January

The first Saturday of the year’s scheduled visit to Tranmere was called off due to a waterlogged pitch and with City out of action Southend’s win at Wigan now saw them four points clear at the top although having played two games more. But with Aldershot the only other team in the top seven to play there was no change to City’s lead over the fifth-placed side.

After recently having to be without Mick Harford due to a suspension for an accumulation of penalty points, City now found themselves in the same boat with captain Trevor Peake following his booking in the game against Mansfield. After a personal appearance in front of the FA Disciplinary Commission, and perhaps taking into account his good record the previous season, Peake received a two-match suspension rather than the three suffered by Harford. Meanwhile, with the game at Tranmere being postponed Colin Murphy took the opportunity to give the full first team a run out in a reserve match which also allowed Steve Thompson to slot in at centre half ready to replace Trevor Peake for the duration of his suspension. Goals from Tony Cunningham and Gordon Hobson were enough for a comfortable win over Notts County’s reserves and the only downside was a foot injury suffered by David Hughes – but as Colin Murphy said, it was a risk that had to be accepted, pointing out that injuries could just as easily be suffered in training. Murphy himself accepted a new, longer contract with the club, extended by a year to run until May 1984.

For the visit of Bradford City, on the fringes of the promotion race, the Sincil Bank crowd was down to the usual four and a half thousand or so after the heights of the Mansfield game. David Hughes was passed fit to play, so the only change saw Steve Thompson step in for the suspended Trevor Peake. It was as a replacement for Peake that many supporters assumed the big Yorkshireman had been signed at the end of the previous season, but with Peake and David Carr forming such an effective partnership at the heart of the Imps’ defence all his 23 appearances so far had been in midfield. He now had a chance to show what he could do in his true position, and despite having what he described himself as “an indifferent first half” in which he gave away the free kick from which Bradford took the lead settled well after the break.

In a gritty contest City were still trailing with just over twenty minutes to go when Colin Murphy threw on substitute Derek Bell in place of full back Nolan Keeley and the greater attacking threat brought an equaliser from Phil Turner with a shot from close range. As the other teams above and below them had all won the second 1-1 draw in a row put the Imps a further point behind Southend and cut their lead over Mansfield by a point as well as reducing the gap to Doncaster in fifth to six points. The gap to third place was then reduced to three points after Mansfield registered a 4-1 win over Crewe while City were unable to play their game at Bury due to heavy snow. However, there were no other changes at the top with Southend also out of action and defeat for Hartlepool at Torquay allowing Peterborough to move up to fifth place although six points behind the Imps.

The visit of Crewe to Sincil Bank the following Saturday was therefore City’s third home game in a row and seventh out of the last nine in the league. A 2-1 win made it a satisfactory 12 points out of the 14 available although an unchanged team with Trevor Peake still suspended found the Imps not at their best. Phil Neale’s ninth goal of the season in the first half was soon cancelled out by Crewe’s experienced striker Jimmy Greenhoff and it took a close-range header from Steve Thompson to seal the points five minutes from the end. The attendance held up well at just under five thousand probably due to free admission being offered for children if they were accompanied by a parent paying the normal admission price.

With Southend failing to win at home for the first time in the season, held to a goalless draw by Northampton the night before the Imps narrowed their lead to four points with two games in hand to keep things tight at the top. They also had two games in hand on Mansfield below them, although the Stags kept the pressure up with a 5-0 win over Port Vale, but the gap to fifth place, now occupied by Doncaster was stretched by a point to seven as Peterborough were in FA Cup Fourth Round action.

For their efforts in the season so far, the Imps were rewarded with a mid-season break in Jersey. Apparently at the instigation of Colin Murphy, the trip was organised and partly sponsored by Appleby’s Travel who provided the coaches for City’s away matches. Murphy said he had chosen Jersey as the destination rather than the possibility of visiting Spain as he did not want to risk stomach upsets with Continental food and longer flights.

Flying out from East Midlands airport on the Sunday, the party consisted of the 13 players of the first team squad, and the coaching staff with the exception of assistant manager John Sheridan who was left in charge of things at Sincil Bank until the party’s return on the Thursday afternoon.

