Just watching The Big Match Revisited on ITV 4

From 1979. It's a game between Manchester City & Chelsea. The pitch at Maine Road is covered in snow, they're using an orange ball and have painted all the lines blue. The match would probably have not been played today in those conditions, unless it was being televised live. From a Barnsley angle, both Paul and Ron Futcher are playing for City (Ron's scored) and Danny Blanchflower is Chelsea's manager.

 

They were good days Kev, when football belonged to the supporters and money didn't rule the game. As a kid I used to love it when they played with the orange ball.

 

Love big match revisited mate,pitches like ploughed fields,shirt collers so big and pointy they could have your eye out,greatold grounds with cracking atmospheres,top stuff./

 

I had no responsibilities in those days, mate

And used to love travelling the country watching Barnsley, especially that particular season. It was Allan Clarke's first, as player/manager. After going away for a number of seasons with just a smattering of others and watching us usually lose in run down grounds, 1978/79 was something completely different. The quality of the grounds didn't alter, but the quality of our football certainly did. There were numerous occasions we outnumbered the home support, as our team won and played the opposition off the park.
As you quite rightly say, happy days.

 

Wonderful nostalgia

For grumpy, old fogies like me, mate.

 

Lol didn,t realise they had such high tech shirts in those days! Iloved it too though when they played on snow with the orange ball.It seems like a totally different game sometimes like when they show you the old Baseball ground at Derby when it was all mud and sand and getting the ball to move at all was an achievement!