1985/86
Programme Reviews
Key
PP = Total Pages
Net = Total Pages Less Adverts
P = Perfect Bound
S = Stapled
Arsenal (v West Bromwich Albion 26/04/86)
£0.50 (24 pp / 23 net / S)
Aston Villa (v West Ham United 08/02/86)
£0.50 (24 pp / 19 net / S)
Birmingham City (v Queen’s Park Rangers 01/03/86)
£0.60 (32 pp / 27 net / S)
Chelsea (v Aston Villa 23/11/85)
£0.60 (28 pp / 23.5 net / S)
Chelsea’s programme for the 1985/86 season was a 28-page issue that offered 23.5 pages of content. This provided plenty of space for some readable features.
An introductory ‘Welcome’ column reflected on recent developments with Chelsea’s positive form having put them in the top three of the First Division. The column also referred to the international exploits of striker Kerry Dixon, who had just won his first full cap for England against Northern Ireland after three appearances in friendlies the previous summer. There was a one-page column from manager John Hollins, who looked back at Chelsea’s recent results, including progress on penalties away at West Bromwich Albion in the Full Members Cup (which Chelsea would go on to win later in the season). There were colour photographs of Chelsea’s 4-2 win against Nottingham Forest, whilst there were also three pages of pictures from the victory at the Hawthorns, including images of each of the Blues’ successful spot-kicks.
The best reading in the programme was ‘Chelsea’s Top Goalscorers’, written by historian Scott Cheshire. Over the season, the recurring feature looked at the most prolific marksmen in Chelsea’s history, with the focus in the Villa programme on Ron Tindall, who played for the club between 1955 and 1962. Tindall, who scored on his debut against West Bromwich Albion in November 1955, was described in the column as a loyal and versatile player who spent time playing as a left-back as well as up front. At the time of writing Tindall was the 12th highest scorer in Chelsea’s history, with 70 goals to his name.
Another feature of interest was ‘Out of the Blue’, a two-page interview with one Chelsea player, here featuring defender Keith Dublin. The promising left-back had won Chelsea’s Young Player of the Year award in 1983 but then struggled to establish himself in the first team due to injury issues. Chairman Ken Bates penned his usual column under the heading ‘Straight Talking’. As well as commenting on football matters, Bates referred to supporter behaviour and the club’s efforts to root out troublemakers, as well as the discovery of various historic documents dating back to the birth of the club in 1905. Captain Colin Pates also contributed a column, while ‘Bridge Talk’ was a page of news from around the club that included a physio report from Norman Medhurst and Jimmy Hendry. A detailed stats section included the usual first-team results and fixtures spread alongside the league table and appearance records. There was a page for the club’s reserve team, which analysed their performance in the Football Combination, whilst the youth team’s performances in the South East Counties league received similar treatment.
Visitors Aston Villa were covered over two pages in ‘Facing the Blues’. The main article in the section looked at Villa’s recent history following their league title and European Cup wins in the early part of the decade, as well as the club’s transfer activity under Graham Turner. There was a ‘Who’s Who’ of the Villa squad and a profile of forward Simon Stainrod. Described as “an entertaining striker who likes to try the unexpected”, Stainrod had hit four goals on his debut for Villa in the Milk Cup a few months earlier. The section also included details of Villa’s post-war results against Chelsea and a full summary of the record of match-ups between the two clubs.
Certainly among the better issues for the 1985/86 season, the Chelsea programme was notable for the amount of reading material included, with the ‘Goalscorers’ column a stand-out feature.
Coventry City (v Birmingham City 16/02/86)
£0.50 (24 pp / 17 net / S)
Everton (v Luton Town 14/09/85)
£0.50 (32 pp / 27.5 net / S)
Ipswich Town (v Southampton 31/08/85)
£0.50 (24 pp / 16.5 net / S)
Leicester City (v Oxford United 02/10/85)
£0.50 (24 pp / 16 net / S)
Liverpool (v Coventry City 12/04/86)
£0.50 (24 pp / 15 net / S)
Luton Town (v Newcastle United 07/12/85)
£1.00 (32 pp / 22 net / S)
Manchester City (v Manchester United 14/09/85)
£0.50 (24 pp / 20 net / S)
Manchester United (v Sheffield Wednesday 13/04/86)
£0.40 (24 pp / 16 net / S)
Newcastle United (v Ipswich Town 15/03/86)
£0.50 (28 pp / 20.5 net / S)
Nottingham Forest (v Watford 21/09/85)
£0.50 (24 pp / 18 net / S)
Oxford United (v Chelsea 19/10/85)
£0.50 (32 pp / 18.5 net / S)
Queen’s Park Rangers (v Arsenal 03/09/85)
£0.50 (20 pp / 17.5 net / S)
The QPR programme packs in plenty of content, providing some of the best reading of any issue in the league.
