A Look Into Histories

A LOOK INTO HISTORY TWO HUNDRED AND FORTY NINE

SOUTHPORT LAST SEASON IN THE FOOTBALL LEAGUE

Our Match Programme with a bright yellow cover is for Southport v Huddersfield Town on 22nd April 1978 at Haig Avenue and is a special souvenir edition to commemorate 50 years in the League but its historical significance is very sad as they would be unaware at the time and having not even finished bottom of the league that they would not be re-elected and be the very last to suffer such an ignominy as this re-election process, despite continuing on until 1986 would never see any further clubs dropping into non-league football and was changed to automatic promotion from the GM Conference League.

There is a message from the President and a very long and poignant look back on 50 years but, and I quote from the final paragraph “ There are signs that better times are on the way, Hugh Fisher with strictly limited material, is striving to improve the club’s playing fortunes, the finances are in a better shape than for some time and the club can face the future with renewed optimism” (Ed: it was not to be) There was a welcome to “The Terriers” mid table Huddersfield Town, photos of past teams and the cover of the first programme in February 1922-23, all the League positions since the start, the Division Four table, all results with just one player ever-present, Steve Brooks at No5. There were two away games to finish the season, at Grimsby and Watford. The Lancashire League table showed the Reserves in mid-table and line-ups on the back page. 1465 attended the game, a 1-1 draw.

Elected into the first ever Division Three North in 1921 that became Division Four in 1958 and first gaining promotion in 1966-67 under Billy Bingham, Southport FC were relegated in 1970 only to lift the Division Four championship in 1973 but stay just the one season in Division Three. On December 27th 1949 they achieved their highest ever attendance, 14,766 v Rochdale though some consider it was 20,000 plus v Newcastle United in a 4th round F A Cup replay back in 1932 (after two 1-1 draws they lost the 2nd replay 0-9 at Maine Road, Newcastle Utd going on to win the Cup) In the final season of 1977-78 they posted the contrasts of 3,864 v Hull City on August 31st to 780 v Reading on March 14th. After the game, they lost 0-2 at Grimsby and 2-3 at Watford on 29th April. Watford were the champions and two of the clubs promoted with them were Southend United and Brentford.

The four candidates for re-election were York City, Hartlepool, Southport and the bottom club Rochdale and in the first ballot, York got 49 votes to back them, Rochdale 39, Hartlepool 33 and Southport tied on 26 each with hopefuls Wigan Athletic from the Northern Premier League. The shock second ballot resulted in Wigan achieving 29 votes and Southport 20 so Wigan Athletic took their place in Division Four.

Southport’s last ever Football League game was at Fourth Division champions Watford on 29th April 1978 and in an old gold and black Programme priced 15p with “We are the Champions” on the front cover, the home side were, quite rightly, applauding themselves on a great season and gave very little content to poor Southport. With Chairman, Elton John at the helm, Graham Taylor as Manager and No11 Luther Blissett, the home win sealed the fate on “ The Sandgrounders” with a 3-2 win.