Dingley Dell F.C.

rdf:langString Dingley Dell F.C.

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rdf:langString Dingley Dell

rdf:langString Dingley Dell Football Club

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rdf:langString The Dellers, D.D., the Templars

rdf:langString Dingley Dell

rdf:langString Dingley Dell Football Club

rdf:langString Only played away matches

rdf:langString The Dellers, D.D., the Templars

rdf:langString Dingley Dell Football Club was a short-lived English association football club based in the London area in the late 1850s and early 1860s. Dingley Dell F.C. was founded by members of the Dingley Dell cricket club, which was named after the cricket team in a fictitious village described in The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens. The football side played its first match, against Westminster School, at Vincent Square on 24 November 1858 in the earliest known football fixture in the London area. Led by lawyer George Turner Sills, Dingley Dell was the most active non-school team in the London area in the five years before the Football Association was established in 1863, and was considered the strongest non-public school club in 1862. The club's earliest games were all played against Westminster or Charterhouse schools. On 15 February 1862, the club played Surbiton F.C. As this match pre-dated the FA, it was played with ten men per side to rules set out by Dingley Dell, which banned the carrying of the ball, with goals scored by kicking the ball under a tape. Surbiton had been founded by members of Kingston Rowing Club, notably solicitor Theodore Bell, formerly captain of football at Uppingham School, who represented Surbiton at the 'Meeting of the Captains' at the Freemasons' Tavern on 26 October 1863, when the FA was formed (Bell may also have 'doubled up' and represented both Surbiton and Dingley Dell). The club's final reported fixture was against Westminster School on 11 February 1864.