A brief history of Kingstonian F.C. grounds- 1885 to date.


1885-1886- Bushy Park
1886-1888- Spring Grove
1888-1889- Oil Mill Lane (Villiers Road)
1889-1898- The Fairfield
1898-1901- Dinton Road
1901-1902- Lower Marsh Lane (Near Spring Grove)
1902-1914- Thorpe Road
1908-1914- Norbiton
In 1908-1909 season the club had split with Kingston-On-Thames continuing to play at Thorpe Road with a breakaway team Old Kingstonians moving to Kingston Road, Norbiton. This was named Old Kingstonians Football and Sports Ground.
1919- Jan 1988- Richmond Road
Jan 1988 - May 1989- The Beveree, Hampton
Groundsharing with Hampton F.C. Some games played at Carshalton F.C. when fixtures clashed.
1989- 2017- Kingsmeadow (Norbiton)
In season 2002-2003 there was a groundshare with A.F.C. Wimbledon being tenants and from 2003-2004 onwards with A.F.C. Wimbledon being landlords.
2017-2018- Fetcham Grove, Leatherhead
Groundsharing with Leatherhead F.C.
2018-2022- King George's Field, Tolworth
Groundsharing with Corinthian-Casuals F.C.
2022-2024- Imperial Fields, Mitcham
Groundsharing with Tooting & Mitcham United F.C.
2024 to date- Prince George's Playing Field, Raynes Park
Groundsharing with Raynes Park Vale F.C.

A map of the area of Kingston roughly south of the town centre in 1894 courtesy Kingston Heritage Service. The three locations marked in red are a rough guess as to the likely areas of some of the pre-World War One grounds used by Kingstonian F.C. during the period when they underwent several name changes:
1- Spring Grove, 2- Oil Mill Lane, 3- Lower Marsh Lane.
It shows the semi-rural nature for those grounds that make it hard to pin down exact locations. Middle Mill, towards the top of the map, were early rivals of the club.



On their formation as Kingston & Surbiton Y.M.C.A. in the 1885-1886 season, the club's first home ground was in Bushy Park. The team had to provide goalposts and netting but did not have to pay any rent.

For the following two seasons they paid for a groundshare at a private ground owned by a Mr. Wilcox and to be shared with Dr. Dawes School at Spring Grove. The description of the ground says it was in a field between Grove Lane and Beaufort Road. They then moved to Oil Mill Lane (which was to become Villiers Road), with changing rooms at the Victoria Hotel in Albert Road. Little is known about the arrangement or the exact location of the ground but, given the location of their changing rooms, was very likely close to the Fairfield and Hawks Road.

There was then a long spell of nearly ten years of playing at the Fairfield. This was public land and the club could not charge anything for admission. Towards the end of this period the club would make arrangements for the more important games to be played at other grounds including Kingston Barracks in Kings Road, Queen Elizabeth School (now Kingston Grammar School), and the Kingston Rugby Ground in Richmond Road. This allowed them to charge an entrance fee to help with their finances when they had previously just been relying on members' subscriptions and donations.

In the 1898-1899 season the club, now known as Kingston-On-Thames F.C., was able to rent a private ground at Dinton Road, North Kingston that allowed them to charge admission. The ground was a 2 minute walk from their base and changing rooms at the Alexandra Hotel in Park Road. Season tickets were offered for the first time at 3s 2d (less than 20p), although those prices excluded cup tie matches.

Before the 1901-1902 season, and having been given notice to quit Dinton Road, the club were offered a new ground in fields owned by supporter Harry Offer. This was at Lower Marsh Lane and they chose a field facing New Portland Road with changing rooms at the Kelly Arms. Unfortunately this ground was not well received because of the location and access problems and resulted in greatly diminished attendances which also coincided with a drop in form and problems in maintaining a reserve team.

A return to North Kingston was made after just one season at Lower Marsh Lane and was to be their final move before World War One. The rugby club had been experiencing a drop in interest with poor finances, so were willing to sublet the top pitch at their Richmond Road ground with an entrance in Thorpe Road.

In 1908-1909 season the club split, with Old Kingstonians taking most of the first team players with them. David Judd, the effective owner of Old Kingstonians, bought a large area of land in Norbiton on the Kingston Road. This was mostly used for building development but he had an area of land set aside for Old Kingstonians to play close to the site of the modern Kingsmeadow. He had held the contract for Thorpe Road and there was a tense Summer for Kingston-On-Thames F.C as to whether they would have a ground to play at. However, having secured his own ground for his team, Judd was happy to relinquish the rights to the Thorpe Road lease. The Norbiton ground was modern by the standards of the time and the rivalry between the two teams encouraged improvements to facilities at both grounds.

After World War One, with the newly reunited Kingstonian F.C., the 1919-1920 season saw a ground secured at Richmond Road on the site of the old Rugby ground. Kingstonian were sole tenants and moved their old stand on Thorpe Road down to the Richmond Road site. However in 1920-1921 their ground situation became precarious. In a story shrouded in mystery the owners were led to believe that Kingstonian did not want to renew the tenancy and Leyland Motors signed up to play there. Eventually a deal was negotiated with both teams sharing the ground.

