Football Alliance

The Football League started in 1888. The same year, clubs who were not allowed to play in the Football League started The Combination. The Football League was quick to become a success, but the Combination was not very well organised. There was bad planning and games that did not happen. The first season did not finish and there was no winner.^[1][2]

Some of people who created The Combination met after the final Combination board meeting. They spoke about a new combination. Clubs agreed to start a new league. Four agreed, but did not join: South Shore, Burslem Port Vale, Notts Rangers, and Derby Midland. The board first said Grimsby Town was too far away, but then changed its decision.^[3] The other clubs from The Combination started the Football Alliance. It was to start in the 1889–90 season. The president of the Football Alliance was John Holmes. He was also the president of The Wednesday who were the first champions. They won fifteen games out of twenty-two.

The rules of the Alliance said that the bottom four clubs - Walsall Town Swifts, Small Heath, Long Eaton Rangers, and Nottingham Forest - had to ask to continue in the league. These clubs were not allowed to vote. Seven clubs (Stoke, Witton, South Shore, Chester, Burslem Port Vale, Sheffield United, and Lincoln City) asked to join the league. Stoke had asked to stay in the Football League, but was not allowed. It was accepted in place of Long Eaton Rangers in the Alliance. The other bottom four clubs were also allowed to stay.^[4] The prizes that the champions won included a blue silk flag, with a white border (edge), 12 feet by 6 feet. It had the words "Alliance Champions" on it.^[5]

The year after, Stoke and Darwen, another Alliance club, were allowed to play in the Football League. The League now had 14 clubs. Stoke's biggest problem in winning the title was the threat of being removed from the Alliance, because Stoke had agreed to play a friendly with League club Notts County on the same day as an Alliance match at Nottingham Forest. They did not want to pay the £10 fine.^[6]

At the end of the 1890-91 season, Sunderland Albion resigned in protest at having to pay half the cost of train tickets of visiting clubs.^[7] The bottom four clubs were allowed to stay in the Alliance. Eight clubs applied for the three positions available: Ardwick, Bury, Burton Swifts, Gainsborough Trinity, Middlesbrough,^[8] Northwich Victoria, Lincoln City, and Sheffield United. The successful clubs were Ardwick, Burton Swifts, and Lincoln City^[9] - the last by one vote.

In 1892 it was decided to merge the two leagues. The Football League Second Division started. It had mostly Football Alliance clubs. The only Alliance club that did not ask to join the League was the insolvent Birmingham St George's.^[10] The League clubs that existed, plus three of the strongest Alliance clubs, were in the Football League First Division.

Notes

¹ Elected to Football League First Division

² Elected to Football League Second Division