England's Lost Football Grounds

[martino]

Interesting piece on the BBC website.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-29460621

[Jim LFC]

Great stuff, thanks for sharing

[Fishy]

Nice one Martino!
I especially liked the Middlesbrough part - where there is a football where the penalty spot used to be...........

[martino]

I would like to be the "steward" trying to stop fans getting onto the garden (old Highbury pitch). I bet the residents never saw that one coming.

[littlewiggy]

Me too, loved the story of the bronze boots on a lady’s doorstep and her being really proud of them.

Great article, but it made me feel quite sad too. I really miss the old grounds, each and every one of them simply oozed their own individual character, something so sadly lacking today.
I’m always eternally grateful that I did the majority of “the 92” before 1990, and went to most of these wonderful grounds. I’d visited 84 of the 92 by then, but never quite completed them and have lost all interest in visiting them all now; the soulless new stadiums hold no allure for me whatsoever.

I remember little things like standing on Wolves’ huge South Bank terrace in 1985 when County played there. Molineux was in terminal decline at the time, with two sides of the dilapidated ground permanently closed for safety reasons; yet I recall being completely in awe of the place as I gazed around thinking about all that history and that great Wolves team of the Fifties.

Likewise I remember that solitary Eastville floodlight that remained for years after Ikea moved in. I saw my first County away game there so it was always a ground I had a soft spot for. I think the old clubhouse still remains in the far corner?

All us older County fans miss our old Somerton Park ground terribly, the place was an awful dump and up there with the league’s worst grounds for sure. But nowhere has ever felt like home since. It’s a housing estate these days, and a rather rough one at that. Sadly all that remains of the old ground is the old perimeter wall that separated the Railway End from the train tracks that ran behind it. That’s somebody’s back garden wall now.

Every time I go past the place it still makes my heart hurt, in a way only a fellow footy fan would ever understand.

[derby1884]

I'm glad I at least visited all 92 before the cull started post-Hillsborough.

Took this photo in 1980 - it was the closest I could get.

Anyone hazard a guess as to the club?


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[littlewiggy]

Bradford Park Avenue Steve?

[derby1884]

littlewiggy wrote:

Bradford Park Avenue Steve?

Spot on.

It was in such a "delicate" state at that point that this wee gap was the only view available. Everything else was fenced off.
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[littlewiggy]

derby1884 wrote:

littlewiggy wrote: Bradford Park Avenue Steve? Spot on. It was in such a "delicate" state at that point that this wee gap was the only view available. Everything else was fenced off.

That's one ground I'd have absolutely loved to have visited in its pomp mate, that gabled grandstand had all that charm and wonderful character I was referring to in my rambling post above.

When I was a nipper, I could identify every ground in the top divisions just by the style of goal stanchion and net alone - crikey that makes me feel old.
lol

Just another example though of all the individual character that's been lost since the turn of the Nineties when Sky came along and invented football.

[derby1884]

I think exactly the same as you - used to recognise every stadium. All their quirks and angles.

Now? I switched on an England U-21 match a wee while back - had to check with the BBC which ground it was. I really had no idea.

Here's one I took of that wonderful bank of terracing at Blackpool you mentioned....


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[slightfold]

Great thread this one, pure nostalgia! For more of the same I recommend Grounds for a change by Dave Twydell.
Bury, Bradford City,Chelsea, Exeter City, leeds United, Liverpool, Peterborough United, Portsmouth, Rochdale and Sheffield United have never moved.

[derby1884]

So much unique architecture lost forever.

There's something very dignified about Filbert Street as was....I wish I'd managed to omit the graffiti, though!


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[littlewiggy]

derby1884 wrote:

So much unique architecture lost forever. There's something very dignified about Filbert Street as was....I wish I'd managed to omit the graffiti, though!

Love the photos mate, remember standing on that open terrace at Blackpool last game of 1986 when a drab 0-0 draw kept us up in Div 3.

Agree wholeheartedly with the architecture sentiment too.
I went to Darlo's Feethams on a warm summer's evening, where you had to enter through the cricket ground and walk around to the footy ground part.
I thought it was one of the prettiest, most interesting venues I'd ever seen, couldn't believe my ears when they flattened it for that monstrosity of a concrete bowl that they had no hope whatsoever of sustaining.
If ever somebody needed their bumps felt!

I particularly loved Fulham's Craven Cottage in the 80s too.
Pre its partial redevelopment, I thought it was the most charming ground and setting of all. That beautiful main grandstand with its stunning façade and the iconic cottage in the corner.
Then whilst standing on the open away terrace, you also had that lovely tranquil view of the Thames to your left, which afforded such a contrast.

I've only seen it on the telly since, but those ugly new stands couldn't have eradicated the ground's beauty more.

[bisphamseasider]

derby1884 wrote:

Here's one I took of that wonderful bank of terracing at Blackpool you mentioned....

Nice photo derby.

My early years watching the Pool were spent on there but then it had a roof and when it was full the noise was incredible.

The days before segregation resulted in some very chaotic Saturday afternoons.

[bisphamseasider]

Not a great quality photo but this shows a full Kop at Bloomfield Road when it had the roof on.

[Pete’s Picture Palace]

I like this Huddersfield photo that I got in last month, the old Leeds Road where I never went to although I have been to the Galpharm or whatever it's now called twice. I think the Leeds Rd stadium site is now their car park but I stand corrected.

Action here v Gillingham 1988.

[BAZZABAGGIES]

Bolton.



OLD SOUTH BANK Wolves

[bisphamseasider]

Pete’s Picture Palace wrote:

I like this Huddersfield photo that I got in last month, the old Leeds Road where I never went to although I have been to the Galpharm or whatever it's now called twice. I think the Leeds Rd stadium site is now their car park but I stand corrected.

Loved the old Leeds Road ground with the huge Popular Terrace along one side of the pitch.

Had the priviledge of seeing Blackpool there in the last ever league match.

I think the land now houses a retail park.

[derby1884]

littlewiggy wrote:

I went to Darlo's Feethams on a warm summer's evening, where you had to enter through the cricket ground and walk around to the footy ground part.

Took a photo of just that very view back in 1981. I'll post it up for you once I get back home late this evening.
Did you know the back row of the main stand at Feethams had old cinema seats installed?
The height of luxury, it was, sitting there!
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[derby1884]

bisphamseasider wrote:

Not a great quality photo but this shows a full Kop at Bloomfield Road when it had the roof on.

Terrific.
Any idea, even roughly, what year that photo is from?
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