“This is a picture of special interest to Liverpool Sportsmen. It concerns Banbury Spencer FC, the revelation team of the last two years. They are in the Oxon League but they have a very big streak of Liverpool in their make-up. They gave Hayes the needle in the English cup-tie and having asked for the 15th to be left open for a cup-tie, the League refused the request believing they would not get over round one!”

Back Row (left to right): Eric Lowe, Aubrey “Cobbler Grant”, Norman Walls, Frank Clarke, Jim Martin (former Liverpool player), Jim Hodson, Horace Williams (manager).

Front Row (left to right): Arnold Mobley, George Bate (Everton “A”), Reg Wallis, Bob Kinder (formerly Marine FC), Jesse Twynham.

Note the Liverpool and Manchester areas were an important recruiting ground for employees at the Spencer Works Factory in Banbury. One particular case was that of legendary Spencer forward Bob Kinder who moved to Banbury from Liverpool, taking up employment in the Spencer factory. He usually played either at inside left or as a left winger. He made his debut for the club in February 1934, scoring 11 league goals in the remainder of that Junior League season before going on to captain the side the following season in the Oxfordshire Senior League. He remained with the club right up to the outbreak of the Second World War, adapting successfully to the higher level Birmingham Combination, turned out for Spencer during the two war time seasons in which they competed in the Oxfordshire Senior League, played in the Combination again for a couple of seasons after the War and, to help the club when short of a player, even came out of retirement to make a Combination appearance in April 1951! Bob made a total of 251 first team appearances in his time with Spencer, scoring 106 goals and was still involved with the club in the 1960s as he returned to Spencer in the summer of 1962 to take on a scouting role, looking for young local talent in the Banbury area.

Boxing Day 1934 saw Bob married in Liverpool. Horace Williams, the manager, and the rest of the Spencer team were present at the wedding ceremony. On Boxing Day morning the Spencer team, minus Kinder of course, played a Liverpool County representative amateur side at Marine’s ground. The following article appeared in a local Banbury newspaper in the first week of January 1935:

“One of the finest amateur games seen in Liverpool for some time was won by Banbury Spencer over a selected team of strong Liverpool amateurs on the Marine ground at Great Crosby on Boxing Day. Spencer's 4-3 victory surprised the local players. Spencer won by sheer merit, the quality of the Banburian's play surprising the large crowd. Ronnie Westcott, who is among the leading amateur centre-forwards in the country, scored two of the goals, while Eric Lowe and T. Corbin brought the total to four.”

Another Liverpool connection is that of winger Arthur Barber who was with Weston-super-Mare, and had previously had trials with Cardiff City, before playing one “trial” game in the Birmingham Combination for Banbury Spencer away to Cheltenham Town Reserves on Saturday 26th February 1938. He played on the left wing as Spencer went down 1-0 to the Gloucestershire side. The local press reported that manager Jimmy Cringan was impressed with his performance and very keen to sign him permanently. However, the press article went on to say that the club were unable to agree terms with the player, suggesting the expenses wanted by the player for travelling from his home in Weston-super-Mare being the stumbling block.

Arthur subsequently had a trial with Everton in pre-season 1938/39 and after scoring eight goals in four “A” team games signed professional forms for them in September 1938. After then scoring five goals in Central League and Lancashire Cup matches, Arthur made his first team debut for them on Saturday 8th October 1938 in a home First Division game against Wolverhampton Wanderers. Everton won 1-0 with legendary centre forward Tommy Lawton scoring the goal. Arthur played on the right wing deputising for regular right winger Torry Gillick. The attendance for the game was 36,681. Arthur’s second and final Football League appearance, again for Everton, would come in February of the following year when on Saturday 25th he would again be in the team in place of Gillick as Everton won 2-1 away at Leeds United. He would go on to play a handful of games for Everton during war time football but no record of him playing football after the Second World War can be found.

There follows a selection of articles relating to the game at Marine which appeared in the Banbury Spencer v Banbury Harriers programme issued for the Oxfordshire Senior League game at the Spencer Stadium on Saturday 29th December 1934.