Sport has always been important in Birmingham, England, from the hundreds of diverse grass-roots sports clubs to internationally famous teams, associations and venues. The city has been awarded the title National City of Sport by the Sports Council.

A cricket club was in existence in Birmingham as early as 1745, and today the city is home to Warwickshire County Cricket Club whose ground at Edgbaston is also a venue for international test matches. International athletics meetings take place at the open-air Alexander Stadium in Perry Barr, the home of Birchfield Harriers athletic club, which numbers many Olympic medallists among its past and present members. The National Indoor Arena (NIA) meanwhile is a major indoor athletics stadium and in 2003 hosted the 9th IAAF World Indoor Championships in Athletics. The NIA also hosts events in many other sports, such as the World Indoor Badminton Championships.

The first ever game of lawn tennis was played in Edgbaston in 1859; international tennis is still played at Edgbaston’s Priory Club.

The city is home to two of the UK’s oldest professional football teams: Aston Villa (1874) and Birmingham City (1875), both of whom currently play in the Premier League. The world’s first professional football league was founded at a meeting in Aston on March 22, 1885 under the auspices of William McGregor, a director of Aston Villa.

Birmingham also has a professional Rugby Union side, Moseley RFC, and there is professional basketball, boxing, hockey, skateboarding, and greyhound racing in the city.

Birmingham has been awarded the title National City of Sport by the Sports Council.

Football

The city is home to two of the UK’s oldest professional Premier League football teams: Aston Villa (1874) and Birmingham City (1875) . Nearby West Bromwich Albion’s ground The Hawthorns used to be divided by the Birmingham/ Smethwick border, but was moved completely into the latter by a minor rationalisation of local government borders in the 1960s and is now in Sandwell. The first football league was invented, by William McGregor on 22 March 1885, in Aston.

Athletics

The Birmingham Athletic Club opened a Gymnasium in King Alfred’s Place, in Aug 1865/6, and held their annual display and assault-at-arms in the Town Hall. The first festival of the Birmingham Athletic Club was held in 1868. On the 1st of March, 1880, an association was organised of many of the bicycle clubs, cricket clubs, football clubs, and similar athletic bodies in the town and neighbourhood, under the name of “The Midland Counties Amateurs’ Athletic Union.” The sport was so popular that in January, 1879 the “Midland Athlete,” newspaper was first published.

Today Athletics takes place at the open-air Alexander Stadium on a national and international level. Recent development has seen addition of a High Performance Centre for indoor intense specialist training. The Stadium is also home to Birchfield Harriers, who have contributed towards Britain’s National and International Athletics for many years. The National Indoor Arena is Britain’s Premier Indoor Athletics stadium and in 2003 successfully hosted the 9th IAAF World Indoor Championships in Athletics. The city has been chosen to host the European Athletic Association’s European Indoor Championships in 2007.

Cricket

There was a Cricket Club in existence here in 1745, and it has been chronicled that a match was being played on the same day on which the battle of Culloden was fought. In legion The Birmingham C.C., started in 1819, the members including the young elite of the town at Ladywood. The Birchfield C.C. was organised in 1840. Among the noteworthy matches of late years are those of the All England Eleven against a local twenty-two, at the Lower Grounds, June 5, 1871, the visitors winning. More recently County Cricket is played at the Edgbaston Stadium, home to Warwickshire County Cricket Club. International test matches are also held there.

Other team sports

Rugby Union

Rugby Union is played in Birmingham by Moseley Rugby Football Club in National League 2. The club was founded in 1873 and played for most of their history at The Reddings. However, in 2000 it relocated to a temporary ground at Bournbrook in front of the University of Birmingham and now have a new ground at Billesley Common.

The Pertemps Bees are challenging for a place in the Guinness Premiership.

Basketball

Basketball is played by the Birmingham Bullets, who are in the top UK basketball league.

Hockey

Hockey is a very popular sport with Harborne and Bournville competing at professional level.

Miscellany
Lacrosse, a popular Canadian game, was introduced here June 23, 1883, by a team of Canadian Amateurs and Iroquois Indians, who exhibited their prowess at the Lower Grounds. The game never quite took off in the city.

Racket Sports

Tennis

The first ever game of lawn tennis was played in Edgbaston in 1859 by Major Thomas Henry Gem and Batista Pereira, both residents of the city, and international tennis is still played at Edgbaston’s Priory Club.

Badminton

The National Indoor Arena also hosts many other sporting events, such as the World Indoor Badminton Championships.

Other individual sports

Golf

Professional Golf is played at the Belfry (4km outside Birmingham) which sometimes hosts The Ryder Cup.

Boxing

Boxing is popular in the City with many clubs and famous professional boxers such as Pat Cowdell and Robert McKracken who have continued to support boxing in the UK by turning their skills to coaching new up- and- coming boxers. Prize-fighting was long the popular sport of high and low life blackguards, and Birmingham added many a redoubtable name to the long list of famous prize-fighters, whose deeds are recorded in “Fistiana” and other chronicles of the ring. The earliest account of a local prize-fight is of that which took place in Oct. 1782, for 100 guineas a side, between Jemmy Sargent, a professional, and Isaac Perrins, one of the Soho workmen. Jemmy knuckled under after being knocked down thirteen times, in as many rounds, by the knock-kneed hammerman fiom Soho, whose mates, it is said, won £1,500 in bets through his prowess.

Swimming

The Birmingham Leander Swimming Club commenced their aquatic brotherhood in June, 1877, The celebrated swimmer, Captain Webb, visited Brum several times, and the Athletic Club presented him with a gold medal and purse December 4, 1875.

Other sports and pastimes

Greyhound Racing

Greyhound racing is a popular event in the city with two large stadiums at Hall Green and Perry Barr.

Bowling

Bowling has long been a popular tradition in Brum with bowling greens and quoit grounds often attached to public houses. In 1778 there was one at the Salutation inn, at the bottom of Snow Hill; at an earlier date there was also one at the Hen and Chickens in the High Street. In 1825 a bowling green was laid out at the corner of Highfield Road and Harborne Road, for “a very select party” of Edgbastonians. Bowls is still played in the city today.

Ice Skating

Ice Skating Rinks were opened at the Lower Grounds May 1, 1875; at Bingley Hall, Oct. 2, 1875; at Moseley, Dec. 6, 1876; and at Handsworth, Oct. 8, 1877; and, for a time, the amusement was exceedingly popular, more than one fortune accruing from the manufacture of patent and other roller skates. One of the most noteworthy feats on the slippery rinks was the skating of 200 miles in 24 hours by a Mr. F. Betteridge at Bingley Hall, Aug. 20, 1878. In winter of 2005 one of the largest temporary outdoor ice skate rinks in Britain was errected on Centenary Square.

Skate Boarding

skateboarding is popular in the city, many small skate parks exist as well as the EPIC Skate Park based in Moseley, the park opened in 2003 within an old Bus/Tram garage. The park is one of the largest of its kind in Europe and now hosts international skate competitions as well as music video’s and film. The skate board wheel was pioneered in Birmingham during the 19th century.