Thames AFC and the Football League’s lowest-ever attendance
The brief history of Thames AFC saw an ambitious attempt to launch a new team in London, based at the West Ham Stadium in the Custom House area of East London. Built in 1928 with a capacity of 100,000 and designed by the celebrated Scottish engineer Archibald Leitch, the stadium was primarily known as a greyhound and speedway venue. The consortium of businessmen behind the venture, led by former Lieutenant-Governor of the Punjab, Sir Louis Dane, hatched a plan to put together a football team capable of competing with London’s giants. Confident of attracting the crowds to their impressive ground, Dane announced to the Press:
“It is a stadium in the fullest sense of the word, and we hope will provide a fine opportunity for the people of this densely populated area to enjoy healthy sports and low charges” (Report from the Stratford Express, 1st August 1928)
In conversation with the local paper, Dane outlined ‘a comprehensive programme’ of sporting events, expressed his pride in ‘a wonderful stadium – one of the finest in the Country – and hoped they would be able to live up to it.’ Unfortunately the ‘new professional team’ that was hastily formed to provide the venue with a football club, initially known as Thames Association, never caught the public’s imagination.
Thames Association played their first game at the new stadium on the 30th August 1928 against Brighton & Hove Albion’s second team in the Southern League. After two seasons and a third-place finish, the club achieved its first goal when they were elected to the Third Division (South) in 1930 by a single vote over Aldershot, replacing Merthyr Town. Upon entering the Football League, ‘Association’ was incorporated into the club’s name as Thames AFC. Despite the signings of several high-calibre players including ex-England international Jimmy Dimmock and Harry White, Thames lasted only two seasons and recorded the Football League’s lowest-ever attendance in their vast stadium. Only 469 spectators were at the home fixture against Luton Town on Saturday 6th December 1930.
Ending their first season in 20th position (of 22 teams), the venture soon ended in failure as Thames decided not to seek re-election after finishing bottom of the division in the 1931-32 season. Their place in the League was taken by Aldershot. They never attracted a five-figure crowd, the highest being around 8,000 for the visit of Exeter City in August 1931, and averaged a little under 2,500 during their short League career. Shortly after their demise, over 80,000 attended a speedway Test between England and Australia in 1933, giving a glimpse of the ground’s potential. The West Ham Stadium continued to host sporting events, primarily greyhound racing and speedway but also including baseball and the World Stock Car championships of 1961 and 1965, but never hosted League football again. The famous neighbours of West Ham United used it for training ahead of the 1964 FA Cup Final. The stadium was eventually closed in 1972 and demolished shortly after – housing now stands on the site.
Programme for England v Australia Speedway Test Match, 1933 
Speedway at West Ham Stadium (Archibald Leitch-designed grandstand in the background)
The unwanted record of the League’s lowest-ever crowd is sometimes attributed to Stockport County’s Second Division game against Leicester City in May 1921, where 13 paying spectators were recorded. With County’s Edgeley Park closed due to crowd trouble at a previous match, the fixture was played at Old Trafford, and took place after Manchester United met Derby County that afternoon. With many fans staying on after the earlier game, the actual attendance was comfortably over four figures. The lowest post-War attendance in the Football League was registered at Spotland, for Rochdale v Cambridge United in February 1974; due to the power shortages caused by strikes during the ‘winter of discontent’, the Third Division fixture was played on a Tuesday afternoon. The attendance is sometimes given as 450, but the official figure was 588.
Thames had failed to heed the lessons of New Brighton Tower, an earlier doomed scheme to fill a huge stadium in a footballing hotbed, Merseyside in this instance. The scheme revolved around the development of the area as a resort at the end of the nineteenth century, with the building of a tower to eclipse the one up the coast at Blackpool. The stadium, the Tower Athletic Grounds, needed a football team, and New Brighton Tower FC was born (before the tower itself was even built). Like Thames, they signed players with hopes of climbing the Football League, which they joined in 1898. Though they performed respectably, the crowds never came in the numbers anticipated and, despite a 4th place finish in the Second Division in 1900-01, they were disbanded. The tower, completed in 1900, lasted until 1919. A later side with more modest ambitions, New Brighton FC, competed in the Football League from 1923 until 1951.
