The club
Witton Albion history: formation, the Central Ground and Wincham Park
A Northwich club that traces its first match to October 1887, spent almost eighty years at the Central Ground in the middle of the town and has played at Wincham Park since 1989.
Witton Albion take their name from Witton, a district of Northwich, the salt town in the middle of Cheshire. The club has been part of the town's life since the 1880s and has had only two homes in more than a century: the Central Ground, which stood a short walk from the high street, and Wincham Park, a purpose-built stadium two miles away that opened in 1989.
Formation: 1887 or 1890?
Several football teams in Northwich used the Witton name in the 1880s, and sorting out which of them became the present club is not straightforward. The club's own history traces Witton Albion to a match played on 26 October 1887, and 1887 is the year the club uses: the club pages of the old website were headed "Witton Albion FC Ltd. Established 1887".
For many years, though, 1890 was given as the founding date. The explanation offered by the club is that no record of any match in 1889 has ever been found, so the continuous story appeared to start a year later. Wikipedia's entry for the club also gives 1887.
The early grounds
Albion's first pitch lay next to the vicarage of the parish church. In 1897 the club moved to Magdala Place, close to the Station Bridge, and stayed for thirteen years.
| Years | Ground | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| To 1897 | Beside the Parish Church vicarage | The club's first pitch |
| 1897–1910 | Magdala Place | Near the Station Bridge |
| 1910–1989 | Central Ground, off Witton Street | Rented at first, bought in 1920 |
| 1989 to date | Wincham Park, Chapel Street, Wincham | Built for the club |
The Central Ground, 1910–1989
In 1910 Albion took a field beside the Victoria Saw Mills, just off Witton Street, for a rent of £15 a year. Ten years later, in July 1920, the club bought the freehold for £750 and the ground was given the name it kept for the rest of its life: the Central Ground.
The name was accurate: the ground sat in the centre of Northwich, just behind the town's library. It was Witton's home through the Cheshire County League championships of 1948–49, 1949–50 and 1953–54 and through the first decade in the Northern Premier League, all covered in league history and honours. A small grandstand was added on the southern side in the 1960s.
In 1989 the club sold the ground to the supermarket company J Sainsbury. The last match there, on 1 May 1989, was a 1–1 draw with Frickley Athletic; a Sainsbury's store and a link road were then built on the site.
Wincham Park
With the proceeds the club bought a fourteen-acre site off Chapel Street in Wincham, on the north-eastern edge of Northwich, and built a new stadium there. Roughly half of the surrounding land was later sold to put the club's finances on a firmer footing.
The move was followed almost at once by the best football in the club's history. In its second season at Wincham Park, 1990–91, Witton won the Northern Premier League by sixteen points and were promoted to the Football Conference. The same years brought the FA Cup and FA Trophy runs, and the Wembley final of 1992, described in the club's record in FA competitions. The ground's record attendance, 3,940, was set during that run, for the 1990–91 FA Trophy semi-final against Kidderminster Harriers.
The stadium holds 4,813, with about 600 seats under cover on the north side and terracing on the other three, known as the Lostock End, the Wincham End and the Popular Side.
A ground used by others
The old club website was proud of how widely Wincham Park had been used. Neighbours Northwich Victoria played Conference football there between 2002 and 2005 while their own new ground was being built. In July 2002 the stadium staged an under-21 tournament involving Manchester City, Oldham Athletic and Thailand, which was televised in Asia. Liechtenstein trained there in September 2003 before a European Championship qualifier against England, and Qatar's under-20 squad used it as a base for almost a week in August 2004. It has also hosted Cheshire Senior Cup finals.
Later tenants have included Runcorn Linnets, from 2006 to 2010, and Northwich Victoria again in two further spells between 2015 and 2023.
Since 2009
The archived club website stops in 2009, at the end of a season in which Witton were relegated from the Northern Premier League Premier Division. The outline of what followed is this:
| Season | What happened |
|---|---|
| 2008–09 | Finished 20th of 22 and were relegated to Division One South |
| 2011–12 | Third in Division One North; promoted by beating Curzon Ashton 3–0 in the play-off final on 28 April 2012 |
| 2012–13 | Fourth in the Premier Division; lost the play-off semi-final 3–1 to FC United of Manchester |
| 2014–15 | Relegated on the final day after losing 3–2 at Stamford |
| 2016–17 | Promoted back to the Premier Division through the play-offs, beating AFC Rushden & Diamonds and Spalding United |
| 2026–27 | Playing in the Northern Premier League Division One West |
Wincham Park remains the club's home. Like many non-league grounds it has carried a series of sponsors' names; in 2026 the club's website and the Northern Premier League list it as the Bedspace Trust Community Stadium.
For the club as it described itself in the years this archive covers, with its officials, admission prices and directions to the ground, see the club profile for 2007–09. For present-day fixtures and news, the club's own website is the place to look; this archive is independent of it.
Sources and notes
The dates and prices in the account of the grounds (the 1887 match, the 1897 and 1910 moves, the £15 rent and the £750 purchase) come from the club's own published history. The rent, the purchase and the 1989 sale are also recorded in independent accounts of the Central Ground. The stories about visiting national teams come from the club alone and have not been checked against other records.