In 1889, the town of Brentford, Middlesex was home to the Brentford Rowing Club and Boston Park Cricket Club. Attempts to form football and rugby clubs in the town fell by the wayside until a new recreation ground was opened on 17 October 1889. Seven days earlier, a meeting had taken place at the Oxford & Cambridge pub near Kew Bridge, during which it had been endeavored between the rowing and cricket club members to decide how best to use the recreation ground, in the hope of forming a permanent football or rugby club in the town. The rowing club’s co-founder Archer Green immediately submitted an application to the Chiswick Local Board for the use of the recreation ground and a meeting with the board was called for 15 October. The result was inconclusive and it was decided that the matter would be discussed again at the board’s next meeting, three weeks later. Archer Green and fellow rowing club co-founder John Henry Strachan did not wish to wait and pushed to establish a new club.