Glenavon F.C.

Glenavon

Full name	Glenavon Football Club
Nickname(s)	The Lurgan Blues, The Mourneview Aces
Founded	November 1889; 125 years ago
Ground	Mourneview Park, Lurgan County Armagh
Ground Capacity	4,160 (4,000 seated)[1]
Chairman	Adrian Teer
Manager	Gary Hamilton (player-manager)
League	NIFL Premiership
2014–15	3rd
Website	Club home page
Home colours Away colours

Glenavon F.C. is a semi-professional, Northern Irish football club playing in the NIFL Premiership. The club, founded in 1889, hails from Lurgan and plays its home matches at Mourneview Park. Club colours are blue and white. Gary Hamilton has been player-manager of the Lurgan Blues since December 2011 following the resignation of Marty Quinn.

Glenavon's bitter rivals are Portadown. Their matches are known as the 'Mid-Ulster Derby'. and Glenavon's current player-manager Gary Hamilton played for Portadown before joining the Lurgan Blues.

In August 2008, the club appointed a new manager, Stephen McBride, a former Northern Ireland international and a popular Glenavon player during his footballing career, playing for the club during the 1990s. McBride's reign lasted seven months before he was relieved of his managerial duties with Glenavon at the bottom of the IFA Premiership. The Director of Football, Alan Fraser, was also relieved from his duties.^[2][3] The club chairman is Adrian Teer.

Domestic history

Glenavon was the first provincial club to win the Irish League title (1951–52) and also the first provincial club to do the league and cup double (1956–57). The latter triumph also made them the first Northern Irish team to enter the European Cup. Glenavon has had a number of talented and famous players, none more so than Wilbur Cush and Jimmy Jones, who were to the fore in "the glory years" of the Fifties. The success of the 1950s is still the benchmark at this Lurgan club, the closest the club have come to achieving a league success since came in the 1993–94 season, when but for two late goals in the final match Glenavon would have been crowned champions.

Glenavon enjoyed a good run throughout the 1990s, consistently achieving good placings in the league and winning several cup competitions, including Irish Cup wins in 1991–92 and 1996–97, and were runners-up against Glentoran in the 1997–98 edition of the cup. The club then suffered a relatively poor spell during the early 2000s, which culminated in relegation to the second tier in the 2003-04 Irish League season. Although they were promoted the following season, Glenavon continued to struggle towards the bottom of the league throughout the remainder of the decade, going through several managers such as Terry Cochrane, Stephen McBride & Marty Quinn until former Portadown & Glentoran forward Gary Hamilton was appointed player-manager in December 2011, managing to steer the club from relegation in the remainder of the 2011-12 Irish League season. This was followed up by a 9th place finish in the 2012-13 season. The 2013-14 season was welcomed by many as a successful season, the Lurgan club securing a top-six league finish and a return to winning major silverware with the 2013–14 Irish Cup, in which Glenavon triumphed 2-1 over Ballymena United in the final.

Following on from this cup triumph was a successful 2014-15 season. Though Glenavon did not fare as well in the Irish Cup, exiting at the 6th round to Championship 1 side Harland & Wolff Welders, an excellent late run of 7 consecutive wins saw the Lurgan Blues pip their Mid-Ulster rivals Portadown to a third-placed league finish, therefore sealing European football for the 2015-16 season.

European record

Glenavon was the first Northern Irish team to enter the European Cup. In their first tie they drew AGF of Denmark, drawing 0–0 at home and losing 0–3 away.

Glenavon achieved some more notable results in Europe in the 1990s. In the 1992–93 season, they drew both legs of their Cup Winners Cup tie with Royal Antwerp and lost on penalties. In 1995–96 they reached the first round proper of the UEFA Cup (the last Irish League club to do so), and were beaten by Werder Bremen.

