History of Derry City F.C.
The president of the IFA, Captain James Wilton, a Derry-man, announced on 30 May 1929 that he felt confident that Derry City would be admitted to the Irish League, which since 1922, had covered only Northern Ireland, the following night.
However, luckily, then-manager Willie Ross took advantage of having found a considerable sum of money to spend after the sale of players Eddie Crossan and John Feeney resulted in an annual profit of £2,000 – a figure most Irish clubs would have jumped at in the days of red bank balances.
In the late 50s Derry lost some of their more popular figures: Jobby Crossan left for Coleraine after he had turned down Nottingham Forest; Jim McLaughlin went to Birmingham City F.C.
Within weeks, Doug Wood was named 'Northern Ireland Player of the Year' and Derry performed admirably in a 3–1 friendly defeat to a Spanish 1966 World Cup preparation select in Madrid's Vicente Calderón Stadium.
The IFA wanted their representatives to play the tie in Belfast, although, in what seemed like a case of double standards, they deemed the Showgrounds in mainly-Protestant Coleraine suitable also, despite the fact that the grounds were in much the same state as the Brandywell.
With large chunks of the city a 'no-go area' for the security forces, a gang of youths hijacked the bus of a visiting team, Ballymena United, outside the Brandywell before a league game and burned it.
This unsustainable situation lasted until October 1972 when, faced with dwindling crowds and dire finances, the club formally requested permission from the Irish League to return to the Brandywell.
People such as Terry Harkin, Tony O'Doherty, Eamon McLaughlin and Eddie Mahon, having worked on the visionary project since 1983, helped in the bid to secure senior status once again for Derry City with an election to the League of Ireland's First Division in May 1985.
While some people in the Republic were uneasy about admitting a club from a city with a recent history of political problems, Finn Harps chairman Fran Fields fully backed Derry's application.
To add to this, Derry once memorably beat Celtic by a score of 3–2 at Lansdowne Road during the Irish International Club Tournament, which took place in 1997, and made their Sky Sports television debut appearance after qualifying for the final which was to be broadcast live by the company.
offered their services to play for a Derry City Select XI in a charity match in order to raise funds for Omagh's redevelopment after the town was bombed by the IRA earlier that year.
[15] With the incident, obviously sectarian in nature, occurring outside the ground and being instigated by individuals who were not actually present at the game, though, the PSNI accepted that it should have been their responsibility to ensure the safe passage of the fans.
In the era of building bridges and increasing tolerance, the Brandywell Stadium is usually left free of nationalist symbolism by fans during matches regardless, although Celtic jerseys can often be seen worn by some individuals in attendance.
The position had not been helped as the club was hit with misery on 27 July earlier that same year when the then-chairman, Kevin Friel, was killed in a road accident near Raphoe, County Donegal.
Prior to that meeting Martin O'Neill, then manager of Scottish giants, Celtic, contacted Roddy, the stand-in chairman, to inform him that he would bring his side to the Brandywell in order to help raise funds for the beleaguered club.
However, Kenny's last game at the helm for Derry was when he returned from Dunfermline in an 'advisory role' for the Lansdowne Road encounter with St. Patrick's Athletic in the FAI Cup final.
[40] After a period of much speculation and rumour, Pat Fenlon was finally appointed as manager of Derry City on 8 December 2006 for a three-year-long contract to fill the void left by former boss, Stephen Kenny.
During a press conference on 12 December Fenlon confirmed that he had already undertaken the challenge of finding a replacement for departed goal-keeper, David Forde, as well as convincing the club's out-of-contract squad-members to re-sign for the 2007 season.
[43] Prior to this, Derry City were entered into the draw for the 2007 Setanta Cup (qualifying due to their successes in 2006) on 7 December 2006 and were drawn in a very competitive Group 1 with Drogheda United, Glentoran and Linfield.
Likewise, on 15 December 2006 Paul Hegarty announced that he would be moving on from his role as assistant manager due to difficulties in relation to Pat Fenlon's new training schedules for the 2007 season, while Colm O'Neill, a fitness coach at the club, also left to join Stephen Kenny in Dunfermline.
Although some reports claimed that Curtis Fleming was to take the vacant assistant manager's position left at the club by the departure of much of Stephen Kenny's staff,[44] Pat Fenlon revealed that Anthony Gorman would fill the spot on 31 December.
[46] With goal-keeper Pat Jennings Jr. signing a new contract with the club in January 2007,[47] Fenlon was also linked with bringing in tall Norwegian striker, Øyvind Hoås of Fredrikstad, and highly rated Irish League player, Conor Downey of Cliftonville FC.
Two days later, he made another new addition to his squad – Peter Hynes – while also allowing fellow newcomer, Kyle Moran, to move to Shelbourne on loan to aid his fitness and development.
In the meantime, despite the club being pitted as favourites for the title by numerous bookmakers at the outset of the season, Derry City made a poor start, losing to strong title-contenders St. Patrick's Athletic and Drogheda United in their early-season confrontations.
Conceding four goals on his debut, however, Tidman also failed to inspire confidence as the club seemed to be missing David Forde following his pre-season departure to Cardiff City.
until 15 July 2007 (with the future option of that club being able to purchase the player for an agreed fee if they so wished) did not help matters, although Derry City did stand to make a considerable profit from the deal and were thus realistically unable to turn it down.
The club failed to progress once more, knocked out by Cypriot side APOEL on this occasion by an aggregate score of 5–1 after hoping they had kept the tie alive with just a 2–1 defeat in the first leg away in Cyprus.
Manager Stephen Kenny was delighted with the win stating: They have won the UEFA Cup twice and only a few years ago were in the group stages of the Champions League so this is a great night for everyone connected with Derry City.
The second leg was played at Parc des Princes on 28 September after the club were given the honour of a civic reception in Paris by the Irish ambassador to France, Anne Anderson.
[73] For that season's Champions League, Derry entered the first qualifying round draw as a seeded team, having had their UEFA coefficients boosted heavily after their successful run in 2006.
