David James
On this day (1 August) in 1970 former Manchester City and England goalkeeper David James was born in Welwyn. Here for subscribers is a profile of James:
Starting Monday: Manchester 1840-1919
Every Monday starting on 3 August 2025 I’m posting a section from my book ‘The Emergence of Footballing Cultures: Manchester 1840-1919’. It tells the story of the origins of men’s football in Manchester and discusses the birth of both City and United plus the clubs that predated them such as Hulme Athenaeum, Manchester AFC, Birch…
United’s First Homecoming Led By City Man
This is an important photo of Manchester United’s first homecoming parade in 1909. The Reds had won the FA Cup and City director Albert Alexander (senior) was asked by United to lead the homecoming parade. City had won the same cup in 1904 and Alexander had led that parade, so the decision was taken to…
Ralph Brand
On this day (30 July) in 1965 it was reported that new Manchester City manager Joe Mercer was trying to sign Scottish international Ralph Brand. Brand was to be one Joe’s first signing at City (people often incorrectly claim Mike Summerbee was his first signing).
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About this Website
On this site you will find articles, posts and other material about football. Some of this material is free to access (select ‘Free Content’ from the menu above) while other material is available to those who subscribe to the site.
The site was launched on 1 January 2021. Since then hundreds of articles, interviews (audio & written), history talks and both my PDFs of my first book (From Maine Men To Banana Citizens, published 1989 and out of print since 1990) and the 2010 edition of Manchester A Football History book (this originally cost £24.95 and has been out of print since 2012) have been posted.
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Gary James' Football Archive 