A photograph believed to be the first-ever picture of an England football team has been unearthed by a nostalgia website.

The grainy shot, taken in 1876, was discovered by Derbyshire freelance journalist Peter Seddon, who was researching material for a football book.

He uploaded it to local history site You & Yesterday, published by Associated Northcliffe Digital in association with the Derby Evening Telegraph, hailing it a world picture exclusive.

A story and the photo were then printed in the Evening Telegraph – and generated so much interest that it has featured on the website of Sky News and in nearly every UK national newspaper.

Football Association historian David Barber said the previous earliest recorded photos of England teams dated back to the 1890s.

You & Yesterday site manager Paul Linford said: “This is clearly an exciting find and I was very pleased to see it posted on You & Yesterday before it went everywhere else.”

The photo of the 1876 England team was discovered in microfilms of a 1926 edition of the Derbyshire Football Express, at the Derby Local Studies Library.

It was taken on March 4, 1876, in Glasgow before Scotland beat England 3-0 – a game believed to be only the fifth international football match.

You & Yesterday has been running for a year and features nostalgia and memory lane stories from across Derbyshire.

To view the photograph and read more about its history, go to You & Yesterday.