The Invicta Ground was a
football
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...
stadium in
Plumstead
Plumstead is an area in southeast London, within the Royal Borough of Greenwich, England. It is located east of Woolwich.
History
Until 1965, Plumstead was in the historic counties of England, historic county of Kent and the detail of mu ...
, south-east
London, that was the home of club Royal Arsenal, now known as
Arsenal
An arsenal is a place where arms and ammunition are made, maintained and repaired, stored, or issued, in any combination, whether privately or publicly owned. Arsenal and armoury (British English) or armory (American English) are mostly ...
.
History
Named after ''
Invicta'', the
motto of the
county of Kent, the ground was Arsenal's first proper stadium, being equipped with a stand, a row of
terracing and
changing room
A changing-room, locker-room, (usually in a sports, theater, or staff context) or changeroom (regional use) is a room or area designated for changing one's clothes. Changing-rooms are provided in a semi-public situation to enable people to ch ...
s. The arena stood on the south side of Plumstead High Street with Arsenal's old home, the
Manor Ground which was upon the opposite side of high street being much smaller by contrast.
When Royal Arsenal first moved to the Invicta Ground, they were an amateur team with a following of only about 1,000, but within a year the club had turned
professional and had renamed themselves Woolwich Arsenal. They started to attract much larger crowds, including a record 12,000 for a match against the then
Scottish Cup holders
Heart of Midlothian on 30 March 1891, which Woolwich Arsenal lost 5–1.
Woolwich Arsenal intended to use the Invicta for
1893–94, their first season playing in the
Football League
The English Football League (EFL) is a league of professional football clubs from England and Wales. Founded in 1888 as the Football League, the league is the oldest such competition in the world. It was the top-level football league in Engla ...
. However, the ground's owner, George Weaver (a
mineral water magnate), wishing to make the most out of the rise in Arsenal's fortunes, put the annual rent up from £200 to £350, a sum which the club could not afford. Arsenal returned to the Manor Ground, which they bought outright after a
share issue, and spent the summer of 1893 building proper stands and facilities.
An amateur side,
Royal Ordnance Factories, set up in response to Woolwich Arsenal joining the League, played some home games in the Invicta Ground. However, they had left by late 1894 and Weaver could not find a permanent tenant for the ground. He eventually demolished it, building houses on the site. Today Mineral Street and Hector Street stand where the stadium used to be; some of the stadium's concrete terracing still survives in the back gardens of houses in Hector Street.
References
*
External links
Satellite photo of the stadium site on Google Maps
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Arsenal F.C. home grounds
Defunct football venues in London
Sports venues in London
Sport in the Royal Borough of Greenwich
Sports venues completed in 1890
Defunct football venues in England