Our Kop

[Griffo]

Just been watching the antique road trip on bbc they were in Liverpool. Did a little segment on Liverpools Spion Kop which apparently is named from the Boar war. Does anyone know if our Kop was given the same name when created. I seem to have some recollection of that was the case but can not be sure.
Should read Our Kop blinking spell check

[eastsussexred]

Originally Posted by Griffo

Just been watching the antique road trip on bbc they were in Liverpool. Did a little segment on Liverpools Spion Kop which apparently is named from the Boar war. Does anyone know if our Kop was given the same name when created. I seem to have some recollection of that was the case but can not be sure.
Should read Our Kop blinking spell check

The first recorded reference to a sports terrace as "Kop" related to Woolwich Arsenal's Manor Ground in 1904.[2] A local newsman likened the silhouette of fans standing on a newly raised bank of earth to soldiers standing atop the hill at the Battle of Spion Kop. In 1906 Liverpool Echo sports editor Ernest Edwards noted of a new open-air embankment at Anfield: "This huge wall of earth has been termed 'Spion Kop', and no doubt this apt name will always be used in future in referring to this spot". The use of the name was given formal recognition in 1928 upon construction of a roof. Even though it could be the most well known, it was not the first terrace to carry the Spion Kop name; Arsenal's Manor Ground came before it.[3] Many other English football clubs and some rugby league clubs (such as Wigan's former home Central Park) applied the same name to stands in later years.
Villa Park's old Holte End was historically the largest of all Kop ends, closely followed by the old South Bank at Molineux, both once regularly holding crowds in excess of 30,000. However, in the mid-1980s work was completed on Hillsborough's Kop which, with a capacity of around 22,000, became the largest roofed terrace in Europe.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spion_Kop_(stadiums)


A lot of clubs used to have an embankment called the kop. I think I read that ours is the largest standing terrace of that era still in existence. I think it was just a name that was applied to the Crispin Lane End at a later date.

[eastsussexred]

The first mention of a 'Spion Kop' at The Racecourse that I can find dates from 1929. Obviously many years before the kop as we know it recieved it's current embankment, which I think was concreted in 1952.
The article appears to show that the embankment at The Crispin Lane end of the ground was already referred to as ' a spion kop' in 1929, but this was very common for many clubs of the time, who had their own spion kop, which was just another name for an embankment at a popular end of the ground.

[Red Light]

Saw the TV programme myself - interesting bit of history and I suppose makes a lot of sense in that, as in any battle the armies involved want to take, and control the highest ground - so that's where the football stadium reference comes in.

The Battle of Spion Kop (Dutch: Slag bij Spionkop; Afrikaans: Slag van Spioenkop) was fought about 38 km (24 mi) west-south-west of Ladysmith on the hilltop of Spioenkop(1) along the Tugela River, Natal in South Africa from 23–24 January 1900. It was fought between the South African Republic and the Orange Free State on the one hand and British forces during the Second Boer War campaign to relieve Ladysmith. It was a Boer victory.

[WXM76]

Always wondered why our kop had quite a lot of rows of barriers and evenly spaced compared to old photos of terraces such as Burnley, Liverpool, wolves etc.. where barriers seemed random and sparse.

Any idea why ours was designed / built like that? Was it always like that as haven't seen many old photos of an empty terrace from before the roof looking up from pitchside.

[eastsussexred]

Originally Posted by WXM76

Always wondered why our kop had quite a lot of rows of barriers and evenly spaced compared to old photos of terraces such as Burnley, Liverpool, wolves etc.. where barriers seemed random and sparse.

Any idea why ours was designed / built like that? Was it always like that as haven't seen many old photos of an empty terrace from before the roof looking up from pitchside.

Not sure. Could it be that our barriers were included in terraces that were concreted in the 1950's; later than other clubs, and therefore a bit more safety conscious?

[WasanActonlad]

Originally Posted by Red Light

Saw the TV programme myself - interesting bit of history and I suppose makes a lot of sense in that, as in any battle the armies involved want to take, and control the highest ground - so that's where the football stadium reference comes in.

The Battle of Spion Kop (Dutch: Slag bij Spionkop; Afrikaans: Slag van Spioenkop) was fought about 38 km (24 mi) west-south-west of Ladysmith on the hilltop of Spioenkop(1) along the Tugela River, Natal in South Africa from 23–24 January 1900. It was fought between the South African Republic and the Orange Free State on the one hand and British forces during the Second Boer War campaign to relieve Ladysmith. It was a Boer victory.

That would have been 21st anniversary of Rorkes Drift 22/23 Jan 1879,
which followed the worst known defeat of British Forces by native army at Isandwahana 22 Jan 1879.

(memo for British Army ......do not engage enemy forces in Africa between 22 and 24 January ever.....)

[brymboman]

The barriers on the kop were random in the sixties when I started going to matches and made of pipe a bit like a goal frame, these were replaced with the barriers we have now, I think this was done when the new roof was done, around the time tech end was developed

[Red Light]

South African War, also called Boer War, Second Boer War, or Anglo-Boer War; to Afrikaners, also known as the Second War of Independence, war fought from Oct. 11, 1899, to May 31, 1902, between Great Britain and the two Boer (Afrikaner) republics—the South African Republic (Transvaal) and the Orange Free State—resulting in British victory.

A fascinating time in our history - the number of British troops involved at the time and the internal politics back at home. The British eventually came out as winners but some of the tactics used were deplorable - the 'scorched earth policy' where villages were burnt to the ground with women and children made homeless, crops burnt, animals slaughtered, any form of food supply destroyed - then the Boers were herded up and imprisoned in concentration camps run by the British where thousand's died from hunger, thirst and disease.
40 years later in Nazi Germany a similar scenario was repeated although on a much greater scale.

I recall a partial day I spent at Shrewsbury Castle / museum which is well worth a visit - you think that when you learn about a battle or war in fairly recent times it is unique but delve into the decades and quite often the alarming thing I found was it had frequently happened before - perhaps too far back to remember by people today but go back a number of generations and we were fighting in far off lands, often in the same place with less advanced weaponery. And out of all this comes the 'spion kop'.