Trent Bridge is world-renowned as a cricket venue, but what far less people realise is that is has hosted a whole host of Football League matches too.
Indeed, it was at the iconic venue more readily associated with bat on ball than boot on ball that Notts County played their first ever Football League match.
Some 50 years after William Clarke opened the ground for cricket use, the Magpies took on Blackburn Rovers in their first home game of the 1888-89 season on 6 October 1888 and drew 3-3. It followed their first-ever match against Everton at Anfield, where they lost 2-1 on 15 September that same year.
Among the scorers for the hosts that day was Radcliffe-on-Trent-born Harry Daft, who not only went on to win the FA Cup with County in 1894, but he also played for the England national side, as well as some 200 first-class matches for Nottinghamshire County Cricket Club between 1885 and 1889, taking 86 wickets and scoring 4,370 runs.
During that period, it was not uncommon for players to appear for Trent Bridge’s resident cricket and football teams. For instance, County’s first season as permanent tenants in 1883-84 – they occasionally played there before then – saw plenty of multi-talented sportsman, as depicted in a photograph of the football team’s FA Cup semi-final against Blackburn (pictured above).
Among those wearing the black and white on that day in a 1-0 defeat were former Nottinghamshire captain John Dixon – of Dixon Gates fame, the entrance to the ground next to the club’s main reception – Herbert Emmitt, who made two first-class cricket appearances in 1884 and William Gunn, who was an international in both sports and the founder of cricket equipment manufacturer Gunn and Moore.
Also in that side were Mordecai Sherwin, who doubled as Notts’ wicket-keeper between 1878 and 1896, Arthur Cursham, who played between 1876 and 1879 and brother Henry Cursham who played twice for the county at cricket, but incredibly, with 24 years between his first and second appearances!
Notts County’s first ever match at Trent Bridge had come back in 1866-67, when a crowd on 2,000 saw a 1-0 win over Sheffield on 14 March secured by a JC Hodges goal. The record books show that the first Nottingham derby match against Forest at the ground was a bit of a disappointment as the game ended 0-0.
The second round FA Cup tie of 1883, however, was much more of a spectacle, certainly those of a Magpies persuasion, as they breezed past their rivals in front of a crowd of 10,000 with a 3-0 victory.
Five years previously, the Club had played their first game under floodlights at the ground, before the Football League days, in November 1878 against Derbyshire.
It followed swiftly after Sheffield United’s became the first team to host a match under artificial light a month-and-a-half earlier and, while the Magpies’ match was deemed a success with a 4,000 crowd in attendance, regular floodlit matches did not become commonplace until the 1950s and 60s because of FA rules.
The first non-playing secretary of Notts County was Edwin Browne, who was also Assistant Secretary of the County Cricket Club, living in accommodation at Trent Bridge where the toilets are now located to the back of the current pavilion.
It was this cross-game link between the two clubs that paved the way for the football club to become tenants and they were still in situ when they received a letter from Nottingham Forest in May 1892 (pictured above) asking for their support to join the Football League, by attending a meeting and voting for their admittance.
Forest’s HS Radford, Honorary Secretary, explained that he was writing to ‘solicit you vote and assistance when the clubs are selected’. As Reds fans will know, the club were successful in that application and started their Football League history in the 1892-93.
The two Nottingham clubs met in Division Two in that inaugural Forest season at that level, with County 3-0 victors at Trent Bridge in front of 15,000, while the newcomers won the return 3-1 – and finished five places above their neighbours in the league.
The Magpies continued to play at Trent Bridge throughout the 1890s and early 1900s, with one of the highlights being promotion from Division Two to Division One as champions at the end of the 1896-97 campaign, beating off the challenge of Newton Heath, now better known, of course, as Manchester United.
Another moment to remember came in 1900-01, when the club attained its highest ever league position of third behind only champions Liverpool – who County beat 2-0 in the FA Cup that year – and second-placed Sunderland.
Notts continued to use Trent Bridge – except for the early and late season match at the City Ground – until the end of the 1910 season, when it was decided by the trustees of Trent Bridge that they would not be renewing the lease of their footballing tenants.
It forced County to move to the Meadow for the start of 1910-11, where they re-erected a stand that was dismantled and then transported over the river from Trent Bridge.
Football is not the only other sport to have been played at Trent Bridge. Others such as hockey, tennis and archery have also been played on the ground – but they are other stories for another day!
*****************
You can watch Stuart Broad and England take on India at Trent Bridge in this summer’s Test series, by securing your tickets here.