OUR FIRST EVER GOALKEEPER IDENTIFIED AS JOHN NORRIS MANDY

In the origins of Spanish football, we played a big role. Back in 1890, the club was founded and then played the first ever game on record in Spain - against Huelva Recreation Club during March of that year. The club's History Department continuously work to uncover more and more details from this era and have recently identified our first ever goalkeeper: John Norris Mandy.

The information was found in the The British Newspaper Archive. Collaborating with the prestigious British Library, it now has a digital collection of more than 70 million pages that have been published since the 18th century. In a copy of the North British Daily Mail, published in Glasgow on 11 April 1890, information is revealed about that game against Huelva Recreation Club. Once again, it seems that foreign press companies were the ones reporting on the origins of football in Spain. This comes after previous information had been found in Scotland's The Dundee Courier and Argus, England's The Field and The Otago Witness, which comes from New Zealand.

The information was published in the North British Daily Mail on 11 April 1890

The names of many of the founders of the club were already known - the Scot Edward Farquharson Johnston was our first president and founder while local man Isaías White Méndez was our first secretary. Hugo MacColl was our first captain and Ritson was the first player to score a goal in Spanish football. But we now know the name of the first goalkeeper and can add it to the long list of legendary keepers at the club, which includes Eizaguirre, Busto, Mut, Super Paco, Rodri, Buyo, Dassaev, Unzue, Palop, Sergio Rico and Bono. John Norris Mandy was the first man to stand between the sticks and defend our goal, keeping a clean sheet in a 2-0 win over Huelva Recreation on 8 March 1890 at the Hipódromo de Tablada.

However with investigations like this, it is important to acknowledge that slight differences and inconsistencies can occur within the history books. John Norris Mandy is an example of this, with his name appearing as 'Manday' in the North British Daily Mail article. His remains lie at the cemetary of San Jorge de Sevilla, next to San Fernando, which is known for being the burial site of many English people.