List of winless seasons
A winless season is a regular season in which a sports team fails to win any of its games. The antithesis of a perfect season, this ignominy has been suffered eleven times in professional American football, six times in arena football, three times in professional Canadian football, once each in American professional lacrosse and box lacrosse, more than twenty-five times in major Australian football leagues, thirteen times in top-level rugby league, at least twice in top-level rugby union, and twice in English county cricket.
American football
Because of the short schedules of college and professional football seasons, there is a possibility that a very bad team will not manage to win any games. Before overtime was used consistently, teams might tie a game without winning one; these are generally counted in lists of winless seasons. This is because, during eras before overtime was introduced to American football, leagues generally ignored tied games when calculating winning percentage. In 2001, the Columbus Wardogs of AF2, the minor league of the Arena Football League, made history becoming the first American football team to go 0–16.
NFL teams with no wins in a season (8 or more games)
| Year | Team | Wins | Losses | Ties | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2008 | Detroit Lions | 0 | 16 | 0 | Most losses in a single season. Detroit was the first non-expansion team to lose every game in a full season since World War II. |
| 1982 | Baltimore Colts | 0 | 8 | 1 | Strike-shortened season. |
| 1976 | Tampa Bay Buccaneers | 0 | 14 | 0 | Debut season; went on to lose the first 12 games of the 1977 season as well, to start 0–26 as a franchise. |
| 1960 | Dallas Cowboys | 0 | 11 | 1 | Debut season. |
| 1944 | Brooklyn Tigers | 0 | 10 | 0 | Suspended operations after the season, and did not return to the league after World War II ended. |
| 1944 | Card-Pitt | 0 | 10 | 0 | Merger between Chicago Cardinals and the Pittsburgh Steelers due to player shortages during World War II; the Steelers themselves merged with the Philadelphia Eagles the previous year for the same reasons. |
| 1943 | Chicago Cardinals | 0 | 10 | 0 | If one includes the 1944 Card-Pitt team (see above), the Cardinals are the only NFL team to have back-to-back full seasons without a victory. (The league, however, considers Card-Pitt and the Cardinals to be separate franchises.) |
| 1942 | Detroit Lions | 0 | 11 | 0 | With its 0–16 mark in 2008 (see above), the Lions became only the second NFL franchise with two full winless seasons (and the only one still in existence). |
| 1934 | Cincinnati Reds | 0 | 8 | 0 | Folded before the season was over. |
| 1925 | Columbus Tigers | 0 | 9 | 0 | First franchise with more than one full winless season (the Tigers folded after the 1926 campaign). |
| 1922 | Columbus Panhandles | 0 | 8 | 0 |
The Rochester Jeffersons went a combined 0–21–2 from 1922–25, but played only partial NFL schedules in those years (0–4–1, 0–4, 0–7 and 0–6–1, respectively). They also had another winless season in 1911 going 0-1-3 in the New York Pro Football League.
Source: Worst NFL Teams of all time (ESPN) [1]
NFL teams with no wins in a season (fewer than 8 games)
| Year | Team | Wins | Losses | Ties | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1929 | Dayton Triangles | 0 | 6 | 0 | Dayton's final season. The third and consecutive winless seasons for Dayton. Their final win was in 1927 then consecutively went 0-18-1 losing every game in their final two seasons. |
| 1928 | Dayton Triangles | 0 | 7 | 0 | The second winless season for Dayton. |
| 1927 | Buffalo Bisons | 0 | 5 | 0 | The Bisons consecutively went 0-13-2 through a three season span. |
| 1926 | Hammond Pros | 0 | 4 | 0 | The second winless season for Hammond. |
| 1926 | Louisville Colonels | 0 | 4 | 0 | Louisville changed their name from the Brecks to the Colonels making this the franchise's third winless season and going 1-12-0 in their four seasons. |
| 1925 | Rochester Jeffersons | 0 | 6 | 1 | The fourth consecutive winless season for the Jeffersons. They went 0-21-2 through this span. |
| 1925 | Dayton Triangles | 0 | 7 | 1 | |
| 1925 | Duluth Kelleys | 0 | 3 | 0 | |
| 1925 | Milwaukee Badgers | 0 | 6 | 0 | |
| 1924 | Kenosha Maroons | 0 | 4 | 1 | Only season. |
| 1924 | Minneapolis Marines | 0 | 6 | 0 | Consecutively went 0-9-2 through a three season span. |
| 1924 | Rochester Jeffersons | 0 | 6 | 0 | The third consecutive winless season for the Jeffersons. |
| 1923 | Louisville Brecks | 0 | 3 | 0 | The second winless season for Louisville in their third season, and only having one win in the previous season. |
| 1923 | Rochester Jeffersons | 0 | 4 | 0 | The second consecutive winless season for the Jeffersons. |
| 1922 | Evansville Crimson Giants | 0 | 3 | 0 | |
| 1922 | Rochester Jeffersons | 0 | 4 | 1 | |
| 1922 | Hammond Pros | 0 | 4 | 1 | |
| 1921 | Tonawanda Kardex | 0 | 1 | 0 | Only NFL season. |
