Bristol Rovers Virtual Museum

The matchday programme is regrettably becoming a thing of the past with many clubs now issuing online or not at all. Rovers stopped issuing programmes at the start of the 2024-25 season to be replaced by a monthly magazine. Colourful and informative but is this a viable substitute?

Clubs were known to issue a Match Card In the early days of football. We have two examples here: 1896 vs Hereford Thistle & 1897 vs. Aston Villa for the official opening of the ‘Eastville Rovers Athletic Ground’. We have photos of these match cards but we don’t know if any collector has them in their possession.

Some older programmes showed the date but no opponent and photos were a rarity. When Rovers returned to football action in 1945/6 paper shortage meant that only a small folded page was issued for matches and it is quite surprising that some of them still exist.

When Rovers were promoted to Division 2 for the 1953-4 season, the club issued an iconic programme with a photo inserted within a quartered flag that remained the cover for the rest of the decade. Since the early 60’s, programme covers changed regularly and became colourful, larger and more expensive.

Have a browse through the photos on this page and click on the link to our website that includes examples of Rovers programmes both home and away across our 140+ years existence.