The features provided include ‘The A-Z of QPR’, written by renowned football journalist Tony Pullein. The column profiles several Rangers’ players from down the years, as well as other trivia. The same writer also contributed ‘The Arsenal File’, which examined QPR’s matchday opponents and examined their form, honours, and ‘pointers’ towards the day’s fixture. ‘Statistics Wizard’ Derek Buxton offers further facts related to QPR’s fixtures against the Gunners, while the programme also includes a black and white Arsenal team picture and pen-pics on the back-cover team line-ups.
There are various opinion type pieces, including ‘Bush Telegraph’ which opines on the then government’s proposals to introduce mandatory membership ID cards for football supporters. The column notes how the Police, fans, and clubs alike were opposed to such a scheme and urged supporters to write to their MP to make this point known. There is also an extensive interview with Rodney Marsh, in which the former QPR star speaks of his ongoing affection for the club, his views on making the game more attractive, and his time running Tampa Bay Rowdies in the USA.
A full-colour team group adorns the centre pages of the programme, while another page shows Rangers’ forward Gary Bannister in goalscoring action from the club’s recent visit to Aston Villa. Recent fixtures are reported on in ‘It’s A Record’, which includes details of everything from the weather to the team line-ups and what the press made of the match. ‘Behind the Scenes’ meanwhile provides various snippets of news from around the club, while the familiar statistics pages are duly provided.
Despite being the smallest programme in the division for the 1985/86 season, with just 20 pages, the QPR issue’s small amount of advertising means there is plenty of space for worthwhile content and the programme successfully delivers on this with the range and depth of articles included.
Sheffield Wednesday (v Everton 03/09/85)
£0.50 (24 pp / 17 net / S)
Southampton (v Manchester City 07/09/85)
£0.50 (32 pp / 24 net / S)
Southampton’s programme for 1985/86 offered 24 pages of content, with only four clubs in the league providing more, three of which cost more than the 50p charged by the Saints. This allowed for the inclusion of several highly readable articles, which together provided excellent value for money.
Perhaps the best feature is ‘Centenary Saints’, which in Southampton’s 100th year took readers through the club’s history. The issue for the Manchester City game told the story of the early part of the twentieth century, when Southampton was a successful Southern League club. The article also recalls how the Saints took up their place in the Football League when a new Division Three was introduced in 1920.
‘In Focus’ sees Tony Pullein ask the question ‘Is Wembley Being Devalued’? The article was written against the backdrop of the introduction of the Football League Super Cup, for those teams that would ordinarily have qualified for Europe but were prevented from taking their places by the UEFA ban, and the Full Members Cup, set up as an additional competition for teams in the top two divisions of the Football League. The writer suggests that England’s national stadium risked having its reputation diminished by the hosting of tournament finals that lacked the same status as the FA Cup and League Cup finals.
Another feature takes the form of an interview with local councillor Norman Best CBE, who had spent 30 years supporting Southampton, holding a season ticket since 1970. ‘The D Men at the Dell’ meanwhile profiles three figures at the club, Youth Team Manager Dave Merrington; Reserve Team Manager Dennis Rofe; and versatile reserve player Kevin Brown.
‘Saints in Profile’ is a two-page article in which Southampton defender Kevin Bond is interviewed about his career, including his time playing in the North American League with Seattle Sounders. There is also an interview with Southampton’s groundsman Graeme Scurr, whose picture appeared on the programme cover.
The rest of the programme includes typical club content, with pictures from recent games, notes from the manager, club news, and the first-team statistics spread. There are two pages of coverage for visitors Manchester City, including profiles of the club’s players and a team group picture. A further page then delves into the archives to recall previous meetings of the Saints and City, with full home and away results and match facts from their most recent clash.
This was a high-quality issue from Southampton, and certainly among the best in the division for 1985/86, with few other programmes from the time featuring the range and quality of writing found in the Saints issue.