| 1921 | Muncie Flyers | 0 | 2 | 0 | The second winless season in a row. The Flyers finished their NFL franchise record as 0-3. |
| 1921 | Louisville Brecks | 0 | 2 | 0 | |
| 1921 | New York Brickley Giants | 0 | 2 | 0 | Only Season. |
| 1920 | Muncie Flyers | 0 | 1 | 0 |
Arena Football League
The previously shorter length of seasons in arena football made imperfect seasons quite possible. The following teams went through an Arena Football League season without winning a game:
| Year | Team | Played | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1989 | Maryland Commandos | 4 | Only year branded as the Maryland Commandos. |
| 1991 | Columbus Thunderbolts | 10 | Moved to Cleveland the following year. |
| 1992 | New Orleans Night | 10 | Team ceased operations after season. |
| 1994 | Milwaukee Mustangs | 12 | First winless team to remain in same city during following season. Went to 10–4 in 1996. Folded in 2001. |
| 1996 | Memphis Pharaohs | 14 | Relocated twice, firstly as the Portland Forest Dragons from 1997 and then as the Oklahoma Wranglers. Folded in 2001. |
| 2003 | Carolina Cobras | 16 | Went to 6–10 the following season. Folded in 2004. |
United Football League
The United Football League had one winless season. In their inaugural season, the 2009 New York Sentinels lost all six of their games. The team, which was a traveling team that played games in Hartford, Long Island and New Jersey (and had intended to play a game in New York City but backed out), fired its head coach and settled permanently in Hartford to become the Hartford Colonials. Under the UFL's double round robin format, only one team could finish any particular season entirely with losses, since every team played each other at least twice.
World League of American Football
The 1991 inaugural season of the World League of American Football saw the Raleigh-Durham Skyhawks fold after losing all ten of their regular-season games. The following year, the WLAF replaced that franchise with the Ohio Glory who almost met the same fate but managed one win in their lone season.
Other American football leagues
Since non-professional, semi-professional and minor league teams are inherently unstable in their membership, it is far easier for seasons in which a team wins no games to occur. In the case of non-professional teams, neither mechanisms to force a team to shut down against its will, nor effective drafts or revenue sharing mechanisms to distribute talent evenly among teams typically exist, leading to poor teams accumulating multiple winless seasons. Four teams in football history have both lost all their games and failed to score a single point in an entire season; all played eight games or less. The 1938 Clintonville Four Wheel Drive Truckers failed to score a point in a nine-game season, but managed two 0–0 ties.[2] There are at least twelve teams who have accumulated losing streaks of 20 games or more; there are also four teams who have accumulated seasons of all losses with at least 13 games.[3] In the case of minor professional football, particularly in indoor football leagues, winless seasons often result from an owner's abandonment or other financial hardship. The American Indoor Football Association had at least one winless team in five out of six seasons. The National Indoor Football League went its first three seasons without a winless season, but beginning in 2004, at least one team went winless every year until the league's collapse in 2007. Though the Spring Football League had two teams with winless seasons (the Los Angeles Dragons and the Miami Tropics), and the Stars Football League had one such team (the traveling 2011 Michigan Coyotes), they are almost never mentioned in discussions of perfect and perfectly bad seasons, since those teams only played two games each before the seasons were cut short.
AF2 was the minor league of the Arena Football League. In 2001, the Columbus Wardogs made history becoming the first American football team to finish a season 0-16.
The Legends Football League (originally Lingerie Football League), whose seasons are only three to four games long for each team, has had eight teams with perfectly bad seasons in three years of play. One such team, the Toronto Triumph, did not win a game in either of their competing seasons in 2011 and 2012.
The Princeton Tigers sprint football squad, a team consisting of players under 172 pounds, sustained 16 consecutive winless seasons before Princeton University shut the team down in 2015, citing safety concerns in allowing players to play on a team so heavily outmatched.[4]
Canadian Football League
The Canadian Football League currently has a regular season of eighteen games; from 1952 to 1985 it was generally sixteen games as with the current NFL season, though those teams in the Eastern Division played only fourteen as late as 1973.[5] Consequently, especially given the much smaller number of teams playing, there have been fewer imperfect seasons than in the National Football League, with the exception of the first decade or so when fewer games were played.
