How
it all began . . .
The
Club was formed in 1947 as Fulwood & Broughton AFC. Although the nucleus of the
original squad came from Broughton Youth Club some of the founder
members were also members of Fulwood & Broughton Cricket Club and it is
thought that is where the name was derived from. Gordon Spicer our first
Chairman was a former Captain of the Cricket Club and pictures can be seen
of him in F&B CC clubhouse along with several Broughton footballers from
that era. For many years (till the late 80's) we used to go back to the
Cricket Club for after match refreshments.
Then
we started playing . . .
The
newly formed organisation applied for and were granted playing membership of
the Preston & District Football League (now the Mid-Lancashire League), two teams were entered in the
1947-48 season.
At
the end of the 1949-50 season the club left the District League and joined
the Lancashire Amateur League. The LAL asked them to change the name of the
club as a team called Fulwood were already playing in the League so
we became Broughton Amateurs. This move
was viewed as a definite step up in standard from Local to County standard.
Then we started winning . . .
The
Club won its first trophy in 1952/53 season when we finished level on points
with Old Blackburnians, goal difference and penalty shoot-outs were not used
as tie breakers and the teams had to play off on a neutral ground. We won
2-1 with Jackie Edwards and Colin Flintoff (Grandad of Andrew) scoring the
goals.
The remainder of the 1950's and most of the 1960's saw a period of
consolidation for the club with some occasional trophy wins for one team or
another 1955-56, 1961-62, 1963-64, 1967-68, just enough success to keep
things ticking over. During the late 1950's a young lad called Dave Wilson
joined the Club. Then we couldn't stop winning . . .
From the moment when the 1st team won the LAL Challenge Cup and Div 2
championship in 1971-72 season till the late 1980's we went crazy. In those
16 or 17 seasons we won 38 trophies. Some were club awards but most were
league titles and a few Cup wins. During this period the 1sts won the Premier Division twice and were runners up 4 times,
they also won the LAL Cup in 85-86 and the Jack Kelly Memorial Trophy
(Preston based Cup comp) in 87-88. The
2nds won their league a staggering 8 times in 11 seasons, 3rds won their
league 7 times
in 11 seasons, 4ths only won 1 league title, mainly because they were in same
division as our 3rds. For a few seasons we even had a 5th Team and they
managed to win their league in 87-88. All this success contributed to the Club winning
several Aggregate and other Club Trophies. During this spell
came the Clubs finest achievement when, with Eddy Brown as
manager, we won the LFA Amateur Cup
in the 1980-81 season defeating Sefton 3-2 at Burscough in the Final.
Read Eddy Brown's Wikipedia article
- like many professional footballers, especially those who played in FA Cup Finals, Eddy
(who sadly passed away on 12th July 2012) has an article about him on Wikipedia - and Broughton get a good mention too !!
ALSO: Who was the first English footballer to score against
Barcelona? Read this newspaper article
about Eddy, which also answers the question - in case you haven't guessed !!!
Stability is the key . . .
During all this time Dave Wilson was the Chairman, up to his untimely death on 18th October 2008.
Having been involved with the club for over 50 years,
Chairman since 1971, we owe him a great debt and in 2007 tried to recognise
this by giving him an award for his 50 years service
presented by his hero Sir Tom Finney. He was President of the Lancashire Amateur League in 1988-89 and in
March 2008 he received the Lifetime Achievement Award for Sport an honour
bestowed on him by the City of Preston. Which also qualified him to be nominated for the Lifetime Achievement -
Commitment to Sport award presented by Lancashire Sports. He duly won this regional accolade, and had been notified about it,
but sadly passed away the week before the ceremony, bravely wife Carole went and received it on his behalf.
Into the 21st
Century . . .
The 1990's and
noughties saw us get sparse return as far as trophies are concerned
with the last successes being 3rds winning their league in
1996-97 then in 1997-98 both the 2nds and 4ths won their Leagues, plus we
had Trevor Lafferty as LAL Secretary of the Year in 2004.
In 2005 Mick Jones and Dan Spensley were selected (and played) for the
League Representative side. The 3rds and 4ths got to their Divisional Cup
Finals in 2005 and 2007 but both lost. Finally our first trophy of the new
millennium arrived in 2009 when the 3rds memorably won the cup 3-2 with an
inspired performance against
Rochdale St. Clements who were from 3 divisions above. See Previous Seasons
page 2008/09 season for match details. Then the following season (09-10)
the 4ths won Division 7 for our first League title in over a decade.
What are we up
to now . . .
The 2011/12 season was our last in the Lancashire
Amateur League. After 62 years we left the LAL and for start of 2012/13
season re-joined the newly formed Mid-Lancashire League - formerly the
Preston & District League which was the league we first joined when we
formed back in 1947. During our 2nd season 2013/14 Ian Hesketh was awarded
Mid-Lancs League Secretary of the Year then in
2014-15 season
the 1st Team became the "Broughton Invincibles" when they won our first trophy in the Mid-Lancs League,
going
unbeaten for the whole season whilst
clinching the Division 1 championship AND
the 2nd Team won the Cup. Let's hope it's just the start of something.
As
stated above, "Stability is the key" and we are fortunate since
2009 to have the fantastic Doug Birch as Chairman, providing the solid
platform and sound leadership needed to run an outfit the size of ours.
Come and find us . . .
We currently have 2 senior teams and both play their
home games on the wonderful pitches at Myerscough College.
You're welcome to come and
support any of the teams on any match day, go to the
Current Seasons
page for Fixture details (also via link on the left
navigation panel).
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