Woodhouse Lane Stadium
greyhound racing stadium in Wigan, England
Woodhouse Lane Stadium was a greyhound racing and speedway stadium, located in Wigan.
Origins
The stadium was constructed and opened in 1928, in only the second year of oval track greyhound racing in the United Kingdom. The stadium known as the Woodhouse Lane Stadium was located on the east side of Woodhouse Lane where it met Beech Hill Lane and the south side of Baytree Road. It was built on open farmland next door to the Springfield Park football ground.
Opening
Racing started on 17 March 1928 and racing was independent (unaffiliated to a governing body). Wigan Borough F.C. resigned from the football league during the 1931–32 season. Shortly after Borough went out of business and a new club, Wigan Athletic F.C., was formed and continued to play their home games at Springfield Park. After lengthy negotiations, Wigan Athletic purchased the ground from the owners of the Woodhouse Lane Stadium for £2,800 with the proviso that greyhound racing never take place at Springfield Park.
The independent racing lasted for 33 years.
Speedway
Speedway took place at the stadium in 1952 and 1953.
“Woodhouse Lane Stadium” enters the record as greyhound racing stadium in Wigan, England. Crown Archives preserves that source wording while asking what Woodhouse, Lane and Stadium can confirm, complicate or overturn.
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The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 31, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q55137076. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1928, 1931, 1952 and 1953.
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This entry incorporates text from “Woodhouse Lane Stadium” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.