Black And White Town

It was one of the more unusual - but certainly no less welcome - pieces of correspondence to come into the club’s office on Broadway lately - the news that Juventus FC had offered a partnership with MUFC to help us promote Non-League Day 2026 by adopting our club as a team to support for the day! Not a bad shout-out for a club who have a staggering 12.8 million followers across their X accounts @juventusfc and @juventusfcen. 

 

Juve are twice European champions and a staggering 36-time winners of Serie A. One of the biggest clubs in the world, they operate in a different stratosphere to our Magpies. There is one thing however we have in common with our Italian friends - our beloved colours. 

 

Magpies fans are rightly proud of our long history since 1870 and particularly of our black and white - with a little red - colour scheme. Juventus have played in black and white since the 1901/02 season, the final season that Maidenhead FC competed as founder members of the Southern League, at the time the only direct rival to the EFL. The Turin club asked one of their English team members John Savage to source a new kit because their pink shirts faded in the wash and he arranged for Notts County to supply black and white shirts! 

 

Juve were founded in 1897 and their name comes from iuventūs, Latin for 'youth’. By 1897 Maidenhead FC had been established for 27 years – playing at York Road since 1871, now chalking up 155 years at the oldest football ground in the world used continuously by the same club - and we had been entering the FA Cup since it first started in 1871, reaching the quarter-finals in there consecutive seasons. In 1894 we were founder members of the Southern Football League, the main rival at the time to the English Football League which started in 1888. In 1898/99, the season after Juve was formed, Maidenhead found themselves playing Southern League matches against future Premier League clubs such as West Ham, Watford, Brentford and Fulham. 

 

At the end of 1901/02, Maidenhead found the financial strain of competing in the Southern League to be too great a burden and so they stepped into local football, competing in the West Berks League, Berks & Bucks League and then the Great Western Suburban League. They now came across the town’s ‘other’ team – Maidenhead Norfolkians, the ‘red and whites’ – on a regular basis in league, FA Cup, Amateur Cup and Berks & Bucks county Cup matches, with the longer established ‘red and blacks’ of Maidenhead FC of York Road more often than not being roundly defeated by the Kidwells Park-based upstarts! 

 

The Great War took its toll on the country, and by 1919 the Norfolkians had lost key personnel in battle and were no longer able to put off the advances of Maidenhead FC, ever keen to ‘merge’ the two clubs. For season 1919/20 the newly merged club came together under the Maidenhead FC black and the Norfolkian FC white. In our first season in black and white we won the Great Western Suburban League (pictured) at last, and the suffix ‘United’ was added a year later to appease those of loyal to the Norfolkian club. 

 

Since then, the black and whites of Maidenhead and Juventus have shared soe important milestones. In 1931/32 an 1932/34, MUFC won the Spartan League, whereas over in Turin Juventus claimed their fourth and sixth national titles in those same seasons. In 1957/68 and 1960/61 Maidenhead were champions of the Corinthian League, whilst Juve celebrated their tenth and twelve Scudetto in those same campaigns. MUFC did not win a single first team divisional title for 55 years until we were crowned National League South winners in that memorable 2016/17 campaign…..the same season that Juve won their 33rd Serie A title. As Juventus celebrated the 1995/96 Champions League success in Rome, United were celebrating our 125 anniversary. In 1996/97 Juve won the Intercontinental Cup (alongside their 24th Scudetto) whilst MUFC won the Isthmian League Full Members Cup. 

 

So much history between two clubs playing the same beautiful game in two different universes, both proudly in black and white. Grazie Juventus…..for your support on Non League Day. Your shirt will now forever hang on the walls of Maidenhead United. Forza i bianchi e neri!