Programme Reviews

Key

PP = Total Pages

Net = Total Pages Less Adverts

P = Perfect Bound

S = Stapled

 

Arsenal (v Wolverhampton Wanderers 24/02/79)

£0.20 (16 pp / 15.5 net / S)

 

Aston Villa (v Liverpool 16/04/79)

£0.20 (16 pp / 14.5 net / S)

 

Birmingham City (v Bristol City 25/11/78)

£0.20 (24 pp / 20 net / S)

 

Bolton Wanderers (v Ipswich Town 21/04/79)

£0.15 (24 pp / 15.5 net / S)

 

Bristol City (v Tottenham Hotspur 13/01/79)

£0.20 (16 pp / 15 net / S)

 

Chelsea (v Leeds United 02/09/78)

£0.25 (28 pp / 22 net / S)

 

Coventry City (v Everton 23/12/78)

£0.20 (24 pp / 18 net / S)

Sky Blue was largely unchanged from the programme of the previous season, with 24 pages of content presented in an A5 format. The opening few pages featured the line-ups for the day’s fixture, whilst ‘Looking Back’ listed results between Coventry and their matchday opponents. Manager Gordon Milne reflected in his column on the ongoing issue of hooliganism in the game, as well as the busy Christmas and New Year schedule ahead.

‘Roundabout’ featured various short news snippets, with information about the match referee for the day and details of travel to forthcoming away matches, while the centre pages showed action pictures from a recent match. A two-page stats section featured the usual content for Coventry’s first-team and reserves, with the first-team’s season spread using some especially small text! The reserves had taken part in several high-scoring games in the first half of the season with 5-2 and 5-4 wins as well as 6-5 defeat! The programme also included a couple of player features, as well as a rather left-field column from captain Terry Yorath.

The visitors were profiled across three pages, with the first two running through the away team, with details of the club’s transfer activity, and pictures of several players. A key member of the opposition was then profiled in ‘Danger Man’, which for the visit of Everton, profiled striker Bob Latchford. The forward had been the only player in Division One to register 30 league goals the previous season and was described here as “the biggest danger man of all in the last couple of seasons”.

This was a decent enough issue from Coventry, although several of the articles were on the short side. Any sense of a consistent feel to the programme was hindered by the variety of colour schemes used, from the red, yellow, and blue of the cover to various pages of green inside the issue.

 

Derby County (v Bolton Wanderers 13/01/79)

£0.20 (16 pp / 8 net / S)

 

Everton (v Southampton 07/10/78)

£0.20 (16 pp / 13 net / S)

 

Ipswich Town (v Manchester City 31/03/79)

£0.20 (24 pp / 17.5 net / S)

This was a packed Ipswich programme that blended in-depth columns, football news, detailed opposition coverage, player features, and extensive club information to create an interesting, varied, and informative issue.

The programme opened with ‘Town Talk’ which featured news updates such as ticketing information, before ‘Town in Action’ brought together various pictures from a recent game. Manager Bobby Robson offered his thoughts in a lengthy column which, for the Manchester City issue, included Ipswich’s prospects of qualifying for Europe for the following season, having just been knocked out of the Cup Winners Cup by Barcelona on away goals. Captain Mick Mills also provided a detailed column in ‘Mick’s Chat’. This featured notes on the form of Ipswich and their opponents, as well as developments elsewhere in the game.

‘Round-Up’ collated football news on both a regional and nationwide basis. The former looked at developments with other East Anglian clubs, such as Norwich City, Colchester United, and Northampton Town, while the latter featured updates from around the country and the various divisions of the Football League. The programme included a column from John Motson – described as ‘The Voice of Football’.

There were two player features in the issue. The first of these was presented across the centre pages of the programme, comprising a large portrait of one Ipswich player and a list of his key details, favourite things, and miscellany such as superstitions.  The second was ‘At Home With’, which offered a look at the life of one member of the Ipswich team. For the Manchester City issue, the focus was on a young Terry Butcher who, the article noted, had made 15 first-team appearances during the season, impressing with “a maturity and self-confidence far beyond his 20 years”.

‘Flashback’ recalled Ipswich’s games from 5, 10, and 20 years ago, while ‘Memories’ offered brief notes on a player from the past. There was information on the club’s reserves and youth team, as well as a ‘Junior Blues’ page. A two-page spread of statistics was suitably comprehensive, offering detailed data on each of Ipswich’s teams as well as scorer and attendance details for Division One.

The opposition coverage in the programme was first class. The visiting club was profiled over two pages, with information on the club’s current status and position, a team group picture and images of key players, as well as a lengthy commentary that included profiles of each squad member.

This was an impressive programme from Ipswich, offering a depth of content that was the match of most issues in the league at the time.

 

Leeds United (v Birmingham City 30/09/79)

£0.20 (20 pp / 14 net / S)

 

Liverpool (v Coventry City 16/09/78)

£0.20 (28 pp / 23 net / S)

The front cover of Liverpool’s 1978/79 issue showed Kenny Dalglish scoring the winner in the European Cup Final at Wembley the previous May – the goal that gave the Reds their second successive European Cup. Dalglish was the subject of ‘Career Story’, having recently notched his 200^th career goal, averaging a goal every other game for Liverpool since his move from Celtic in August 1977.

