1898–99 Aston Villa F.C. season

Aston Villa

1898–99 season
Chairman	Frederick Rinder
Manager	George Ramsay
First Division	1st (champions, 4th title)
FA Cup	First round
Top goalscorer	Fred Wheldon (16)

The 1898–99 English football season was Aston Villa's 11th season in the Football League First Division, the top flight of English football. Villa were champions for an unequalled fourth time.

There were debuts for Walter Leigh, Albert Wilkes, Billy Haggart, Frank Bedingfield, Bobby Templeton and Ralph Gaudie (5).

Season highlights

The Aston Villa team of 1899 that won the First Division and the Sheriff of London Charity Shield (centre)

Three of Villa’s 1897 double-winning team joined Celtic in the summer of 1897, so 1897/98 proved to be a rebuilding period for the club. By the mid-point of 1898/99, Villa had a narrow lead over Everton and Burnley but a late season run by Liverpool dropped them to second place. It came down to ‘last-game decider’, with Villa at home to Liverpool. 41,000 spectators shoe-horned themselves into Villa Park to see an emphatic win by the home team, 5–0.

The season was notable for one of those one-off, never repeated events that enliven League history. The referee was late arriving for the match at Sheffield Wednesday. After some deliberation, it was decided to start without him. Though he took over at half-time, the delay meant that darkness fell with 10 minutes left to play. Wednesday were the better team on the day and led 3–1 at the time. The League consulted the rule-book and decided that the last 10 minutes would have to be played at a later date. The first suggestion was that perhaps the 10 minutes could be played before the return game at Villa Park. In the end, Villa agreed to play Wednesday in a benefit match for one of their players, and the missing minutes were duly played out before the friendly game. Villa made one change for the second game, Garraty replacing Bedingfield.

Villa competed in the 1899 Sheriff of London Charity Shield.

Final league position

Pos	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GAv	Pts	Relegation
1	Aston Villa (C)	34	19	7	8	76	40	1.900	45
2	Liverpool	34	19	5	10	49	33	1.485	43
3	Burnley	34	15	9	10	45	47	0.957	39
4	Everton	34	15	8	11	48	41	1.171	38
5	Notts County	34	12	13	9	47	51	0.922	37
6	Blackburn Rovers	34	14	8	12	60	52	1.154	36
7	Sunderland	34	15	6	13	41	41	1.000	36
8	Wolverhampton Wanderers	34	14	7	13	54	48	1.125	35
9	Derby County	34	12	11	11	62	57	1.088	35
10	Bury	34	14	7	13	48	49	0.980	35
11	Nottingham Forest	34	11	11	12	42	42	1.000	33
12	Stoke	34	13	7	14	47	52	0.904	33
13	Newcastle United	34	11	8	15	49	48	1.021	30
14	West Bromwich Albion	34	12	6	16	42	57	0.737	30
15	Preston North End	34	10	9	15	44	47	0.936	29
16	Sheffield United	34	9	11	14	45	51	0.882	29
17	Bolton Wanderers (R)	34	9	7	18	37	51	0.725	25	Relegation to the Second Division
18	The Wednesday (R)	34	8	8	18	32	61	0.525	24

Source: World Football
Rules for classification: 1) Points; 2) Goal average; 3) Goals scored
(C) Champions; (R) Relegated

Ever-present: Tommy Bowman

First at top: 29 October

Date won league: 29 April (last game)

Players used: 23

See also

• List of Aston Villa F.C. records and statistics

External links

• Aston Villa official website