The stay involved a match against a Jersey FA side on the Monday night and gave some useful match practice to Trevor Peake whose two-match suspension meant he hadn’t played for nearly a month thanks to the postponements. His return saw Steve Thompson left out of the starting side with Derek Bell also getting a useful run-out in place of Gordon Hobson who was given a rest due to facial injuries sustained against Crewe. The Imps were given a fairly stiff test by the amateur side but did enough to win without over-exerting themselves thanks to goals from Phil Neale and Derek Bell who hit the winner soon after the home side had equalised in the second half.

After training as normal on the Friday following the return from Jersey late the previous day there was then the long-ish trip to Wigan, and I was there for the second season in a row, to stand on the grassy bank behind the goal. Trevor Peake returned to the side with Steve Thompson left out altogether as Derek Bell continued on the subs’ bench.

In a display which Maurice Burton described as “team football of a high standard” and which had Colin Murphy saying it was the best the team had played for two months City took the lead minutes after the break with striker Tony Cunningham’s first goal since August. In contrast, midfielder Phil Turner’s header which sealed the win on the hour mark was his fourth goal in the last seven games.

With Southend dropping another point in a draw at Tranmere their lead was cut to three points which meant the Imps were still well in contention for the championship, while with Mansfield suffering a shock defeat at bottom club Hereford the gap to third place was now five points.

February

Sunday football had first been tried midway through the 1973/74 season as a consequence of restrictions on the use of electricity during a national emergency, and although it had initially proved popular with better than average attendances the crowds had generally then fallen back to their normal level as the novelty had won off – this was certainly the case with City, although some increasingly poor results at the time may have been part of the reason. But now, seven years on, some clubs were agitating for Sunday football to be played regularly again and this was on the agenda at an Extraordinary General Meeting of the Football League. Both Colin Murphy and Dennis Houlston said they were against the idea – “We don’t think our fans want it, and it is unlikely that we shall be playing any of our home matches on Sundays”, said the chairman, announcing the club would not be voting for it. However, a resolution was passed to raise the limit on the number of games that could be played on Sundays.

Several other items of significance emerged as a result of the EGM. Firstly, coming into force from the following season was the awarding of three points for a win ‘to encourage more attacking football’. This proposal was preferred to one put forward by Leicester City and Ipswich involving a complicated system of awarding bonus points depending on whether a team led at the interval and how many second half goals were scored.

The early 1980s were a time of supposed financial restraint in the country with the Government telling everyone to live within their means, but despite this million-pound transfer fees had started to become commonplace in football to the detriment of the sport’s reputation. As Simon Inglis put it in his history of the Football League, “Some managers and chairmen were beginning to confuse piles of Monopoly money with the real thing.” In response to this a proposal was passed to the effect that no club was to be permitted to sign any players until all outstanding transfer debts had been settled.

Finally, at what must have been a busy meeting, it was decided that no club official or director was to have any influence on the control of more than one league club at a time and that each club was allowed to have one paid director.

Back to on-field matters, and the next visitors to Sincil Bank were bottom four side Stockport County, a club currently undergoing something of a financial crisis. Fighting for every ball and looking to catch City on the break the scores were level at the break, but soon after half time a quality goal from Tony Cunningham, heading in a right-wing cross from Phil Neale was enough to win the game. That made it two in two games for the big striker who until then had been receiving some criticism from supporters – no doubt simply due to his not being Mick Harford.

With Southend – as usual! – having won at home the previous night there was no change at the top with Mansfield in third also winning at home, but with Doncaster, the only team in the top six not to have won the gap to fifth place was increased to eight points.

Despite the win at Wigan the attendance for the visit of Stockport was down by around five hundred perhaps due to the free attendance for accompanied children scheme not operating for this match. In order to increase revenue, the club announced they would be creating a new post of commercial manager to bring in new fund-raising ideas, as Dennis Houlston said, to help in their ambitions for a higher grade of football with the aim of Second Division football within five years. He pointed out that improvements to the ground would be necessary with no real structural improvements made since before the war, and mentioned, as a long-term plan the possibility of covering the Sincil Bank side of the ground and the construction of a new St Andrew’s stand.

