Aston Villa 3–0 Hibernian (1887)

The match between Aston Villa and Hibernian was an exhibition football match that took place in the city of Birmingham in April 1887. It was a return match from a friendly played between the sides in January 1887.[1]

Aston Villa v Hibernian
Aston Villa, winning team
Aston Villa Hibernian
England Scotland
3 0
Date9 April 1887
VenuePerry Barr, Birmingham
Attendance6,000–10,000

The match was advertised in the Birmingham Daily Mail in their 7 April 1887 edition as a "Great International Match". Aston Villa won the match 3–0.[2]

Overview

On 9 April 1887, Scottish Cup holders Hibernian, from Edinburgh, took on FA Cup winners Aston Villa in an exhibition match at the Birmingham club's Perry Barr ground. The sides had both recently won their respective national cups at a time before national football leagues were considered the best side of each country, with The Sportsman describing them as "powerful clubs".[3]

Aston Villa won the match 3–0 and were regarded by many as the best footballing side in the United Kingdom in 1887, being described as having the "right and claim to be the champions of the football world for the year" by the Preston Herald in May 1887.[4] The advert Villa placed in the Birmingham Daily Mail in their 7 April 1887 edition described the game as a great international match; however, the Scottish newspapers The Glasgow Herald and The Scotsman reported on it in similar detail to several other cross-border challenge matches of that weekend, though they did acknowledge the participants' cup-winning statuses.[5][6] and other newspapers covered other matches on Hibernians' tour of England (which saw them beaten by Stoke and Wolverhampton Wanderers) in similar fashion.[7][8] The Dundee Evening Telegraph noted that the match was "the most important" of the Scottish clubs' 1887 tour of England as it was between the cup holders and again re-affirmed the matches billing as a "great international match" that "caused immense excitement at Perry Bar[sic], some 10,000 persons looking on".[9]

Birmingham Daily Mail highlighting the details of the upcoming Great International Match between Aston Villa and Hibernian in April 1887.

Subsequent match

Later in 1887, Hibernian won a friendly against 1887 FA Cup semi-finalists Preston North End that was billed as 'The Association Football Championship of the World'.[10][11][12] However newspaper reports of the day did not bill the Hibs v Preston game as anything other than a friendly and anyway to qualify for a world championship fixture both teams had to be either a league champion or a cup winner; Preston North End at the time were neither so the Hibs claim is invalid.

Participant teams
Team Qualification
England Aston Villa1886–87 FA Cup winners
Scotland Hibernian1886–87 Scottish Cup winners

Match details
Aston Villa England3–0Scotland Hibernian
Hodgetts
Brown
Fagan (o.g.)		 Report
Attendance: 7,000
Aston Villa
Hibernian
GKJimmy Warner
FBFrank Coulton
FBJoseph Simmonds
HBJohn Burton
HBHarry Yates downward-facing red arrow
HBFrankie Dawson
FWRichmond Davis
FWAlbert Brown
FWArchie Hunter
FWHoward Vaughton
FWDennis Hodgetts
GKJohn Tobin
FBJames Lundie
FBBarney Fagan
HBPaddy Gallacher
HBPeter McGinn
HBJames McLaren
FWPatrick Lafferty
FWWillie Groves
FWJames McGhee
FWGeorge Smith
FWPhilip Clark downward-facing red arrow

References
  • Lugton, Alan (1999). The Making of Hibernian 1. John Donald Publishers Ltd. ISBN 0-85976-509-1.
  • Mackay, John (1986). The Hibees. John Donald Publishers Ltd. ISBN 0-85976-144-4.
  • Birmingham Daily Mail, 7 & 9 April 1887
  1. "Hibernians v Aston Villa". Manchester Courier: 3. 3 January 1887.
  2. Birmingham Daily Mail, 7 & 9 April 1887
  3. "ASTON VILLA (English Cup Holders) vs. EDINBURGH HIBERNIANS (Scottish Cup Holders)". The Sportsman. 12 April 1887. Retrieved 22 July 2022 – via British Newspaper Archive.
  4. "FOOTBALL & c.". Preston Herald. No. 11 May 1887. Retrieved 22 July 2022 – via British Newspaper Archive.}
  5. Association Matches in England. | Aston Villa v. Edinburgh Hibernians., The Glasgow Herald, 11 April 1887
  6. Football, The Scotsman, 11 April 1887 (pages 1, 14 and 15 of scans), via London hearts Supporters Club
  7. "Football notes". Birmingham Mail: 4. 13 April 1887.
  8. "Outdoor sports". Manchester Courier: 13. 16 April 1887.
  9. "Today's Sporting Intelligence: Sporting and Athletic Notes". Dundee Evening Telegraph. 11 April 1887. Retrieved 22 July 2022 – via British Newspaper Archive.}
  10. Scott Murray and Rowan Walker (2008). Day of the Match: A History of Football in 365 Days. Boxtree. ISBN 978-0-7522-2678-1. Retrieved 17 August 2010. In August 1887, Scottish Cup holders Hibernian took on FA Cup winners [sic] Preston North End in a friendly at Hibs' Hibernian Park ground. Posters appeared all over Edinburgh billing the encounter as 'The Association Football Championship of the World'. Hibernian won the match 2–1 and therefore had the right (whichever way you look at it, as nobody else had bothered to stage such an event) to call themselves the first world champions, beating Uruguay to it by 43 years.
  11. Mackay 1986, p. 40
  12. Lugton 1999, p. 121
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