© SCRAN

Twenty months after the first international rugby match between the two countries, the Auld Enemy met for the first official association football international match. Like its rugby counterpart, the match was played in Scotland on a cricket ground. Whilst the rugby match had taken place in the east, football looked to the west, and Hamilton Crescent, the West of Scotland Cricket Ground, was selected as the venue.

Prior to the first official meeting, there had been several unofficial international matches played between the countries at the behest of the English Football Association. Such was their enthusiasm for these fixtures they arranged the venue, the officials, the selection of the English side and, incredibly, the selection of the Scottish side. For these matches, the "Scotland" team was assembled from players in and around London who had Scottish connections.

In 1872 League Championships had yet to begin in either country. The FA Cup tournament had completed its inaugural running in England and the Scottish competition would start the following year. For the match on 30 November 1872, St Andrew's Day, the Scotland players were all selected from Queen's Park, the leading Scottish Club of its day. This was not the original intention but the Scots were unable to obtain the services of two countrymen who had competed in the FA Cup final. Arthur F Kinnaird of the Wanderers and Lt Henry Waugh Renny-Tailyour of the Royal Engineers would have to wait until 1873 to play for their country.

While Scotland was eventually represented by eleven men drawn from the Queen's Park club, England played the match with players from nine different sources selected by Charles Alcock the English Football Association Secretary and captain of the FA Cup winning Wanderers. Alcock, who was the driving force behind the unofficial matches, was unable to play in the first official meeting due to injury but he participated by running the line.

Three England players came from Oxford University but only Reginald Welch played from the successful Wanderers side. Scotland wore dark blue shirts, the then colour of Queen's Park, with a single lion crest badge attached. England, in white, had the badge of the three lions on their shirts.

© SCRAN

Page: 1 2

The crowd who gathered to watch the match numbered 4,000 and they paid an entry fee of a shilling, the same price charged by the English Football Association for the first FA Cup final. They endured a twenty-minute delay to the scheduled 2pm kick-off but then settled to watch the contest in the relaxed and enjoyable atmosphere that would accompany the fixture for over one hundred years before the wrong shade of partisan behaviour started to creep in during the 1970s.