100 Years of Football at St Andrews

by John (the Barmy Blue Nose) Doherty 

On Boxing Day 2006 Birmingham City F C celebrated 100 years to the day of playing football at St Andrews and my good friend, the editor of Big n Bostin - Pete Millington, (affectionately known as Scumbag to myself) has asked me to write A brief history about St Andrews and some facts that you may not know (because Pete does not know a lot about Football as he supports some team from Witton).

The club was formed in 1875 and originally known as Small Heath Alliance and for the first two years played on local pitches around the the Small Heath area before moving to a more permanant site in 1877 to Muntz Street, in Small Heath where they remained for the next 29 years. In July 1885 the Alliance was dropped and the club was then known as Small Heath Football Club Ltd until March 1905 when the club name was changed to Birmingham ('City' was then added in the summer of 1943) and since then the club as been known as Birmingham City Footbal Club PLC.

Birmingham City is also known as the "Blues" as they have worn blue shirts from day one and the fans are affectionally known as "Bluenoses" by local rivals. In the Autunm of 1905 the Blues board at the time submitted plans to build A larger stadium on watseland in Garrison Lane, between Boardsley Green and Small Heath and former art student and carpenter "Harry Pumfrey" designed and, with the help of other local trademen, built the new stadium and on boxing Day 1906 Blues played Middlesborough in the old 1st Division ending in 0-0 draw at St Andrews.

When St Andrews was being constructed the club evicted a band of Gypsies who were living there at the time, disgruntled at their eviction the Gypsies took their revenge by placing a curse on the site stating that while Birmingham would never be successful as long as they played on the site, which in the end was only partially true over the years, yet in the 80's then manager "Ron Saunders" being deeply superstitious, got in a Gypsy to lift the curse, made the players wear red soled football boots and put crosses on the floodlights, whilst in 1993 the ever eccentric "Barry Fry" had a novel way of removing the curse, after a poor run in the then Division 1, he decided to urinate on the four corner flags to lift the curse and that season Blues promptly went down to Division 2.

In 1996 managing Director "Karren Brady" decided to lift the curse by incorporating A " Vicars Dog Collar" on the shirts, that did not work either. It is believed that the curse was finally removed when an inventive builder who happened to be a very keen "bluenose" whilst dismantling the old Tilton Road stand took bits of rubble with him and when working on the new Holte End at Villa Park placed the rubble into the foundations thus transferring the curse.

In 1909 after Blues lost a match due to bad refereeing decisions, (nothing changes), Birmingham had the dubious honour of being one of the first cases of football hooliganism when a mob gathered outside St Andrews to lynch the referee, he was only saved when quick thinking police officers smuggled out the referee in a police uniform.

Over the years, as well as being Birmingham City's home ground St Andrews has hosted two full England internationals in April 1922 when England drew 1-1 with Scotland and in 1941 when England beat Wales 2-1. St Andrews has also hosted England B, Youth and Under 21 internationals over the years. St Andrews has also hosted pop concerts including Birmingham's own bands UB 40 and Duran Duran in recent years, also St Andrews has had many famous people visit including Mohammed Ali and Prince Charles and famous supporters include comedian Jasper Carrott (no: 1 Fan), radio presenter Tom Ross, writer and actor Al Hunter Ashton, Mike Skinner aka The Streets, Rock star Jeff Lynne and UB 40's Astro.

In 1967 St Andrews was used in Peter Watkins' surreal film "Priviledge" starring ex- Manfred Mann lead singer Paul Jones and 60's super model Jean Shrimpton and also Jasper Carrotts situation comedy "All About Me" in 2002. In the past 100 years St Andrews has seen very many structural changes from war damage and rebuilding over the years and under the current owners David Sullivan and the Gold Brothers the stadium was fully modernised in 1994 and 1995.

Over the years the ground capacity has been reduced from 52,500 standing to a 30,000 all seater stadium today. Blues biggest gate was in February 1939 in an FA cup tie against Everton when 67,341 attended and on the 11th of December 1954 recorded their biggest win over Liverpool in the then 1st Division 9-1 at St Andrews. Many of the great footballers have played at St Andrews such has Mathews, Finney, Mortesen, Milburn, Wright, Best, Charlton, Moore, Shearer, Henry, Beckham and Rooney and as well as the domestic cups St Andrews as hosted the Fairs Cup matches with Blues reaching the finals twice in 1960 and 1961 losing to Barcelona and AS Roma respectively.

There have been many famous Blues players at ST Andrews such as Harry Hibbs, Joe Bradford, Gil Merrick, Jeff Hall, Len Brown, Alex Govan, Terry Hennesey,Jimmy Broomfield, Bertie Auld, Trevor Hockey, Johnny Vincent, Jimmy GreenHoff, Bob Hatton, Joe Gallagher, David Seaman, Robbie Savage, Christophe Dugarry and of cause the first son of Birmingham "Trevor Francis" who was manager of Blues from 1996 until late 2001 having taken Blues to the first Worthington Cup Final at Cardiff only losing to Liverpool on penalties.

Blues current Manager Ex-player Steve Bruce took over from Francis and immediately took Blues into the Premiership in 2002 and stayed there until May 2006 when Blues were relegated to the Championship.

In 1956 Birmingham city's anthem "Keep Right On to the End Of Road" originally sung by Sir Harry Lauder and was adopted by Blues Fans after hearing Blues Scottish winger Alex Govan was heard singing it during the 1956 F A Cup run, In the early 70's the now famous Ball and World Crest replaced the city's official Coat of Arms as so not to be confused with Birmingham City Council and the Blues official mascot Beau Brummie was first launched in the mid 60's and is now very much part of ST Andrews.

There have been great times and bad times at St Andrews over the past 100 years seeing Blues reach the F A Cup Final in 1931 losing to West Bromiwich Albion 2-1 and again in 1956 losing 3-1 to Manchester City, in 1963 beating Aston Villa over two legs 3-1 to win the League Cup, winning both the Leyland Daf Trophy in 1991 and Auto-Windowscreen Shield 1995, (much to the Witton Supporters Amusement) and not forgetting that goal on that great September night in 2002 when Blues thrashed their arch enemies 3-0 for the first time in 18 years on Blues return to top flight football. What ever happens at St Andrews in the next 100 years, but as the song goes "We'll Be There", "where?" "At The End Of the Road".

 

John (The Barmy Bluenose) Doherty