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EPL Today marks 200 years since the world’s first passenger railway journey. On September 27, 1825, around 450 people made the 26-mile journey from Shildon to Stockton in the north-east of England on a steam train named Active, at an average speed of around 8mph. In the 19th century, Britain was the world leader in railways and in football. The relationship between the two shouldn’t be underestimated. Advertisement Broadly speaking, there were three major reasons for the explosion of sport as a spectator activity in this period. The most important was the novel practice of workers getting their Saturday afternoons off, a victory for a lobbying group named the Early Closing Association, which had been formed in the 1840s. This opened up that time slot for leisure pursuits — and, in particular, sport. The second was the ‘golden era’ of the British press. Whereas previously newspapers had been aimed at the upper class, the increased literacy rates amongst the British population created a market for newspapers aimed at the lower-middle class. Coverage of sport proved popular, and promoted it beyond the capabilities of clubs and associations. And the third was the expansion of the railways. Without this latter development, in an era before motorised transport, the concept of people travelling halfway across the country to participate in — or watch — a mere game of sport would have been absurd. But when football became codified and, eventually, professionalised, there was already an extensive network of railway tracks linking most major towns and cities in England. The early rounds of nationwide professional competition in England relied heavily on the railways. “Trains came to provide footballers with cheap and easy access to other teams around the country, ” wrote James Walvin in The People’s Game, his social history of English football. “Train-borne footballers and fans were whisked to distant parts of the country they may not otherwise have seen. ” A particularly notable early example of train travel came in the very first edition of the FA Cup, in 1872. Scottish clubs were eligible to enter the competition then, and Queens Park travelled all the way from Glasgow to London for their semi-final with Wanderers at Kennington Oval. Like today, the semis were played at the same ground as the final. The semi-final finished goalless, and so a replay was arranged. But Queens Park couldn’t afford the rail fare for a second trip south, and so withdrew. Wanderers therefore progressed to the final, which they won 1-0. This story underlines the fact that rail travel was, at this stage, prohibitively expensive for many. Advertisement Therefore, in the 1880s, The Athletic News — the formative sports newspaper of the time — campaigned for football clubs to be allowed a return journey to away matches for the price of a single fare. Their argument was that the game had provided the railways with a huge amount of business, and therefore the clubs responsible should be afforded a discount. The campaign proved unsuccessful. Now, it is expected that teams travel by road — or air — rather than rail, but it’s still surprisingly common for top-level teams to catch a train. Manchester United are particularly fond of rail trips when playing in London, including for their 1-1 draw with Fulham earlier this season. The most extensive (partial) train journey conducted by an English side in recent times came in April 2010, due to the eruption of Icelandic volcano Eyjafjallajokull, which disrupted flights throughout Europe for a week. Liverpool were forced to get trains from nearby Runcorn to London, then from London to Paris, then from Paris to Bordeaux in southern France — at which point they could finally board a plane and fly to Spanish capital Madrid to face Atletico in the first leg of a Europa League semi-final. They lost the game, 1-0. It is sometimes overlooked that the railways have been directly responsible for the formation of clubs, particularly in the north of England. British influence in this respect actually stretches to South America. For example, Penarol were initially formed as Central Uruguay Railway Cricket Club, named after the British company constructing lines across that country. Sixty per cent of their initial members were British. The club later took up football, changed their name, and Penarol have become the most successful side in Uruguay. The first English club you might think of are Crewe Alexandra — nicknamed the Railwaymen — but they shouldn’t really count. Although originally part of Crewe Alexandra Cricket Club, formed by railway workers, their employer — London and North Western Railway (LNWR) — refused to hire anyone involved in professional sport. Crewe’s football team had to break away from the organisation. They therefore exist both because of, and in spite of, employment on the railways. So the clearest case, in terms of their name, are Harrogate Railway, formed by workers on the London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) in 1935. In football’s first season back after competition was suspended due to the Second World War, the club won the British Railways National Cup final in 1946, which prompted them to seek a site for a new ground. They found it at Station View, on the outskirts of the Yorkshire town, named after the adjacent Starbeck station. Three hundred LNER workers committed a penny from their weekly wages to fund the ground. Advertisement The other obvious example are the club many will know as Leigh RMI (Railway Mechanics Institute), who were founded in 1896 as Horwich RMI, and changed their name after relocating 10 miles up the road in the mid-1990s. The Leigh RMI years were their finest, as they included reaching the FA Cup first round on three occasions, most notably forcing a replay against Kevin Keegan’s Fulham. The club were renamed Leigh Genesis upon their move to Leigh Sports Village in 2008, but later folded, relaunched and now play at the 13th level of the English pyramid. Their old ground hosted matches at the Women’s European Championship three years ago, when Leigh proved an unpopular location — ironically, because the town doesn’t have a train station. It also serves as the home venue for Manchester United Women. That is somehow fitting, because United were the other club launched by workers on the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway (LYR), and originally known as Newton Heath LYR. The railway itself paid