1893 British Home Championship

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The 1893 British Home Championship was an international football tournament between the British Home Nations. The competition was won and dominated by England, who beat all three rival teams and scored 17 goals in just three matches. Fred Spiksley claimed four and Walter Gilliat scored a hat-trick in the competition's opening game. Scotland came second with victories over Ireland and Wales, who finished third and fourth respectively.

England began the strongest team, scoring twelve goals in the first two games against the Irish and the Welsh with only one in reply. Scotland too began well, winning their match against Wales in Wales by eight goals to nil before netting another six in a rout of Ireland at home. In the final games England and Scotland played a match in London which England easily won 5-2 to whitewash their opponents and take the trophy. In a concilation game in Belfast, Ireland beat Wales 4-3 in a thrilling encounter to finish third.

The official attendance for the England v. Scotland match was 16,000; the crowd was so large that it was forced to stand in front of the journalists who were therefore prevented from seeing all of the action. Consequently, there is some dispute over the goal-scorers and several sources claim that Fred Spiksley actually scored a hat-trick, although this is not credited in any of the official references.

[edit] Table

Team	Pts	Pld	W	L	GF	GA	GD
England	6	3	3	0	17	3	+14
Scotland	4	3	2	1	16	6	+10
Ireland	2	3	1	2	6	15	-9
Wales	0	3	0	3	3	18	-15

The points system worked as follows:

2 points for a win
1 point for a draw

[edit] Results

February 25, 1893	England	6–1	Ireland	Perry Barr, Birmingham
	Walter Gilliat 3, Gilbert Smith, William Winckworth, Rupert Sandilands		George Gaffkin	Perry Barr, Birmingham

March 13, 1893	England	6–0	Wales	Victoria Ground, Stoke
	Fred Spiksley 2, Billy Bassett, Johnny Goodall, Jack Reynolds, Joe Schofield			Victoria Ground, Stoke

March 18, 1893	Wales	0–8	Scotland	Racecourse Ground, Wrexham
			Jake Madden 4, John Barker 3, William Lambie	Racecourse Ground, Wrexham

March 25, 1893	Scotland	6–1	Ireland	Celtic Park, Glasgow
	William Sellar 2, Sandy McMahon, James Hamilton, James Kelly, Own Goal (Samuel Torrans)		George Gaffkin	Celtic Park, Glasgow

April 1, 1893	England	5–2	Scotland	Athletic Ground, Richmond
	Fred Spiksley 2, Robert Gosling, George Cotterill, Jack Reynolds		Thomas Waddell, William Sellar	Athletic Ground, Richmond