Instruct: Given a question, retrieve documents that can help answer the question.
Query: When was Wimbledon Football Club formed?
Wimbledon Football Club was an English football club formed in Wimbledon, south-west London, in 1889 and based at Plough Lane from 1912 to 1991. Founded as Wimbledon Old Centrals,[n 1] the club were a non-League team for most of their history. Nicknamed "the Dons" and latterly "the Wombles", they won eight Isthmian League titles, the FA Amateur Cup in 1963 and three successive Southern League championships between 1975 and 1977, and were then elected to the Football League. The team rose quickly from obscurity during the 1980s and were promoted to the then top-flight First Division in 1986, just four seasons after being in the Fourth Division.
As soon as The Football Association approved this move in May 2002, former Wimbledon F.C. supporters founded their own replacement club, the semi-professional AFC Wimbledon, and the club's support overwhelmingly shifted to the new team, who in their second and third seasons of existence earned successive promotions to the First then Premier Divisions of the Isthmian League. The club also won the Combined Counties League Premier Challenge Cup in 2004 and the Surrey Senior Cup in 2005 to complete consecutive league and cup doubles, in one of which finishing the season unbeaten in the league. Another great achievement by the Wimbledon Independent Supporters Association (WISA) saw the return of the Patrimony of Wimbledon F.C. in 2007 to the care of Merton Council There is now a permanent display in Morden Library. In 2008 and 2009, AFC Wimbledon earned two more promotions, via the Conference South into the Conference Premier. On 21 May 2011, promotion to the football league was achieved when AFC Wimbledon won their Conference Premier play-off against Luton Town on penalty kicks (after a goalless draw and extra time) at City of Manchester Stadium This put Wimbledon back into English Football League, a remarkable achievement in such a short time. AFC Wimbledon were promoted again to League One now in the division above the franchise club in Milton Keynes (formerly Wimbledon F.C.).
On 2 December 2012, Ardley managed AFC Wimbledon in their first ever meeting with MK Dons, the football club formed via his former side Wimbledon's relocation to Milton Keynes. An injury-time goal saw AFC Wimbledon lose 2–1.
Wimbledon Old Central Football Club were formed in 1889, taking its name from the Old Central School on Wimbledon Common where players had been pupils. The club's first match was a 1–0 victory over Westminster, and it only took seven years for success to come to Wimbledon as the club won both the Clapham League and the Herald League in 1895–96. Wimbledon won the Clapham League again in 1900–01, as well as two minor trophies. A meeting was convened on 1 May 1905, and the decision was taken to drop "Old Central" from the club's name – the club became Wimbledon Football Club, and under its new name the club won the South London Charity Cup the same year – however, excessive debts caused the club to fold in 1910. The club was restarted a year later under the name Wimbledon Borough, though "Borough" was dropped from the team's name after barely a year. The club continued to play on Wimbledon Common and at various other locations in the Wimbledon area until 1912, when the side settled at Plough Lane. Wimbledon joined the Athenian League for 1919–20, and in the second season in its new division finished as runners-up.[4] The club then joined the Isthmian League. Winning four Isthmian League titles during the 1930s, and reaching the FA Amateur Cup final in 1934–35, Wimbledon began to prosper. The club reached another FA Amateur Cup final in 1946–47, and finished as runners-up in the league twice over the next few seasons.[4]
The club was founded by former Wimbledon F.C. supporters in 2002 after the Football Association allowed that club to relocate to Milton Keynes in Buckinghamshire, north of Wimbledon. Most of the Wimbledon F.C. supporters were very strongly opposed to moving the club so far away from Wimbledon, feeling that a club transplanted to a distant location would no longer represent Wimbledon or the club's legacy and traditions. Wimbledon F.C. moved in 2003 and formally changed the name of the club to Milton Keynes Dons in 2004.
