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Crystal Palace F.C. was an amateur football club formed in 1861 who contributed a major role in the development of association football during its formative years. They went on to become founder members[1] of the Football Association in 1863, and competed in the first ever FA Cup competition in 1871–72.

Crystal Palace

Full name	Crystal Palace Football Club
Founded	1861
Dissolved	1876; 146 years ago (1876)
Ground	Crystal Palace Park
Home colours

The amateur club was thought to have disbanded around 1876, however historians have found evidence to support claims that the professional Crystal Palace football club that exists today is directly linked and should be acknowledged as the same club,[2][3] the theory being that the original club was re-formed as opposed to a completely new club being created, as they were both owned by the same Crystal Palace Company. This has led to claims that Crystal Palace should be recognised as the oldest professional football club in the world in existence today.[4]

Formation

The Crystal Palace Company who owned the Crystal Palace Exhibition building founded the Crystal Palace Club in 1857 to play cricket before turning their attention to football. It had been lobbied by existing members of the cricket club to provide a continuation of sporting activities during the winter months. The company formed the football club in 1861.[5] All of the football club’s management-committee and most of its original players were previously members of the cricket club,[6] and they shared the same pitch within the Crystal Palace Park.[7]

Commercial structure

Although both the cricket and football clubs were amateur, they formed part of the Crystal Palace Company’s commercial enterprise, which was intended to generate revenue.[8] Membership of the club was by subscription only, at a price of one guinea per season, and spectators who wished to watch the games had to pay the one-shilling entrance fee into Crystal Palace Park.[9]

Players

The football club’s players were not company employees; typical membership was formed from wealthy upper-middle-class businessmen who could afford the subscription and had the leisure time to participate in sport.[10] Walter Cutbill (1844-1915) and A. Cutbill were prominent members, and both former pupils at Forest School, which was a leading school in the early development of the game.[11]

Committee member and goalkeeper, Croydon-born wine merchant James Turner (1839-1922) became the first proper treasurer of the Football Association after its formation,[12] and numerous Palace players were influential committee-members of the F.A. during its formative decade.[13]

When international football commenced in 1870 and 1872, players from Crystal Palace featured in both the official[14] and the ‘unofficial’[15] versions of the first-ever international games.

Four players from the club appeared for the England national team:

• Charles Chenery (Forward) (3 appearances)
• Alexander Morten (Goalkeeper) Morten is the oldest player ever to make a debut for England (aged 41).
• Arthur Savage (Goalkeeper)
• Charles Eastlake Smith (Forward)

Support of Association Rules

The club became founder members of the Football Association in 1863, and along with Wanderers F.C., Barnes F.C. and the N.N. Club, were described by Charles W. Alcock as being the four clubs who formed ‘the backbone of the Association game’ in its early years.[16] Delegates of the club attended every AGM of the F.A. for its first crucial decade, during which time the Laws of the Game were evolved. In 1867, when just five delegates turned up at the AGM, it was only the vote of Crystal Palace’s representative Walter Cutbill which prevented the adoption of two major Sheffield Rules laws. Proposals to adopt rouges (secondary goals either side of the main goal) and the virtual abolition of the offside rule were defeated by a single vote.[17]

Creation of the FA Cup

At the Football Association Committee meeting held on 16 October 1871 to discuss the creation of the FA Cup competition, the Crystal Palace captain and share-registrar Denison Allport (1844-1931) proposed the formation of a committee to draw up the rules required for the competition.[19] He was also part of the delegation which selected and purchased the trophy.

Palace competed in the first ever FA Cup competition in 1871–72, reaching the semi-final stage, where they lost to the Royal Engineers after a replay.[20] The club also played in the FA Cup over the next four seasons.

Demise of the club

The club's last recorded match was against Barnes F.C. on 18 December 1875.[21] The Crystal Palace Company had experienced a financial crisis during that year, partly as a result of being sued by its refreshment contractor.[22] Consequently it was forced into a number of cost-cutting measures among the attractions in its park, one of those was the football pitch, which is thought to have caused the team to disband the following year. Until the end of the season players were still giving Crystal Palace as their club of origin for representative matches,[23] but the following season club captain Charles Eastlake Smith was dedicating himself to Wanderers F.C..[24]

Aftermath

The Crystal Palace Company began hosting the FA Cup Final on a regular basis in 1895,[25] which was held at the sports stadium in the Crystal Palace Park. The company then decided in 1905 they wanted a new professional football club to play at the stadium. The current Crystal Palace F.C. played at the Cup Final venue until 1915, when they were forced to leave due to the outbreak of the First World War.

Records

• FA Cup
  • Semi-finals: 1871–72

References

External links

• Profile on Football Club History Database
• England players' details
• Historical Football Kits

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