SHEP'S BOLTON SHORTS
Cardiff City historian Richard Shepherd takes a look at historical ties and more ahead of our upcoming fixture v Bolton on Saturday.
A LONG ABSENCE: It’s almost thirteen years since we last played Bolton Wanderers way back on December 21st 1999 when we played at their Reebok Stadium in an F.A. Cup Third Round tie. The game had been originally scheduled for ten days earlier, but was postponed because of a waterlogged pitch and we lost the re-arranged game 1-0. Our last League meetings with them were in 1989/90 in the Third Division. We lost 2-0 at Ninian Park on the opening day of the season, and lost 3-1 at their former Burnden Park home on January 20th.
THE FIRST TIME: Our very first meeting with Bolton was in a friendly at Burnden Park on January 3rd 1921, two days after we had played at Bury in a Second Division match. We won promotion that season (our first in the League) and played them at top level home and away in October 1921. 40,000 saw us lose 2-1 at Ninian Park, but the following week we won 2-1 at Burnden Park in front of 35,000.
THE ORIGINAL DIVISION ONE: The last time that we played Bolton at top level (the original Division One) was in 1961/62. On September 9th 1961, we lost 2-1 at Ninian Park, Dai Ward scoring our goal in front of a 22,076 attendance. Ward also scored in the return at Burnden Park on January 20th 1962 when we drew 1-1.
BILL JENNINGS: Our manager from April 1937 to April 1939 was our former coach Bill Jennings, a Welsh International who had played for Bolton for many years and who had taken part in the first Wembley F.A. Cup Final in 1923 for Bolton against West Ham United when the Stadium was overrun with an estimated 250,000 people!
FOUNDER MEMBERS: Bolton Wanderers were founder members of the Football League in 1888. They were one of twelve clubs in the Midlands and North-West who formed the League, and their very first League match was on September 8th 1888 when they lost 6-3 at home to Derby County.
THE LION OF VIENNA: Bolton’s most famous player was undoubtedly locally-born centre-forward Nat Lofthouse who spent nearly twenty years as a player with them, appearing in their 1953 and 1958 F.A. Cup Finals. They lost the first one 4-3 against Blackpool, but beat Manchester United 2-0 in the second one when Lofthouse scored both goals. He was a famous England International, and when he scored the winning goal in England’s 3-2 victory against Austria in Vienna, he was nicknamed “The Lion of Vienna”. He later became manager of Bolton, and was for many years their President until his passing a few years ago.
RECORD APPEARANCES: Goalkeeper Eddie Hopkinson, an England International, made a club record 519 League appearances for Bolton between 1956 and 1970.
F.A.CUP TEAM: Bolton were the F.A. Cup team of the 1920s – they won the trophy in 1923, 1926 and 1929. They also win it in 1958 and were runners-up in 1894, 1904 and 1953.
THEIR FORMATION: It was the boys of Christ Church Sunday School in Bolton, led by their master Thomas Ogden who established a football club in 1874 under the name of the school. When their President began too many rules about the use of church premises to hold their various meetings, the club broke away and formed “Bolton Wanderers Football Club” in 1877, holding their meetings at a local hotel.