A more successful template for how to launch a club at a new football ground was Chelsea. In 1904, businessman Gus Mears and his brother Joseph bought Stamford Bridge, built in 1877 but formerly used for athletics. After extensive redevelopment by Leitch, they set about finding a team to fill the stadium. After Fulham rejected Mears’ approach, he formed Chelsea FC in March 1905 and succeeded in persuading the League to admit them to the Second Division for the following season. At the time, Woolwich Arsenal were the only League club in London, and Chelsea soon established themselves in the west of the capital. After promotion to the First Division at the end of their second season, Stamford Bridge saw the highest average attendances in the country during the 1907-08 season, and later hosted the FA Cup Final between 1920 and 1922. When Thames AFC reached the League twenty-five years after Chelsea, London had a host of successful sides; there were now twelve in total, six of them in the same division as the newcomers. Both West Ham United and Clapton Orient were near-neighbours. Faced with such competition, and a huge stadium to fill, it was always going to be an uphill struggle for Thames AFC. Forty-five years were to pass until another London club – Wimbledon – entered the Football League.
Great article (again) but one correction: “London had a host of successful sides; there were now twelve in total, six of them in the same division as the newcomers.”
Crystal Palace were not a London club until April 1965. At the time Thames joined the League, Palace were a Surrey club.
Thank you for taking the time to read and comment, glad you enjoyed the post. That’s an interesting point, I’d always considered Palace as a London club – but then I’m a northerner!
I hope you continue to follow the blog, and of course feel free to comment, I appreciate any feedback.
And the location of West Ham Stadium at that time was Essex, as were both Upton Park and Brisbane road, Whilst White Hart Lane would have been in Middlesex then.
I always wondered if Darwen had smaller crowds than Thames, during their dreadful last Football League division 2 season in 1898-1899.. (won 2 matches, conceded 141 goals)
It maybe they were never published although presumably the Football League would need to know them at the time.
Thank you for commenting – that’s an interesting question as I think up to the mid-1920s published attendances were only ever approximate rather than ‘official’ – but I haven’t seen any reports of Darwen’s going lower, even at the end of their stay in the League.
I think the closed shop attitude of the Football League was the real reason no London team appears for 45 years. It was very difficult for any team to get elected.
Thames were doomed because they never had a level of support and should never have got elected just because they had a big ground. Chelsea were different because professional clubs were a novelty at that time in the south .
The Southern League was strong but turned Chelsea down, so they applied to the League. Historically the upper class amateur teams had dominated in the south . My team Wimbledon had to win the still powerful Southern League 3 years running and have massive FA Cup runs before getting elected.
Thankfully you can now get promoted through the tiers and my clubs supporters struggle appears to have stopped franchising as a alternative route in the future. Unfortunately the ever increasing gap between the rich and the poor means teams like Bury and Macclesfield are falling by the wayside.
I do find the glorious failure interesting though. In Scotland there is the story of Helensburgh, elected to the league in 1923, The Scottish League formed a Third Division, electing the Western League en mass. Helensburgh topped the new Division in it’s third season, the only problem was no other team completed their fixtures with all facing financial hardship. The league abandoned the season, closing the Division and only electing Forfar to the Second Division. Helensburgh, formed in 1896, folded 1928. An Amateur Helensburgh played league football from 2010 until 2017, but then the league closed down again! They only carried on as a youth team after that, all those years with no record of them ever winning a league .
Thank you for commenting – yes, the re-election process was definitely open to abuse but as you say, now there are a different set of issues facing clubs lower down the leagues…
Fascinating article. I learnt a lot there. Never knew there was a stadium over in Custom House, presumably they never drew in the crowds as West Ham were only up the road?
Thank you, I found it a really interesting story too. It shows how the election process could be abused, and also how difficult it is to start a League club ‘from scratch’, especially given the local competition – however impressive the stadium!
Great article. Never understood the ‘old school’ football league election process and was glad to see the back of it. I am mindful too that a few of our successful local amateur clubs – Romford, Ilford and Walthamstow Avenue readily spring to mind – could possibly have fallen foul of it on a few occasions. As for the stadium, we only lived a few miles away on the Isle of Dogs and I remember it well but never knew it had a football history. My mum tells me she used to go to speedway and greyhound racing over there with the family although none of them have ever mentioned football there despite her brothers being regulars at Millwall. Having been a West Ham fan for almost 60 years, I can only assume that the local fan base was firmly set at that time and it just proved too difficult for Thames AFC to compete and establish themselves just a mile or so up the road. Really interesting piece though, especially with the comments made since relating to other similar projects that popped up elsewhere.
It was a very interesting one to research – there are so many ‘hidden’ bits and pieces of Football League history out there! Thank you for reading, and sharing your family connection with the stadium, it really brings the history to life.