Goodison Park
Before Goodison Park
Before Goodison Park
Everton originally played on an open pitch in the south-east corner of the newly laid out Stanley Park (on a site where rival Liverpool FC considered building a stadium over a century later). The first official match following the renaming of the club from St. Domingo's to Everton was at Stanley Park, staged on 20 December 1879; St. Peter's was the opposition, and admission was free. In 1882, a man named J. Cruit donated land at Priory Road with the necessary facilities required for professional clubs, but asked the club to leave his land after two years because the crowds became too large and noisy.
Before Goodison Park
In the 1890s, a dispute about how the club was to be owned and run emerged with John Houlding, Anfield's majority owner and Everton's Chairman, at the forefront. Houlding disagreed with the club's committee initially disagreeing about the full purchase of the land at Anfield from minor land owner Mr Orrell escalating into a principled disagreement of how the club was run. Two such disagreements included Houlding wanting Everton to sell only his brewery products during an event and for the Everton players to use his public house The Sandon as changing room facilities.
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