Southfield F.C.
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| Full name | Southfield Football Club | |
|---|---|---|
| Founded | 1881 | |
| Dissolved | 1893 | |
| Ground | Victoria Park, Handsworth | |
| Secretary | 1885: George Thomas Morgan[1][2]
1887: John Ingram[3] 1888: P. O. Humphries[4] | |
|
| ||
Southfield Football Club, occasionally referred to as Birmingham Southfield, was an English football club based in Birmingham, then in Warwickshire.
Player death
The club was founded by John Ingram, a copper broker who had been closely involved with the Calthorpe F.C. amateur club[5] as umpire and occasional goalkeeper,[6] as the footballing branch of the Southfield Athletic Club.[7] Southfield's first recorded match was against the Mayflower club, at Summerfield Park, Balsall Heath, in early 1881.[8] The club was a working-class amateur club, key player William Deebank being a carpenter.[9]
The club joined the Birmingham Football Association for the 1883–84 season[10] and promptly entered the Birmingham Senior Cup, losing 5–0 at West Bromwich Wellington in the first round, a "voluminous" Southfield protest against the size and state of the pitch being literally laughed out of committee.[11] Ingram optimistically suggested at the start of the season that the Birmingham FA push to host an end-of-season play-off between the champion clubs within the United Kingdom, although the idea did not take off.[12]
The club's matches were originally generally low-key, twice suffering match abandonments because of a burst ball.[13] The club was not an opponent for the bigger Birmingham clubs in friendlies. The club did play St George's during the latter's one season at Winson Green,[14] but otherwise the club could only attract the second team of Small Heath Alliance[15] and the third team of Aston Villa.[16]
On 23 May 1885, during a match against Aston Trafalgar at Bournbrook, one of the club's players, Charles Bache, suffered a knee to his thigh. The day after he sought medical assistance, but the doctors found nothing wrong; four days later, he was admitted to hospital with acute blood poisoning, and died. An inquest found the blood poisoning was a result of his footballing injury and it returned a verdict of accidental death.[17] Bache, a lamp-maker, was 23.[18]
Stepping up
The club was boosted at the start of the 1886–87 season when the Moseley Olympic side broke up, and most of its members joined Southfield, which fielded a second XI under the Southfield Olympic name.[19] With more players available, the club became a member of the Birmingham Junior FA, and entered its second XI in the Junior Cup.[20] 1886–87 saw the club's only significant run in the Senior Cup; Southfield beat Sutton Coldfield 6–2 away in the first round,[21] then drew a bye in the second. In the third, Southfield was drawn at home to Burslem Port Vale, and the club switched the fixture to gain a better crowd. 2–1 down at half-time having played up the slope in the first half, was fancied to win. However the de facto professional Valiants were in much better condition and won 6–1.[22]
In October 1886, at a Birmingham FA meeting for the selection of a side to play the Sheffield Football Association, the Southfield representative nominated the entire Southfield side.[23] Perhaps because of the snub of not having a single player accepted for the representative side, the club entered the FA Cup the following season, despite many better-established Birmingham clubs not doing so. The club was drawn to play Burton Swifts away from home and lost 7–0, conceding five in the first half.[24] The club was described as "a fine set of fellows, but shocking bad players at football".[25] There was praise for the club's esprit de corps and wishes expressed that the players could use the tie to develop further.[26]
Decline
In fact the opposite seems to have happened - its last entry to the Birmingham Senior Cup was in 1888–89, and the club retreated to a much lower standard. An attempt to turn professional in 1889 was not successful,[27] and the club, which had long been seen as the "pet" of Ingram,[28] who funded payment for ex-professionals largely from his own pocket,[29] nearly broke up at the end of the 1891–92 season. Ingram - "who loves the game too much to discard it"[30] - revived the club in October 1892. The attempt was in vain, as Southfield only turned up with 8 men for a match at Singers on 3 December 1892, and, with three local players press-ganged into action, the club bowed out with a 13–1 defeat.[31][32]
Colours
The club colours were orange, black, and red,[33] which were similar to those of the amateur legends the Wanderers.
