Queen’s Park Football Club was certainly the most influential Scottish club in the early development of the game of Association football and arguably the most influential club in Great Britain and therefore the world.  The team from the southern suburbs of Glasgow was at the centre of the development of the passing style of football we are all so familiar with today.

This account of the early years of Queen’s Park’s existence focuses primarily on the matches played by the club.  It is not an attempt to replicate the content of Richard Robinson’s outstanding work History of Queen’s Park Football Club 1867-1917, which provides a wealth of information about the formative years of the club.

My principal sources in pulling together this early history of an outstanding football club have been the newspapers of the day.  The Mitchell Library in Glasgow and the British Newspaper Archive have proved invaluable in providing access to old newspapers.  I have also taken some of the details about the very early days of Queen’s Park from the Robinson book because he had access to information that is no longer available elsewhere.

Inevitably, there will be errors and omissions in some of my descriptions of matches played by Queen’s Park.  There were no numbers on jerseys or team sheets in those days and it was not uncommon for details of goal scorers etc to vary from newspaper to newspaper.  If there are any obvious mistakes, please accept my apologies.

As well as first team matches, I have recorded the results of Queen’s Park’s second, third and fourth teams, where available.  Reserve team football had a higher profile in Victorian times.  Also, the Second XI (eventually known as The Strollers) and the Hampden XI (third eleven) often faced other clubs’ first teams, including the likes of Aston Villa and Stoke (now Stoke City).  I have also listed the results of "official" representative matches in which Queen's Park players were involved.

It had been my intention to cover the period from 1867 to 1890 and stop at that point. However, I have now completed seasons 1890/91 to 1896/97, using on-line resources only, and I have attempted to compile details of Queen's Park's results up to 1900 - the point at which the club joined the Scottish League. I am also working on checking potential additional sources of information for the period up to 1897.

Frank McCrossan
March 2022