Today I'm going back 42 years to 1980 and York City's League Division 4 fixture against Torquay United played at Bootham Crescent in front of just 1,791 fans, the lowest attendance of the season.
Whilst I've had a regular moan on here about the poor effort that was the York City programme of this particular era, I would concede that having team line-ups on the cover (front or back) is an essential feature of a good programme. I'm sure that many York fans will wallow in the nostalgia of the names shown in the starting XI on this particular issue and it's nice to confirm that the line-up shown was exactly the line-up selected by Barry Lyons to play on the day (with the addition of substitute Stewart Ferebee). I have more than one programme in my collection where neither the front nor back page carries the team line-ups with the rear cover being given over to advertising and I have to say that it's rather annoying. Having to hunt through the programme for the line-ups page when the stadium announcer has started to go through the teams is an irritation I could well do without although I suppose that it's just another first world problem.
As you can see, back in 1980 the line-ups were numbered strictly from one to eleven with the sole substitute at number twelve, Whilst it's possible to find this particular tradition still in existence at Northern Premier League level and below, clubs in National League North and above have, for several years used squad numbering with a player retaining the same shirt number for a complete season. I have to say that I approve of squad numbering since it makes it possible to identify a player even if you've arrived late to the match and missed the announcement of the team changes.
City's line-up in the featured game included Billy McGhie, a Scot who signed for York from Leeds United in 1979 and for whom he made just two League appearances scoring one goal. At York, McGhie made 43 League appearances (scoring one goal) before departing in 1981, perhaps somewhat unusually, for Denmark's Boldklubben 1903. Incidentally, the Steve Cooper shown in the Torquay starting XI is not the journeyman pro of the same name who played for York in the early 1990's. This Steve Cooper made 234 League appearances for Torquay scoring 76 goals between 1977 and 1984.
I'm indebted to York's "History Man" Paul Bowser for pointing out that this was City's first match under caretaker manager Barry Lyons following the dismissal of Charlie Wright. The game itself was settled by a single goal scored in the first half by Terry Eccles. Eccles, of the trademark curly perm, signed for York in 1979 following a spell in Greece playing for Ethnikos Piraeus. Prior to his Greek adventure Eccles had appeared for Blackburn Rovers, Mansfield Town and Huddersfield Town and, when he left York in 1981, he ended his career playing for Scarborough in the Conference.
City ended the season in 17th position, just three points clear of the bottom four re-election places. Torquay had a better season and ended up in 9th place some 13 points short of the top four automatic promotion positions (there were no Play-Offs at this time). Promoted that season were Champions Huddersfield Town along with Walsall, Newport County and Portsmouth.
CRB Match No. 84
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