The Football Association Challenge Trophy, commonly known as theFA Trophy, is aknockout cup competition inEnglishfootball, organised by and named afterThe Football Association (the FA). It was staged for the first time in the1969–70 season,[1] and was initially open to allsemi-professional teams, complementing the existingFA Amateur Cup.[2] After the abolition of official amateur status by the FA in 1974, the leading teams from the Amateur Cup entered the Trophy, while lower-level teams competed in the newFA Vase.[3] As of 2008, the Trophy is open to all clubs in the top four levels of theNational League System, equivalent to levels five to eight of the overallEnglish football league system, although a club's home stadium must meet certain requirements before the club can enter the tournament.[4]
The record for the most wins is jointly held byScarborough,Telford United, andWoking, with three each.[1] Scarborough and Telford United are both defunct and therefore not able to add any further wins.[5][6] Scarborough, Woking,Grays Athletic andKingstonian have each won the Trophy in two consecutive seasons.[1]Mark Stimson managed the winning team in three consecutive finals.[7] The Trophy is currently held byAldershot Town, who beatSpennymoor Town in the2025 FA Trophy final.[8]
The first FA Trophy final was won byMacclesfield Town, who also won the championship of theNorthern Premier League in the same season.[9] Northern Premier League clubs dominated the first decade of the competition, withTelford United the onlySouthern League team to break the northern clubs' hold on the competition.[10]Scarborough reached the final four times in five seasons and won the Trophy three times between 1973 and 1977.[5] In 1979, the leading Southern and Northern Premier League teams formed the newAlliance Premier League,[11] and teams from this league dominated the Trophy during the 1980s.[12] In the1980–81 season, however,Bishop's Stortford of the comparatively lowlyIsthmian League First Division won through nine rounds to reach the final, where they beatSutton United.[13] Telford United's win in 1989 made them the second team to win the Trophy three times.[12]
Between 1990 and 2000, a smaller number of clubs claimed the Trophy, asWycombe Wanderers andKingstonian each won the competition twice, andWoking became the third team to win it three times.[12] ManagerGeoff Chapple led Woking and Kingstonian to all their victories, a total of five wins in seven seasons.[14][15] After Chapple's period of success,Mark Stimson became the first man to manage the Trophy-winning team in three successive seasons, when he ledGrays Athletic to victory in 2005 and 2006 and repeated the feat with his new clubStevenage Borough in 2007.[7] In 2019AFC Fylde became the first team to have won both the FA Trophy and FA Vase.[16] The2020 final was delayed until May 2021 due to theCOVID-19 pandemic and won byHarrogate Town, who in the intervening period had been promoted to theEnglish Football League, making them the only EFL team to lift the trophy.[17] Less than three weeks later,Hornchurch became the first club playing at tier seven of theEnglish football league system to win the trophy. They defeatedHereford 3–1 in the2021 final.
Originally, if the final finished with the scores level afterextra time, the teams would play again in areplay at a later date;[12] more recently the final has always been decided on the day, with apenalty shootout as required.[18] The winning club receives the FA Trophy itself and, as of 2021, prize money of £60,000, in addition to that accumulated for winning earlier rounds.[19]
| (R) | Replay |
| * | Match went to extra time |
| † | Match decided by a penalty shootout after extra time |
| % | Club played in tier 6 at the time |
| ^ | Club played in tier 7 at the time |
Teams shown initalics are no longer in existence. Teams shown inbold compete in thePremier League or theEnglish Football League as of 2024 and therefore do not enter the FA Trophy. Additionally,Bangor City switched to theWelsh football league system in 1992, making the club ineligible to compete in the competition from then onwards.[20]
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