CFL teams with no wins in a season (based on official CFL site)
| Season | Team | Games | Wins | Losses | Ties | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1949 | Hamilton Wildcats | 12 | 0 | 12 | 0 | Merged with the Hamilton Tigers for 1950 season |
| 1946 | Hamilton Wildcats | 12 | 0 | 10 | 2 | |
| 1941 | Montreal Royals | 6 | 0 | 6 | 0 | Did not resume when Canadian football recommenced after World War II. |
| 1939 | Montreal Royals | 6 | 0 | 5 | 1 | |
| 1938 | Edmonton Eskimos | 8 | 0 | 8 | 0 | |
| 1938 | Montreal Royals | 6 | 0 | 6 | 0 |
National Pro Grid League
The National Pro Grid League has a short season of 3 to 4 games per team plus a 4 to 8 team playoff. The Los Angeles Reign did not win one game during the first three seasons of the league.
NPGL teams with no wins in a season (based on NPGL site)
| Season | Team | Games | Wins | Losses | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | LA Reign | 3 | 0 | 3 | |
| 2015 | LA Reign | 3 | 0 | 3 | |
| 2014 | LA Reign | 4 | 0 | 4 | Including one playoff loss. |
Lacrosse
Seasons in the National Lacrosse League and its predecessors Major Indoor Lacrosse League and Eagle Pro Box Lacrosse League have varied from eight games in the first years of competition to sixteen games today, with the extension having been gradual. The Charlotte Cobras, who played only one season before folding, are the only team in the history of the NLL to have not won a game in a season. In their sole 1996 season they played twelve games and lost them all, before folding.
In Major League Lacrosse, the season has consisted of either twelve or fourteen games since the league was formed in 2001. The only winless season in Major League Lacrosse has been by the 2006 Chicago Machine, who went 0–12 and lost an MLL record thirteen consecutive games.
Other North American leagues
In the other major professional sports leagues of North America it is virtually impossible that a team could lose all its games, for the simple reason that there are many more games in the regular season than in football or lacrosse.
Major League Soccer
The Major League Soccer schedule has consisted of between twenty-six and thirty-four games. No team in Major League Soccer has ever come close to losing all its games: the most losses in a MLS season is 24 from 32 games by the Kansas City Wizards in 1999, the year when the league used shootouts to decide all tied games. Shootouts were abandoned the following season. In 2013, D.C. United set new MLS records in futility. They won a league low three games, and lost a record 24 games, tying the aforementioned Wizards.
National Basketball Association
Since the 1967–68 season, the National Basketball Association's regular season schedule has been 82 games long (except 1998–99, 50 games and 2011–12, 66 games due to lockouts). It has been as few as 48 games long, but eventually expanded to an 82-game schedule.
The 2011–12 Charlotte Bobcats hold the record for the lowest winning percentage of any team in an NBA season, winning only 7 out of 66 games in a lockout-shortened season, for a winning percentage of .106. This broke the record held by the 1972–73 Philadelphia 76ers, who had a winning percentage of .110 in a full 82-game season. The 1947–48 Providence Steamrollers won an all-time NBA low of six games out of 48 (.125 winning percentage).
The 1953–54 Baltimore Bullets went 0–20 on the road. More recently, the 1990–91 Sacramento Kings managed a near-imperfect road season, winning only one of 41 away games.[6] Overall, the Kings lost 43 consecutive road games before beating the Orlando Magic 95–93 on November 23, 1991.
Women's National Basketball Association
Since its formation in 1997, the WNBA regular season has been gradually increased from 30 to the current 34-game schedule.
No team has gone through a WNBA season without winning a game; the fewest wins in a WNBA season has been three by the 1998 Washington Mystics in their first season, and the 2011 Tulsa Shock. Two other expansion WNBA teams, the 2008 Atlanta Dream at 4–30 and the 2006 Chicago Sky at 5–29 have come closest to this record.
United States Basketball League
The Atlantic City Seagulls of the (now defunct) summertime, minor league USBL finished the 2001 season with an 0–28 record. It was quite a turnaround for the franchise, as they were dominant in the USBL just a few years earlier; the Seagulls were USBL runners-up in 1996, then swept to three straight titles in 1997–99. In 2000, the Seagulls slipped to 12–18, fourth place, and were beaten in the first round of the playoffs; after their winless 2001 campaign, the Seagulls folded.
British Basketball League
In 2013, Mersey Tigers became the first top-flight British basketball team to go a whole season winless.
