Oxford United Football Club

Headington United were renamed Oxford United in 1960 as part of an effort to raise the club's profile and ambitions. The gamble paid off spectacularly. Under a succession of ambitious managers, Oxford climbed from the Southern League to the Football League, and then under Jim Smith in the early 1980s, stormed through the divisions with three promotions in four years to reach the First Division in 1985.

The crowning glory came on 20 April 1986 at Wembley, when Oxford beat Queens Park Rangers 3-0 in the League Cup final. Goals from Trevor Hebberd, Ray Houghton, and Jeremy Charles sealed a famous victory for a club that had been in the Third Division just three years earlier. Oxford spent three seasons in the First Division before relegation in 1988, but the memories of that era - the Manor Ground rocking, the giant-killing cup runs, the sheer improbability of it all - remain the bedrock of the club's identity.

After relegation from the First Division in 1988, Oxford began a long and painful decline. Financial difficulties, poor management decisions, and the controversial tenure of chairman Firoz Kassam defined this era. The club left the beloved Manor Ground in 2001 for the new Kassam Stadium on the outskirts of the city, but the stadium was owned by Kassam personally rather than the club - a decision whose consequences continue to reverberate.

In 2006, Oxford were relegated from the Football League for the first time in their history, dropping into the Conference. They spent four years in non-league football, an agonising period for supporters who remembered the First Division and Wembley glory days. Promotion back to the Football League came in 2010 via the Conference play-offs, but Oxford remained in League Two and League One for over a decade, slowly rebuilding.