The announcement that the Premier League would return on June 17 was greeted, by and large, with relish across the country.
Football’s cancellation left a void in our lives that we’ve been trying to fill ever since with podcasts, TV repeats, and, more recently, the Bundesliga.
But whilst the return of elite sport is a welcome one, clubs that sit further down the pyramid are still in panic.
Lower league football is finished for the foreseeable future, with the 2020/21 season still shrouded in uncertainty. It remains a very real and worrying possibility that COVID-19 may ultimately claim some clubs forever.
In the meantime, fans are finding solace in looking back through the footballing archives, distracting themselves with great chapters of history and origin stories.
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In the case of every club, there’s so much to explore. Football found its feet in separate parts of the country in so many different ways – but the true tale of how the sport took off in Manchester remained hidden until six years ago.
Manchester’s original football club: Hulme Athenaeum
Turton FC was, for many years, believed to be the oldest club in the Lancashire region – founded way back in 1871.
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But when researchers Gary James and Dave Day elected to delve through the annals of local history in 2014, they discovered the region’s first association football team had been forgotten.
Eight years prior to Turton, there was Hulme Athenaeum.
The memories of Manchester’s original football club have been published in James/Day’s paper, The Emergence of an Association Football Culture in Manchester 1840–1884 – a document that ultimately rewrote football history (and has since been expanded upon in James’ superb book: The emergence of footballing cultures, Manchester 1840-1919).
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Research shows that Hulme was one of the most impoverished local areas during the 19th century, with the neighbourhood described as being ‘sunk in filth.’
Sir William Thackeray Marriott – an ordained deacon and curate of St George’s Church and champion of working-class rights – helped to introduce sports to the poverty-stricken settlement in the 1850s, with the aim of giving residents an outlet.
This led to the opening of a clubhouse in 1860 – which was given the name ‘Hulme Athenaeum.’
Sir William Thackeray Marriot – A deacon in Hulme and later an MP
In 1863, members of the club began playing an ‘elementary association game’, before eventually introducing dribbling and passing.
Football was far from prevalent in the North-West at the time and was a new activity for some of the players – several of whom seemingly joined the club purely to take advantage of the clubhouse facilities.
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According to James & Day: “Gas rental collector James Warrington, an early captain of the football club during the 1860s, later admitted he joined ‘for the sake of the gymnasium’.”
Membership was charged at one shilling, and with fifty members in the ranks Hulme Athenaeum ended up developing into an organised, ambitious football club – producing consistently updated records.
Evidence shows they played fixtures every Saturday over the course of five consecutive seasons, competing against the likes of Sale and, a little further afield, Garrick – a team in Sheffield.
With football still in its infancy, rules weren’t exactly concrete, meaning clubs would have to adapt to different regulations when they visited another area; similar to the way you might begrudgingly play along to friends’ Monopoly laws when you’re in their home over the holidays.
One match report from Hulme and Garrick, for example, states that “Sheffield rules” were used.
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Gary James
After 1873, the name Hulme Athenaeum vanished into the footballing wilderness, but James believes the club’s brief existence was crucial to the development of the game in the region.
He states: “Despite the failure to create a viable fixture list each season, the club did encourage individuals to adopt the game at a time when formal association football, if later chroniclers of the game are to be believed, did not exist in Lancashire.
“Moreover, the club deliberately engaged with lower middle class and working men within a densely populated area of the city.”
Some of the men that represented Hulme continued to play on after the team folded – signing for the second club founded in the city: Manchester Association.
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Man City Gifts
As word travelled and the game of football gathered momentum, people came to watch as well as play; leading to the birth of more local clubs in the 1880s such as West Gorton St Mark’s – who eventually turned into Manchester City (via Ardwick AFC) – and Newton Heath Lancashire & Yorkshire Railway: Who would become Manchester United.
Hulme Athenaeum wasn’t just the club that laid the groundwork for local football. It was also an organisation that proved the first people playing the game in Manchester were ordinary, working blokes.
“While football now might be thought of as a predominantly working class sport, typically football clubs in the 1860s were founded by public schools who also set the rules,” says James.
“The re-discovery of Hulme Athenaeum challenges that perception.”
Feature
Hardcastle Crags – the prettiest autumn walk in the North West with a great restaurant at the end
Daisy Jackson
This is the time of year where it’s particularly difficult to drag yourself off the sofa and into the great outdoors.
The weather isn’t quite crisp enough to feel festive and most of us (even the pumpkin spice latte, cardigan-clad crew) are missing the more reliable warmth of the summer months.
But autumn is here, like it or not, and it definitely has its perks.
One of which is the undeniable beauty the season brings.
It’s not just the blazing red, orange, yellow and brown leaves that suddenly take over the green spaces around the UK.
It’s also in the sunsets and sunrises that become so much easier to catch while the days are shorter (you have to admit, the commutes are prettier when they coincide with sunrise).
The riverside walk at Hardcastle Crags. Credit: Unsplash
And there aren’t many places better to soak in all the autumn beauty than Hardcastle Crags, just across the border in West Yorkshire.
The National Trust site sits between Leeds and Manchester and is a popular day trip destination for Mancs, given the trains that run regularly to Hebden Bridge.
A walking route around Hardcastle Crags at this time of year will take you through a landscape of blazing orange trees, babbling streams, and dappled sunlight.
When you catch a golden autumnal day the leaves will crunch underfoot, but even on a soggy day the leaf mulch has its own special kind of beauty here.
There are two walking routes between the main car park and Gibson Mill, a former 19th century cotton mill which is now home to a lovely cafe.