This record of 0–33 in the regular season of the 2012–13 BBL Championship, was completed with a 90–57 loss away to Glasgow Rocks, but can also be extended to include their complete season of 0–35 (defeats in the first round of the BBL Cup and BBL Trophy).
The defeat in the BBL Trophy was also significant because they fell at this stage to EBL Division One side, Worthing Thunder, and in doing so, it was the first time a BBL side had been knocked out from a competition by an EBL team.
They also currently hold the longest losing streak of 34 consecutive defeats in the BBL Championship.
National Hockey League
The National Hockey League's schedule, like that of the NBA, consists of 82 games. Since the 2004–05 lockout, teams receive two points for a win, one point for a loss in overtime or a shootout, and zero points for a loss in regulation time. From 1997 until 2004, teams received two points for a win, one point for a tie or overtime loss, and zero points for a regulation loss. Prior to 1997, teams received two points for a win, one point for a tie, and no points for a loss. From 1997 to 2004, NHL standings tables had four columns: W-L-T-OTL. From 2005 to 2010, it was reduced to three, W-L-OTL; in 2011, a "regulation/overtime win" column (ROW) was added, which excludes shootout wins; it does not change the point totals, but does serve as the second tiebreaker (after games played; since all teams play 82 games by the season's end barring any unreschedulable cancellations, it becomes the first tiebreaker at season's end).
No team has ever come close to losing every game in an NHL season; the worst record is by the 1974–75 Washington Capitals who went 8–67–5 (8 wins, 67 losses, 5 ties). The 1974–75 Capitals and 1992–93 Ottawa Senators hold the record for fewest wins on the road with one. The NHL played an 80-game season in 1974–75, whereas in 1992–93 the schedule consisted of 84 games, thus giving the Senators the percentage record for worst road record. The Senators also set a record by losing their first 38 consecutive road games. (The Senators’ road statistics include a neutral-site game played in Hamilton, Ontario, in which the Senators were considered the road team.)
Major League Baseball
Since the early 1960s, the schedule of both leagues of Major League Baseball has been 162 games long, and before that, it was 154 games long. With such a schedule, it is practically impossible for a team to finish with a winless season.
The closest to a perfectly imperfect season in the National League was the infamous 1899 Cleveland Spiders season, who finished with a record of 20-134 after its roster was looted by the owners of the team, who then stacked the best players onto the St. Louis Perfectos.
With a win percentage of .130, the Spiders are (as of 2016) the last of three major league teams to have finished a season below the Mendoza line (.200) in win percentage; the others were the 1889 Louisville Colonels (.196), and the 1890 Pittsburgh Alleghenys (.169), whose best players had jumped to the Pittsburgh Burghers of the newly formed Player's League.
Since the establishment of the American League in 1901, the teams to have come closest to imperfection are the 1916 Philadelphia Athletics (36–117), the 1935 Boston Braves (38–115), the 1962 New York Mets (40–120) and the 2003 Detroit Tigers (43–119).
Australian rules football
VFL/AFL
In the Australian Football League, until 1990 called the Victorian Football League, seasons have ranged from fourteen games per team (in its initial season and the shortened wartime seasons from 1916–18 and 1942–43) up to 22 games since 1970.
VFL/AFL teams with no wins in a season
| Season | Team | Wins | Losses | Draws | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1897 | St Kilda | 0 | 14 | 0 | |
| 1898 | St Kilda | 0 | 17 | 0 | |
| 1899 | St Kilda | 0 | 17 | 0 | VFL/AFL record low percentage of 23.2 (scored only 323 points and conceded 1,391). |
| 1902 | St Kilda | 0 | 17 | 0 | Full forward Charlie Baker won the VFL Leading Goalkicker Medal despite the team being winless |
| 1913 | University | 0 | 18 | 0 | Full forward Roy Park won the VFL Leading Goalkicker Medal despite the team being winless |
| 1914 | University | 0 | 18 | 0 | Dropped out of competition and returned to amateur football at the end of the season |
| 1919 | Melbourne | 0 | 16 | 0 | Melbourne's first season back in the VFL after withdrawing from competition during World War I[7] |
| 1926 | North Melbourne | 0 | 17 | 1 | |
| 1928 | Hawthorn | 0 | 18 | 0 | |
| 1931 | North Melbourne | 0 | 18 | 0 | |
| 1934 | North Melbourne | 0 | 18 | 0 | |
| 1950 | Hawthorn | 0 | 18 | 0 | |
| 1964 | Fitzroy | 0 | 18 | 0 |
VFA/VFL
From the time of the formation of the Victorian Football League in 1896 until it was disbanded in 1995, the Victorian Football Association (VFA) was the second-tier club competition in Victoria, after which it was replaced by the current Victorian Football League (VFL) which serves as a state league and feeder to the AFL. Its home-and-away season has varied erratically from twelve to twenty games in length.
