IRONOPOLIS WILL NEVER BE TOPPED

Northern League statistics go down in history

Saturday 29th October, 1955 Dulwich Hamlet 2 Wycombe Wanderers 4

My first ever game and despite being a Crystal Palace season ticket holder and having played some 700 games in AFA football, it is the Hamlet who I most want to win each week.

In my first ever season, Hamlet got to the semi-final of the old Amateur Cup and beat West Auckland Town 3-0 in a replay in the quarter-final in front of 13,000 at Dulwich. I can see it now.

Given the less sophisticated media in those days there are people who think the size of the crowd was because many believed we were playing Bishop Auckland who are the most successful Amateur Cup side ever.

These days, the Isthmian and the Northern are part of the Pyramid with the latter two levels below the southern competition.

But history shows that in the past these were the two top leagues which dominated the amateur game until we all became players.

It was in 1889-90 that the Northern Leagues played their first season. It was a bit of a messy start. For reasons which are still unknown today, the committee declared that the games which ended Birtley 4-1 Elswick and Middlesbrough 3-2 Elswick should be declared as draws, even though the scores stood.

Despite this help, Elswick Rangers would last for only two seasons.

So right at the start the ‘blazers’ were taking strange decisions!

Darlington St Augustines were champions for the first and last time in their short career in the league and became the first side to have two points deducted in 1896-97 for ‘playing an unqualified man’.

In the League’s second season a new club, Middlesbrough Ironopolis, joined and won the championship for the next three years, remaining unbeaten in the third year and reaching the quarterfinal of the FA Cup losing to Darlington.

This was a professional outfit and came about after a dispute with the amateurs of Middlesbrough.

In 1893-94, they joined the Second Division of the Football League, finishing 11th, but then lost their ground and disbanded never to be heard of again. Nor is there any derivation of the word ‘Ironopolis’ to be found.

In the same year when Ironopolis left the League, Newcastle East End, now known as ‘United’, went with them, as did Sheffield United. However the later had played in the Football League as well as the six-team Northern in 1892-93 and had actually won promotion to the First Division.

From this point on the Northern became a strictly amateur competition. While clubs increased in number to a degree, many came and went and quality was somewhat lacking, typified by North Skelton Rovers. They lasted only two years, the second of which saw them concede a total of 117 goals in 18 games, including a 21-0 defeat at South Bank.

Bizarrely they had recorded a 12-1 win over Darlington St Augustine the previous season, only to lose the return 7-1.

Middlesbrough were champions for the next two seasons, followed by Darlington. Then Middlesbrough, Stockton and Bishop Auckland completed the decade. ‘Bishops’ had played in the first season but then resigned before returning in 1893-94 without the suffix ‘Town’ to become the longest-serving NL club.

In 1897-98, a Second Division was formed which would only last three years, the second of which shows some chaotic administration and recordkeeping. Perhaps a smallpox outbreak did not help as three of Middlesbrough’s games in the top division had to be played the following season. How times have changed.

For the purposes of this series only the top division has been included.

At the end of the decade we see the total table for the period with Middlesbrough leading the points table. However, Midlesbrough Ironopolis, with an 85 per cent success rating, ruins the consistency table and along with Sheffield United and Newcastle United are never likely to be bettered.

Stockton sit on top of the goals table but again Middlesbrough Ironopolis and Sheffield United have set a goals per game average never likely to be beaten.

In the FA Cup, which had been started some 18 years before the foundation of the NL, several clubs got through to the first or second rounds during the decade but only the Ironopolis reached the quarter-final.

Bishop Auckland would dominate the FA Amateur Cup which started in 1893-94 and in the first season reached the semifinals, losing 5-1 to the eventual winners Old Carthusians.

Middlesbrough won the trophy beating Carthusians the following year and then Bishops recorded the first of their eventual ten wins beating Royal Artillery (Portsmouth) 1-0.

In 1896/97, Stockton lost to Carthusians after a replay, then Middlesbrough beat Uxbridge and the decade ended with Stockton winning the trophy against Harwich and Parkeston.