page_title: West Bromwich Albion F.C.
section_title: Early years (1878–1950)
hierarchical_section_title: West Bromwich Albion F.C. / History / Early years (1878–1950)
caption_attribution_description: English: West Bromwich Albion F.C., team lineup of 1888.
context_page_description: West Bromwich Albion Football Club is an English professional football club based in West Bromwich, West Midlands, England, that competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. The club was formed in 1878 and has played at its home ground, The Hawthorns, since 1900.
  Albion were one of the 12 founding members of the Football League in 1888, the first professional football league in the world. The club have spent the majority of their existence in the top tier of English football, where they have played for 81 seasons as of May 2020. They have been champions of England once, in 1919–20, and have been runners-up twice. Albion have reached ten FA Cup finals, winning the Cup on five occasions. The first win came in 1888, the year the league was founded, and the most recent in 1968, their last major trophy. They also won the Football League Cup at the first attempt in 1966. The club's longest continuous period in the top division spanned 24 years between 1949 and 1973, and from 1986 to 2002 they spent their longest ever spell out of the top division.
context_section_description: The club was founded as West Bromwich Strollers in 1878 by workers from George Salter's Spring Works in West Bromwich, in Staffordshire. They were renamed West Bromwich Albion in 1880, becoming the first team to adopt the Albion suffix; Albion was a district of West Bromwich where some of the players lived or worked, close to what is today Greets Green. The club joined the Birmingham & District Football Association in 1881 and became eligible for their first competition, the Birmingham Cup. They reached the quarter-finals, beating several longer-established clubs on the way. In 1883, Albion won their first trophy, the Staffordshire Cup. Albion joined the Football Association in the same year; this enabled them to enter the FA Cup for the first time in the 1883–84 season. In 1885 the club turned professional, and in 1886 they reached the FA Cup final for the first time, losing 2–0 to Blackburn Rovers in a replay. They reached the final again in 1887, but lost 2–0 to Aston Villa. In 1888 the team won the trophy for the first time, beating strong favourites Preston North End 2–1 in the final. As FA Cup winners, they qualified to play in a Football World Championship game against Scottish Cup winners Renton, which ended in a 4–1 defeat.
  In March 1888, William McGregor wrote to what he considered to be the top five English teams, including Albion, informing them of his intention to form an association of clubs that would play each other home and away each season. Thus when the Football League started later that year, Albion became one of the twelve founder members. Albion's second FA Cup success came in 1892, beating Aston Villa 3–0. They met Villa again in the 1895 final, but lost 1–0. The team suffered relegation to Division Two in 1900–01, their first season at The Hawthorns. They were promoted as champions the following season but relegated again in 1903–04. The club won the Division Two championship once more in 1910–11, and the following season reached another FA Cup Final, where they were defeated by Second Division Barnsley in a replay.
  Albion won the Football League title in 1919–20 for the only time in their history following the end of World War I, their totals of 104 goals and 60 points both breaking the previous league records. The team finished as Division One runners-up in 1924–25, narrowly losing out to Huddersfield Town, but were relegated in 1926–27. In 1930–31, they won promotion as well as the FA Cup, beating Birmingham 2–1 in the final. The "double" of winning the FA Cup and promotion has not been achieved before or since. Albion reached the final again in 1935, losing to Sheffield Wednesday, but were relegated three years later. They gained promotion in 1948–49, and there followed the club's longest unbroken spell in the top flight of English football, a total of 24 years.
caption: The Albion team of 1888, FA Cup winners and Football League founder members
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