| Season | Team | Wins | Losses | Draws | VFA Division | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1886 | University | 0 | 14 | 1 | Single | Left VFA after the season. |
| 1898 | Brunswick | 0 | 15 | 0 | Single | |
| 1903 | Essendon Town | 0 | 18 | 0 | Single | |
| 1904 | Preston | 0 | 18 | 0 | Single | |
| 1910 | Preston | 0 | 18 | 0 | Single | |
| 1912 | Melbourne City | 0 | 18 | 0 | Single | First season in the VFA. |
| 1913 | Melbourne City | 0 | 18 | 0 | Single | Folded at the end of the season. |
| 1941 | Sandringham | 0 | 18 | 0 | Single | Conceded then-record score of 43.29 (287). |
| 1951 | Box Hill | 0 | 19 | 1 | Single | First season in VFA. |
| 1961 | Brighton | 0 | 18 | 0 | Second | Nearly folded at the end of the season, before reforming as Brighton-Caulfield. |
| 1973 | Box Hill | 0 | 18 | 0 | Second | |
| 1977 | Box Hill | 0 | 18 | 0 | Second | |
| 1981 | Sunshine | 0 | 18 | 0 | Second | |
| 1983 | Waverley | 0 | 18 | 0 | First | |
| 1986 | Camberwell | 0 | 18 | 0 | First | |
| 1986 | Mordialloc | 0 | 18 | 0 | Second | |
| 1989 | Camberwell | 0 | 18 | 0 | Single | Defeated Sunshine early in season, but Sunshine dropped out of the VFA and folded after eight games and their record was expunged. |
| 1990 | Camberwell | 0 | 18 | 0 | Single | Dropped out of the VFA and folded before the following season. |
| 1993 | Coburg | 0 | 18 | 0 | Single | Lost 29 consecutive matches between 1992–1994. |
| 1995 | Williamstown | 0 | 16 | 0 | Single | |
| 2001 | Bendigo | 0 | 20 | 0 | VFL | |
| 2002 | Bendigo | 0 | 19 | 1 | VFL | |
| 2009 | Bendigo | 0 | 18 | 0 | VFL | |
| 2013 | Bendigo | 0 | 18 | 0 | VFL | |
| 2014 | Bendigo | 0 | 18 | 0 | VFL | Folded at the end of the season. |
| 2015 | Frankston | 0 | 18 | 0 | VFL |
SANFL
In the South Australian National Football League, which until the 1970s was not that far below the VFL in standard, seasons before the league was reorganised under its present name in 1927 after previously being known as the South Australian Football Association up to 1906 and as the South Australian Football League were from twelve to fourteen games long. Since then they have been between seventeen and twenty-two games long.
| Season | Team | Wins | Losses | Draws | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1898 | West Adelaide | 0 | 14 | 0 | First season in SAFL. |
| 1906[8] | West Adelaide | 0 | 12 | 0 | |
| 1908[9] | Sturt | 0 | 12 | 0 | |
| 1909[10] | South Adelaide | 0 | 12 | 0 | |
| 1921[11] | Glenelg | 0 | 14 | 0 | First season in SAFL; would not record first win until Round 1 of 1925. |
| 1922[12] | Glenelg | 0 | 14 | 0 | |
| 1923[13] | Glenelg | 0 | 14 | 0 | |
| 1924[14] | Glenelg | 0 | 14 | 0 | |
| 1926[15] | South Adelaide | 0 | 13 | 1 | |
| 1933[16] | West Adelaide | 0 | 17 | 0 | |
| 1948[17] | South Adelaide | 0 | 17 | 0 | |
| 1950[18] | South Adelaide | 0 | 17 | 0 | |
| 1964[19] | Central District | 0 | 20 | 0 | First season in SANFL. |
| 1995 | Sturt | 0 | 22 | 0 | The first (and to date only) 0-22 season in a major Australian rules football league. |
WAFL
The West Australian Football League has existed within Western Australia under various monikers since 1885, and until the 1980s was of equivalent standard to the VFL and SANFL. Its season was originally around fourteen games in length, later increasing to twenty games.[a][20]
| Season | Team | Wins | Losses | Draws | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1902 | Subiaco | 0 | 15 | 0 | |
| 1905 | Subiaco | 0 | 10 | 0 | Played fewer games than rival league clubs due to financial difficulties. |
| 1917 | Midland Junction | 0 | 12 | 0 | Disbanded at end of season. |
| 1999 | Peel | 0 | 20 | 0 |
Rugby league
Great Britain
In the Rugby Football League Championship, teams initially played a variable number of games, with the maximum ranging over time from 26 to 38, and some teams playing as few as fourteen. In more modern times the fixture list has been standardised at 26 games per team.