for the lease on the club’s first ground, and although the ‘LYR’ was dropped after a decade, players and supporters continued to be, largely, railway workers for several years. They became Manchester United in 1902. The name “Manchester United” might not suggest their railway-related origins, but the name does lend itself to the small ‘station’ directly beside their current home ground. The stop was originally named United Football Ground upon its opening in 1935, then was changed to Old Trafford Football Ground and finally Manchester United Football Ground, although locally it was generally known as the Old Trafford Halt. An incredibly primitive construction consisting of nothing more than a single platform and steps up to the ground’s Munich Tunnel, it was only open on matchdays, and hasn’t been in operation at all since 2018 because of safety concerns. It’s far from the only example of a ‘halt’ (essentially, a stop so basic it doesn’t qualify for ‘station’ status) constructed because of football. While the Old Trafford Halt was built for the simple reason that the adjacent stadium was poorly served by existing stations, many were constructed primarily because fan trouble in English football had become a major issue. There had been so many problems with away supporters arriving at a town’s main rail station and running into home fans that it was decided to build stops right next to football grounds, rerouting the away crowd, who could then be escorted straight to their section of the stadium by police. A good example was the Watford Stadium Halt, built in 1982. Interestingly, it was jointly funded by four sources: Watford FC, the local council, the Football Trust and British Rail, underlining the sense that it was in everyone’s interests. Advertisement The halt was opened by — of course — Elton John. “Matchday crowd control problems could be over now that the new soccer halt has been opened close to Watford Football Club’s Vicarage Road stadium, ” reported the Watford Observer at the time. “After the train broke the symbolic yellow, black and red tape, which was tied across the track, John said: ‘The halt should go a long way to ending Watford’s hooligan problem. It is a marvellous day for the club’. ” The first visitors were, coincidentally, Manchester United fans, who were presumably familiar with the concept. Watford’s halt is no longer in use. It probably wasn’t the inspiration for Elton’s 2001 song, This Train Don’t Stop There Anymore, but who knows? Derby County also had a halt on an otherwise freight-only line, originally referred to as the Baseball Ground Halt after the name of the club’s then-stadium, but later changed to Ramsline Halt, a nod to their nickname, upon opening in 1990. But it was only ever used four times, all in 1990-91, partly because the problem of hooliganism had largely faded by that point and the halt was no longer required. Other football halts included Boothferry Park Halt for Hull City, and, north of the border, Easter Road Park Halt for fans travelling to Hibernian’s Easter Road ground in Edinburgh. Ashton Gate station and Ninian Park station were opened due to Bristol City and Cardiff City playing nearby, although only the latter survives (the Ninian Park ground does not). What was originally called The Hawthorns Halt, next to West Bromwich Albion’s stadium, is now a proper station. To a certain extent, new stations are still opening because of football: it seems unlikely Reading Green Park would have begun life two years ago — significantly delayed — if not for the need to provide better transport to Reading’s previously somewhat inaccessible out-of-town ground. As is somewhat typical with the British railways, there are generally teething problems. The saga of transport to Coventry City’s ground could be an article in itself, but after 15 years of the stadium being accessible only by road, a new Coventry Arena station opened a decade ago. The only issue was that match-going fans were advised not to use it. “We only have the one diesel train, ” said a spokesman upon its opening. “It only has 75 seats. Until further infrastructure changes are made, we are limited. There just aren’t the trains available. ” The situation has improved somewhat, but it remains somewhat surprising that the ground has been awarded a couple of England Women matches, for example, when there’s such a scramble to get onto the short, infrequent trains from the city centre. And that brings us to the main role of railways in footballing terms: transporting supporters. Trains are often considered in terms of travel for away fans. But in the formative years of the game, they primarily enabled larger clubs to attract support from further afield, and catchment areas developed not solely because of simple geography, but because of rail connections. Advertisement In the north east, home of the railways going back to that first ever journey in 1825, Sunderland agreed a deal with the North Eastern Railway to put on cheap train travel into the city from the surrounding colliery settlements on matchdays. Aston Villa were considered particularly accessible for fans in towns around the Midlands heading into Birmingham. But it was the FA Cup which attracted the most interest from supporters at this time, and while away travel was relatively uncommon in the early days of the game, the FA Cup final was a genuine national event. Supporters, particularly in the north of the country, used to pay a small amount of money every week over the course of the season into ‘final clubs’, effectively paying for a potential ticket in instalments. Many would then travel to London for the final even if their favourite club weren’t playing in it. In 1886, West Bromwich Albion qualified for the final and the Midlands club negotiated a special fare with the LNWR for a discounted return fare for supporters. This gave rise to the famous ‘football special’, most associated with the middle of the 20th century. These were specific services from the town of the away club to the closest station to the relevant stadium, usually at around half of the usual price, and often on lengthy and bizarre routes to avoid the regular train traffic. Some clubs branded their own trains: the Seagull Special for Brighton & Hove Albion supporters, for example. Among the most famous trips, by supporters of particular clubs, include the 14 football specials put on by British Rail for Sunderland’s trip to Wembley for their 1973 FA Cup final victory, carrying a total of 7, 000 