Northwich Victoria
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| Full name | Northwich Victoria Football Club |
|---|---|
| Nickname(s) | The Vics, The Trickies |
| Founded | 1874 (amalgamated in 1890 with Hartford and Davenham United) |
| Ground | Wincham Park, Northwich (Groundshare with Witton Albion F.C.) |
| Capacity | 4,813 (600 seated) |
| Chairman | Jim Rushe |
| Manager | Paul Moore |
| League | Northern Premier League Division One South |
| 2015–16 | Northern Premier League Division One North, 3rd (transferred) |
| Website | Club home page |
Northwich Victoria Football Club is an English football club based in Northwich, Cheshire, playing their home games at Wincham Park, Northwich, the home of Witton Albion. The club currently participates in the Northern Premier League Division One South, the eighth tier of the English football league system, having been demoted from the Premier Division at the end of the 2011–12 season—despite finishing second—for a breach of league rules regarding financial matters.
The original club was founded in 1874, and named in honour of the then-reigning monarch, Queen Victoria, before becoming defunct and amalgamating with Hartford and Davenham United in February 1890 with the new club taking the old Northwich Victoria name. The new club was a founder member of several leagues including the Football League Second Division, in which they competed for only two seasons from 1892 to 1894.
They played at the same Drill Field ground for over 125 years. At the time Drill Field was believed to be the oldest ground in the world on which football had been continuously played. However, it was demolished in 2002 and, after a ground-sharing period with their local rivals Witton Albion, they started the 2005–06 season in their new stadium, the Victoria Stadium in Wincham, just outside Northwich and across the Trent & Mersey Canal, which separated them from their rivals. The ground was later demolished.
The generally accepted year for the original Northwich Victoria Football Club's founding is 1874 by Charles James Hughes and James Heyworth. However, according to club historian Ken Edwards' book A Team for All Seasons, the organisation itself could have been in existence earlier in the 1870s. Northwich played their first challenge matches in the 1874 season and originally accepted both association football and rugby rules. This was shown in 1876 when they contested an away match under Rugby rules at Farnworth and Appleton F.C. (now known as Widnes Vikings) and then at home under association rules, winning both games. The first time the club entered an organised competition was the 1877 Welsh Cup, which at the time was open to Welsh teams as well as English teams situated close to the border. Its best achievement in the competition was in the 1881–82 and 1888–89 seasons, when the club reached the final, losing to Druids and Bangor respectively. When they reached the final in 1882, they were the first English club to do so. In 1880, the club entered the inaugural competition for the new Cheshire Football Association Challenge Cup (Cheshire Senior Cup) and became the first winners of the cup with a victory over Hartford St. John's. They went on to win the cup for the next five seasons, defeating in the finals: Birkenhead (1881), Northwich Novelty (1882), Crewe Alexandra (1883 and 1884), and Davenham (1885).
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