As a result of this fairly lengthy schedule, it has been almost impossible for British rugby league teams to lose all their games, with the only exception being during World War II's so-called "Wartime emergency League" when teams were often able to arrange no more than ten games and some as few as five. The only two winless seasons since normal competition resumed after the war have been in the second and third divisions of the Championship.
| Season | Team | Wins | Losses | Draws | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2006 | Oldham Roughyeds | 0 | 18 | 0 | National League One Finished with a points difference of -724 |
| 1991–92 | Nottingham City | 0 | 26 | 0 | Third Division Last season in league Finished with a points difference of -1159 |
| 1989–90 | Runcorn Highfield | 0 | 28 | 0 | Second Division Renamed Highfield for following season; still took five successive wooden spoons before disbanding in 1997 |
| 1941–1942 | Bramley | 0 | 19 | 0 | Left the league until 1945–1946 |
| 1940–1941 | Broughton Rangers | 0 | 10 | 0 | "Wartime Emergency Season" Left the league until 1945–1946 as Belle Vue Rangers before disbanding in 1955. |
| 1940–1941 | Leigh | 0 | 13 | 0 | "Wartime Emergency Season" Did not return until 1946–1947 |
| 1906–1907 | Liverpool City | 0 | 30 | 0 | Scored only 76 points and conceded almost 1,400. |
Australia
In Australian rugby league seasons were initially between eight (in the event of Kangaroo tours) and sixteen games long, so that a very bad team could go through a season with only losses. As a result of the expansion of the NSWRL from 1947 onwards, the season has been lengthened gradually with a few intermissions. The following NSWRL teams up to 1966 did not win a single game:
| Season | Team | Wins | Losses | Draws | Remarks |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1966 | Easts | 0 | 18 | 0 | Longest winless season in NSWRL/NRL history. Last season with 18 games: in 1967 the season expanded to 22. Sequence of 29 winless games from Round 13 of 1965. |
| 1946 | Souths | 0 | 14 | 0 | Lost 22 successive games after the death of Alf Blair during the 1944/1945 off-season. |
| 1937 | University | 0 | 8 | 0 | Team disbanded after season shortened by Kangaroo tour, having won only one game in three years (13–11 against St. George in the last round of 1936). |
| 1935 | University | 0 | 16 | 0 | Lost 42 consecutive games after winning 4–3 in opening game of 1934 |
| 1921 | University | 0 | 8 | 0 | Kangaroo tour shortened season. Won only one game in initial season of 1920 for a combined 1–20 record. |
| 1920 | Annandale | 0 | 13 | 0 | Disbanded at end of season after having won only one game (8–5 against Norths) in three seasons. |
| 1918 | Annandale | 0 | 14 | 0 | Sequence of 27 winless games: won only twice in last four seasons |
Since 1967, NSWRL and later NRL seasons have been between 22 and 26 games long; thus it is much less likely a very bad team could lose every single one of its games.
Rugby union
Super Rugby, the Southern Hemisphere's principal club competition, has seen two teams go through an entire season with no wins or draws. Both seasons were in the competition's past incarnations of Super 12 and Super 14, each name reflecting the number of competing teams.
Under both Super 12 (1996–2005) and Super 14 (2006–2010) formats, each team played all other teams once, resulting in seasons of 11 and then 13 games. The competition became Super Rugby with the addition of a 15th team in 2011. The season format was also heavily revamped; the regular season now consists of 16 matches.
The Super 12 and Super 14 eras each saw one team finish a season with only losses; both teams with this dubious distinction are from South Africa. In 2002, the Bulls, based in Pretoria, finished with 11 losses from 11 matches. The other imperfect season was that of the Johannesburg-based Lions in the final season of the Super 14 format in 2010, who lost all 13 of their matches, while ending up with a final points difference of negative 300.
Cricket
County cricket
In English first-class county cricket, which has a history dating back to the early nineteenth century and was until the middle twentieth century up to the highest standard of the game, seasons have varied in length. Before the 1880s, they were generally less than ten matches in length and some "first-class" counties played only against one or two different opponents, so that a team losing all its games was not uncommon. Between 1887 and 1929, seasons were gradually increased in length to a standard twenty-eight matches for all counties. However, because of the development and popularity of one-day cricket, seasons have been reduced to twenty-four games in 1969 and twenty in 1972, though this was increased by two in 1977 and 1983. With an increase to four days for all games, sixteen or seventeen games have been played since 1993.
