Before Burnley had even been formed, Rovers already had a fierce rivalry with a local team; Darwen. The football party of the club had been founded in 1875, the same year as Rovers, although the club itself can trace its roots back to 1870, when rugby was played rather than the round ball game. It took five years until it adapted to Football Association rules. The club played at Barley Bank, an area near the motorway turning is now and set back about a hundred metres from Bolton Road. Darwen are remembered as the first professional football club in the world. This happened in 1878 with the signing of two Scottish players, Fergie Suter (who had played for Partick Thistle and Turton) and James Love (from Partick Thistle). Although lip-service was paid to the FA by pretending that they also worked in the town, it is was an open secret that this work was not of the most strenuous kind. Indeed, it involved not even having to go to the workplace!

Darwen emerged as the first and certainly at least equally the most hostile of the rivals of Blackburn Rovers. This rivalry started in earnest with the defection of Suter to Rovers, allegedly because they offered him more money (again he was assigned a token job to try and dampen claims of professionalism). Although Suter claimed he moved to Rovers for ‘personal reasons’ it is safe to assume that he was Rovers’ first professional player. The Darwen board was incensed.

The results of this antagonism were the scenes in the friendly at Alexandra Meadows in 1880 between the two clubs. A massive crowd for the time of over 10,000 saw two teams kicking and fouling each other repeatedly. In the second half the centre-of-attraction Fergie Suter began fighting with Jack Marshall of Darwen (a future England international) which led to a pitch invasion by both sets in fans in an attempt to reproduce the fighting. The game was abandoned in scenes of chaos and the dressing rooms were ransacked. A mirror was reported as having been smashed, although I’ve no idea why this was deemed to be such an important piece of news. Maybe there was a mirror-shortage of the time, who knows?

Hostilities looked to be about to be restored when the two sides were drawn together in the Lancashire Cup. However they refused to agree a date for the match for so long that the Lancashire FA threw both teams out of the competition. Darwen were so aggrieved with the officials that they withdrew from the competition the next season as well! By then Darwen had become the first Northern team to have a decent run in the FA Cup, reaching the semi-finals in 1881.

The next season they faced Rovers in the FA Cup for the second time (Rovers won the first tie 3-1 in 1880) and were thrashed 5-1 as Rovers marched on to the cup final. Darwen gained their revenge by knocking Rovers out in the second round the next year by the only goal. It was to be their last time they could ever really compete with Rovers, as the blue-and-whites went on to record their hat-trick of cup wins. A fourth and final meeting in the FA Cup in 1888 resulted in a 3-0 Rovers victory at Barley Bank in front of over 10,000 fans.

Despite being initially left behind in the scramble for a Football League place, Darwen were elected to the league in time for the 1891/92 season, in which they promptly finished bottom and failed to be re-elected, falling into the newly formed Second Division. Their most memorable result in that season would probably have to be their woeful 12-0 pummelling by West Bromwich Albion, which remains the heaviest defeat ever suffered in the top league. They lost both their games against Rovers.

Despite this setback, they won promotion back to the top division after beating Notts County 3-2 in a test match (a precursor to the playoffs of today). This second season in the top flight was to be their last as they finished second from bottom and were relegated. Again they got no favours from Rovers, losing both games. Darwen remained a Second Division league club until 1899, when they did not seek to be re-elected. They did break some records along the way however. In 1896/97 they went the entire season without a draw, the only club to ever do so in a league season. In 1898/99 they were rubbish and lost 18 games in a row- still a Football League record, although Sunderland came close in 2004. They also conceded 141 goals in 34 games. Again, a record they probably didn’t want at the time but at least know it keeps them in the memory. With those types of performance it was unsurprising to hear they decided not to reapply to the league, especially as their financial performance matched that displayed on the pitch in levels of awfulness.

Darwen were never the same again and became a part-time non-league club. They did have a mini-revival in the thirties when they reached the third round of the FA Cup by beating Chester 2-1 in front of more than a 10,000 crowd at the Anchor Ground in Darwen. They had lost the use of the Barley Bank ground in 1899 when they fell out the league and moved to the Anchor Ground site where they remain to this day, near the Anchor Service Station and the Anchor Hotel off the main road in Darwen (there is only one main road in Darwen). Drawn away to the greatest team of the day in the third round, Arsenal, they lost 11-1. Despite the defeat, their share of the gate receipts paid for a new stand. It was to be seen as a golden era, as they were allowed to enter the FA Cup at the first round stage for the next four years but kind of messed it up by losing every time. Darwen have not reached the first round of the FA Cup since the Second World War.

Darwen continue today in the North West Counties League. Although they were lucky enough to have a good side and decent following at the beginning of professional football they were unlucky enough to be too close to Blackburn Rovers to survive as a league club. In the other direction, Bolton chipped away at their support. However, they still played an important part in the growth of professional football and remain today as a football club, unlike other rivals of the period such as Blackburn Park Road, Accrington (the original league club), Turton, Witton and Blackburn Olympic, all of whom simply folded or gave up. They are also still in the record books, though mainly for what was inflicted upon them rather than what they achieved themselves.

[edit] Darwen results against Blackburn Rovers in major competitions.

• 1879/80 – FA CUP R2 – Blackburn Rovers 3 Darwen 1
• 1881/82 – FA CUP R4 - Blackburn Rovers 5 Darwen 1
• 1882/83 – FA CUP R2 – Darwen 1 Blackburn Rovers 0
• 1887/88 – FA CUP R5 – Darwen 0 Blackburn Rovers 3

• 1891/92 – DIVISION ONE – Blackburn Rovers 4 Darwen 0
• 1891/92 – DIVISION ONE – Darwen 3 Blackburn Rovers 5
• 1893/94 – DIVISION ONE – Blackburn Rovers 4 Darwen 1
• 1893/94 – DIVISION ONE – Darwen 2 Blackburn Rovers 3