14. Despite the outbreak of World War I in August 1914, the 1914–15 season was completed and Preston finished second to regain immediate promotion but it would be more than four years before they could return to the First Division.
The onset of war eventually brought a halt to British football in the country and many players enlisted in the armed forces. A Footballers' Battalion was formed in December 1914 and grounds were used as volunteering points.
1919 to 1930 Division One (1919–25) Despite the fact that several regional competitions ran during the First World War, it was not until September 1919 that English league football returned.
North End struggled for the most part of the inter-war period, with the club finishing first 19th and then 16th for three consecutive seasons before finally being relegated in 1924–25.