Wimbledon Football Club was an English football club from Wimbledon, south-west London, amateur from 1889 to 1964 and professional thereafter. Founded in 1889 as Wimbledon Old Central Football Club, an amateur club playing in local league competitions, the club shortened its name to "Wimbledon" in 1905, entered the FA Amateur Cup for the first time in 1905–06 and joined the Spartan League in 1909. After going out of business a year later, Wimbledon immediately reformed and returned to local leagues in 1912, where the team stayed until the 1919–20 season when the club joined the Athenian League. Moving to the Isthmian League in 1921, Wimbledon won four league championships in six years during the 1930s and reached the FA Amateur Cup Final in 1935 before losing to Bishop Auckland after a replay. The club continued to be successful following the Second World War, again reaching the Amateur Cup Final in 1947 and finishing as runners-up in the Isthmian League in 1950 and 1952. After claiming a fourth Isthmian League crown in 1959, Wimbledon then took three successive championships from 1962 to 1964, as well as the 1963 FA Amateur Cup.
When AFC Wimbledon was formed, it affiliated to both the London and Surrey Football Associations, and entered the Premier Division of the Combined Counties League, the ninth tier of English football. The club has since been promoted six times in 13 seasons, going from the ninth tier (Combined Counties Premier) to the third (League One).
The club played on Wimbledon Common until World War I, using the Rose & Crown in Wimbledon Village as changing rooms and clubhouse. The club then went into suspended animation when the First World War started, and was only re-formed in 1927. It was at this time that the club changed colours from broad blue and white hooped jerseys, to maroon and Cambridge blue hooped jerseys. The club's celebration of its centenary with a dinner held in February 1966, was demonstrative that it perceived itself a continuation of the original Wimbledon Hornets.
As part of WISA's campaign to try and reclaim the history of Wimbledon Football Club, the Wimbledon Old Players Association (WOPA) was formed in 2005. Membership of WOPA is open to all former Wimbledon F.C. and AFC Wimbledon players and managers. Among the sixty founding members were Glenn Mulcaire, who scored AFC Wimbledon's first ever goal in 2002 and Kevin Cooper, who remains the club's all-time highest goal scorer with 107 goals between August 2002 and May 2004, as well as retaining the title for the most goals scored in a season with 66 during 2003–04. Others that joined included some of the legends of the old Wimbledon F.C. such as John Fashanu, Dave Beasant, Efan Ekoku, Neil Sullivan, Dave Bassett, Wally Downes, Marcus Gayle, Neal Ardley, Alan Kimble, Andy Thorn, Roger Joseph, Dickie Guy, Allen Batsford, Roger Connell, Ian Cooke, Roy Law and Steve Galliers. On 16 July 2006, WOPA fielded a team in the Masters Football Tournament at Wembley Arena, with AFC Wimbledon's backing. The team included Carlton Fairweather, Scott Fitzgerald, Marcus Gayle, and Dean Holdsworth.
Just after the end of the 2001–02 season, South London based Wimbledon were given permission to move to Milton Keynes, some 70 miles from their traditional home. A relocation on this scale was unprecedented in English football, and led to the majority of the club's fans switching their support to a new fan-formed club, AFC Wimbledon, who joined the Combined Counties League. The club's move to Milton Keynes was completed in September 2003, when they became tenants of the National Hockey Stadium until a new permanent home was completed four years later, and the club's name changed to Milton Keynes Dons in June 2004.
Cooke joined the amateur Isthmian League club Wimbledon in 1963, and played in the club's final two amateur matches a year later. Wimbledon turned professional in 1964, and Cooke's employers, Westminster Bank, initially refused to let him sign for the club. Wimbledon eventually managed to secure Cooke's signature, and the young forward had made eight appearances by the end of the 1964–65 season. Cooke broke into the side during the following season, and scored 29 goals in 44 matches to be Wimbledon's top scorer, something he would remain for six out of the next seven seasons. Cooke later became captain of Wimbledon, and moved back into midfield during his later years as a player; taking part in Wimbledon's final season as a non-League club, Cooke's career finally ended in 1977, just before Wimbledon's election to The Football League. Cooke made the second highest number of appearances for Wimbledon, with 615; his 297 goals was also the second highest number scored for the club.
The club went on to achieve 5 promotions in 9 years, ensuring that they were the first club to be formed in the 21st century to make it into the Football League and making them the youngest of the 72 Football League clubs by some distance. On 30 May 2016, AFC Wimbledon achieved their 6th promotion to Football League One after victory in the 2016 Football League Two play-off Final, exactly 14 years to the day since the club's formation.
