Guyanese Andrew Watson

Research finds first black international footballer in the world

Andrew Watson was the world’s first black international football player; and he is known to have captained Scotland three times between 1881 and 1882. He was also considered as one of the top ten football players in the world in the nineteenth century.

So says research unearthed from recently digitalised 19th century documents.

Watson was born in May 1857 in British Guiana, and was the son of a wealthy Scottish sugar planter named Peter Miller and comely local lass named Rose Watson.

He left British Guiana to further his studies in England. At fourteen, he was enrolled and studied at the prestigious and exclusive King’s College in London.

School records show that he excelled at sports, especially football. At age 19, he began studies at the University of Glasgow, where he blossomed as a football player.

There he began studying Philosophy, Mathematics and Engineering in November 1875. By that time, however, he had already begun to play for Queen’s Park and was already considered a valuable player to the team.

Watson’s achievements are significant. He was the first black player to have played for Scotland. He represented Scotland three times between 1881 and 1882. He played for Queen’s Park, the top Scottish team of those days. He was the first black captain of an international team (Scotland vs. England 1881). He was the first black captain to win a major competition, The Scottish Cup 1881, and he became the first black player to play in the English FA Cup (London Swifts 1882).

He is also reputed to have been the first black football administrator, and was the Match Secretary for five years at Parkgrove and Queen’s Park football clubs. Watson was credited with having inspired British football in the 1870s.

In the Scottish Football Association’s 1881 Annual, it stated: “He is one of the very best backs that we have; since joining the Queen’s Park, he has made rapid strides to the front as a player; he has great speed and tackles splendidly; has a powerful and a sure kick; he is well worthy of a place in any representative team.”

Discovery

An old photograph, some yellowing newspaper files, and some census records led to the discovery of Watson’s contribution to British football.

The discovery has been hailed as most important in the history of black footballers in Britain.

“We believe the findings, dated between the 1870s and 1880s, could prove that the first black British footballer was Andrew Watson, who played for Queen’s Park (Glasgow) and Scotland,” said GED O’Brien, director of the Scottish Football Museum and leading member of the Association of Sports Historians.

Details of the discovery read like pages from an archaeological adventure.

Researchers sifting through old football programs and memorabilia noted the adolescent face and distinctive features of one Queen’s Park player and decided to investigate who he was. They combed through the pages of the Scottish Internationalist and the “Who’s Who 1872- 1986”. But after five years they still had no proper clues to the youth’s elusive identity.

But scanning the recently digitalised 1881 census data put the researchers on the right track. The entry shows that an Andrew Watson, aged 24, lived with his wife and child at Afton Crescent in Govan.

Newspaper interviews and articles of the day gave further clues. Photographs of Watson in the colours of the Queen’s Park Football Club, the most elite and famous amateur football club of the day, confirmed the discovery.

“Our eyes were opened to a wider vision of Watson, the man, the Scottish and international player and club secretary,” said O’Brien.

O’Brien revealed that Watson started his career with Maxwell FC in Glasgow. His next stop was Parkgrove in 1874, then came the halcyon days of glory at Queen’s Park from 1880 to 1887. According to Scottish football researchers, Watson was “no mere scuffler on the field, and he was a respected player and team supporter.” Additionally, O’Brien said, Watson roamed far afield to play the game, as was common in those days. He was much sought after by clubs in England as well as Scotland. Records show he played in 36 competitive games for Queen’s Park. He also appeared for the London Swifts in the English Cup championships of 1882, making him the first black player in English Cup history.

Commentators of the day regarded Watson “as one of the best players in Britain”. He earned two Scottish Cup medals and four Charity Cup medals during his career. The Who’s Who acknowledged his performances in international matches.

Watson’s place in football history extends to the highest echelons of the game. As club secretary for Queen’s Park, the man who arranged the team schedule and managed its affairs, Watson was the first black in a British club’s boardroom.

He helped build up the profile of his club in prestigious tournaments, and ensured the loyalty of future generations of fans and spectators.

His stellar attributes marked him as special for his times. The Football Association, the game’s governing council, was formed in 1863, and professionalism was legalised in 1885.

Undoubtedly, Watson was there at the birth of organised football out of its “aimless, chaotic, often violent, roots in workingmen’s culture.” No mean feat for a first generation immigrant in a game where non-whites were rare, and in a city like Glasgow, where blacks from the Caribbean were nearly invisible.

Previous researchers had erroneously cited Arthur Wharton of Ghana as the first black player in Britain. However, Wharton’s claim to fame was being the first professional black player. He played for Preston North End towards the late 1880s.

Some of Watson’s achievements were also mistakenly attributed to Walter Tull, a person of Barbadian heritage who played for Tottenham Hotspurs.

Andrew Watson married and migrated to Australia, where he died and was buried. (Contributed by Ras Michael, Guyanese writer and researcher)