Trying to imagine

What this board would have been like the year we lost our first six games under Allan Clarke

 

probably very quiet, not many of us would have been able to afford a computer with internet capabilities, horace goes skiing was the best i could muster and that was mid 80s :biggrin:

 

and the crowds were little over 4,000 in those days. The second home match, against Leeds, had a crowd of 6,843! In fact, the only four games we played in the league that season with crowds in excess of 10,000 were at Leeds, Derby, Ipswich and Sunderland. We couldn't even get a crowd of 10,000 when we played Spurs at home in the League Cup. Still managed to finish 11th though.

It all changed the season after, as we went top after 6 games, thanks to Rodger Wylde's 2 goals against Plymouth. Ah, those were the days...

 

Empty as half the contributors would have topped themselves.

 

Must have been the prices. Or not.

 

He took from Collins didn't he ? Remember one of the games the attendance was around or just under 3000. They were hard days

 

What year was this?

 

Can't remember a 3,000 crowd in the second tier. Could be wrong but in the dark days I still thought we averaged around 6,000

 

A potted history of attendances...

1981-82 we had nearly 34,000 at home to Man City, 1982-83 we were getting 10-13,000 during the first part of the season, but, as Dave mentioned, the miner's strike badly affected the crowds, which had fallen to 6,457 for the last game of the season against Charlton (I remember standing on the Kop for that one!).

1983-84 the crowds got even worse, although we still managed 20,322 against Wednesday. Only 4,672 for the last match against Carlisle though. Then we really slumped. By the end of 1984-85 we were down to 3,053 for the last game against Wimbledon. As an aside, this is the game where Gordon Owen nutted Nigel Winterburn. There was a bit of a carry on after the game too. A week later and Barnsley's players jet off to Spain for a week's jolly and walk into the bar near the hotel. Which team are standing at the bar? You guessed it. They all kissed and made up over a pint though.

In 1985-86 we had the following attendances at Oakwell - Middlesborough 3,827, Huddersfield 5,746 and Sheff United 5,451. And then when we went top of the league in the 6th game of 1986-87 we did it in front of 4,163 at home to Plymouth.

Things started picking up in 1987-88, although even then we only had 6,512 at home to Ipswich in David Currie's first game and 9,061 at home to Man City. There were a lot of local teams and big teams in the division that season with decent away followings - Villa, Leeds, Man City, etc.

They were back down again the next season though, even though we only missed the play-offs by one place. Less than 6,000 for three of our last four home games. 1989-90 the attendances were back up, but a lot of that was down to away following.

Only one crowd less than 5,000 in 1990-91 (Pompey at home 4-0). We still had some crowds below 5,000 in 1992-93 and 1993-94 (under Viv and Danny). And then they slumped again in Wilson's first season - 3,928 at home to Notts County, 3,659 at home to Southend. But hey presto, crowds back up the following season and then we started 1996-97 with home crowds of 9,787 against Huddersfield and 7,523 against Reading, before finishing with 18,605 against Bradford (I think we were all at that one!).

 

Think the 3,000 crowd was after strike against wimbledon as it states above (just seen it)

 

It was at the start of the 1986/87 season

After losing our entire strike force just before the season started (David Hirst to Sheffield Wednesday, Ian Walsh to Grimsby Town, Gordon Owen to Bristol City), we lost the first six league games. We drew the seventh 1-1 at home to Plymouth Argyle & won the eighth 1-0 at Grimsby Town.

 

Re: It was at the start of the 1986/87 season

And thats when we actually had a brilliant second half of the season, starting with that new years day 3-4 win at Hull.

 

Correct

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Re: Correct

ahhh Ian Chandler.... i loved the games back then, even though we were rubbish and the ground was empty... the innocence of youth!!

 

Re: Correct

Gordon Owen was my face player back then, obviously. Met him when l was the mascot v Middlesborough 1986.

 

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Yes, he was my favourite too, which made me embarrassed when I didn't immediately recognise him when he drove me to Donny in a cab a few years ago. Nice bloke too, with some good stories.

 

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The famous Ian Chandler hat trick (Andy Duggan got our stoppage time winner). That was at the old Boothferry Park wasnt it, which was a good away fixture for us in those days.

Remember the fa cup games that season against Caernarfon & Aldershot.

 

That was a real season of 2 halves

Only won 4 up to december 31st and only lost 4 to the end of the season (won at Hull on New Year's day).

Wasn't that the Centenary season?

I remember my dad saying we were down before the end of september.

 

Gordon Owen

Gordon was fantastic, pace and skill, I remember him scoring against us for Cardiff at Oakwell in a 3-2 (I think) defeat the season before we signed him. I said to my dad, "he looks a decent player, we could do with somebody like that". I had no idea at the time that he was actually a Barnsley lad.

Didn't he score a hat-trick of headers against Oxford who were top of the 2nd division in a 3-0 win?

Another memory was a 2-2 draw against Portsmouth in the snow with an orange ball (it was on the BBC that night because there were so many postponements). He almost scored from a tight angle near the end and Ron Futcher was furious with him for not squaring it for a tap-in. The score at the time was 2-1, only for Pompey (who had been outplayed) to grab a lucky equalliser at the death.

Is he still a taxi driver then?