Crane Sports Football Club were a football club based in

Ipswich Ipswich () is a port town and borough in Suffolk, England, of which it is the county town. The town is located in East Anglia about away from the mouth of the River Orwell and the North Sea. Ipswich is both on the Great Eastern Main Line r ...

Suffolk Suffolk () is a ceremonial county of England in East Anglia. It borders Norfolk to the north, Cambridgeshire to the west and Essex to the south; the North Sea lies to the east. The county town is Ipswich; other important towns include L ...

, England.

History

The club joined the

Suffolk & Ipswich League The Suffolk and Ipswich Football League is a football competition based in Suffolk, England. The league has a total of eight divisions; the Senior Division and Divisions 1–3 for first teams, three divisions (Leagues A, B and C) for reserve te ...

prior to

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, winning Division Three in 1935–36. They won the

Suffolk Senior Cup The Suffolk Senior Cup is the second level football cup competition organised by the Suffolk FA after the Suffolk Premier Cup. It is currently open to Suffolk–based clubs competing in Eastern Counties League Division One and the top divisions o ...

in 1971 and 1974, and the following season won the Senior Division of the Suffolk & Ipswich League in 1974–75. They won the Senior Cup again in 1982 and 1984, and also entered the

FA Vase The Football Association Challenge Vase, usually referred to as the FA Vase, is an annual football competition for teams playing in Steps 5 and 6 of the English National League System (or equivalently, tier 9 or 10 of the overall English footb ...

for three seasons during the 1980s, reaching the second round in 1983–84 after defeating Arlesey Town in what the ''Ipswich Evening Star'' described 25 years later as "memorable matches". After dropping into the lower divisions of the SIL, the club won Division Three in 1998–99 and Division One in 2001–02 to return to the Senior Division. In 2004–05 they won the League Cup for the first time. They won the Senior Division title in 2014–15, retaining the title the following season. In April 2021 Crane Sports announced they would be folding, due to "commercial, financial and logistical factors".

Ground

From the early 1960s to the 1980s, the club was the regular venue for the Suffolk county

hockey Hockey is a term used to denote a family of various types of both summer and winter team sports which originated on either an outdoor field, sheet of ice, or dry floor such as in a gymnasium. While these sports vary in specific rules, numbers o ...

team's matches. According to ''

The Times ''The Times'' is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title ''The Daily Universal Register'', adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. ''The Times'' and its sister paper '' The Sunday Times'' ...

correspondent, it had "a well-kept pitch with good drainage and the amenities are superb. Suffolk have been using this ground for 19 years and it is believed to be lucky for them". After the ground was taken over by

Ipswich Town Ipswich Town Football Club is a professional association football club based in Ipswich, Suffolk, England. They play in League One, the third tier of the English football league system. The club was founded in 1878 but did not turn professio ...

in 1998, the club had to share facilities; they moved to their current home, Greshams Sports Ground, before the 2010–11 season. Between 1966 and 1998, the club played host to an annual seven-a-side invitational football tournament, the "Crane Summer Sevens", to be revived in 2011. Among the early winners were

, whose team included future England national team captain

Mick Mills Michael Dennis Mills MBE (born 4 January 1949) is an English former footballer who played for Ipswich Town, Southampton and Stoke City. He managed Stoke City, Colchester United and Birmingham City. During his career he achieved Ipswich Town's ...

.Plans afoot to re-stage Crane Sevens again
Ipswich Star, 27 January 2011

Honours

*Suffolk & Ipswich League **Senior Division champions 1974–75, 2014-15, 2015–16, 2018-19 **Division One champions 2001–02 **Division Three champions 1935–36, 1998–99 **League Cup winners 2004–05 2010-11, 2012-13, 2017-18 *Suffolk Senior Cup **Winners 1970–71, 1973–74, 1981–82, 1983–84

Records

*Best

performance: Second round, 1983–84

References

External links

Official website
* {{coord, 52.075844, N, 1.179664, E, region:GB_type:landmark, display=title Defunct football clubs in England Defunct football clubs in Suffolk Sport in Ipswich Suffolk and Ipswich Football League 2021 disestablishments in England Association football clubs disestablished in 2021