Tinsley Lindley

Lloyd's Weekly London Newspaper (23.11.90)

Lindley was England's leading goalscorer before Steve Bloomer.  He scored 14 goals in 13 internationals.

A 'League Table' for 1885

Imagine the speculation over the relative merits of various clubs before the existence of leagues.
Cricket had come to terms (to some extent) of deciding which was Champion County, but in football the only honours available were cups decided on the knock out basis. (The challenge aspect of the Football Association Challenge Cup was short lived- Wanderers received a bye to the 1873 final).
On March 7th  1885, The Preston Chronicle  published a League table.
The selection is broad:  There are 34 teams: 8 of the original 12 League clubs (no West Bromwich Albion, Stoke, Everton, Derby County); The Universities; 6 Scottish clubs; 4 'Old Boys' clubs. 13 of the teams came from Lancashire.

Ingeniously the compiler devised a system ('average to 1') of goal ratio by which to rate the teams. So a stingy defence was rewarded.

	P	W	D	L	F	A	ave
Cambridge University	20	18	1	1	93	15	6.20
Wolverhampton Wanderers	25	17	6	2	103	18	5.72
Walsall	24	16	2	6	110	23	4.78
Preston North End	37	25	7	5	137	40	3.42
Hibernians	25	20	1	4	119	37	3.21
Oxford University	18	12	1	5	58	19	3.05
Bolton Wanderers	41	31	2	8	165	55	3.00
Great Lever	34	24	3	6	135	45	3.00
Queen’s Park	25	18	5	2	80	29	2.75
Blackburn Olympic	32	19	5	8	142	52	2.73
Notts Club (County)	29	20	4	5	90	34	2.61
Accrington	28	23	1	4	82	33	2.48
Blackburn Rovers	37	23	7	7	128	55	2.32
Upton Park	21	12	4	5	65	29	2.27
Vale of Leven	23	13	5	5	61	28	2.17
Glasgow Rangers	26	16	3	7	90	44	2.05
Church	27	16	4	7	80	45	1.97
Burnley	44	25	6	13	105	62	1.89
Walsall Swifts	29	14	7	8	70	44	1.89
Nottingham Forest	23	16	2	5	63	40	1.57
Old Foresters	25	13	3	9	66	42	1.57
Aston Villa	32	17	6	9	87	60	1.45
Darwen	30	10	7	13	68	48	1.41
Wednesbury Old Athletic	24	13	3	8	71	51	1.39
Halliwell	31	14	3	14	87	65	1.33
Pollockshields Athletic	20	14	0	6	45	34	1.32
Padiham	29	17	4	8	74	53	1.32
Old Carthusians	12	8	0	4	33	28	1.21
Old Westminsters	23	11	4	8	51	53	1.0
Wednesday	28	12	5	11	55	59	0.93
Blackburn Park Road	23	7	7	9	44	50	0.88
Witton	28	12	1	15	51	59	0.86
3rd Lanark RV	24	9	5	10	37	48	0.77
Old Etonians	17	5	3	9	36	51	0.70

One big name from this era not included was Corinthian FC. Granted, Corinth was still a relatively new outfit. I looked at their fixtures from September 1884 to March 1885. The figures were not impressive:

Corinthian FC

10

3

1

6

24

34

0.70

I have redone the table using a points system (3 for a win and 1 for a draw) and determined what percentage of the points available each team obtained. Cambridge still come out clear winners, but there are significant differences in the placements of some of the other teams.

%
91.66	Cambridge University
83.33	Accrington
81.33	Hibernians
78.66	Queen’s Park
77.23	Bolton Wanderers
76	Wolverhampton Wanderers
73.87	Preston North End
73.56	Notts Club (County)
73.52	Great Lever
71.66	Upton Park
70	Pollockshields Athletic
69.44	Walsall
68.51	Oxford University
68.46	Blackburn Rovers
66.66	Old Carthusians
65.38	Glasgow Rangers
64.58	Blackburn Olympic
64.19	Church
63.76	Vale of Leven
63.76	Nottingham Forest
63.21	Padiham
61.36	Burnley
59.37	Aston Villa
58.33	Wednesbury Old Athletic
56.32	Walsall Swifts
56	Old Foresters
53.62	Old Westminsters
48.80	Wednesday
48.38	Halliwell
44.44	3rd Lanark RV
44.04	Witton
41.11	Darwen
40.57	Blackburn Park Road
35.29	Old Etonians

The success of the team had an impact on the sporting culture of the Universities.  On 5.3.85 at the Cambridge Union Society's Debate it was agreed to promote Football to a 'full blue' (elevating the  game to the same exalted level as athletics, cricket and rowing).

This is the Cambridge team for the 1885 Varsity Match:

GK	M.J Rendall
FB	A.M Walters
	9 England appearances (1885-90)
FB	H. Buckley
HB	A. Amos
	2 England appearances (1885-86)
HB	T.W Blenkiron
HB	F.E Saunders
	1 England cap (1888) when playing for Swifts
F	B.W Spilsbury
	3 England caps, 5 goals (1885-86)
F	T.H Marsh
F	T.Lindley
	Later played for Nottingham Forest and won 13 England caps (1886-91) scoring 14 goals. England’s top scorer before Bloomer.
F	W.N Cobbold
	Also of Old Carthusians- 9 England caps (1883-87) scoring 6 goals.
F	F Marchant

I've scoured the newspaper archives in order to try and identify the 20 matches that the compiler had drawn Cambridge's record from ('up to the end of February 1885').
I could only find the following :

01.11.84	Cambridge University	13	0	Swifts
??.11.84	Cambridge University	2	0	Old Foresters
15.11.84	Cambridge University	6	2	Sussex
19.11.84	Cambridge University	5	0	Corinthian FC
22.11.84	Brentwood	0	2	Cambridge University
29.11.84	Cambridge University	12	1	Carthusians
11.12.84	Cambridge University	4	0	Middlesex
13.12.84	Aston Villa	3	1	Cambridge University
??.12.84	Cambridge University	5	2	Nottingham
04.01.85	Stoke	1	2	Cambridge University
08.01.85	Liverpool Ramblers	2	2	Cambridge University
12.02.85	Cambridge University	9	0	Brentwood
14.02.85	London	0	4	Cambridge University
16.02.85	Cambridge University	1	1	Aston Villa
21.02.85	Cambridge University	4	0	Clapham Rovers
25.02.85	Cambridge University	1	0	Oxford University

These results compute as:

P	W	D	L	F	A	ave	Points %
16	13	2	1	72	13	5.53	85.41

Which would still place Cambridge at the top of the table.