Cup. Olympic beat St. Mark's in the final to win the tournament, and, as the competition was not held again, the club retained the trophy in perpetuity. Over the next two seasons the club continued to play friendly matches and also entered the Blackburn Association Challenge Cup, a knock-out tournament open to all local clubs set up by the organisation which governed football within the town. Olympic won the cup in both 1879 and 1880, after which the competition was discontinued when the Blackburn Association was absorbed into the larger Lancashire County Football Association. As with the Livesey United Cup, the trophy remained in Olympic's possession for the remainder of the club's existence. In 1880 the club's committee decided that Olympic should compete for greater prizes, and opted to enter two further competitions, the Lancashire Senior Cup and the Football Association Challenge Cup (FA Cup), the country's premier football competition. In the club's first FA Cup match, the "Light Blues" were defeated 5–4 by Sheffield, and the following season the team again lost in the first round, away to Darwen. The club's reputation within its home area was growing, however, and matches were now being arranged with teams from further afield, such as Sheffield Wednesday, Nottingham Forest, and even Scottish clubs such as Cowlairs and Hibernian. The club's increasing expenses were met with the help of Sydney Yates, a local iron foundry owner, who invested a large amount of money and continued to bankroll the club for most of its existence. At the end of the 1881–82 season, Olympic defeated Blackburn Rovers to win the East Lancashire Charity Cup. Success In the 1882–83 FA Cup, Olympic defeated four other Lancashire clubs, Accrington, Lower Darwen, Darwen Ramblers, and Church, to reach the fifth round. At this stage the "Light Blues" were drawn to play Welsh team Druids. Olympic defeated the Ruabon-based team 4–1 to progress to the semi-final stage, where for the first time they faced opponents from the south of England — Old Carthusians. The Carthusians, the team for former pupils of Charterhouse School, had won the cup two years earlier and even the local newspapers in Blackburn considered them strong favourites to reach the final again. Olympic, however, won 4–0 in a match played at a neutral venue in Whalley Range, Manchester, to set up a match with another of the great amateur teams, Old Etonians, in the final