Peterborough United - London Road

Peterborough United FC

London Road

Peterborough

Cambridgeshire

PE2 8AL

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Ground: 1

Date: Tuesday 3rd August 2004

Peterborough United 1-1 Norwich City

Pre-Season Friendly
Attendance: 3,308 (official)

Peterborough United FC - History

Peterborough United, commonly known as "The Posh" were founded in 1934 to replace the recently-folded Peterborough & Fletton United. They played in the old Midland League for the first 25 or so years of their existence, winning it six times (including five times in a row from 1956-1960).

Peterborough first entered the Football League in the 1960/61 season, winning the Fourth Division at the first attempt. They then spent seven seasons in the Third Division and reached the Quarter Finals of the FA Cup in 1964/65, eventually losing to Chelsea after beating Arsenal and Swansea Town in previous rounds.

In 1968, Peterborough were relegated back to the Fourth Division for financial irregularities. Six seasons later, the club once again won the Fourth Division to return to the Third Division and, in 1977/78, almost won promotion to the Second Division.

After this, the club struggled, relegated back to the Fourth Division, where they spent 12 seasons before finally winning promotion to the Third Division again in 1991. The following season saw Peterborough reach the League Cup Quarter Finals, beating Wimbledon, Newcastle United and Liverpool before losing to Middlesbrough in a replay. Peterborough also reached the Football League Trophy area final in this season, but lost to Stoke. The club then went on to secure a play-off spot on the last day of the season, eventually earning promotion from the Third Division to the newly-named First Division.

They played in the First Division from 1992-1994, eventually being relegated back to the Second Division (formerly the Third Division). In 1997, Peterborough were relegated from the Second Division to the Third Division, and this was followed by a few years of yo-yoing between the Second and Third Divisions.

In 2007/08 and 2008/09, Peterborough earned back-to-back promotions from League 2 to the Championship, before being relegated back to League 1 in 2009/10. This was then followed up by an immediate return to the Championship, but they once again found themselves in League 1 after relegation on the final day of the 2012/13 season. Since then, Peterborough have maintained their position in League 1 without ever particularly looking likely to be promoted or relegated.

My Visits

I've visited London Road three times so far, each time to watch my team Norwich City play there. The first of these visits is the one which I have chosen to focus on here. This was for a pre-season friendly just before the start of the 2004/05 season, which was Norwich's first campaign as a Premier League club in my lifetime. I'm going to be honest here and say that I actually remember very little about this first visit, other than the fact that it definitely happened (not surprising as I was only 5 years old at the time). I've also been unable to find a match report anywhere online, although I did find team line-ups from the day as well as the attendance: there were 3,308 people at the ground on that day, 1,173 of which were away fans. I also know who scored and when: Callum Willock gave Peterborough the lead on 22 minutes, before Norwich's David Bentley (on loan from Arsenal) equalised on 59 minutes.

My other visits were for a pre-season friendly on 28th July 2012 (which Norwich won 2-0, with goals from Steve Morison on 33 minutes and James Vaughan on 85 minutes) and an FA Cup 3rd Round tie on 5th January 2013 (which Norwich won 3-0, with goals from Elliott Bennett on 30 minutes, Simeon Jackson on 41 minutes and Robert Snodgrass on 70 minutes) in front of a bumper crowd of 13,198 (including 5,088 Norwich fans).

The Ground

London Road is a fairly decent ground as far as League 1 is concerned, with 3 seated stands and 1 covered terrace behind one of the goals. The ground has an overall capacity of 15,314, of which 12,647 is seated (the remaining 2,667 is accounted for by the aforementioned terrace, also known as the London Road Terrace).

Photos

I wasn't actively groundhopping at the time of any of my visits to London Road, so I didn't bother taking any photos. However, I'm sure that Norwich will cross paths with Peterborough again soon enough to give me the opportunity to return and take some photos.