The season we almost went up (a short history lesson!)

I've been spending the day sorting through my bookshelves to make some space, which of course means I've actually spent the day flicking through books and thus far the pile of books to go out remains empty. Anyway, I have a book with all the league tables in it, so I had a little look at the pre and post WW1 period, as we all know we nearly went up immediately after the war, had Arsenal not bought the remaining promotion place.

But did you know that in 1921-22 we missed out on promotion by one goal? We finished level on points with Stoke and our goals for/against were 67-52, whereas Stoke's were 60-44. We actually scored 16 more goals than Forest who finished champions. Had it been three points for a win we'd have finished 4 points clear of Stoke.

So one more goal would have taken us up. Earlier that season we had missed two penalties in a 0-0 home draw with Leicester. We also missed a penalty in a 1-1 draw at Forest three games prior to the end of the season.

The way we missed out was worse than that time we thought we were in the play-offs after beating Middlesborough though. We won our last game 3-0 against Notts County to move 2 points clear of Stoke. Stoke then had a game at home to Bristol City to play. Bristol were bottom, but a win would have moved them up two places and condemned Bradford PA and Coventry to the drop to the new Division Three North and South. In fact, on the day that we beat Notts County, Bristol beat Stoke 2-0 at home, and with Stoke not having won one of their previous 5 matches prior to their final game the odds were stacked in Bristol's (and Barnsley's) favour for their return game a week later.

The champagne was therefore on ice...which is where it stayed, as Stoke ran out 3-0 winners and went up with a goal average (a fancy way of doing goal difference!) of less than a tenth of a goal better than the Reds. As Barnsley had brought Ernie Hine in midway through the season and he finished with 12 goals from 18 games, chances are we may have been good enough to have put up a good fight in the first division, but it wasn't to be. Stoke came straight back down the next season and Barnsley never came this close again until we eventually got promoted three quarters of a century later!

At least this proves that our grandad's were put through the same agony that the Reds have put us through though. Some things never change.

 

Gerry was gutted at the time.

 

Cracking Post

I only realised last month that there was a weeks grace between our end of season and Stokes.

If the snow continues have a look at 1937-38 season when we went into the last game vying with Nottingham Forest for a relegation place. The final fixture just happened to be at home against the Tricky Trees. With three minutes to go Forest equalised to take the point that would ultimately give them safety but not without a very late scare. With seconds remaining Beaumont Asquith broke through and with the goal at his mercy managed to see his shot hit the base of the post, run along the line, and hit the other post before bouncing clear. In the end we were relegated by 0.002 thousandths of a goal.

I'm doing a bit of digging about 1919 at the moment. It looks like Arsenal, Man United, Liverpool and Chelsea all colluded to steal our rightful place in Division One.

 

Gerry, King ot Whispers!

 

Re: Cracking Post

Whilst clearing out some football books this afternoon there is one with a piece on Arsenal's chairman of that time in it and I'm pretty sure that when I read it some time ago there was mention of the dodgy promotion. I'll dig it out and see if it does. I think it was the book by David Conn, who loves a conspiracy and can see the negative in anything (he should post on here).

On another note, I have found out what the game was for that picture of Harry Hough and Len Fairclough that I have. It took place on 13th August 1967 at Community Park, Ward Green and was between Northern ITV All Stars and Harry Hough's XI. The programme lists the ITV players as featuring Bill Grundy, Stuart Hall, Freddie Garrity and Malcolm Allison, whereas Harry's XI features players from the 1950s, like Jimmy Baxter and Johnny Kelly. I never thought we'd get to the bottom of that one without asking Harry himself!

 

Re: Cracking Post

That's the famous one where they got promoted over us due to some shenanigans that I can't remember just now. Then they embarked on their unbroken top tier tenure that should/could have been us!!

 

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That's right. We finished 3rd and Wolves 4th and yet Arsenal, who finished 5th, went up instead. I think their chairman was involved in some shenanigans, but I'll dig the book out and see what it says. Just think what we missed out on. Bertie Mee, 13 league titles, Charlie George, Liam Brady, Graham Rix missing the penalty, 1-0 to the Barnsley, Charlie Nicholas, offside trap perfection, Bergkamp, "I didn't see the incident", Thierry Henry...could have all been us!

 

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the forest goal was scored with 3 minutes left when the forest forward charged Cliff Binns into the barnsley goal, the referee disallowed the goal but changed his mind after protests from forest. It was Bert Barlow who hit both posts as well not Asquith when I saw bert he still remembered it he said he couldnt miss picked his spot but the ball hit a divot which deflected it onto the post.

 

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Good on yer Wayne.

As I was writing the piece I was thinking it wasn't Beau Asquith but thought I would take a flyer rather than look it up (When will I ever learn).

As for Bert Barlow, what unusual record did he and his son hold in Professional Football ?

 

Re: Cracking Post

The details I am chasing involve Manchester United and Liverpool who admitted fixing the score of a match in the 1914-15 season. The main players involved were banned for life but on the resumption of the League in 1919, there was quite a clamour among clubs (with Arsenal the main mouth piece) that the two should be demoted for their part in the scandal. Chelsea themselves were supporters of the action but they had finished in the relegation places at the end of 1914-5 and would need a management decision to overturn their fate.

Needless to say the actual decison making is shrouded in mystery but a solution was worked out that saved all the named clubs in return for their support of the Arse in an unprecidented "Election" for the final promotion place.

We were truly stitched up.

 

Don't worry though we would be a bit crap now! No champions league, no cups for years! Oh it be awful!