Historian’s research suggests Sunderland football origins date to 1861 | OneFootball

Newly uncovered research suggests football may have been played in Sunderland as early as 1861, more than a decade earlier than previously believed. According to Sunderland Echo, historian Keith Gregson has found digital records that appear to shift Wearside’s starting point.

Football on Wearside had long been thought to date from 1873, yet Gregson’s online trawl points to earlier activity. He has overseen the Ashbrooke sports archive in Sunderland for the past 40 years and outlined the trail he followed.

He found that in the summer of 1861 the Reverend George Iliff placed a series of adverts for his boarding school, the Grange, in a local newspaper now digitised online. The school stood slightly south of the modern Sunderland travel Interchange, and the advert mentioned tickets giving pupils immediate access to cricket and football fields.

Gregson also noted an 1860 notice in a Carlisle paper, by George and his father, stating the Sunderland school had a gymnasium, ball and bowling grounds, plus a garden, offering healthy recreation.

He believes this points to some form of organised football in Sunderland earlier than assumed, when the benchmark had been a Boxing Day 1873 match involving what became the town’s rugby club. He thinks pupils likely formed pick-up sides rather than playing other schools, much like schoolyard games.

Gregson added a personal footnote, recalling that he and his wife first came to Sunderland on Cup Final Day in 1973, not for the football but to house-hunt, and found the place deserted.

Source: Sunderland Echo

“Artificial intelligence was used to assist in creating this article based on reporting from the original source quoted.”