Barnet

Woodville FC lasted three seasons in the 1880s before folding into New Barnet FC, and when that side collapsed too under financial strain in the early 1900s, it was Barnet Avenue FC — formed in 1890 — that took up the name in 1904. Even then the identity did not settle straight away: in 1912 the club merged with Barnet Alston FC, a works team grown out of Alston's factory, and played for seven years as Barnet and Alston in the Athenian League before reverting to plain Barnet FC in 1919.

For the best part of eighty years the club stayed amateur, and did well out of it: seven Athenian League titles between 1931 and 1965, plus the FA Amateur Cup in 1946. Lester Finch was the face of that era, part of the side that lifted the Amateur Cup. The step up came in 1965, when Barnet turned semi-professional and joined the Southern League — Les Eason, the first player signed under professional terms, marked the change by scoring 31 goals in that first season. Full professional status followed with entry to the Football League in 1991, the same year the club topped the Conference for the first time; three more Conference titles came in 2005, 2015 and 2025.

Home matches are played at The Hive, a 6,500-capacity ground with 5,419 seats, and the amber and black kit gave the club its nickname — the colouring is meant to recall a bee, hence the Bees. The fiercest of their rivalries is with Wealdstone, fought out as a north London derby, with Boreham Wood supplying the more local, Hertfordshire-flavoured needle.

Few who pulled on the shirt are remembered as fondly as John Akinde, who scored 87 goals in 166 games between 2014 and 2018 and was on the pitch when the club won the 2015 National League title.