Season	Competition	Round	Opponents	1st leg	2nd leg	Aggregate
1957–58	European Cup	PR	AGF	0–3	0–0	0–3
1960–61	European Cup	PR	Wismut Karl Marx Stadt	w/o		N/A
1977–78	UEFA Cup	1R	PSV Eindhoven	2–6	0–5	2–11
1979–80	UEFA Cup	1R	Standard Liège	0–1	0–1	0–2
1990–91	UEFA Cup	1R	Bordeaux	0–0	0–2	0–2
1995–96	UEFA Cup	PR	FH	0–0	1–0	1–0
		1R	Werder Bremen	0–2	0–5	0–7
2001–02	UEFA Cup	QR	Kilmarnock	0–1	0–1	0–2
2014–15	UEFA Europa League	1QR	FH	0–3	2–3	2–6
2015–16	UEFA Europa League	1QR	Shakhtyor Soligorsk	1–2	0–3	1–5

Stadium

Mourneview Park is now considered to be one of the best grounds in the Irish League. Along the side of the pitch runs the Geddis Stand (holds roughly 1700) and on the other side the newly built Glenfield Road Stand (holds roughly 2000). One end of the ground has the Crescent Stand (400 seats, and standing area), and at the other end the Hospital End terracing. In addition to Glenavon's home matches, the stadium is also a regular host for Northern Ireland under-21 matches.

Due to ongoing renovation of Windsor Park, Mourneview Park was chosen as the venue for Linfield's home ties in the 2014–15 UEFA Europa League.

Honours

Senior honours

• Irish League: 3
  • 1951–52, 1956–57, 1959–60

• Irish Cup: 6
  • 1956–57, 1958–59, 1960–61, 1991–92, 1996–97, 2013–14

• Northern Ireland Football League Cup: 1
  • 1989–90

• City Cup: 5
  • 1920–21, 1954–55, 1955–56, 1960–61, 1965–66

• Gold Cup: 4
  • 1954–55, 1956–57, 1990–91, 1997–98

• Ulster Cup: 3
  • 1954–55, 1958–59, 1962–63

• Floodlit Cup: 2
  • 1988–89, 1996–97

• County Antrim Shield: 2
  • 1990–91, 1995–96

• Mid-Ulster Cup: 24
  • 1897–98, 1901–02, 1904–05, 1906–07, 1908–09, 1910–11, 1924–25, 1925–26, 1930–31, 1932–33, 1937–38, 1947–48†, 1957–58†, 1965–66†, 1971–72†, 1976–77†, 1983–84, 1985–86, 1988–89, 1990–91, 1998–99, 2004–05, 2009–10, 2010–11

• North-South Cup: 1
  • 1962–63^{[note 1]}

• Charity Shield: 1
  • 1992 (shared)

† Won by Glenavon Reserves

Intermediate honours

• Irish Intermediate Cup: 3
  • 1907–08, 1910–11, 2004–05

• George Wilson Cup: 1
  • 1963–64†

• Bob Radcliffe Cup: 1
  • 1990–91†

† Won by Glenavon Reserves

Junior honours

• Irish Junior Cup: 1
  • 1897–98

Current squad

Note: Flags indicate national team as defined under FIFA eligibility rules. Players may hold more than one non-FIFA nationality.

No. Position Player 1 GK Jonathan Tuffey 2 DF Gareth McKeown 3 DF Kyle Neill 4 DF Simon Kelly 5 DF Connor Dillon 6 DF Kris Lindsay 7 MF Andy Kilmartin 8 DF Rhys Marshall 9 FW Joel Cooper 10 FW Eoin Bradley 11 MF Andy Hall 12 MF Mark Patton

No. Position Player 14 MF Mark Sykes 17 MF Andy McGrory 19 FW Declan O'Brien 20 FW Gary Hamilton (Player-manager) 22 FW Kevin Braniff 23 MF Daniel Kearns 24 MF Ciarán Martyn 25 DF David Elebert 27 MF James Singleton 33 GK James McGrath TBA DF Kyle Buckley TBA MF Josh Lynch

Managers

Glenavon FC Academy

Glenavon FC's Academy consists of teams at Under 7, Under 8, Under 9, Under 10, Under 11, Under 12, Under 13, Under 14, Under 15 and Under 16. There is also an Under 19 team which comes under the auspices of the Senior Club and plays as Glenavon III's.

The Glenavon FC Academy is headed by Ryan Prentice The Academy currently has three UEFA A Licence and two UEFA B Licence coaches.

In recent times the Club have introduced various coaching programmes and training camps aimed at increasing the numbers within the Academy. These have included the Glenavon FC Academy Club Affiliation Programme, Schools Programme, Aces, Girls Football and our annual Football Camps at Easter, Summer and Halloween.

Notes

References

External links

• Glenavon FC Website
• Glenavon FC Academy Website
• Glenavon Statistics and Results at the Irish Football Club Project