Football Programmes Centre

bigearl79 · Joined: 03 Nov 2013 Posts: 450

Just reading a post about some Chesterfield reserve issues for sale. They were playings teams like Aston Villa and both Manchester sides regulary in the 60's at least. Reserve football is so miss under used now. At Scunthorpe we play about a dozen times a year now and all but one fixture is a 2pm mid week fixture. I used to watch them when they were 7pm about 15 years ago. We played a couple of home fixtures a month and they was a couple of hundred there. I know back in the 60's four figures on the gate was not too uncommen at the OSG. Also a few named players who were coming back from injury or not playing first team. It'll never come back of course but how useful was it to the whole squad though? You played most weeks, at a decent standerd and it served a viable purpose. Seemed to start sliding about 1992. Can't think why....

wandererpaul · Joined: 05 Feb 2013 Posts: 486 Location: Brentford

The London Combination, the Central League, the Midland League and North Eastern league all had their place in football at one time up to the 1980's.

Nowadays it's about development and taking care of their young charges.
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derby1884 · Posted: Thu Jan 07, 2016 10:29 pm Post subject:

I never did - and still don't - know why Sunderland and Middlesbrough didn't have their reserve team in the Central League back when there was a Central League.
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CNSOBU · Joined: 21 Jun 2015 Posts: 161

Used to watch Norwich Res in the mid 70s when there was a mix of seasoned pros and youngters (ie Duncan Forbes and Justin Fashanu)

At the end of the game we would get autographs (I was 13/14), actually walking onto the pitch! (well, couple of metres) without being manhandled.

Programmes were a single sheet costing 2 or 3p (didn't realise the investment potential).

I used to love them from the autograph perspective.

1st team games were also good. We would arrive when the turnstiles opened (about 12.30). I have no idea how we passsed the time. Often the turnstile operator would only charge for one of us but the two of us had to squeeze into the single gap.

My most recent game was Norwich at Old Trafford - very different from those days in the 70s.

Pete’s Picture Palace · Posted: Thu Jan 07, 2016 11:07 pm Post subject:

I can remember going to a Palace reserve game in about 1972 and during a lull in play the radio announcer told us that Palace had taken the lead in the away game, probably a crucial one at the foot of Div 1. The Palace reserve keeper, Paul Hammond, turned to the few hundred fans on the Holmesdale, grinning and with arms aloft, punching the air.

Always held a soft spot for him since then and soon after he made his 1st team debut in place of legend John Jackson, made a couple of mistakes and the crowd were on his back - I would wager, all the home crowd except those who'd been at that reserve game.

Rocky · Joined: 15 Jun 2009 Posts: 1537

derby1884 wrote:

I never did - and still don't - know why Sunderland and Middlesbrough didn't have their reserve team in the Central League back when there was a Central League.

Possibly it may have been the costs & time incurred with travelling especially during the 50’s & 60’s? Taking Newcastle out of the equation, the nearest Central League team would have been Leeds, which is 67 miles away for Boro & 92 miles for Sunderland. Also the road networks wouldn't have been as good as they are now.

Boro finally ventured out of the North East in the late 60’s joining the North Midland league although half of the teams in that league were Yorkshire based. They eventually joined a depleted Central league in 1982.

derby1884 · Posted: Fri Jan 08, 2016 12:40 am Post subject:

78-9 (I think) Aberdeen v Dunfermline reserves.
A very wet and very foggy night.

I was the only person in the Merkland Road stand - paid my 25p or whatever only to have to act as unofficial ball boy to errant strikers of each club!

Jim Leighton was in goal for Aberdeen that night - I remember him shouting "hurry up " at me as he wanted the ball back.

I can look back now and laugh but at the time I was a bit miffed.
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Rocky · Joined: 15 Jun 2009 Posts: 1537

With Jim Leighton in goal I would have thought the ball would have been in the back of the net more than in the stands.

derby1884 · Posted: Fri Jan 08, 2016 12:59 am Post subject:

Rocky wrote:

With Jim Leighton in goal I would have thought the ball would have been in the back of the net more than in the stands.

i saw him in goal for the reserves against Keith in the Aberdeenshire Cup.
Probably same season.
Another foggy night (we used to get a lot of them here)
This one I watched from the main stand but the Keith player (in his own half) saw Jim wandering about his penalty area, hit the ball into the fog and it dropped perfectly into the net.
Remember thinking that if it had been filmed, they'd be talking about it for years.
Not so much a lob as a hoof 50 yards into the night sky that completely baffled our Jim.

Irritating fact - AFC never issued programmes for these reserve games.
So I made my own when I got home.

The things you do when you're young, eh?
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