1888–89 Football League
The season began on 8 September 1888 with 12 member clubs from the Midlands and North of England: Accrington, Aston Villa, Blackburn Rovers, Bolton Wanderers, Burnley, Derby County, Everton, Notts County, Preston North End, Stoke, West Bromwich Albion and Wolverhampton Wanderers.
[2] The original league rules stated that teams' positions should be calculated "from wins, draws, and losses", without further detail.
Albion won 2–0 at Stoke in front of 4,500 spectators and would have headed Preston North End, Derby County and Everton by virtue of an infinite goal average as they kept a clean sheet.
However the post-match reports of relative kick-off times show most games were delayed allowing for crowds to assemble.
Albion also won 2–1 at Derby County but the victory gave them an inferior goal average while Everton were the only other club to secure maximum points from their opening two games.
Richard Whittle marked his Preston debut with a goal in their 7–0 victory over Stoke to take their perfect start to five games.
West Bromwich Albion visited Deepdale for the first ever league clash between teams occupying the top two positions at kick off.
Accrington became the first team to gain a point against Preston when they held the league leaders to a 0–0 draw in what was their seventh game of the season.
Preston North End extended their unbeaten start to the season to eight games when they defeated Wolverhampton Wanderers 5–2 at Deepdale with John Goodall scoring a hat-trick.
Preston stretched their unbeaten start to the season to nine games when Jack Gordon and John Goodall both scored hat-tricks in a 7–0 victory at Notts County.
Bottom club Derby travelled to unbeaten league leaders Preston having not won in nine games, the last seven of which had all ended in defeat.
Their nearest challengers, Aston Villa were unable to make any impact into the seven-point deficit though as they too were held 1–1 at Accrington.
Notts County arrived at Deepdale having failed to win in seven outings, the last five of which had all ended in defeat and rarely threatened as Preston ran out 4–1 winners.
