Celebrating Yorkshire’s first great football side

A quick heads-up for those Yahoo Sport readers with a deep love of the history of English football: a special event will be held this Sunday, 17th April, when Sheffield Wednesday’s first FA Cup success in 1896 will be toasted by football fans and descendants of the first Yorkshire side to capture a major trophy.

Wednesday beat Wolves 2-1 in the 1896 FA Cup final and Fred Spiksley was the hero with two goals. Spiksley’s descendants Clive and Ralph Nicholson and football historian Mark Metcalf have now written a biography of the outside left, who scored Wednesday’s first goal at Hillsborough and also netted hat-tricks in his first two England internationals against Wales and Scotland. Flying over an Olive Grove is to be published in September by False 9 Media.

The authors have amassed a wealth of research on the final and have unearthed what are believed to be the earliest known action photographs of any final. There will be talks about football in the 1890s, the 1896 team, the cup run and the final.

Descendants of the players such as Tom Crawshaw are coming to the event. Roy Massey, a former footballer, will be speaking about his grandfather, Jimmy Massey, the 1896 goalkeeper. There will be free gifts to the first 50 people, plus specially brewed beers on sale. The event kicks off at the Kelham Island Tavern in Sheffield City centre at 5pm and runs ‘till 8pm.