Last Updated : 30 Aug 2009
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Sport in England tends to be dominated by Football and this is especially true in Liverpool. However, a range of other sports are also well established. Here's a summary of some sports associated with Liverpool.
Cricket Aigburth Cricket Club was founded in 1888 and is based at Southwood Road, Aigburth, Liverpool 17. The Liverpool Cricket Club also has it's ground in south Liverpool, at Aigburth Road, Liverpool 19. Scenes for the second series of The Forsyte Saga were filmed at the clubs ground by Granada TV when it was temporarily transformed into London's Lords Cricket Ground of the early 20th century.
Football (Soccer) To many people Football and Liverpool are synonomous. Both the city's two main football clubs "Liverpool FC" and "Everton FC" originated in 1878 from a team formed from the youth club of St.Domingo Methodist Church who played at Stanley Park. The first football goal nets in the world were first used by the club in 1890. In 1892 half the team moved to nearby Goodison as "Everton". The manager of the remainder of the team then created his own rival team which he called "Liverpool" (despite protests from the existing rugby club of the same name) at Anfield. Liverpool FC has won the English Premier League a total of 18 times and European Cup 5 times from the 1976-1977 season to the 2004-2005 season.
Golf Greater Liverpool has a number fine golf courses including Royal Liverpool (at Hoylake), Wallasey, Royal Birkdale and Formby amongst the better known examples. The first amateur championship (1885), the first matches between Scotland and England, between Britain and the USA and various other firsts all took place at Hoylake. During July 2006, The Open Championship was held at the Royal Liverpool Golf Club with participants from all over the world. This was the eleventh time since 1897 that it had been held there. Birkdale hosted the same championship eight times from 1954 up to 1998.
Hockey Hockey may not be a popular sport in Liverpool but it's world famous trophey has its origins with a local family. In 1893, Frederick Stanley, later 16th Earl of Derby, gave Canada a treasured national icon, the "Stanley Cup" when Governor General of Canada. Not long after his brother died and he returned home to succeed him as the new Earl. Soon after he also became Lord Mayor of Liverpool.
Horse Racing The "Derby" was first run by
Lord Derby at Wallasey, then the owner of Leasowe Castle. The race got it's name when in 1780, Edward Smith Stanley, 12th Earl of Derby won a toss of a coin with Sir Charles Bunbury to name their new horse race. A Waterloo hotelier, "Bold" McLynn, started racing at Aintree in 1829. Steeplechasing there goes back to at least 1847, started by a Lord Sefton led syndicate of aristocrats and local landowners. One such race, the "Grand National", has been run at Aintree each March ever since. Racing over Kirkdale Sands was also known to have marked the accession to the throne of Elizabeth I in 1558.
Rugby Discounting the "closed" Old Boy and Hospital sides, Liverpool Rugby Club is the oldest rugby club in the world and was founded in 1857. Other Greater LIverpool teams are Waterloo, Birkenhead Park and New Brighton.