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Football champions, 1936-37
Standing, from left: A. Waddington, B. Hall, E. Blades, S. Walsh, J. Burke, J. Riley, Mr J. Bill.
Seated, from left: J. Farley, J. Shore, B. Ford, V. White, A. Weston.
The inscription on the board reads:
St GREGORY’S RC CENTRAL
SCHOOLBOY CHAMPIONS
1936 – MANCHESTER – 1937
1ST DIVISION CUP WINNERS
DD SHIELD WINNERS
CHAMPIONS 1ST DIV. (SOUTHERN)
This was a highly successful St Gregory’s Cup team which supplied three players to the Manchester Boys team of 1936-37 – J. Burke, J. Shore and S. Walsh – and another, A. Waddington, in 1938-39.
Football champions, 1936-37
Probable names are:
Standing, from left: Mr Johnny Bill (team coach), Edward Blades, Unidentified, V. White, B. Hall, J. Riley, J. Burke, Mr Wilfrid Holmes, headmaster.
Seated, from left: J. Farley, A. Weston, B. Ford, S. Walsh, A. Waddington, J. Shore.
The school had a reputation for producing successful soccer teams and Mr Holmes was always keen to pose with the players. Mr Bill, by the way, was also a youth coach with Manchester United.
As for the school’s soccer successes, there was a comment in the HMI Report of 1936 that was really an exercise in masterly restraint: “The football teams especially have a habit of winning matches, and have provided one or two members of the Manchester Schools’ XI.” That sentence surely must have been the understatement of the year. St Gregory’s remained the only selective central school for Catholic boys in Manchester during the decade prior to the Second World War and was renowned for its success on the soccer pitch. St Gregory’s was known across the city as “the football school”.
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