After Stockport the next game brought another meeting with a bottom-four side with a trip to Halifax Town. I made the trip for a first-ever visit to their Shay Ground which proved to be an even more quirky venue than Springfield Park at Wigan two weeks previously. Still in use for speedway, which apparently drew bigger crowds than football, the pitch was separated from the spectator accommodation by the track, meaning at the ends you seemed to be a very long way away from the action. It was also disconcerting to find a wooden hut marked up for the sale of speedway programmes.

Whether it was the attraction of a second-in-the-table side or whether there were a large number of travelling supporters the match drew a season’s-best crowd for Halifax of 4,444. Colin Murphy had warned his players against any complacency against a side which had in fact gone five matches without defeat, and the usual unchanged side came out on top in a game where they took their chances to score and Halifax did not. City were set on their way by Gordon Hobson who ended a lean spell of six games without a goal to open the scoring just before half time. A George Shipley penalty doubled the lead after 50 minutes after Hobson was fouled and City’s top scorer made it 3-0 after running from the half way line to beat four men and the goalkeeper for what Maurice Burton rated as Hobson’s best goal for the club. Halifax pulled a goal back with a penalty of their own but City saw the game out with little trouble, and although Southend had won again a draw for Mansfield the following day meant they ended the weekend six points clear of third place and no less than nine ahead of fifth place following defeat for Hartlepool who now began to slip out of contention.

The win at Halifax was to be the last time City would score as many as three goals in a game for the rest of the season with 15 games still to play, and in fact on only two occasions, starting at Scunthorpe the following week would they manage two goals in a match.

The already evident process of grinding out results based on a tight defence was not altogether popular with supporters and had led one to complain in a recent letter to the Echo that as a supporter of over 30 years, and delighted to see the Imps in serious contention for promotion he was “heartily sick of watching the same old routine week after week”. He ended with a plea to Colin Murphy to “provide us with a feast of entertainment” so that many of the “not-so-loyal supporters” would return to the terraces. In response to comments like this Colin Murphy pointed to figures that showed only Southend had scored more goals than City in the whole of the Football League, that no other team had scored more goals at home, that they had won more away matches than any other team and that, again, only Southend had more points than the Imps. On the other hand, he went on to say that “from now to the end of the season we have to come up any way we can with the points at home.”

Extra police were on duty for City’s visit to Scunthorpe with a large crowd expected, and the gate of just over five thousand was over double the usual attendance at the Old Showground. The usual unchanged line-up for City dominated in midfield and the Imps were deservedly ahead until the hour mark thanks to a Gordon Hobson goal early in the first half. But then Scunthorpe equalised through winger Paul O’Berg and although City got back into their rhythm, they were unable to find a goal until the 88^th minute when Tony Cunningham set up Hobson for his fourth goal in two games. That appeared to have won the game and led to a pitch invasion by about 200 City fans but in the time added on after they had eventually been cleared the ball was given away and full back Stuart Pilling equalised with the last kick of the match.

One individual who ran onto the pitch was taken away by the police and as he happened to be the driver of a supporters’ minibus his passengers were left stranded in ‘the freezing cold’ – that is until Colin Murphy, although saying he didn’t want to set a precedent, took pity on them and gave them a lift home on the team coach.

Definitely a point dropped, the result allowed Southend to continue remorselessly on with another win to extend their lead to four points again. However, with Mansfield losing the gap to third remained at seven points and as Hartlepool were the team beaten by Southend the gap to fifth place was now up to ten points.

The following Tuesday night saw Wales play an international friendly against the Republic of Ireland in Dublin but although David Felgate had been included in the squad for the first time, he was not called on to play as regular keeper Dai Davies of Wrexham kept his place in goal.

City repeated their free admission for an accompanied child offer for the following Saturday’s home match with Wimbledon, and maybe because of that the attendance held to just above four thousand. Just outside the promotion race, the Dons had gone eight matches without defeat and matched City in a midfield battle which saw little flair or skill on display. It was a lost opportunity to make up any ground on Southend who had also been held to a 0-0 draw at home, in their case by Doncaster who moved up to third place as a result. Hartlepool’s third defeat in a row saw them continue to slip away and the all-important gap from City to fifth place, now occupied by Bournemouth who had moved up three places after beating Peterborough, stretched to eleven points.