In the Summer of 1921, Kingstonian were given the option to buy the Richmond Road ground outright by the Dysart Trustees who owned the land. This covered the land that was the first team pitch as well as a second "top pitch", previously the Thorpe Road ground from pre-World War One. The second pitch was to be used for reserve fixtures when the first team pitch was already in use. Sammy Emms secured the option on the purchase with a £250 deposit but it became a struggle to raise the total sale price of £5,000. Despite the purchase being billed as a ground for the whole borough, only around £1,000 had been raised towards the initial payment of £2,500 and Emms was highly critical of the Kingston public's response given this was the only enclosed sports facility in the town. The original deadline of August 1921 for the £2,500 deposit was not met and it was only due to a donation of £1,000 by Dr. R.N. Goodman that K's were finally able to reach the £2,500 mark in November of that year with the balance remaining to be paid by April 1923.

 

Sale agreement for Richmond Road ground showing the area purchased by Kingstonian.


Despite all of this financial uncertainty, K's immediately went ahead with building a main stand costing £1,100 that provided 1,500 covered seats and it was opened as quickly as January 1922. A bank mortgage of £4,000 to cover the ground and new stand was arranged and ownership was finally transferred into K's name. Income was good at the time and the club were gradually making repayments on the mortgage. Although their early finances were good, there was a period before and after the war where the club's finances were not so strong, and they had been in negotiations with the council to buy the top pitch. Negotiations were slow and looked likely to fail due to council funding constraints, but as crowds and finances improved after the war Kingstonian had no need to sell the land, although they still had a £3,000 mortgage on the ground as late as 1950. Various estimates were given for the ground capacity, some as high as 15,000 or more, but the ground never hosted a crowd of more than about 10,000 people.

Leyland Motors F.C. had continued to use Richmond Road, as tenants, until the 1925-1926 season when Casuals F.C. replaced them and Leyland Motors found a ground further down Richmond Road. During the war, when Kingstonian F.C. suspended operations, the whole of the ground was requisitioned by the Civil Defence and eventually allotments were created on the top pitch. The main pitch continued in use for Civil Defence matches, war benefit games, as well as being used by Metropolitan Police F.C. on a number of occasions.

Casuals had merged with Corinthians just before the war and Corinthian-Casuals played at Richmond Road during the 1945-1946 season. However, because the reserve "top pitch" was being used for wartime allotments, Corinthian-Casuals were asked to leave before the 1946-1947 season in order for Kingstonian to use the main pitch to accomodate Reserve and 3rd Teams more easily. The top pitch remained as allotments for some time after the war and K's were only being paid £9 a year for the rental. After intervention from their solicitors the rental was increased to £120 a year in 1948, which possibly facilitated the return of the pitch for use by the Reserves, and it was returned to the club in time for the 1950-1951 season.

 

Richmond Road pictured in the 1980's- Picture courtesy David Crawt.


During the 1950's K's were relatively solvent, although they were to sell part of the frontage of the ground to Shell for them to build a petrol station, and there had also been rumours about the sale of the reserve pitch. However their finances markedly deteriorated during the 1960's as crowds dropped and success was harder to come by. A new clubhouse was built between the First and Reserve team pitches in 1963 but this new revenue stream didn't prevent a further decline in the finances. K's had taken on a loan from Sammy Emms in 1965 of £11,000 at a cheaper rate than would have been offered commercially. This had increased to £15,000 by 1972 when they announced the sale of the reserve pitch, which had been leased to Surbiton Byron F.C., to be developed for housing. They claimed this made them one of the richest clubs in Amateur football. However, with a further downturn in their fortunes and an old ground in desperate need of upgrading, they made the decision to sell the Richmond Road ground for housing in the mid 1980's. A long term 999 year lease was agreed with Kingston council at Norbiton Sports Ground, which was to be renamed Kingsmeadow. The club spent a season and a half groundsharing at Hampton from 1988 to 1989 until the new ground was completed.


A brief groundshare at Hampton during 1988 and 1989. Picture courtesy David Crawt.


In exchange for the lease, Kingstonian paid for the development of the whole site and constructed a purpose built stadium for themselves with an official capacity of 6,000, considered suitable for League Football. However the actual capacity seemed to reduce to about 4,500 whenever they held a sell out game and further ground regulations brought in by the Football League made it inadequate for League Football by the time Kingstonian were promoted to the Football Conference.


The newly completed Kingsmeadow Stadium in 1989- Picture courtesy David Crawt.


Promotion to the Football Conference in 1997/1998 season gave Kingstonian 3 successful seasons, but the cost of ground improvements undertaken to allow them the chance of competing in League Football together with an expensive squad, resulted, after their eventual relegation, in the club going into Finanical Administation during October 2001. After nearly a year of negotiations between the administrators and various interested parties, the club was bought by Rajesh Khosla. Almost immediately he entered into a groundshare agreement with the newly formed A.F.C. Wimbledon and a year later he offered them the purchase of the ground. Terms were negotiated for a 20 year lease agreement for Kingstonian to play there but by 2016-2017 season A.F.C. Wimbledon had gained Football League status following regular promotions and were given an opportunity to return near to the original home of Wimbledon F.C. in Plough Lane. Negotiations began for K's to leave Kingsmeadow entirely and for Chelsea F.C. to buy the ground for use by their womens team. A deal was agreed with around £1m given to Kingstonian for the purposes of finding a new ground and the cost of short term groundshares.

Since the 2017-2018 season Kingstonian have been involved in 4 different groundshares while searching for a permanent new home.

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