Now known as Sheffield Wednesday, this club was initially a cricket team called The Wednesday, due to the fact that they played their games on a Wednesday. Their first competitive football match was in a tournament called the Cromwell Cup, only the second football tournament in history (after the Youdan Cup), and The Wednesday came out winners after scoring the first ever “golden goal” in the final against The Garrick Club. It came as a surpise as everyone expected Garrick to brush the brand new Wednesday aside, but they stood their ground and held Garrick to 0-0 after 90 minutes. The two captains agreed to play on and award the trophy to the team who scored the first goal, and thus the golden goal was born, although the term wasn’t in use at the time.

 

In 1870, Wednesday were joined by the famous Clegg brothers, Charles and William. The former became the clubs first ever international player when he lined up for England against Scotland in 1872. His brother became an international the following year. James Lang, who played in the first ever Scottish Cup final, joined the club in 1876 after Wednesday’s directors watched him playing for Glasgow against a Sheffield XI representative side. They were so impressed, that they invited Lang to move to Sheffield to play for The Wednesday, and in exchange they would provide him with a job at a company owned by one of the directors. He wasn’t paid by the club, as professionalism was not yet permitted, so he was instead paid by the company which manufactured bayonet spirals, ledger blades and chaff knives. However, Lang had no duties and just spent the day reading the paper. Lang, therefore, is thought to be the first professional footballer in the history of the game. He became one of the Wednesdays star players, despite only having vision in one eye, and he left the club in 1886 ironically due to professionalism. When it was legalised in 1886, he moved professional club Burnley as The Wednesday were still amateur.

 

Wednesday cemented their place as a force in local football by winning the Sheffield FA Challenge Cup in 1876 by beating their biggest rivals at the time, Heeley FC, 4-3 after extra time in the final. In 1879, several Wednesday players were involved in an exhibition team called The Zulus. They toured northern England and Scotland raising money for the families of victims of The Zulu War, but were forced to disband by the Sheffield FA in 1882. The Wednesday became a force to be reckoned with in the FA Cup, except for 1886/87 when someone forgot to submit for the teams entry, which led to a number of the clubs most skilful players leaving to play for a local works team who had managed to submit their entry by the deadline. This group of players then threatened to form a professional team called Sheffield Rovers. The Wednesdays president, John Holmes, was staunchly against professionalism, but under the duress of losing his best players, he entered into talks with the group and eventually offered them professional terms. A meeting was set up to form the Sheffield Rovers, at which one of the group of rebels, Tom Cawley, argued that The Wednesday should be given one final chance. The club subsequently turned professional in April 1887 with players each receiving 5 shillings for home games and 7 shillings and sixpence for away games.

 

Up until then, The Wednesday played at Bramall Lane or Sheaf House where the owners took a share of the gate, but as a professional team they now needed their own stadium. The Duke of Norfolk leased them some land by the railway tracks, on which they constructed the Olive Grove ground, so called because an olive grove was bulldozed to make way for it. Their application to join the Football League in 1889 was rejected, so they became members of the Alliance instead, becoming its first champions. The next year, they reached the FA Cup final but were soundly beaten by Blackburn Rovers, 6-1. From champions of the Alliance, Wednesday finished bottom the following season, then fourth in its final year. They were finally elected into the Football League when it was expanded, topping the poll, and promptly defeated Wolverhampton Wanderers in the 1896 FA Cup final. The Wolves goalkeeper was injured in the buildup to Wednesday’s winning goal and did not realise that a goal was awarded when the ball crashed off the bar, crossed the line and then bounced out. At the full time whistle, he walked up to The Wednesday’s captain, Earp, and asked when the replay will be. “There is no replay, old man!” Earp replied, “We won by two goals to one as you will see when we take the medals.” The dawn of a new century was kind to The Wednesday, seeing them win the league back to back in 1902/03 and 1903/04 and topping it off with a 1907 FA Cup win over Everton.

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Achievements: 
Cromwell Cup – Winners x 1
Sheffield FA Challenge Cup – Winners x1
FA Cup – Winners x3
Football League Division 1 – Champions x2

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Star player: Charles Clegg, dob 15 June 1850, pob Sheffield, England

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Sir John Charles Clegg was born in Sheffield and spent his entire life there. His father was a solicitor and three time mayor of Sheffield who ran his own law firm called Clegg and Sons, for which Charles also worked, following his father into the profession. Charles and his brother William were known throughout the area as talented athletes, and Charles often won awards for the 100 yard sprint and the quarter mile. He played football for Sheffield FC (the first football club in the world), Perseverance FC and Broomhill FC but his favourite club and the one where he achieved the most was The Wednesday. He and his brother also played in the first ever inter-association match against the FA at Bramall Lane in 1871, Sheffield XI winning 3-1. Notably, Charles played in England’s first ever international match, but he didn’t enjoy the experience, calling his team mates “snobs from the south with no use for a lawyer from Sheffield”. In terms of his playing style, Clegg was said to be very fast with the ball, and a passer of great judgement with an “unerring kick on sight of the enemy’s goal posts”. Towards the end of his playing days, Charles and his brother were selected to captain the two sides involved in one of the first matches to experiment with flood lights. After nightfall on 15 October 1878, 20,000 spectators turned up to see Charles’ Reds defeat William’s Blues 2-0. After retiring as a player, Charles rose to the very top echelons of English football. He first became a noted referee, and it’s said that during the 1880’s there were very few football matches in Sheffield that did not feature Charles or William as referee. Charles was in charge of the 1882 and 1892 FA Cup finals, the 1888 Scotland vs Wales match and the 1893 contest between England and Scotland. In the mid 1880’s, he became the president of The Wednesday, and then chairman of the Sheffield FA which earned him a place on the FA Council in which role he amalgamated the Sheffield and Hallamshire FA’s. In 1889, when he was president of the Sheffield United Cricket Club, he proposed that a football club should be based at Bramall Lane. This gave birth to Sheffield United Football Club in 1889, of which Clegg was the first president and chairman. In 1890, during a turbulent time in English football, he became president of the FA. He flatly opposed professionalism his entire life, fearing that it would become a corrupting influence on the game (perhaps he was right), and fought a losing battle against it throughout his administrative career, but it had been legalised 5 years before and the Football League was founded in 1889. Clegg oversaw the FA’s entry into FIFAin 1905, and their exit in 1919. Clegg received his knighthood from King George V in 1927, the first person to receive a knighthood for services to football. Clegg was known to be strongly religious and was a strict non-drinker and non-smoker, frowning upon players who did partake, and he also disliked gambling. However, he was broad-minded, he possessed a sharp wit. One anecdote goes that during a disaplinary meeting, a young player had been brought before him to explain his remarks to a referee. Clegg asked the player what he said, and the player responded, “Well, I said that I’ve shit better referees.” “I see.” Clegg replied, “Alright, I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’ll give you a week to prove you can do just that. But if you can’t, I’m afraid you’ll have to pay a £1 fine.” Clegg died in June 1937 just two months after seeing his beloved Sheffield Wednesday fall into the Second Division.