passengers. Many of the return services were long, overnight journeys back to Wearside. A more extreme version was the Liverpool-Rome ticket purchased by fans of the Anfield club for the European Cup final of 1977 in the Italian capital. Before the days of the Eurostar, this journey involved a train from Merseyside to Folkestone in the south-east of England and then an overnight ferry to Belgium (because French railway services were, somewhat stereotypically, unavailable due to industrial action) before a journey through Germany and Switzerland, then on south to Rome. The round trip took five days; there were no catering facilities, no running water nor anywhere to sleep aside from luggage racks. Though it sounds like Hell on Earth, the trip has gone down in history, helped by the fact Liverpool defeated Borussia Monchengladbach in that final on the Wednesday night to win their first European Cup. It also meant fans had still been able to attend both the FA Cup final win at Wembley the preceding Saturday and stalwart Liverpool defender Tommy Smith’s testimonial on the Friday night at Anfield against a Bobby Charlton XI, which finished 9-9. Advertisement To describe this as the ‘golden era’ of rail travel is probably misleading. Football supporters became renowned for smashing up the trains, and they became a target for home supporters wishing to give them a ‘welcome’ and a send-off as they rolled in and out of town. All this led to the creation of the League Liner, surely the highlight of football railway travel. This was a train owned by the Football League, hired out in turn to various clubs, which offered first-class travel to away matches. It featured football videos shown on colour televisions, good quality food served to your seat, and most excitingly, a ‘disco carriage’. “The added touch of luxury provided by the League Liner, together with its unusual and novel facilities, will encourage supporters to bring their wives and families — and girlfriends — with them, ” said Alan Hardaker, secretary of the Football League. Sadly, the train only lasted three years before vandalism took it out of service. If launched in 2025, it would surely be the target of ‘The game’s gone! ’ mockery. The decline of the football special is attributed to various factors: the privatisation of the railways, the rise of the motor car and, somewhat most intriguingly, the era of train vouchers on the side of washing detergent bottles. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Unilever — most notable for its Persil laundry brand range — offered cheap buy-one-get-one-free train tickets if you collected 12 vouchers from its products. Football supporters headed to supermarkets, hoovered these vouchers up (often, it appears, without actually buying the product involved) and were now able to travel affordably on regular services, meaning they could enjoy a couple of hours in the pub before a match, rather than being herded straight to the ground. These services were also less heavily policed compared to the football specials, and some gave a name to multiple infamous hooligan firms: Leeds United Service Crew, West Ham’s Inter City Firm, and Portsmouth’s 6: 57 Crew, which was named after the time the train rolled out of Portsmouth & Southsea station for London. Even when stations aren’t directly involved, it’s interesting how often football grounds find their homes directly next to rail lines. Advertisement There’s no point in an exhaustive list, but it’s particularly notable that in London, where land is at a premium, Arsenal and Millwall found new sites in the corner where two tracks converge, while Brentford’s stadium is essentially in a triangle between three. On the other hand, it’s worth considering that Chelsea’s future redevelopment of Stamford Bridge is heavily constrained by the rail line to the east of the site. In fact, almost every English league ground is reasonably accessible by rail. Cricket supporters who have tried to visit the Rose Bowl in Hampshire, or rugby fans travelling to Worcester Warriors’ home ground, know that this shouldn’t be taken for granted. The slight irony is that the most difficult current ground to reach by train, of those clubs who have been in the Football League in recent years, is The New Lawn, home of Forest Green Rovers, who are famed for their interest in environmentalism and sustainability but whose location in Nailsworth, a town without a station, makes road travel almost mandatory. Some grounds are, if anything, actually too close to stations. Brighton’s, for example, is directly next to Falmer. A stop previously used primarily by residents of sleepy suburbs and University of Sussex students, it would be better if there were a longer walk between stadium and station, to thin out the crowds after matches. Incidentally, because the train is almost the only viable way of getting to Brighton’s ground, they are not able to host Boxing Day fixtures, due to the absence of a rail service as December 26 is a national holiday in the UK. Indeed, rail travel is so fundamental to English football that it continues to be somewhat pitiful that competitions and television companies often schedule fixtures at times that leave away fans with no means of travel home by public transport afterwards. It was telling to be in the Swiss city of Basel for the Women’s European Championship final there this summer and hear audible gasps when the stadium’s big screen not merely informed England supporters that there would be special trains running back to the city centre post-match, but that their departures would be delayed accordingly in the event of the game going to extra time. This surely shouldn’t be such a novelty. But railway transport to football remains popular. For all the emphasis upon supporter coaches, and the advent of the teams themselves taking incredibly short flights to away matches, when Arsenal travelled to Manchester United last month, they chartered a train to Manchester Piccadilly for 500 fans, and the squad travelled by rail too. In that respect, things haven’t changed too much since the 19th century. (Top photos: Topical Press Agency/Getty Images; design: Eamonn Dalton) Spot the pattern. Connect the terms Find the hidden link between sports terms Play today's puzzle Michael Cox concentrates on tactical analysis. He is the author of two books - The Mixer, about the tactical evolution of the Premier League, and Zonal Marking, about footballing philosophies across Europe. Follow Michael on Twitter @Zonal_Marking