60 free Burnley trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
Burnley are a mill town of 80,000 people that has twice been champion of England, one of the twelve founder members of the Football League and one of only five clubs to have won all four divisions. This quiz covers the whole story: the rugby club that voted to switch codes in 1882, the royal visit that made Turf Moor a first, the 1914 FA Cup received from King George V, the 30-match unbeaten run of 1920-21, Harry Potts's home-grown 1960 champions, Bob Lord and Gawthorpe, the Wimbledon shock, the 1987 brush with the Conference, Owen Coyle, Sean Dyche, Vincent Kompany's 101 points and Scott Parker's 16-goals-conceded season. Early questions suit anyone who has stood on the Longside; later ones are for Clarets who know their Bee Hole End from their Cricket Field Stand: why the club wore a Prince of Wales crest, what Turf Moor sells that no other British ground does, and which liqueur East Lancashire soldiers brought home from the trenches. Good for a supporters' club night or an East Lancashire pub quiz. Every answer was checked against Wikipedia's articles on the club, its history and Turf Moor, and each question shows its source.
30 of 60 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01Burnley Football Club was founded in May 1882 by members of a club that played which sport?
Rugby
Burnley Rovers voted to switch to association football and dropped the 'Rovers' suffix a few days later.
Q 02In 1884 Burnley led 35 other clubs in forming a breakaway body to challenge the FA over what issue?
The ban on professional players
The FA caved in 1885 and Burnley entered the FA Cup for the first time that season.
Q 03Which royal visited Turf Moor in October 1886, the first royal visit to a professional ground?
Prince Albert Victor
To mark it Burnley wore white shirts with a blue sash and the Prince of Wales's coat of arms, a crest they kept until 1894-95.
Q 04Burnley were one of how many founder members of the Football League in 1888-89?
12
Six of the twelve were from Lancashire, and Burnley's William Tait scored the first league hat-trick in history in their second match.
Q 05Which Burnley player scored the Football League's first hat-trick, against Bolton in 1888?
William Tait
Fred Poland scored the first league goal at Turf Moor in the same season's 4-1 win over Bolton.
Q 06For what was Burnley goalkeeper Jack Hillman suspended for a whole season in 1900?
Trying to bribe Nottingham Forest players
Two years earlier Burnley and Stoke had played out a 0-0 test match dubbed 'the match without a shot at goal' because a draw suited both.
Q 07Before adopting claret and blue in 1910, what colour shirts had Burnley worn for the previous decade?
Green
The club had also tried pink and white stripes in 1894-95 and all-red in the late 1890s.
Q 08Burnley's only FA Cup win, in 1914, came in a 1-0 final victory over which club?
Liverpool
Burnley were the first club to knock out five top-flight sides in one cup run, and Tommy Boyle was the first captain handed the trophy by a reigning monarch.
Q 09Which monarch presented the 1914 FA Cup to Burnley, the first time a reigning king had done so?
George V
Burnley wore the Prince of Wales's arms on their shirts for the occasion.
Q 10Burnley's 1920-21 title season set an English record of how many straight unbeaten league matches?
30
They had lost the first three games of the season; the record stood until Arsenal's Invincibles of 2003-04.
Q 11In 1925 Burnley sold Bob Kelly to Sunderland for £6,500, a fee that broke what?
The world transfer record
The following season Burnley lost 10-0 at Aston Villa on the opening day and still stayed up by a point.
Q 12Which Burnley forward scored a club-record six goals in a single match, a 7-1 win at Birmingham in 1926?
Louis Page
Page later played for England at Turf Moor in the ground's only senior international, a 2-1 loss to Wales in 1927.
Q 13Burnley's all-time record goalscorer, with 188 goals, is who?
George Beel
He also holds the single-season league record with 35 in 1927-28.
Q 21Burnley lost the 1962 FA Cup final to which club?
Tottenham Hotspur
Consolation came for captain Jimmy Adamson, named FWA Footballer of the Year with McIlroy as runner-up.
Q 22The controversial 1963 sale of playmaker Jimmy McIlroy took him to which club?
Stoke City
His departure and Adamson's 1964 retirement, together with the end of the maximum wage, began Burnley's long decline.
Q 23Burnley won the 1973 Charity Shield by beating which club?
Manchester City
They had just won the Second Division title under Adamson, who had promised the 'Team of the Seventies'.
Q 14Burnley's record appearance holder, goalkeeper Jerry Dawson, made 569 appearances over how many years?
22
He retired in 1929, a year before the club dropped out of the First Division on goal average.
Q 15Which future England centre-forward became Burnley's youngest ever player at 16 in March 1936?
Tommy Lawton
His £6,500 move made him the most expensive player under 21 at the time.
Q 16Burnley's 1946-47 defence conceded only 29 goals in 42 games and earned what nickname?
The Iron Curtain
The same season they lost the FA Cup final 1-0 to Charlton Athletic after extra time.
Q 17Burnley's pioneering purpose-built training ground, opened under Bob Lord in the 1950s, was called what?
Gawthorpe
It was replaced by the Barnfield Training Centre in 2017; Calder Vale was the club's first home ground.
Q 18Who managed Burnley to the 1959-60 First Division title?
Harry Potts
He used the then-unfashionable 4-4-2 and a Total Football style; the road beside the Bob Lord Stand is named after him.
Q 19Burnley's 1959-60 title-winning squad cost only about how much in transfer fees?
£13,000
£8,000 went on Jimmy McIlroy and £5,000 on left-back Alex Elder; the rest were home-grown.
Q 20Which club knocked Burnley out of the 1960-61 European Cup quarter-finals?
Hamburger SV
Turf Moor's first European match was a 2-0 win over Reims in November 1960.
Q 24Which then Southern League club shocked Burnley 1-0 at Turf Moor in the 1975 FA Cup?
Wimbledon
Non-league Lincoln City repeated the trick at Turf Moor in 2017, Burnley's first such home defeat since.
Q 25Which former prime minister opened the Bob Lord Stand, part-funded by selling Martin Dobson to Everton, in 1974?
Edward Heath
Some fans dubbed it the 'Martin Dobson Stand'.
Q 26Burnley stayed in the Football League in 1986-87 with a last-day win over which club?
Orient
Two years earlier they had been relegated to the Fourth Division for the first time.
Q 27Who beat Burnley 2-0 in the 1988 Associate Members' Cup final before a record 80,000 at Wembley?
Wolverhampton Wanderers
Wolves were the first club to win all four divisions; Burnley became the second in 1992.
Q 28By winning the Fourth Division in 1991-92, Burnley became only the second club to do what?
Win all four professional divisions
Manager Jimmy Mullen had won his first nine league games after taking over in October 1991.
Q 29In early 2002 the collapse of which broadcaster brought Burnley close to administration?
ITV Digital
Stan Ternent kept the club up with loanees and half-fit players before being sacked in 2004.
Q 30Which manager took Burnley back to the top flight in 2009 after 33 years, then soon left for Bolton?
Owen Coyle
Burnley beat Sheffield United in the play-off final and won their first four home Premier League games, a first for a promoted side.