New Brighton A.F.C. was a soccer

club Club may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * ''Club'' (magazine) * Club, a ''Yie Ar Kung-Fu'' character * Clubs (suit), a suit of playing cards * Club music * "Club", by Kelsea Ballerini from the album ''kelsea'' Brands and enterprises * ...

Christchurch Christchurch (; ) is the largest city in the South Island and the List of cities in New Zealand, second-largest city by urban area population in New Zealand. Christchurch has an urban population of , and a metropolitan population of over hal ...

, New Zealand. The original New Brighton Association Football Club was founded in 1924 but went into hiatus eight years later. The club was re-founded 27 years later in 1959. In 2007 they merged with Rangers A.F.C. to form Coastal Spirit FC. The team entered the second division of the new Southern League in 1968, winning the league to gain promotion to the top flight. The following season saw their best-ever performance in the

Chatham Cup The Chatham Cup is New Zealand's premier Single-elimination tournament, knockout tournament in men's association football. It is held annually, with the final contested in September. The current champions of the Chatham Cup are Wellington Olymp ...

, with them reaching the

final Final, Finals or The Final may refer to: *Final examination or finals, a test given at the end of a course of study or training *Final (competition), the last or championship round of a sporting competition, match, game, or other contest which d ...

only to lose to Auckland's

Eastern Suburbs AFC Eastern Suburbs Association Football Club is an association football club based in the suburb of Kohimarama in Auckland, New Zealand. The club competes in the Northern League. Club history Eastern Suburbs was formed in 1934 as a result of ...

. 1971 saw the team win the championship, gaining them entry to the

New Zealand National Soccer League The New Zealand National League is the name given to the current New Zealand top association football, football competition. Originally set up as the New Zealand National Soccer League there has been many versions of the competition as well as ma ...

. The competed in this league for six seasons, spending much of that time in the bottom half of the table. Their best finish was third in 1974. They were relegated from the league in 1977. The club gained new clubrooms in Bexley Road in 1979, but they were demolished after the

2011 Christchurch earthquake A major earthquake occurred in Christchurch on Tuesday 22 February 2011 at 12:51 p.m. New Zealand Daylight Time, local time (23:51 Coordinated Universal Time, UTC, 21 February). The () earthquake struck the Canterbury Region ...

Prominent players

* Ken France * Owen Nuttridge *

Alex Smith Alexander Douglas Smith (born May 7, 1984) is an American former professional football quarterback who played in the National Football League (NFL) for 16 seasons. He played college football for the Utah Utes, earning first-team All-American ho ...

Graham Storer Graham Storer is a former footballer who represented New Zealand at international level. Storer represented New Zealand at under 20 level before making his full All Whites debut in a 2–1 win over China on 20 May 1975 and ended his internatio ...

External links

NZ Clubs DatabaseClub website (still under construction)
Association football clubs in Christchurch Association football clubs established in 1960 {{NewZealand-footyclub-stub