One will take you down to the river, where wooden boardwalks weave right along the water’s edge.
There are even stepping stones you can use to scamper across the river – a great Instagram pic, or just a way to keep the kids entertained for a few minutes.
A walk around Hardcastle Crags in Autumn. Credit: The Manc Group
The other route goes up through the upper woodland, where pine trees loom and you get a great view of the valley below.
For an easy loop, you can do both – a stroll through the trees, a stop for coffee and cake, then return along the river (or vice versa).
But with 15 miles of footpaths, you can explore way beyond that.
The National Trust’s list of walks includes everything from a wheelchair and pram-accessible estate track to peaceful woodland loops, to rocky scrambles and former railway lines.
And when you’re done with Hardcastle Crags itself, there’s a world-class restaurant in the gorgeous town centre itself.
Coin sits in the shell of the former Lloyd’s bank, with exposed brick and massive period windows, and specialises in natural wine and small plates.
When The Manc Eats visited, we found plates of freshly-cut meat and cheese served alongside ice-cold batched classic cocktails, where ‘quality is key, and it shines through on the plate’.
Our reviewer said: “With its higgledy-piggledy stone mill houses, surrounding woodland, hidden waterfalls and treasure-trove charity shops, Hebden Bridge is a popular attraction all of its own for those wanting to venture beyond the city. Coin is simply the cherry on top.”
In celebration of Momo Shop: a Chorlton favourite that has flourished since its rebrand
Danny Jones
It’s not often we go out of our way to hammer home just how staggering we found a restaurant, but after now losing track of the number of times that a member of our team has eaten at Momo Shop in Chorlton and come back near speechless, it deserves more than a review.
We regularly hold ourselves back and resist the urge to talk in superlatives wherever possible, especially because we worry we might be falling into the recency bias trap, but in this instance, we’re going to go out on a limb and fall on our hospitality sword. Well, this particular writer is…
It’s official: Momo Shop Nepali Street Food – for our money, anyway – is up there with one of THE best restaurants in Manchester right now.
And there are plenty of reasons why, not least of all because of the years of practice they have feeding increasingly discerning Manc diners under a different moniker.
Simple but charming – all the focus is on the foodAnd the food speaks for itselfSome of the most flavourful fillings you’ll find in ManchesterBusy any given night of the weekNo review (Credit: The Manc Eats/Momo Shop via Instagram)
If you don’t live in/frequent Chorlton, you’ll be forgiven for thinking that this gaff was a somewhat new addition to Chorlton, but in actual fact it’s been gradually growing a loyal and passionate following for more than seven years.
This is because before the miniamlist rebrand that saw the walls stripped back, the exterior painted blue and cutesy little bits of artwork hung amidst that familiar and atmospheric festoon lighting, Momo Shop was once The Little Yeti.
Its former iteration boasted hundreds of glowing reviews in its own right, which already plated up plenty of stunning Nepalese food, but since switching primarily towards serving a menu primarily made up of momos (Tibetan-style fried dumplings hand-folded into various shapes) they’ve well and truly shone.
Now approaching a full 12 months under the new name, the Nepali street food spot isn’t just one of a relatviely small handful considering how much great South Asian food there is across Greater Manchester, we’d wager it could be the very best representing that Alpine-Himalayan belt in our region.
Our latest visit was genuinely just as good as our first, second, third and so on – take your pick.
From the simply incredible deep fried pork dumplings and the deeply moorish butter sauce that goes with literally any momo filling, to the super traditional buffalo ones that are not only authentic but, come on, where else can you find such a unique meat in these parts? It’s some of the best food we’ve eaten.
And we don’t just mean of late; Momo Shop might genuinely among of the nicest scran we’ve had in ages and it’s no exagerration to say that the first taste we enjoyed from many of these flavours have formed some of the strongest culinary memories we’ve created in quite a while.
It’s also worth nothing that it isn’t just one main snack-sized dish. The chow mein, keema noodles and cheesy chops are showstoppers themselves, and we’ve already booked in again for a 30th birthday celebration purely so we can try those lambs ribs and their take on a shashlick.
Nevertheless, we love the idea of the numerous configurations and concotions by pairing different dumplings and owner Niti Karki gave us some pro-tips of the best duos and even let us in on the trade secret of her go-to combo when she’s hungover. Legend.
Once again, at the risk of sounding too hyperbolic, odd moments have felt like core foodie memories on a par with our favourite all-time meals.
Personally, I’m glad to report that this isn’t just a review: consider this a declaration that Momo Shop has quickly become my favourite restaurant not just in Chorlton but in all of central Manchester, something I haven’t had since the heartbreaking closure of Cocktail Beer Ramen + Bun in 2023.
Plenty of varietyDamn straightNiti = absolute iconWe’ll keep your condiment secret forever, Niti…
There might be an element of the almost HakkaPo-esque style drawings, the colour palette and the carefully curated pop-punk, old school emo and post-hardcore playlist that’s over half a decade in the making that makes particualrly partial to this place
But before we wrap up this glorified love letter parading as a ‘review’, we also want to give a special nod to the charming staff and Niti’s mum, specficially, who was too modest to even let us share her picture, but whose wealth of wisdom, influence and experience has clearly inspired Momo Shop’s success.
Don’t be shy, Sue – the only thing more stylish than the food was you, girl. Pop off.
Put simply, we’ll be going back here as regularly as possible until we try every different momo + sauce variation there is, and there’s nothing you can do to stop us.
If you are in the mood for more dumpling excellence, by the way, you might want to check out the unassuming Northern Quarter gem that is Chef Diao.
The Manc -
18th June 2020 
