Our ‘On This Day’ feature for 24th August is the programme for the Yorkshire derby between Leeds United and Sheffield Wednesday, from the 1991/92 season. Read the full review below and click here to see all the 1991/92 top-flight programmes.
Leeds United’s programme for their title-winning season was a 32-page effort, with 25 pages of content – above the average for Division One clubs that year.
The standard for the programme is set by a detailed column from manager Howard Wilkinson – called ‘Howard’s Way’ – where the Leeds boss reflects on his associations with the day’s opponents Sheffield Wednesday and looks ahead to the Yorkshire derby against his old club. The programme also includes ‘On the Park’ and ‘Off the Park’ columns – together providing five pages of news snippets related to all things Leeds, including information on recent signing Steve Hodge and the unfortunate premature retirement of the injured Jim Beglin.
There is an interview with another signing, striker Rodney Wallace, and a two-page interview with midfielder David Batty, who reflects on his burgeoning international career. ‘Topic’ sees club secretary Nigel Pleasants interviewed about ongoing discussions regarding the formation of a ‘Super League’ for the country’s top clubs – an innovation that proved to be less than a year away from being implemented.
Coverage of visitors Sheffield Wednesday is well presented across three pages, with a feature on the club’s squad accompanied by a team group picture, a ‘roll-call’ of the club’s squad, and a profile of Trevor Francis, Wednesday’s new player-manager.
Probably the best feature in the programme is ‘Memory Match’ which looks back to a clash between Leeds and Wednesday from January 1924. As well as a detailed article about the fixture and its context within the season, there is a picture of the Wednesday team from 1923/24 and a box of ‘1924 Headliners’ – which refers to events of the time.
First-team statistics are suitably detailed and there are pictures of recent games in ‘United Action’. Coverage of United’s reserve and youth teams also goes into some depth, with full details of recent matches, including results and line-ups alongside fixtures for the new season for both teams.
This is a high-quality programme from Leeds, providing plenty of content and making use of often quite small text to pack in lots of worthwhile reading. This is an issue that is among the pick of the programmes for 1991/92.