History
The club were founded in 1890 when three teams Swifts, Slough Albion and Young Men’s Friendly Society formed a new club, Slough FC, between them. The team initially played in the Southern Alliance before later moving on to the Great Western Suburban League. In 1921, they attempted to join the Isthmian League but lost out to Wycombe Wanderers in the voting. Instead, Slough chose to join the Spartan League.
In 1936, the owners of the club’s ground, The Godolphin Stadium, sold up to a greyhound racing consortium, which ordered the football club to vacate the stadium three years later. After being forced to groundshare with Maidenhead United for several years, the club agreed to merge with Slough Centre FC to return to a ground in their home town. The new club took the name Slough United FC.
After the Second World War Slough United were reluctant to rejoin the Spartan League and led a breakaway movement to form a new league, which became the Corinthian League. It was from this that the club derived its nickname of “The Rebels”. Shortly after this, the two clubs which had merged to form Slough United separated once again, with the former Slough F.C. continuing under the new name of Slough Town FC.
Slough Town won the Corinthian League in 1950–51 but in 1964 the league folded and Slough, along with many other former Corinthian clubs, joined an expanded Athenian League. The Rebels were champions of this league on three occasions, with the third win earning promotion to the Isthmian League in 1973. During the 1980s, they were league champions on two occasions, the second of which brought promotion to the Football Conference. Slough lasted four seasons at this level, were relegated back to the Isthmian League, bounced back at the first attempt, and then played three more seasons of Conference football. In 1998, the consortium which had bought the club out of receivership seven years earlier decided that they were not prepared to pay for ground improvements required to remain in the Conference, and so the club was demoted back to the Isthmian League despite having finished in 8th place.
Further relegation to the Isthmian League Division One followed in 2000–01 but the club regained its Premier Division status in 2003–04 and remained there until the end of the 2006–07 season, when they finished bottom and conceded over 120 goals. In the 2004–05 season, Slough knocked Walsall of League One out of the FA Cup. Slough transferred over to the Southern Football League Division One South & West for the 2007–08 season, where they finished 21st out of 22 teams. Although initially relegated (for the second year running), they were one of the teams given a provisional reprieve after Halifax Town went into administration.
Over the next two seasons, and now playing in the Southern Football League Division One Midlands, Slough’s performance continued to improve. In the 2009–10 season, Slough Town finished 5th in the table but lost out in the play-off final to Chesham United.
The club looked to take a new direction in 2013–14 and appointed Neil Baker and Jon Underwood, the management duo who had taken league rivals Godalming Town to the play-offs in the previous season. With Godalming forced to relocate to the South & West Division following their failure to win the play-offs, the majority of their squad decided to follow Baker and Underwood to Slough. In their very first season, the new management team steered the club to promotion via the play-offs. Slough claimed a 3–0 victory at Rugby Town in the semi-final before winning the play-off final against Kettering Town in front of 2,331 at Kettering’s home of Latimer Park on 5 May 2014. Slough trailed 0–2 at half-time before staging a second-half comeback. Two goals from Johnnie Dyer brought the Rebels level before James McClurg scored the goal that ultimately returned Slough Town to the third tier of non-league football after several years away.
The 2017–18 season was one of their best for many years. In December, they reached the second round of the FA Cup against Rochdale at home. The game was televised by BT Sport and Slough lost 4–0. With records broken for points attained and goals scored they went on to finish 3rd in the league. Slough were in play off action again. After a home 3–1 win against Kettering Town, they played away to King’s Lynn Town in the final. By virtue of an 89th-minute winner from Manny Williams, they won 2–1 and thus secured promotion to the National League South, where they have remained since.
Form
Slough have made a positive start to the 2024/25 season under the guidance of Scott Davies – the highest-ranked player/manager in English football.
They currently sit just inside the play-off places in seventh with 21 points from 12 games and are unbeaten in their last four National League South matches.
Last Six
22/10 – St Albans City (H) – Drew 2-2
19/10 – Maidstone United (A) – Drew 1-1
12/10 – Woking FC (A) – Lost 2-1 (Emirates FA Cup)
05/10 – Tonbridge Angels (H) – Won 3-1
28/09 – Chatham Town (A) – Won 0-3 (Emirates FA Cup)
21/09 – Eastbourne Borough (A) – Drew 1-1
The Gaffer
36-year-old Scott Davies became first team manager at Slough Town on 23 November 2022 having taken on the role of caretaker manager the previous week, following the departure of Neil Baker and Jon Underwood.
Scott combines his management role with playing duties in either midfield or at the heart of the defence. He originally joined the Rebels in March 2018 to boost the squad in a packed end-of-season promotion run-in and has played a big part ever since.
He is a technically gifted midfield player with a habit of chipping in with a sensational goal from time to time, most notably twice from inside his own half with several others from free kicks.
Scott began his career as a professional at Reading and enjoyed a successful loan spell at Aldershot Town, where he won promotion to League Two. He also won the Conference National goal of the season award with his injury-time goal against Torquay United. Scott went on to score 13 goals in 41 appearances in League Two for the Shots.
He played around 100 games in the Football League for Aldershot, Wycombe Wanderers and Crawley Town amongst others, and went on to make well over 100 appearances in the National League South for Wealdstone, Oxford City and Chelmsford City.
The Captain
30-year-old Josh Jackman joined the club in the summer of 2016 from March Town.
He began to feature more regularly in the 2017/18 season, also chipping in with his first goals for the club and has featured consistently in the side since the club’s promotion to National League South, surpassing the 200 appearance mark in 2022/23.
Primarily a right back, Jackman has also performed well on the left of the defence and is also comfortable playing further forward on the right side of midfield.
He won the Players’ Player of the Season and jointly won the Golden Boot award in 2022/23 after scoring six goals.
Key Player
25-year-old centre-back Dan Bayliss joined the club in May 2023 and went on to win the Manager’s Player of the Season award at the club last term.
Dan joined Gary Abisogun and Mickel Platt in signing from the Rebels from Bracknell Town. He captained the Robins to second place in Southern League Premier South, the First Round of the Emirates FA Cup and lifted the Berks & Bucks FA Senior Cup in 2023/24.
He has been ever-present in Slough’s defensive line this season and has scored some important goals from defence, including a brace against Tonbridge Angels in their 3-1 win.
