Players me and my childhood mates took the mick out of (now 24 yo)

It's fair to say when you're a kid your football goggles aren't as good as they are in adulthood. You don't understand the game properly, you despise every stray pass and scoring is everything.

I'm 24 now, but I wanted to put to the BBS the names of players me and my childhood mates would always take the mickey out of 15+ years ago. Wonder how many are deemed on here to be decent players?

• Antony Kay
• Kevin Donovan
• Chris Lumsden
• Stephen McPhail
• Tommy Wright
• Isaiah Rankin
• Kevin Betsy

 

I was around 24 years old when they were playing. In my opinion:

Kay - good, solid player. Great servant to BFC.
Donovan - idle lovely person stole a living One of my least favourite BFC players ever.

Lumsdon - a tragic waste of talent, as he freely admits himself. If I didn't know better, I'd have thought Sunderland sent a different bloke back when we signed him permanently.

McPhail - classy but very brittle. Didn't score anywhere near the number of goals he should have.

Tommy Wrong. Absolutely terrible player. He tried hard though.

Isiah Rankin - was really excited when we signed him, but he clearly never lived up to his potential. Will always remember the goal against Brentford. Luckily I wasn't there to witness his shithousery at Grimsby.

Kevin Betsy - an excellent player for us during a very tough period in our history. Plenty of effort and no little skill.

From that general period, Paul Gibbs definitely sticks out as being the worst player, not only of that era, but possibly of all time. Special mentions to Barry Conlon and his comedy tight shorts, and Tony Bedeau, the Torquay reserve who was supposed to save us from relegation. Dark days.

 

Neon Light.. sorry Leon Knight was one of those players who were overhyped. I loved taking the mick out of those players

 

That goal Rankin scored against us at Grimsby still makes me blow mi lid. Absolute cnuts trick. I remember been 4-0 down at half time and loads of us wanted to leave but the stewards wunt let us out.

 

That's just cruel. Really can't see how they can keep you there against your will. Can you imagine being locked in the cinema and made to finish watching Titanic?!

 

When everyone started getting a bit pi33ed off wi stewards and ‘asking’ why we wasn’t allowed to leave they came up the wnak excuse of “think about the people’s houses round here if we let you out” what a load of owd Shiite

 

I was only in my teens but here's how I remember it.. . .

We were getting absolutely spanked at half time and hundred's of Barnsley fans wanted to escape. The local police/stewards thought it would be much better to hold people against their will. The more people trying to get out the worse it got and a sort of crush developed resulting in aggro with the police and stewards. If memory serves, for whatever reason, they then opened the gates at the other side of the stand. By this point the local nutcases had formed a group and there was chaos outside. Me and a few mates ending up running into a sex shop to avoid getting our faces caved in.....not sure we needed to spend quite so long in there though..

 

Solid breakdown, ta for that. We used to call Donovan 'scuffer'

 

Always remembered Mcphail as being class

 

Won Hoyland Reds poy and possibly official poy.

 

Wasn’t Doncaster’s way of trying to beat us just to take Mcphail out as well early on? They knew he was pivotal for us in that play off season

 

It never really worked out for isiah Rankin at Barnsley but I was under the impression that if he played so many games Barnsley had to pay Bradford more money and with us been flat broke at the time it hindered his career with us .

 

Sounds about right to me. I was only a youngen anorl but the group of blokes I went with didn’t try get out of the way nor did they get me out of the way.

 

Macfail was a lazy arse who flattered to deceive ..

 

Don’t agree with you on that one Helen. Quality footballer.

 

Quality but extremely lazy. One of many we've had who believed their natural ability allowed them to put in a lot less effort than their colleagues.

Mcphail, McCourt, Moncur, Mellis.

We really should stop signing players beginning with M

 

A lot felt as you did but he didn't perform for us. And I never felt he gave 100% effort.

 

“He didn’t perform for us”. We’ll just have to disagree on that one too.

 

I can see where you’re coming from but i’d have to say that I love the times when every so often the Club sign someone who can actually play the game!! They are then often called lazy. You’ve named one then in Paddy McCourt who is probably the most gifted footballer I’ve ever seen in a red shirt. Not the best - but his ability with a ball at his feet. Gets you off yr seat.

I’ll give you another. My favourite player of all time - Ronnie Galvin. I know we’ve now re-written history and he’s recognised as one of the greatest, if not the greatest, player we’ve ever had. But at the time there were quite a few who called him out for being lazy, fat, never tracks back etc....including his own manager!