Hope & Glory Sportswear are delighted to announce a partnership with Wanderers FC to become their new kit manufacturer.
Starting immediately, the deal will see the Hope & Glory supply the bespoke playing kit, replica shirts, travel / training wear and other merchandise to the historic club.
Wanderers were one of the dominant teams of the early years of organised football and won the FA Cup on five occasions, including defeating Royal Engineers in the first FA Cup final in 1872.
After the formation of The Football Association (the FA) in 1863, of which the club was among the founder members, Wanderers became one of the strongest teams playing by FA rules. They won the FA Cup three times in succession during the late 1870s, a feat which has only been repeated once. Among the players who represented the club were Charles W. Alcock, the so-called “father of modern sport” who proposed the creation of the FA Cup, and Arthur Kinnaird, regarded as the greatest player of his day and a five-time FA Cup winner and nine-time finalist. The club took its name from never having a home stadium of its own but playing at various locations in London and the surrounding area but, in 2019, the club successfully completed a crowdfunding campaign to put down roots in Upper Norwood. Virgo Fidelis Convent Senior School will be the club’s new home ground
The current club was reformed in 2009 to continue the name Wanderers, with the endorsement of the descendants of the Alcock family, to raise money for charity. Since 2011, the revived club has competed in the Surrey South Eastern Combination and currently runs two men’s XIs, a women’s XI, who compete in the Greater London Women’s Football League, several weekly training sessions, and a lively social calendar including annual overseas tours, to Portugal, Spain, Bulgaria, Poland, and more. Over 50 nations have been represented by players who have turned out for Wanderers teams over the past decade and this, their matches abroad, and their historic role in the world’s oldest, knock-out, football competition, has led them to adopt the identity of ‘The World’s Club’.
Recently, Wanderers partnered with a team in Ghana, who they provide kit and equipment for, Brixistane FC, a youth football club also based in south London, and announced that the current charity partner will be CALM.
Players and supporters will be able to buy Wanderers kit through a new web store and pre-orders can be placed, once the new designs have been revealed.
