Crewe is a town in the east of Cheshire, famous perhaps as a large railway junction and home to Crewe Works, for many years a major railway engineering facility, but now much reduced in size.
From 1946 until 2002 it was also the home of Rolls-Royce motor car production. The Pyms Lane factory on the west of the town now produces Bentley motor cars exclusively.
There is actually a crater on Mars named the “Crewe crater” after the town and Bill Bryson once described Crewe as "the armpit of Cheshire" in his 1995 book "Notes from a Small Island".
Crewe Alexandra were the classic lower league strugglers until the emergence of Milan born manager Dario Gradi in the early 1980’s.
The club was actually formed in 1877 and were founding members of the Second Division in 1892. They lasted just five years in the competition before dropping out of league football in 1897.
Since re-entering the competition in 1921, they have mostly remained in the lower divisions and have no major honours to their name.
1955 saw a terrible run as they did not win away from home for 56 matches. The dismal run ended with a 1-0 win at Southport. Shortly after they took part in perhaps their most famous match against Spurs in the FA Cup. A new record attendance of 20,000 saw struggling Crewe hold Spurs to a 2-2 draw. However in the replay Tottenham won convincingly 13-2 - still a record defeat for the club.
Another club who have their record win over Crewe is our good selves, racking up a fine 11-1 win back during Crewe awful run in the 1950’s. Andy Graver heavily featured amongst the Imps goals that day.
1961 saw Crewe's most notable win in their history, Jimmy McGuigan's side defeated Chelsea 2-1 in the FA Cup at Stamford Bridge. The Chelsea side contained the former the likes of Jimmy Greaves, Peter Bonetti and Terry Venables.
1979 saw a young South African goalkeeper called Bruce Grobbelaar join. During the season he would score from the penalty spot against York and kept 8 clean-sheets in his 24 matches played. He later went on to play for the Imps and some other side from the Merseyside area.
In June 1983, Crewe appointed Dario Gradi as manager and ushered in the most successful period of their history. At that time, Crewe had again just avoided being voted out of the Football League having finished bottom for a record eighth time.
Gradi quickly gained a reputation for developing young talent, In 1989 he managed to get them promoted to Division Three, and started a long line of stars on their way in football, including Neil Lennon, Rob Jones, and future England captain David Platt.
Having spent the last fifteen years in a league above Lincoln, Crewe finally slipped back into the basement division last season after a miserable run of results. Their Icelandic manager left earlier in the campaign to be replaced once again by the evergreen Gradi.
They play their home games at The Alexandra Stadium, although football fans will possibly always refer to it as Gresty Road. There are four sides to the ground as follows:
The Air Products Stand, (formerly the Railtrack Stand, before a change in sponsors), built in 2000 at a cost of £5.2 million. It accommodates 6,809 spectators, together with the club's office accommodation.
The AB Nutrition Stand, (formerly The Advance Personnel Stand, before a change in sponsors) - also known as the Gresty Road End, accommodates 982 spectators and 4 disabled spectators.
The Wulvern Housing Stand, also known as the Railway End, accommodates 682 spectators.
The BMW Bluebell Stand, formerly the Pop Side, accommodates 1,680 away spectators.