Full Name: Plymouth Argyle Football Club City: Plymouth Country: England League: Football League Championship Founded: 1886 Stadium: Home Park (19,500) Colors: Green, White Previous Names: Argyle Football Club (1886-94), Argyle Athletic Club (1897-1903) Nickname: The Pilgrims, Argyle Rival: Torquay United, Exeter City
The Pilgrims of Plymouth Argyle are both the southernmost and westernmost professional football club in England and, with Hull City's recent promotion, owners of a title I'm quite sure they'd rather do without - the largest city in England never to have had a top-flight club. This is just one of a number of unique factoids about the most popular club in Devon County and indeed all of southwest England. We can start with the origins their name, which to this day remain something a mystery.
Home Park:
Plymouth Argyle have been based at Home Park since moving there in 1901. The ground opened in 1894, originally being used by the Devonshire Albion Rugby Football Club. The rugby club had a disagreement with the ground's owners over rent payments and left and at that point Argyle stepped in. The ground is located in the Central Park area of Plymouth, a large public park in the north-central section of the city. Home Park suffered extensive damage during World War II and had to be nearly completely rebuilt. In recent years the ground has been almost completely rebuilt again in a thorough modernization project.
Previous Stadiums: Marsh Mills (1897-1901)
Major Trophies:
Third-Tier League Titles:
Football League Division Two (2003-04)
Football League Third Division (1958-59)
Football League Third Division - South (1930, 52)
Fourth-Tier League Titles:
Football League Third Division (2001-02)
Non-League Titles:
Southern League (1913)
Western League (1905)
History:
The origin of Plymouth Argyle's unique name has been examined in detail with a final conclusion seemingly never quite reached. A number of theories have been put forth and frankly we may never definitively know. The most authoritative (and most mundane) explanation to be found is that the club's two founders (F Howard Grose and W Pethybridge) lived in the same house on Argyle Terrace in Plymouth. Among other theories that have been put forth:
The club was named in honor of the Argyle & Sutherland Highlanders army regiment who were based for some time in the Plymouth area.
The club members spent a great deal of time at the Argyle Tavern.
The club took the name Argyle as an homage to the then-ruling monarch Queen Victoria's great interest in all things Scottish, Argyle being a region of Western Scotland. Argyle was a popular name for many things during this time period.
It may be true that the Argyle name comes from some or all of these sources.
What is definitely known is that the Argyle Football Club was founded by F Howard Grose and W Pethybridge at the Borough Arms Coffee House on Bedford Street in Plymouth in 1886. The first years of the club were played out as a series of friendlies against other local clubs and schools as Argyle were without any formal league or cup competitions and also without a home ground to call their own. This club stumbled along in this fashion until 1894 when the first incarnation of the club ground to a halt.
Three years later the Pilgrims were reborn as the football section of the Argyle Athletic Club, an entity that also contested cricket, rugby and (surprise) athletics. Their early matches were played at Marsh Mills on the east side of Plymouth. A stroke of good luck fell their way in 1901 when the Devonshire Albion rugby side abandoned their Home Park ground and Argyle stepped in. The location was much more central (in fact part of Plymouth's Central Park) and offered the club a higher profile, attracting touring professional sides.
In 1903 the club made the move to professional football and joined both the Southern League and Western League. To accentuate this expansion of their ambitions the team's name was changed to Plymouth Argyle Football Club.
Argyle contested both the Southern and Western Leagues until 1909 when they resigned from the Western League to focus exclusively on the higher-profile Southern League, a move which soon paid off in the form of a Southern League title in 1913. In 1920 Plymouth Argyle (along with a host of other Southern League clubs) joined the Football League to form the new Third Division, which was split a year later into a Third Division North and Third Division South. Argyle spent the next decade in the Third Division South, incredibly finishing second place SIX seasons in a row at a time when only the champions were promoted.
The move up to the Second Division finally came in 1930 and the Pilgrims spent the next twenty years in the second tier, finishing as high as 4th in the 1931-32 season. After a 1950 relegation, promotion was quickly gained and Argyle again finished fourth in the 1952-53 season. That remains the highest position achieved in the club's history.
The years since have been a story of ups and downs, shuttling between the second and third tiers, with the occasional solid cup run to spice things up - the Pilgrims reaching the FA Cup semifinals once (1984) and the League Cup semifinals twice (1965 and 1974). Argyle were relegated to the fourth tier of English league football for the first time in 1995, bounced straight back up and then returned for four long years. Argyle won the Third Division title in 2001-02, the Second Division title two years later and currently inhabit the second-tier Football League Championship, rarely looking likely to trouble their record as the largest city in England never to have had a club in the top flight.
Colors and Logo:
Plymouth Argyle's logo features an image of the Mayflower (the ship the Pilgrims sailed to the New World in) and the words Plymouth Argyle (above) and Football Club (below).
The Pilgrims adopted their green and black colors from the old county borough of Plymouth. This county borough, along with those of Devonport and East Stonehouse, were rolled into the borough of Plymouth in 1914 which was granted city status in 1928.
Previous Logos:
Nicknames:
Plymouth Argyle's most common nickname is the Pilgrims. This refers to the group of English religious non-conformists who set sail from Plymouth for the New World in 1620. This group would play an instrumental part in the development of the United States. The group is often called the Pilgrims in the US and the Pilgrim Fathers in the UK but the club and its supporters go by the Pilgrims.
The club name is often just shortened to Argyle in regular conversation and Plymouth Argyle and its fans also go by the Greens and the Green Army.
Rivals:
The principal rivals of Plymouth Argyle are their Devonshire neighbors Torquay United and Exeter City. The rivalries are somewhat dormant at the moment as both of those clubs are playing at a lower level than Plymouth and have been since 2003.
Check out the latest State of the States column by Michael S. Hund, covering the US national team, Major League Soccer and other parts of soccer in the States.
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