League One Lowdown: Bradford City

Last updated : 22 July 2018 By Jim Bonner

Vital Statistics

Founded: 1903

Chairmen: Edin Rahic and Stefan Rupp

Last Season: League One - 11th

Nicknames: The Bantams

Rivals: Leeds United, Huddersfield Town

Major Honours

FA Cup: 1911

Scheduled Matches

Portsmouth vs Bradford: Saturday, March 2nd (3pm)

Bradford vs Portsmouth: Saturday, November 3rd (3pm)

Bradford City: A brief history

Bradford City were formed in 1903 as a result of a series of meetings between the sub-editor of the Bradford Observer, representatives of Rugby club Manningham FC and F.A. representatives which led to Manningham changing their code to association football, taking the old club's colours and stadium with it.

Eight years later the new football club won their only major trophy to date, the 1911 F.A. Cup but they wouldn't find any real glory in the league pre and post-war until their Division Three win in 1985 which was unfortunately overshadowed by the Valley Parade fire.

The club bounced back from that tragedy despite some setbacks and won a shock promotion to the Premier League in 1999 under Paul Jewell where they spent two seasons before a period of obscurity and financial crisis saw the club enter administration twice and be relegated to League Two.

They would stay there until 2012 in a season where the Bantams won the League Two play-off final having also got to the League Cup Final. The following season saw more cup heroics as Bradford reached the F.A. Cup quarter-finals and two seasons ago they just missed out on promotion after being beaten by Millwall in the League One play-off final.

The Manager: Michael Collins

As a player, Collins spent the majority of his career at Huddersfield Town before moving onto Scunthorpe. The midfielder also had spells at AFC Wimbledon, Oxford United and Indian club Bengaluru before retiring early at the end of the 2016/2017 season having spent some time at Leyton Orient.

Collins briefly came out of retirement to play for hometown side Halifax having done some youth coaching for Bradford but following Simon Grayson's dismissal, the Bantams' board has given the Irishman his first job as first team manager at the age of just 32.

The Ground: Valley Parade (Capacity: 25,136 - Away: 1,840)

Ground review forthcoming.