Also, because of improvements to pitches via the heavy roller and covering to protect from rain, the proportion of games "drawn" (not finished) has steadily risen since the 1870s.
Only two county teams have ever finished a season with only losses in a program of eight or more games:
| Season | Team | Wins | Losses | Draws | Remarks | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1884 | Derbyshire | 0 | 10 | 0 | Won only three games from 1884 to 1887 Lost every game in 1887, but played only six games | |
| 1920 | Derbyshire | 0 | 17 | 0 | One match, against Nottinghamshire, was abandoned without a ball bowled | |
Teams losing or drawing every game in a first-class county season have been rather less exceptional, though by no means frequent:[21]
| Season | Team | Wins | Losses | Draws | Remarks | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1865 | Yorkshire | 0 | 6 | 2 | Were to have an amazing rise due to the discovery of deadly fast bowlers Freeman and Emmett, winning every game in 1867. | |
| 1871 | Surrey | 0 | 9 | 4 | ||
| 1877 | Sussex | 0 | 7 | 1 | ||
| 1886 | Derbyshire | 0 | 8 | 1 | Was demoted from first-class status between 1888 and 1893 | |
| 1897 | Derbyshire | 0 | 9 | 7 | Lost two games by one wicket to power clubs Lancashire and Yorkshire | |
| 1900 | Hampshire | 0 | 16 | 6 | Lost star batsman Robert Poore to the Boer War | |
| 1901 | Derbyshire | 0 | 13 | 7 | ||
| 1910 | Somerset | 0 | 15 | 3 | Lost star bowler Bill Greswell to business in Ceylon. Two-year record in 1910 and 1911 was one win, 28 losses and five draws | |
| 1924 | Derbyshire | 0 | 13 | 11 | ||
| 1928 | Worcestershire | 0 | 19 | 11 | Most matches and most losses by any winless county team. Played 54 county matches without a win between June 1927 and May 1929. | |
| 1936 | Northamptonshire | 0 | 9 | 15 | Did win one game against Sussex under "one-innings" rules after first two days washed out by rain | |
| 1937 | Northamptonshire | 0 | 16 | 8 | Lost star batsman Fred Bakewell to a car crash and bowler "Nobby" Clark to loss of form | |
| 1938 | Northamptonshire | 0 | 17 | 7 | Ninety-nine County Championship matches without a win between 14 May 1935 and 29 May 1939 | |
| 1967 | Nottinghamshire | 0 | 4 | 24 | Only team to be winless without finishing bottom 24 drawn matches is most in county cricket history; four finished games is fewest in a season of more than sixteen games | |
| 1979 | Glamorgan | 0 | 10 | 11 | ||
| 1982 | Warwickshire | 0 | 8 | 14 | Alvin Kallicharran was leading run-scorer in country, but bowling exceptionally weak with average of over 45 runs per wicket | |
| 1996 | Durham[22] | 0 | 12 | 5 | Won only one match in any competition (four-day or one) against a first-class opponent | |
| 2008 | Surrey | 0 | 5 | 10 | First Division[23] | |
| 2008 | Gloucestershire | 0 | 5 | 11 | Second Division[23] | |
| 2009 | Worcestershire | 0 | 10 | 6 | First Division[24] | |
| 2013 | Leicestershire | 0 | 8 | 8 | Second Division[25] | |
| 2014 | Northamptonshire | 0 | 12 | 4 | First Division[26] | |
| 2014 | Leicestershire | 0 | 10 | 6 | Second Division. First back-to-back winless seasons by a county since the Second World War.[26] | |
There were no completely winless seasons in the Sunday League limited-overs competition during its history from 1969 to 2009.
International first-class cricket
With the exception of the Sheffield Shield since the 1970s, most first-class cricket competitions outside England have either been knock-outs or of such short length that it becomes an everyday occurrence for a team to lose all its games. Some, such as the Ranji Trophy and most seasons of the Quaid-e-Azam Trophy, have indeed been knockout competitions, which typically use first innings lead to decide if a match is unfinished.
There have still be some notable winless sequences in non-English first-class cricket:
- in the 1981–1982 Quaid-e-Azam Trophy, Karachi lost all nine of its matches[27]
- between 1959–1960 and 1986–1987, Jammu and Kashmir played a total of 115 games without a win[28]
International one-day and Twenty20 cricket
In the 2012–13 season of the Australian Big Bash League, the Sydney Thunder completed an imperfect season where they lost all their eight games despite possessing the likes of Chris Gayle.
