Reading Abbey was an

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association football Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 Football player, players who almost exclusively use their feet to propel a Ball (association football), ball around a rectangular f ...

club based in

Reading Reading is the process of taking in the sense or meaning of symbols, often specifically those of a written language, by means of Visual perception, sight or Somatosensory system, touch. For educators and researchers, reading is a multifacete ...

, which entered the

FA Cup The Football Association Challenge Cup, more commonly known as the FA Cup, is an annual Single-elimination tournament, knockout association football, football competition in domestic Football in England, English football. First played during ...

in 1880–81 and 1881–82.

History

The club was founded in 1875 under the name Reading St Lawrence, based at the Abbey Institute, an organization for young men affiliated with St Lawrence's Church; its earliest recorded matches are from the 1877–78 season. The changed its name to Reading Abbey in 1880, in time for its first entry to the Cup. This was an ambitious step for the club, which had not yet played the leading club in the town (

Reading F.C. Reading Football Club ( ) is a professional football club based in Reading, Berkshire, England. They compete in EFL League One, the third level of the English football league system. They play their home matches at the Select Car Leasing Sta ...

), but by now the club included some players from the now-defunct Reading Hornets F.C. side, such as Abbey captain Charles Pontin. In the first round, the club beat the St Alban's club from Forest Gate, thanks to an own goal from a corner in the last five minutes. In the second round, held at the Reading Cricket Ground, Abbey beat Acton, coming from a goal behind to win 2–1, thanks to injuries and illness reducing Acton to 9 men for much of the second half. The third round tie at

Romford Romford is a large List of places in London, town in east London, east London, England, located northeast of Charing Cross. Part of the London Borough of Havering, the town is one of the major Metropolitan centres of London, metropolitan centr ...

was postponed after Abbey refused to travel after a hard frost - the home side eventually beat Abbey 2–0. The club also played Reading for the only time, in the

Berks & Bucks Senior Cup The Berks & Bucks FA County Senior Cup is the Senior County Cup competition of the Berks & Bucks FA. History The competition first took place in 1878–79 – a time when the FA Cup had only been going for seven years, there was no Football Lea ...

second round, losing 2–0. The club reached the second round in 1881–82, beating Woodford Bridge F.C. in a replay in the first, thanks to a very late goal by full-back Maxwell (who was "playing well up"), but its defeat (again at the Reading Cricket Ground) to the Hotspur club of Battersea was its last appearance in the competition. The biggest problem the club had was that it had no permanent enclosed ground; it had to beg use of the Cricket Ground for big Cup ties. This seems to have caused the club to forgo membership of the

Football Association A football association, also known as a football federation, soccer federation, or soccer association, is a governing body for association football. Many of them are members of the sport's regional bodies such as UEFA and CONMEBOL and the world gov ...

after 1882, and, therefore, not be able to enter the FA Cup. The club had some strength within the town, being runners-up in the Reading Challenge Cup to South Reading F.C. in 1883, but the Abbey Institute closed during the 1883–84 season, and the club played very few matches during it. The club's 2–0 win over Culham College on 10 February 1884 appears to have been the club's last match, with players spreading to various other clubs in the region thereafter.

Colours

The club's colours were blue shirts with red sleeves.

Ground

The club played at the Recreation Park in the King's Meadows in Reading.

References

{{reflist, 30em Association football clubs established in 1875 1875 establishments in England Football clubs in Reading Defunct football clubs in England Association football clubs disestablished in the 19th century Defunct football clubs in Berkshire