A club with proud
and ancient tradition, who are striving to bring the good times back
again. The club was founded by a group of cricketers in Birmingham and
initially played on an amusement park, sharing with (very) lacrosse
players and trick-cyclists. People thought they were mad !!
The name actually comes from a Shakespeare poem. The Bard had sauntered
across from Stratford-Upon-Avon to view the building work in the area
close to Spaghetti Junction (which didn't exist in his day, it was
called Spaghetti crossroads then). The poem read :-
"The
sight of such labours and burgeoning construction,
Beauteous result of that exquisite function,
As ton and as ton of brick
From deepest sunset orange to plain manilla,
Were assembled forsooth,
To createth a villa." |
The colours chosen by the new
club reflected their attitude to the game. The claret picked to reflect
the colour of the red wine quaffed by the carafe after playing and the
blue, the sky behind as they raised their glasses high in celebration.
And celebration figured large in the early days. They became the second
team to complete the League and FA Cup "double" when men were
men and footballers wore bloomers. Indeed, despite the success, they
were labelled as "The Villains" of the piece, when in 1895, as
holders of the FA Cup, they put the trophy on display in the window of a
sports shop. The Cup was stolen and was never recovered. The Villa were
fined £25 and had to pay an equivalent amount to replace the FA Cup.
Luckily, they were insured and so was one of their players, Charles
Athersmith, who played the whole of one match under an umbrella when it
was raining. Anthony Smythe once played a match pursued by his butler
carrying cucumber sandwiches and Tobias Larman wore the full regalia his
position of Chair of the Cradley Heath Chamber of Commerce allowed
during a game against Glossop NE.
The club have, since the Second World
War, fallen upon comparatively barren times. Villa did win the first
ever League Cup, when only a few teams entered and won again in 1977,
which is a little known fact, because the Final against Everton went to
so many replays, most people forgot who took part, let alone who came
out on top. This final had to be played on a neutral ground and after
the initial game at Wembley, toured the country playing on 58 of the 92
League grounds at that time. A First Division championship in 1981 was
achieved with an unbelievably low number of players (9, in fact) and
then the following season, took the European Cup, despite losing their
goalie very early in the match and hairy monster, Peter Withe, almost
missing the winning goal from two feet out, but managing to guide it in
off his shin pad. Unfortunately, Villa have slipped into a cycle where
they appoint managers in rotation, on their personality or lack of it (Venglos,
Atkinson, Taylor, Little, Gregory). An excellent ground (a regular venue
for FA Cup semis) needs a successful side to do it justice. The
successful sides at Villa Park these days are too often the visitors.
Villa did perk up in 1999-2000,
by reaching their first FA Cup final for thirty-odd years, but lost to
Chelsea and have now installed David O'Leary in the manager's job, but
his battles are mainly off the pitch to get money out of the chairman to
buy new players.
FAMOUS PLAYERS :- Gary Penrice,
Ian Olney, Pongo Waring (who had his own dressing room), Brendan Ormsby,
Perry Barr, Ian Ormondroyd.
FAMOUS FANS : - Nigel Kennedy
(Violinist), Floella Benjamin (Children's TV presenter), Mark Williams
(Actor - The Fast Show (TV), One Hundred and One Dalmatians (Film)),
John Taylor (Musician - Duran Duran), Jane Sixsmith (England Ladies
Hockey player), Sir Norman Fowler (Former MP and Chairman of the
Conservative Party).
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