Pontefract FC’s Latest Signing

Pontefract Collieries Football Club (PCFC) has signed a new 25-year lease on their current premises at Beechnut Lane on the Duchy of Lancaster’s Pontefract Estate in West Yorkshire.  PCFC has been a tenant of the Duchy since the Club first moved here from its former home in Ackworth Road.  

Situated near the site of the old Prince of Wales colliery, the football ground is fully floodlit and holds approximately 1,200 spectators.  The main stand is equipped with a terrace, cover and seating, with seats recovered from the former Manchester City ground at Maine Road prior to its demolition in 2004.

Commenting on the new lease, Duchy Head of Rural Christopher Sparrow said: “This is an important community sports facility and the current owners, management team and fans have invested time, money and effort in its upkeep. We believe strongly in the power of local sports clubs as a way of inspiring young people and bringing fans of all ages together as a single community. We are therefore very pleased to have reached agreement with the Club for another 25-year lease at Beechnut Lane.”

There has been a football club at Pontefract since the 1890s when a side composed mainly as soldiers competed in the West Yorkshire League as Pontefract Garrison. Although by the late 1920s the Pontefract Borough Club had reached the heights of the Yorkshire League, the Club failed to finish the 1929-30 season. Then in 1935 a club called Tanshelf Gems acquired a ground on Ackworth Road and renamed itself Pontefract United.

The Pontefract Collieries side was formed at the end of the Second World War and a fierce rivalry ensued, with both teams playing in the West Yorkshire League. In 1960 the old Collieries Club became extinct and a couple of years later United merged with a local youth side and adopted the name for themselves.

Today, Pontefract Collieries Football Club is a founder member of the Northern Counties East League (NCEL) and currently plays in its Premier Division.