St Mark’s Church & MCFC

Founded in 1862, and closed in 1974, St Marks Church stood about halfway along Clowes Street in West Gorton. The team that would become known as Manchester City FC was founded at St Mark’s in the winter of 1880 in a bid to bring the community together and provide an alternative to the gang culture of the 1870s. The team’s first recorded match occurred on 13 November 1880 against a church team from Macclesfield.