NORTH EASTERN LEAGUE

On May 5^th, 1906, a meeting was held in the Board Room at Newcastle United’s St. James’ Park ground.  This had been set up by the club’s Chairman, John Cameron, who was hoping to organise a competition in the region which would give the North East’s Football League teams a higher standard to play at.  Ten clubs had representatives at the meeting, including three from Yorkshire and six whose first teams played in the Football League.  If Cameron’s idea was to create a strong competition, then no doubt he was to be disappointed over the first two seasons, as Hull City did not take part and at least four of the founder members had teams of the ‘same level’ playing in another league as well as the North Eastern League.  However, the competition took hold, growing in popularity, size and strength within a short time.

The North Eastern League started with 10 clubs, half of which were from Football League teams.  The competition was a competitive one on the whole, which compensated for the doubts over the quality of some of the teams actually fielded.  Apart from one hiccough in 1909, the North Eastern League grew in both size and popularity, there being 20 members playing in each of the 3 seasons before the Great War led to the suspension of the competition.  Some of the record-keeping was not as strong as the competition itself, so goals for and goals against totals did not always match during the early years.

North Eastern League Final Table 1906-1907

 

1	Newcastle United Reserves	18	12	2	4	35	20	26
2	Sunderland Reserves	18	12	1	5	44	22	25
3	West Stanley	18	10	4	4	37	23	24
4	Leeds City ‘A’	18	9	4	5	33	20	22
5	Workington	18	6	6	6	34	33	18
6	Sunderland Royal Rovers	18	4	9	5	23	30	17
7	Middlesbrough Reserves	18	5	6	7	34	34	16
8	Carlisle United	18	4	5	9	24	38	13
9	Bradford City ‘A’	18	5	1	12	26	34	11
10	Hebburn Argyle	18	2	4	12	16	52	8
		180	69	42	69	306	306	180

Carlisle United and Workington both chose to field their reserve teams for the second season and three new clubs joined the competition – Bradford Park Avenue Reserves, Penrith and Shildon Athletic.