Netball
In the ANZ Championship, which formed out of the old Commonwealth Bank Trophy in 2008, seasons have been thirteen games. There has so far been one winless season, by the Central Pulse from Wellington (formed as a combination of the Wellington Shakers and Western Flyers)[29] in the opening 2008 season. They did earn one point when a game was abandoned due to a leaking roof. The Pulse were to win only one game each in 2009[30] and 2010, thus having a record of 2–36 after three seasons.
Association football
Only one team is known to have completed a season with no victories or draws. Antigua Barracuda lost all 26 matches of the 2013 USL Pro. Elsewhere, four teams have however completed their respective domestic seasons without winning a game. In the 2010–11 Serbian SuperLiga, FK Čukarički Stankom played an entire season winless, drawing five matches and losing 25 in a 30-game season, giving them only 5 points and finishing bottom in a field of 16. The team also only scored ten goals whilst conceding 65.
In the Bulgarian A Professional Football Group, which is the top tier of association football in the European country, three teams have all played a season without winning, with those being Torpedo Ruse (four draws out of 22 matches during 1951), Rakovski Ruse (one draw out of 30 matches during 1996/97) and Chernomorets Burgas Sofia (also one draw out of 30 matches during 2006/07). Chernomorets were however the worse performing out of these, conceding 131 goals with only eight in reply (the same number scored as Rakovski Ruse in their winless season), they still however completed the season with a minus 2 points total, because they violated a rule concerning not being able to field enough youth players.
In the 1946-47 Allsvenskan, the Swedish Football League season of 1946-47 with 22 games played, Billingsfors IK tied 3 games and lost 19, the only team in Swedish football history never to win even one single Allsvenskan game.
The open high frequency of draws in association football, coupled with the relatively long length of seasons and promotion and relegation system used in a majority of jurisdictions to automatically remove the lowest performing teams from any given league, makes winless seasons less likely to occur.
Notes
a In the 1944 under-19 wartime competition that replaced the senior competition between 1942 and that season due to the player drain of World War II, South Fremantle lost all nineteen of their games.
References
- ↑ "Worst NFL Teams of all Time". ESPN. August 22, 2002. Retrieved 2002-08-22.
- ↑ "Semi-pro Football / Minor League Football – Team Points Records". Semiprofootball.org. Retrieved 2014-01-02.
- ↑ "Semi-pro Football / Minor League Football – Team Games Records". Semiprofootball.org. 1986-10-08. Retrieved 2014-01-02.
- ↑ http://www.sprintfootball.com/single-post/2016/04/12/Princeton-drops-Sprint-Football
- ↑ "1973 Regular Season Standings | CFL.ca | Official Site of the Canadian Football League". CFL.ca. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "Sacramento Kings at Washington Bullets Box Score, November 20, 1990". Basketball-Reference.com. 1990-11-20. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "Melbourne Football Club – Bio". Australian Football. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "West Adelaide Football Club – Stats". Australian Football. 2013-03-27. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "Sturt Football Club – Stats". Australian Football. 2013-03-27. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "South Adelaide Football Club – Stats". Australian Football. 2013-03-27. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "Glenelg Football Club – Stats". Australian Football. 2013-03-27. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "Glenelg Football Club – Stats". Australian Football. 2013-03-27. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "Glenelg Football Club – Stats". Australian Football. 2013-03-27. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "Glenelg Football Club – Stats". Australian Football. 2013-03-27. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "South Adelaide Football Club – Stats". Australian Football. 2013-03-27. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "West Adelaide Football Club – Stats". Australian Football. 2013-03-27. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "South Adelaide Football Club – Stats". Australian Football. 2013-03-27. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "South Adelaide Football Club – Stats". Australian Football. 2013-03-27. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "Central District Football Club – Stats". Australian Football. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "West Australian Football League". WAFL. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ Wynne-Thomas, Peter; The Rigby A–Z of Cricket Records; pp. 53 to 67. ISBN 072701868X
- ↑ "The Home of CricketArchive". Cricketarchive.co.uk. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- 1 2 "The Home of CricketArchive". Cricketarchive.co.uk. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "The Home of CricketArchive". Cricketarchive.co.uk. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "The Home of CricketArchive". Cricketarchive.co.uk. Retrieved 2014-09-27.
- 1 2 "The Home of CricketArchive". Cricketarchive.co.uk. Retrieved 2014-09-27.
- ↑ "The Home of CricketArchive". Cricketarchive.co.uk. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ Wynne-Thomas; The Rigby A−Z of Cricket Records; p. 68
- ↑ "Central Pulse fail to attract Silver Ferns". Stuff.co.nz. 2009-01-01. Retrieved 2014-02-18.
- ↑ "Netball: Pulse winless no more". 28 June 2009.