English Park

Before there was football at 127 Cranford Street, there were bicycles: the ground in St Albans was in use for cycle racing by 1927, and motorcycle speedway ran there until 1929. The date the stadium proper opened, and who built it, are not settled.

What it kept from that history is a habit of hosting other people's occasions. English Park staged the Chatham Cup final in 1962, and again in 1972 for a replay, and it was chosen for the Centenary Chatham Cup Final in 2023 — six decades between the first and the most recent, on a ground that has also held the Kate Sheppard Cup final. In 1975 a Canterbury XI played Rangers here.

The pitch is no longer the one those finals were played on. During the 2010–2011 renovations the natural grass came out and artificial turf went down, which is why the ground now takes the traffic it does: it is home to Canterbury United Dragons and to Western AFC, and it houses the headquarters of Mainland Football besides.

It has never staged a FIFA or OFC tournament final, and no record attendance figure is on the books for it.