Northampton Town FC

Dave Bowen managed Northampton Town for five years from 1960, and in that stretch took the club from the Fourth Division to the First, a rise that stands unmatched in English football. The single season in the top flight came in 1965/66; the stand behind one goal at Sixfields now carries his name.

The club had started out in a different way altogether, formed on 6 March 1897 in a room at the Princess Royal Inn by a group of local schoolteachers and a solicitor, A. J. "Pat" Darnell. The original plan was to call it simply Northampton Football Club, until the town's rugby club objected and Town was added to keep the two apart.

The nickname came from the shoemaking trade that once defined the town: the Cobblers, with supporters known as the Shoe Army. There is little glamour in the honours list to match that industry — the closest the club came to major silverware was the 1909 Charity Shield, lost to Newcastle United, and the Southern League title won that same year. Promotions have mattered more than cups here: the Fourth Division title arrived twice, in 1986/87 and again in 2015/16, either side of a play-off final win over Swansea City in 1997 and another over Tranmere Rovers in 2020.

Sixfields has been home since 1994, replacing the County Ground where the club had played from its earliest days. The ground's east stand reopened in March 2025 after redevelopment, taking capacity to 8,203. On matchdays the fiercest exchanges are saved for Peterborough United, met in what both sets of supporters call the Nene derby, named for the river that runs through both towns.

Two FA Trophy finals, in 1983 and 1989, both ended in defeat to York City. A first spell among the elite of English football, brief as it was, has never been repeated.