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    Buckingham Town FC RIP

    The first team I ever saw play football has folded. Buckingham Town were founded in 1883, and until a few years ago they played at Ford Meadow, by the River Ouse, five minutes' walk from the house where I grew up. They played in the North Bucks League for a while. When I was a child I would go the reference library and read 19th century match reports from the local newspaper archive.

    In 1983 the Robins (now in the United Counties League) were on the up, and hosted Second Division leaders Leicester City for a friendly to celebrate their centenary. The week before they came to town they thrashed Wolves 5-0, as I excitedly pointed out in middle school assembly when the headmaster announced that Big Football was coming to town. Leicester came, in November, with all their stars - Lineker, Alan Smith, Lynex, the stylish Gerry Daly - and I was lit. Spent most of the game running around trying to get autographs. Told John O'Neill he was one of four players I hadn't managed to get stickers of in my Espana 82 album (he took it well). Was refused a half-time autograph by Leicester manager Gordon Milne because he was "busy" (his team won 7-0, I think).

    I had a pre-existing soft spot for Leicester since they ended Liverpool's record home unbeaten run two years previously. This match cemented that they were my team (yes, I know, it should have cemented Town as my team, but at the age of 10 I wanted a team with exciting famous players). Years later i realised that at the time their fans probably thought it was pretty odd to take all those first team players for a mid-season friendly with a non-league side. I wrote the whole thing up for Leicester fanzine The Fox, and (now in my 30s) felt ridiculously proud that I had a published article linking the two football clubs that have loomed large in my life.

    But Buckingham weren't quite that little, they were coming into the best period of their history. With the mighty Terry Shrieves leading the line, Town had titanic battles at the top of the UCL with Rushden, Irthlingborough Diamonds and Brackley Town. Two of those had to merge to get the better of Robins! I think they won the UCL twice, and also brought the club's only appearance in the FA Cup proper, when they hosted Leyton Orient (lost 1-0. Supposedly a local character of our acquaintance, Pete Puissant, misdirected the visitors' coach so it got stuck in the ford from which Ford Meadow took its name, but I acknowledge this sounds pretty apocryphal).

    After their second UCL win (I think) Town were awarded promotion to the Southern League, where they acquitted themselves with distinction, winning the Southern Division. This revealed the absolute limit of any possible ambition, as they were denied promotion due to the ground not meeting Premier Division standards. WSC ran an article on this by Philip Cornwall, in 1990 or thereabouts, and this ensured that I became a faithful reader of the mag. I was a casual, irregular attender at this time but I did go to the odd away match, travelling on the coach with the players and officials. Town also made the FA Vase QFs twice, losing out to Tiverton and Guiseley.

    Being unable to gain promotion had an inevitable stagnating effect, and a few years later Town were relegated back into the UCL, but it wasn't the league it once was. The old rivals had gone - Rushden and Irthlingborough teaming up for a short-lived Football League adventure, Brackley starting a measured climb through the leagues that has seen them reach a ludicrously high level (Conference North playoffs FFS). Following a bizarre interlude where they appointed a manager who claimed to have managed the Fiji national side (he hadn't), Town continued to muddle along, managed for years by the odd but savvy Morell Maison, at one point including former FA Cup winner Christopher Wreh in their lineup, until being relegated from the UCL Prem in 2007. In 2011 they were forced to leave Ford Meadow and go into exile, first in Winslow, then in Milton Keynes. Last year I was in Buckingham and took photos of the rotting stands and goals - the land hasn't been developed and never will, as it floods like anything. If I can work out how I'll post some here, though they're hardly exciting.

    Town's 'localness' can perhaps be measured by noting that I knew the children of two of the chairmen, as well as Mr. Newton who ran the programme hut. Buckingham's pop is (or was) about 10,000. Their demise leaves Buckingham Athletic of the South Midlands League as the town's only team, so good luck to them (they have a women's team, unimaginable when I was growing up).

    Many thanks to Furtho for keeping me updated on the situation and on North Bucks football in general. He did tip me off that they were playing what would likely be their last game a couple of weeks ago, but sadly I was too ill to make it up there.

    Thanks to anyone who made it through the whole post, and sorry if it was boring. I didn't want to let them go without saying something.

    #2
    Thank you, dm; that is a fine and heartfelt tribute.
    Last edited by Benjm; 04-05-2018, 10:47.

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      #3
      That's a great post, DM. It's sad when teams you've seen disappear but I've not had one I was that close to / involved with as your story.

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        #4
        Yes, thanks very much for that DM. I'm glad you wrote and posted it.

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          #5
          Lovely post and a lovely story. What a shame it’s over.

