Ernest Jardine, the son of the company founder, was a footballer for Nottingham Forest in the early 1880s and it may have been his impetus to have the club play against external opposition.

The club joined the Nottinghamshire Football Association in 1884[3] and entered the Nottingham Senior Cup for the first time.

In the first round, the club beat the Eastwood Collieries side 3–1,[4] but Eastwood objected because "Jardine's had played four men contrary to Rule 22, which said that no club should play any man in a Cup tie who had not been registered for 1 calendar month before the match"; a sign that Jardines had been recruiting players, probably by offering jobs at the factory to avoid the restrictions on professionalism.

[5] The following season, the club reached the third round of the tournament, where it played Nottingham Forest, at home.

[12] County had arranged a friendly against West Bromwich Albion for that date but due to kick off at 2.45pm.

County did turn out 90 minutes later, for the friendly, which was a 3–1 victory for the home side, in front of a crowd of 4,000.

If the association should be so ill-advised as to stultify its own decisions, we shall protest against such degrading conduct by withdrawing from the competition.Nevertheless, the Notts FA ordered the match to take place on 10 February 1887.

[15] Jardines carried out its threat and refused to turn up for the re-arranged match, on the basis it was appealing to the Football Association.

[17] On the relevant day (26 February), neither side turned up; County instead hosted Aston Villa[18] and Jardines were playing Burnley.

Dick Danks left for Wolverhampton Wanderers, captain Robinson for Gainsborough Trinity, and two players signed for Notts Olympic.

The denuded side was far short of its previous standard, losing 8–1 at Newton Heath,[23] and only being able to field 10 men in the Gainsborough Cup competition against Derby Junction, the match ending in a 5–1 defeat.

Now, however, Rangers were able to arrange more fixtures with other local FA members, and therefore had more matches for players being paid by the game.

[28] One of the players in the Trinity side was Arthur Elliott, who had scored the Jardines goal the previous season.

It only won one match, against County Rovers, and even then it lost the 2 points from that win because of fielding an ineligible player.