AFC Wimbledon is an English professional association football club, currently based in Kingston upon Thames, Greater London. The club was formed on 30 May 2002 by supporters of Wimbledon Football Club, led by Kris Stewart, Marc Jones and Trevor Williams who strongly opposed the decision of an independent commission appointed by The Football Association to allow the relocation of Wimbledon F.C. to Milton Keynes, to be subsequently renamed as Milton Keynes Dons.
These achievements prompted the switch to professional football, which occurred in 1964, concurrently with the extension of membership from the Southern Football League. Wimbledon finished second twice out of the team's first four outings in this competition, before again winning three consecutive titles from 1975 to 1977. The club won election to The Football League after these successes, and thus entered the Fourth Division for the first time in 1977–78. Wimbledon took only ten seasons as a Football League club to reach England's top flight, winning promotion to the First Division for the 1986–87 season; Wimbledon then beat League champions Liverpool 1–0 in the 1988 FA Cup Final to achieve the feat of having won both the FA Cup and its amateur equivalent (as of 2009, only one other club – Old Carthusians – has done this). Wimbledon remained in the top division until 2000, when the side was relegated. The club announced an unpopular relocation to Milton Keynes in 2001, which received permission a year later, causing the foundation of AFC Wimbledon by the majority of Wimbledon fans, who called it "the death of [their] club". The club subsequently relocated to Milton Keynes in September 2003, and rebranded itself as Milton Keynes Dons in 2004.
Ahead of the 1997–98 season, the league received further sponsorship and subsequently became known as the Courage Combined Counties Football League. In 2002, the league reached a membership of 24 clubs – most notably with the addition of AFC Wimbledon. The introduction of AFC Wimbledon proved invaluable for the league's other clubs. With crowds of up to 4,000 spectators for their home clubs, many clubs would break their attendance records when AFC Wimbledon visited their ground which could generate substantial matchday revenue. The club's first matches in the league also required large numbers of police to control crowds, including mounted and police and patrolling helicopters.
In 2010–11 AFC Wimbledon finished as runners-up of the Conference Premier, qualifying for the play-offs. The Dons faced fifth placed Fleetwood Town in the play-off semi-finals, whom they went on to thrash 8–1 on aggregate. This aggregate scoreline set a record as the largest winning margin recorded since the Conference Premier first introduced the play-off system at the beginning of the 2002–03 season. In the play-off final at the City of Manchester Stadium on 21 May 2011, in front of a crowd of 18,195, AFC Wimbledon beat Luton Town 4–3 in a penalty shoot-out, after the match had ended 0–0 in extra time. The victory resulted in promotion to the Football League for the first time and represented the club's fifth promotion in nine years. The club's achievement of attaining League status after just nine seasons of existence is considered to be one of the fastest ascents for a new club since automatic promotion to the Football League first commenced in the 1980s. AFC Wimbledon also hold the record of being the first club to be formed in the 21st century to make it into the Football League, making them the youngest club in the Football League by some distance.
At the end of the 1978–79 season, 20 leading non-League clubs left the Southern League and the Northern Premier League to form the Alliance Premier League. This national non-League division started in the 1979–80 season; it was called the Football Conference from 1986 to 2015, when it became the National League. Since the 1986–87 season, the champions of this league have received promotion to the Football League, with the League's bottom club being relegated in exchange. This was expanded to the Conference champions and the winners of a promotion play-off before the 2002–03 season, with the worst two Football League clubs being relegated. The situation of the Football League "closed shop", which for nearly a century effectively barred most non-League clubs from accession, therefore no longer exists. Any club in the English football pyramid (which also includes some clubs from Wales) can potentially win enough promotions to reach the Football League or the Premier League, the separate top division formed in 1992.
AFC Wimbledon is an English professional association football club, based in Kingston upon Thames, Greater London. The club was formed on 30 May 2002 by a group of supporters of Wimbledon Football Club, led by Kris Stewart, Marc Jones and Trevor Williams who strongly opposed the decision of an independent commission appointed by the FA to allow the relocation of Wimbledon F.C. to Milton Keynes, who were subsequently reformed as Milton Keynes Dons in 2004.
