England Football Online
 Home  New Team Matches
Seasons Competition  Opponents Comment
Features Q & A Forum Appendices
Contact Us Page Last Updated 22 November 2004

England in the British Championship 1980-81 Season (86th)
 
British Championship Index

 

 

British Championship Table 1980-81 Season
Competition Abandoned - No Winner Declared
Team P W D L F A GD Pts
1-Scotland 3 2 0 1 3 2 +1 4
2-Wales 2 1 1 0 2 0 +2 3
3-England 2 0 1 1 0 1 -1 1
4-Northern Ireland 1 0 0 1 0 2 -2 0

Notes

In 1973 Northern Ireland's home British Championship match against England had been transferred to Liverpool from Belfast because civil unrest--"the troubles"-- forced Northern Ireland to play all their home matches away for three years.  This time, when both England and Wales refused to travel to Belfast because of the strife surrounding the Maze Prison hunger strike, no such accommodation was made.  The two matches were cancelled.  Only Scotland, which played Northern Ireland at home that year, completed the Championship match programme.  Consequently, the Championship was abandoned for the first time in its history and no winner was declared. 

British Championship Matches 1887-88 Season
Date Match Score Venue Att.
16-May-1981 Wales 2 Scotland 0 [2-0] Vetch Field, Swansea 18,985
16-May-1981 Northern Ireland vs. England - cancelled Windsor Park, Belfast -
19-May-1981 Scotland 2 Northern Ireland 0 [1-0] Hampden Park, Glasgow 22,248
20-May-1981 England 0 Wales 0 [0-0] Wembley Stadium, Wembley, London 34,280
22-May-1981 Northern Ireland vs. Wales - cancelled Windsor Park, Belfast -
23-May-1981 England 0 Scotland 1 [0-0] Wembley Stadium, Wembley, London 90,000

Notes

Northern Ireland had won the British Championship outright for the first time in 1979-80  (although united Ireland had done it once before in 1913-14).  And so the joint match programme prepared for Northern Ireland's two 1981 British Championship matches against England and Wales at Belfast's Windsor Park proudly proclaimed on its cover that the home side were the British Champions.   But the two matches were never held; both England and Wales refused to visit Belfast because of the civil unrest there.  The 1980-81 Championship was thus abandoned.