          I reckon the photos would have a real poignancy by the sound of it. Have you tried Imgur.com ? I got an account on there for free when I ditched TinyPic and have managed to post pics on OTF from there. Avoid the app and peripherals if you can.

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            #6
            Terry Shrieves' son George was in the Buckingham Town lineup for that last ever home game, DM.

            The club folded because the committee eventually comprised two people. You cannot run a Step 6 football club, or arguably any football club, with two people.

            And this is the second longstanding north Bucks club to fold within a week, after the committee of Olney Town announced here that their club -- like Buckingham, members of the United Counties League Division 1 -- are to be wound up with immediate effect. The problem at Olney is that the club can't keep pace with the FA's ground grading requirements necessary to continue participating at Step 6 and they can't drop down to more local football because the reduction in income would make the club unsustainable.

            The idea that a relatively prosperous place like Olney now finds itself unable to support a Step 6 club should set alarm bells ringing loud and clear, but of course it won't because the FA simply doesn't care about football at this level. A mate summed up the broader issues here as follows:

            "Everything is hand to mouth at that level. Not enough people in a community that can or will care, along with the atomisation of the social links that used to exist through schools and employers, and just too many work/life pressures. Take all that and multiply by the FA rules and it's non-league decimation. All that is amplified by the EPL vacuuming up any and all interest as if nothing else exists. I don't suppose that the decline in local news media has helped, either."

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              #7
              Thanks for that dm. It's bad enough losing clubs round here (north-west London), but it's much worse when the only game in town goes.

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                #8
                Lovely sad piece, dm.

                The loss of clubs that have been community institutions since Victorian times should be something preventable at a legal level. We have listed buildings, preservation orders and subsidies for local arts and civic endeavours so we should protect something that is part of a town or area's cultural life like a sports club.

                The recent demise of Surrey's oldest club Dorking FC (under dubious circumstances which saw another twenty year old club take over their old ground) went by with barely a mention and it shouldn't be allowed to happen.

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                  #9
                  Thanks for writing that dm - interesting to know where your support for Leicester came from (and apologies for mentioning this, but I was at Anfield when Pat Byrne and Jim Melrose ended their massive run - happy memories). It's a real shame when a club that was a part of your football upbringing goes out of business; I felt the same when Enderby Town folded as I spent many a happy Saturday afternoon there in the early 70's when my uncle was their manager.

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                    #10
                    what a lovely post. however, some further elucidation of this

                    Following a bizarre interlude where they appointed a manager who claimed to have managed the Fiji national side (he hadn't)
                    would be very welcome.

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                      #11
                      Terrific post, moth.

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                        #12
                        Originally posted by dogbeak View Post
                        what a lovely post. however, some further elucidation of this



                        would be very welcome.
                        I'm awfully sorry, but that's nearly all I can remember. He may have been called Gary. He was in situ for a few months in the early 90s before departing, I think when his CV embellishment was uncovered. This skeletal story is from my hazy memory and the details I would have got from the local paper, as my tenuous acquaintance with a couple of club officials didn't extend to hearing club scuttlebutt.

                        The loss of clubs that have been community institutions since Victorian times should be something preventable at a legal level. We have listed buildings, preservation orders and subsidies for local arts and civic endeavours so we should protect something that is part of a town or area's cultural life like a sports club.

                        Absolutely, though of course plenty of 'preservation' (e.g. Gainsborough Studios or Arsenal's old ground) is of the 'put a few artifacts on display in the new development and call it a homage' variety. But Buckingham Town were two years older than Leicester City, I'm guessing that Dorking and Olney were at least as old, and for them to just vanish is pretty shit. Wolverton were another North Bucks club that folded a few years ago, they supposedly had the oldest stand in the country (which at least still exists, apparently).

                        For those who don't know, Buckingham and Olney are also the centres of pancake racing. Every Pancake Day we'd troop out of school to the town centre to watch people run through town tossing pancakes. I used to think every town in Britain did this. Olney's is the famous one.
                        Last edited by delicatemoth; 04-05-2018, 18:26.

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                          #13
                          If I can get anything on that I’ll add it here.

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                            #14
                            That's a lovely piece, dm.

                            It's only in the last few years that I've really begun to appreciate just how often this sort of thing happens in the mid to lower reaches of non-league, and when you think there's a couple of hundred fans with fond memories of each of those clubs - well, that's an awful lot of collective sadness, isn't it?

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                              #15
                              Following that link to Wolverton, I see that Franchise Team didn't even come up with using "MK" as a prefix.

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                                #16
                                I just did a search, then sort of wished I hadn't: defunct clubs in England and Wales.

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