Wimbledon's success as a club in the top flight of English football was founded on unorthodox financial management and judicious dealings in the transfer market. Rumours of a move or a merger with another London side persisted, leading the club's chief executive Colin Hutchinson to resign in 1987 amid talk of an amalgamation with Ron Noades's new club Crystal Palace or a groundshare at Queens Park Rangers' Loftus Road ground in Shepherd's Bush. Wimbledon were granted planning permission to build a 20,000-seater ground in their home borough of Merton in 1988, soon after they won the FA Cup, but the site was instead made into a car park by a newly elected Labour council in 1990. Wimbledon's desire to move was made a necessity a year later, when the Taylor Report, which ordered the extensive redevelopment of football grounds, was released.
The location of the history and legacy of Wimbledon F.C., as well as the honours won by the club, was disputed for four years after the independent commission's approval of the move on 28 May 2002. In the view of AFC Wimbledon and that club's supporters, the "identity of a football club is implicitly bound up in its community". The club regards itself as Wimbledon F.C.'s spiritual continuation to this day, holding that the community maintaining and backing AFC Wimbledon is the same one which originally formed Wimbledon Old Centrals (later Wimbledon F.C.) in 1889, "and kept Wimbledon Football Club alive until May 2002".
In 2001, after rejecting a variety of possible local sites and others further afield, the club announced its intention to move 56 miles (90km) north to Milton Keynes in Buckinghamshire. The idea of Wimbledon leaving south London was deeply unpopular both with the bulk of the club's established fanbase and football supporters generally, but an independent commission appointed by the Football Association granted permission in May 2002. A group of supporters responded by forming a new club, AFC Wimbledon, to which the large majority of Wimbledon fans switched allegiance.[2][3] Wimbledon F.C. played their first match in Milton Keynes in 2003 and changed their name to Milton Keynes Dons in 2004.[1]
Having campaigned against the move, a group of disaffected Wimbledon fans reacted to this in June 2002 by forming their own non-league club, AFC Wimbledon, to which most of the original team's support defected. AFC Wimbledon entered a groundshare agreement with Kingstonian in the borough of Kingston upon Thames, adjacent to Merton. The original Wimbledon intended to move to Milton Keynes immediately but were unable to do so until a temporary home in the town meeting Football League criteria could be found. The club remained at Selhurst Park in the meantime and in June 2003 went into administration. With the move threatened and the club facing liquidation, Winkelman decided to buy it himself. He secured funding for the administrators to keep the team operating with the goal of getting it to Milton Keynes as soon as possible. The club arranged the temporary use of the National Hockey Stadium in Milton Keynes and played its first match there in September 2003. Nine months later Winkelman's Inter MK Group bought the club out of administration and announced changes to its name, badge and colours—the team was renamed Milton Keynes Dons Football Club.
Wimbledon Football Club relocated to Milton Keynes in September 2003, 16 months after receiving permission to do so from the Football Association on the basis of a two-to-one decision in favour by an FA-appointed independent commission. The move took the team from south London, where it had been based since its foundation in 1889, to Milton Keynes, a new town in Buckinghamshire, about to the northwest of the club's traditional home district Wimbledon. Hugely controversial, the move's authorisation prompted disaffected Wimbledon supporters to form AFC Wimbledon, a new club, in June 2002. The relocated team played home matches in Milton Keynes under the Wimbledon name from September 2003 until June 2004, when following the end of the 2003–04 season it renamed itself Milton Keynes Dons F.C. (MK Dons).
AFC Wimbledon currently hold the record for the longest unbeaten run of league matches in English senior football, having played 78 consecutive league games without a defeat between February 2003 and December 2004. They are the first club formed in the 21st century to make it into the Football League.
Smith's initial plan was to purchase a National League 1 club, rename the club, relocate them to London and earn their way to promotion to the English Premiership. Eventually such a move failed so Smith moved lower down the divisions and started discussions with Wimbledon RFC to purchase the club and take over their position in London 2 South in 2004. However, in light of Smith's publicised plans and a rival operation called London Tribes RFC planning a similar move, Wimbledon rejected the offer and the Rugby Football Union also prohibited the attempt. As such, London South Africa were formed as a new club and made an application to join the Surrey Rugby Football Union. Their application was successful and they started playing in the bottom tier of English rugby. They initially started playing in Wimbledon but moved to Imber Court in Esher, Surrey.