Burscough FC  

The Lancastrian town of Burscough has had a football team since 1880 though the present club were only formed in 1946. 

The current club took over the tenure of Victoria Park following the demise of Burscough Rangers ten years earlier.   

The Linnets began life in the Liverpool County Combination and have steadily collected silverware through the years though they have enjoyed their greatest success since the turn of the new century.    

A remarkable FA Trophy campaign in 2003 saw the club spring to national prominence and an unbelievable treble last season means Burscough FC are now competing in the Blue Square North. 

The new club formed after the Second World War made an immediate mark by winning a treble of north-west knock-out competitions; Lancashire Junior Cup, George Mahon Cup and the prestigious Liverpool Challenge Cup.   

By the middle of the 1950s Burscough FC had progressed to the Lancashire Combination winning the First Division championship in 1956. 

The Linnets reached the First Round proper of the FA Cup for the first time in 1959; a feat they were to repeat three times between 1977 and 1980. 

After spending some time in the Cheshire County League the club were founder members, and champions, of the North West Counties League in 1982.   

The eighties and nineties were largely unsuccessful in terms of silverware though 1998 saw progression with promotion to the Northern Premier League to signal an era of unprecedented success for the club.  

A top ten finish and good cup runs in 1998/99 was the the foundation for a great season the following year when, despite selling teenage star Michael Yates to Dundee, Burscough FC finished as runners-up in the First Division thereby securing promotion to the Premier Division of the Northern Premier League.   

The Liverpool Senior Cup was won for the first time in 2001 and that year also saw another teenage star leaving Victoria Park with Lee McEvilly, who went on to play for Northern Ireland, signing for Rochdale in a £20,000 deal. 

Former Aston Villa defender Shaun Teale took over as manager in 2002 and within 12 months he guided the Linnets to the final of the FA Trophy with the underdogs beating Tamworth 2-1 at Villa Park to win their first ever national competition.   

Unfortunately controversy followed glory and Teale left the club less than two months after lifting the Trophy to be replaced by Mike Marsh who subsequently quit following a poor start to the following season. 

New manager Derek Goulding took the club to the play-offs in 2004 but couldn’t quite clinch a place in Conference North and the club missed out again the following season following the controversy which surrounded the demise of Spennymoor United and the awarding of points to all the clubs who had yet to play them. 

FA Cup glory followed in 2006 with Burscough FC reaching the Second Round proper for the first time but with former Southport manager Liam Watson in charge the Victoria Park outfit carried all before them in 2006/07 by winning the title in a last day ‘winner take all’ shoot out with AFC Telford and also lifting the Lancashire Co-op Trophy and the Peter Swales Memorial Shield.