The programme paid tribute to midfielder Ian Callaghan, who had moved to the USA on a loan deal following the European Cup success a few months earlier, having made 857 appearances for Liverpool – a club record that stands to this day. ‘Take a Tip’, written by Liverpool’s Youth Development Officer Tom Saunders, was aimed at younger supporters, here covering the essential points of the laws of the game, while Jim Kennefick outlined Liverpool’s plans to deal with the ‘spoilers’ who caused problems on the train back from a recent league cup tie.

Reference was made in another column to the number of high value transfers that had taken place that summer, noting that First and Second Division clubs were “speculating hundreds of thousands of pounds”. Manager Bob Paisley in his ‘Team Talk’ expanded on the subject, commenting that he foresaw a time when a player would move between British clubs in a million pound deal – something that would come to pass just months later when Trevor Francis joined Nottingham Forest from Birmingham City.

The programme provided extensive coverage of visitors Coventry City, kicked off by an introductory piece that assessed the club’s progress since winning the Third Division in 1963/64, fighting numerous successful battles against the drop from the top-flight during the 1970s. Five pages of the programme were given to profiles of the Coventry squad, with a spotlight piece on captain Terry Yorath. There were also pictures and recollections of the previous season’s Anfield meetings with the Sky Blues, which took place in Division One and the League Cup.

This was a high-quality Liverpool issue, having more pages of content than any other programme in Division One that season. With several articles and opinion pieces, as well as detailed opposition coverage, this was a programme befitting of such a successful era for the club.

 

Manchester City (v Nottingham Forest 23/12/78)

£0.20 (24 pp / 20.5 net / S)

 

Manchester United (v Aston Villa 24/02/79)

£0.15 (24 pp / 22 net / S)

 

Middlesbrough (v Chelsea 16/12/78)

£0.15 (20 pp / 15 net / S)

 

Norwich City (v Derby County 30/09/78)

£0.20 (24 pp / 18.5 net / S)

 

Nottingham Forest (v Arsenal 09/09/78)

£0.20 (24 pp / 18 net / S)

Forest’s 1978/79 programme cover features four pictures, which for this issue against Arsenal in early September include the parading of plenty of silverware from the clubs’ triumphs the season before!

‘Forest Focus’ is a two-page column written by club secretary Ken Smales, which here offers opinions on TV coverage of football and the pressure that referees are put under by pundits who have the benefit of numerous replays for assessing controversial incidents. The article also speaks to the recent performances of Forest’s reserve team and the goalscoring troubles of the first team who had endured four consecutive goalless draws.

There are two pages of action shots from Forest’s last home league game against West Bromwich Albion, while ‘What the Papers Say’ looks at press coverage of Forest’s recent performances. Club Scene’ collates news snippets from around the club and there are a couple of pages given over to letters from supporters. Meanwhile, ‘Those Were the Days’ is a continuing feature that recalls in this issue the end of Forest’s 1930/31 season.

‘The Reds in Spain’ is a one-page article that covers Forest’s recent visit to Vigo to play a pre-season tournament, in which they drew with hosts Celta Vigo and lost to Porto. Organised at the start of Forest’s first European Cup campaign, the trip perhaps gave the club the kind of experience that helped them to bring back the trophy at the end of the season!

Coverage of opponents Arsenal is impressively detailed, with an introductory page that recalls the club’s form of the previous season and their meetings with Forest, alongside Arsenal’s team group picture. The programme’s centre pages then analyse the Arsenal squad, with profiles of twelve players and pictures of Frank Stapleton and Graham Rix.

There is a good amount of content in this Forest issue, with a mix of contemporary, historical, and opinion pieces combining to make the programme an interesting read.

 

Queen’s Park Rangers (v Norwich City 13/04/79)

£0.20 (20 pp / 18.5 net / S)

 

Southampton (v Middlesbrough 26/08/78)

£0.20 (24 pp / 15 net / S)

For the 1978/79 season, the Saints marked their return to the top-flight with a move to a landscape shaped programme. The issue opens with brief introductory notes from manager Lawrie McMenemy, while ‘Saints Scene’ contains various items of information from around the club, as well as ticketing updates.

‘In the News’ gathers together stories from around the league, reflecting on the early matches of the season, while there is a page on ‘New Faces at the Dell’ in the shape of first-team coach Lew Chatterley and winger Terry Curran. ‘Do You Remember’ recalls Southampton’s fortunes from 5, 10, and 15 years ago, as well as providing a league table for the 1947/48 season.

In terms of club information, there is a page on the club’s reserve and youth teams, with reports and line-ups from recent games. The centre pages are given over to the first team’s results and fixtures spread, together with a league table and attendance information.

The day’s opponents, Middlesbrough, are given two pages, with a team group picture accompanying some detailed text on the visitors’ players and notes on the club’s form the previous season. The section also contains ‘When We Met Before’ – results from the Saints’ most recent fixtures against Middlesbrough.

With 24 pages, only the Chelsea and Liverpool issues had more pages than Southampton’s during this season. However, the Saints programme contained more pages of adverts than any other, reducing to 15 the number of pages of actual content. It is the resulting lack of readable material that is this programme’s biggest downfall.

 

Tottenham Hotspur (v Manchester United 21/04/79)

£0.20 (16 pp / 13 net / S)

 

West Bromwich Albion (v Queen’s Park Rangers 24/03/79)

£0.20 (24 pp / 22.5 net / S)

 

Wolverhampton Wanderers (v West Bromwich Albion 16/12/78)

£0.20 (24 pp / 18.5 net / S)