The Football League Second Division 1896/97 was the fifth season of the Football League Second Division as the second highest English football league . Second division champion was Notts County and the second-placed Newton Heath also qualified for the "test games" called relegation games against the two first division clubs AFC Sunderland and Burnley FC in the table below . While Newton Heath failed there, Notts County secured participation in the elite league in the following season 1897/98. The Burton Wanderers then no longer took part in the Second Division. In addition, the Burton Swifts and Lincoln City had to worry about staying in the class, but then all received enough votes in the re-election process of the league association to be allowed to participate again in the Second Division in the following season 1897/98. Instead of Notts County and the Burton Wanderers, relegated FC Burnley and promoted Luton Town took the vacancies.
Before the automatic promotion and relegation rule between the first-class First Division and the second-rate Second Division, which first came into effect at the end of the 1898/99 season, potential promoters from the Second Division had to prove themselves in play-off- like “test games”. Participation in the game was also dependent on an election procedure of the league association, which had to decide whether a club might participate. Also in the season 1896/97 there were test matches between the two first division AFC Sunderland and Burnley as well as the second division Notts County and Newton Heath, from which Notts County and AFC Sunderland emerged as the sporting winners and then each the majority of the votes of the League Association.
Tom Boucher