Tottenham Hotspur (v Nottingham Forest 11/01/86)
£0.60 (32 pp / 24.5 net / S)
Watford (v Tottenham Hotspur 14/12/85)
£0.50 (24 pp / 18.5 net / S)
The Watford issue was once again presented in the ‘square’ format that had become familiar to Hornets fans. The programme was otherwise typical of Division One issues of the time, offering 18.5 pages of content for the price of 50p.
The programme for the game against Tottenham Hotspur opened with ‘Kick Off’ – a collection of news snippets and adverts, before manager Graham Taylor’s column, in which he referred to the “uncertain climate” in which football found itself and the inconsistent performances that Watford had delivered in the first half of the season. ‘Hornets News & Views’ offered more information from around the club, including details of the postponement of a planned stadium redevelopment due to cost concerns.
The centre pages of the programme featured an ‘Action Profile’ of winger John Barnes, who is pictured in full flow in a recent Watford game. The article included stats on Barnes’ career to date and his hopes for the following summer’s World Cup tournament in Mexico. The Watford programme was very good on coverage of previous matches at all levels with ‘Action Replay’ focusing on the first team’s results, ‘Action in Reserve’ looking at the reserves fortunes in the Football Combination, and ‘Junior Playback’ covering the youth team’s performances in the South East Counties League and FA Youth Cup. The results, scorers, line-ups, and attendances were detailed in each instance. League tables and fixtures were for each team were covered separately in ‘Fact Finder’ towards the back of the issue.
Visitors Tottenham were covered over two pages, which featured a full colour team group picture, notes on the last meeting between Watford and Spurs, and details of the club’s players. Winger Chris Waddle was singled out for special mention, following his £600,000 move from Newcastle United in the summer of 1985.
‘Viewfinder’ offered something a little different, in the shape of an interview with Spurs fan Julie Welch – the first female sportswriter on a national newspaper. Welch had written the screenplay for the TV film ‘Those Glory Glory Days’, which looked at Tottenham’s double-winning season of 1960/61 through the eyes of a young girl nicknamed “Danny” after her hero Danny Blanchflower. Welch discussed her career on Fleet Street, covering her big break with the Observer and her developing interest in writing screenplays and books.
The most interesting feature though was ‘Seasons Past’, which in each issue looked at a season from Watford’s past. For the Spurs programme, the season covered was 1952/53, which was described as “the birth of a new era for Watford”. Having had to apply for re-election to the Football League in 1951 a new board had taken over the running of the club in 1952 and, with a long list of new signings, the club’s fortunes began to improve with Watford finishing 1952/53 in 10th place.
This Watford issue provided good value with some interesting reading and a wealth of statistical information. The design work utilised well the space available with the shape of the programme, with good use made of colour to mark out different types of content.
West Bromwich Albion (v Leicester City 15/03/86)
£0.60 (32 pp / 25.5 net / S)
West Ham United (v Liverpool 31/08/85)
£0.60 (24 pp / 19 net / S)
The opening article of ‘Hammer’ provides a commentary on the fallout from the recent ban on English clubs competing in European competitions, following the Heysel disaster just three months earlier, noting “we must not be impatient” in expecting the ban to be overturned. The column also recalls West Ham’s recent trip to a tournament in Japan, noting the potential damage to the English game if clubs were not able to compete against overseas opposition. The Hammers, who would finish the season in a record-high third place, would be denied a UEFA Cup spot for the following season as the ban continued.
Information from around the club is provided in some detail. There are two pages of ‘Upton Park News’; a ‘Junior Hammers’ column from club President Trevor Brooking; and coverage of the club’s reserve and youth teams (including a picture of a young Paul Ince, who had scored in two recent South East Counties League fixtures).
Reports of recent first-team fixtures are provided, alongside the match stats and line-ups, and several pages of action pictures (a mix of colour and black and white). There is also a comprehensive double-page stats spread that covers information from each of the first-team, reserve, and youth sides. Additional reading comes in the form of a two-page feature on Hammers’ goalkeeper Tom McAlister, who had enjoyed a run in the team during the 1984/85 season, following an injury to first-choice Phil Parkes.
Visitors Liverpool are covered over two pages, with some introductory notes preceding brief biographies of the players. There is also a profile of new player-manager Kenny Dalglish who, the programme notes, had proved a surprise choice in some quarters to replace previous boss Joe Fagan. ‘Hammers History’ meanwhile looks at West Ham’s record against Liverpool. The feature analyses notable matches from the fixture’s history, with commentary on highlights and lowlights from the Hammers’ perspective.
A good all-round issue from West Ham, this programme provides some well-written features alongside in-depth news and information from around the club.