Search: 'Darwen'

Reading fan Roger Titford is worried by the state of the Nationwide as the Premiership fulls further clear

Pre-season favourites West Ham were always going to be the big story in this league, whatever they did. One of the top dozen clubs in the country (in theory) slumming it in the Nationwide; would it be ruin or revival? From a distance it sounded like a catalogue of disasters: the Rotherham dressing room; Glenn Roeder’s exit; the ruck with Reading over Alan Pardew’s contract; his failure to get a win for ages; losing a 3-0 lead to West Brom; backroom staff shown the door; Jermain Defoe collecting red cards like they were Monopoly properties before following David James out of the club; fans booing awful home performances; dismal dis­plays in key away games; the board under pressure from shareholders. And yet like a real EastEnders script they kept it going to the last moments of the season.

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Can Roman buy the Premiership? One man did just that and Ray Chenery can't see anything wrong with the transformation of Blackburn wrought by the late Jack Walker

Back in the 1970s, when  Match of the Day  was king, they’d show the top of the table in each div­ision. And occasionally Blackburn Rovers’ name was there, mostly in their Third Division days, for all the nation to see. I remember being envious of the teams who seemed always to feature near the top of the Second – why couldn’t we ever do that? And then we did; in each of the three seasons from 1987 to 1990, under the guidance of Don Mackay, a good and imaginative man­ager, we reached, but failed, in the play-offs for promotion to the First. By January 1991, however, we were 20th in Division Two. But that was the January that Jack Walker took control of Blackburn Rovers.

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In a dark season for the game as well as Stoke, Ken Sproat saw Newcastle inflict one of the Potters’ 31 defeats of 1984-85 – but can now see it wasn't all gloom

A football team cannot get much worse than Stoke City during the 1984-85 season. There, in the all-time records for being hopeless, they skulk alongside such Victorian disasters as Darwen, Loughborough Town and Glossop. The fewest points in a season (17), the fewest wins (three – all at home), the most defeats (31) and, with 24, the fewest goals (the leading scorer was Ian Painter with six, of which four were penalties). They failed to score in 25 of the 42 league matches. They suffered mathematically definite relegation with eight miserable matches still to play.

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Dear WSC
You published a letter from me in WSC 70 (December 1992), suggesting that Newcastle City Council may one day be cajoled into erecting an Arthur Horsfield memorial statue in Eldon Square. For over six years, WSC then callously ignored the career of one who, even in the face of fierce recent competition, must still rank as one of Newcastle United’s least successful signings (seven games in six months before being ship­ped off back to the lower leagues from whence he came). Imagine my surprise, then, upon read­ing an article in WSC 150 in which Harry Pearson suggested that the music which Middlesbrough used to run out to was “far too exotic to announce the arrival of Arthur Horsfield”. Having read Mr Pearson’s latest contribution in WSC 153, where he again cites Arthur in his musings on loyalty at Middlesbrough, I am convinced he shares my obsession with this shadowy character from my footballing childhood. Nevertheless, I must object at the vilification of Arthur as a footballing “serial philanderer” given that, apart from his brief stay at Newcastle, history shows that he played between 78 and 139 games for each of the other clubs which he represented (presumably with great­er distinction), and indeed held the record of consecutive appearances for Char­lton Athletic. Perhaps Mr Pearson would care to provide moral support to my latest plan to lobby Derwentside Council for a statue based on Arthur’s famed pose with arms outstretched, screaming for the ball to be centred? This could be situated inland, midway between Newcastle and Middlesbrough, high up on the rol­ling moors which dominate those great industrial conurbations. The Arthur of the North?
John Wright, Limours, France

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