Sheffield United 1982-1983

[JJ Sefton]

Brealey was well ahead of his time in some respects. Plus the mess of the early 1990s was not his doing, but Paul Woolhouse's

True, old Reg ran a tight ship fiscally. In every way I can think of we were in better shape when he left than when he joined.

 

[Dnblade]

Another thing to remember about that season was that in the summer of 1982, as well as the signing of Curran from our arch-rivals, Brealey unveiled large-scale plans to develop Bramall Lane, including a two-tier Kop and a hotel. Planning permission was never granted despite Brealey taking it as far as the House of Lords, but it all indicated how ambitious Brealey was for the club at the time, in stark contrast to his later years at the club in the early 90s.

It was ambitious,and at the time I was hoping it came to fruition,but looking back we would have been left with a running track around the pitch...Not sure,but I think the plans were for a 3 tier Kop in some sort of horse shoe shape..I think the Council and the House of Lords probably did us a back handed favour with hindsight.

 

[Revolution]

True, old Reg ran a tight ship fiscally. In every way I can think of we were in better shape when he left than when he joined.

Well, it's a mixed legacy (we had a 3 sided ground and were bottom of the league when he left), but we were 2 divisions higher than when he arrived and had a 4 year spell in the top flight.

I think that, if McCabe sold the club today, Brealey should be regarded as having the more successful tenure.

 

[BushBlade]

Brealey was well ahead of his time in some respects. Plus the mess of the early 1990s was not his doing, but Paul Woolhouse's

He was. It was the jute mill thing that finally did for him. As SEB has said, he'd already started to lose interest after the planning consent was refused but once he had the jute mill incident (a leak that poisoned the surrounding areas) he had too much on his plate.

This was a weird time in football when most clubs were seriously undervalued. I remember Knighton talking about his failed bid for Man U. It was about £20m and he was shocked he couldn't get funding. He said 'I could have paid it off just by selling Giggs if I had to'.

So Reg was desperate to sell, at just the wrong time and ended up selling to a bunch of crooks. That tainted his legacy.

 

[Dnblade]

I read a lot about apathy at the club at this time, low attendances and the like. Was that the case? Or were folk just skint?

A combination of all those things,there was a recession on,and I remember getting laid off from work and having a few bad months out of work...On the whole our attendances were first class in the fourth tier...the odd crowds over 20k..I remember a crowd of around 16/17k turning up at Anfield one Tuesday night which was un heard of,and Coventry were only getting 10k in the first division.

 

[BushBlade]

A combination of all those things,there was a recession on,and I remember getting laid off from work and having a few bad months out of work...On the whole our attendances were first class in the fourth tier...the odd crowds over 20k..I remember a crowd of around 16/17k turning up at Anfield one Tuesday night which was un heard of,and Coventry were only getting 10k in the first division.

Yes, I hardly went between 86-89 due to being too old for Junior Blades (sudden hike in entrance prices) and being in and out of work. I just never had that much money. Although I actually stopped originally because I was going to play Saturday league but then, I didn't.
And it wasn't that tempting either. I was particularly pissed off when we sold Keith and just thought 'fuck it'.
But it's a fucking drug and once Harry arrived I got hooked again. Might have been better if I'd not bothered and joined a snooker club or forced myself to like Cricket but there has been some good times through all the shite and I've stayed in touch with a lot of mates back home by continuing to go to the match with them.

 

[Cheets]

A combination of all those things,there was a recession on,and I remember getting laid off from work and having a few bad months out of work...On the whole our attendances were first class in the fourth tier...the odd crowds over 20k..I remember a crowd of around 16/17k turning up at Anfield one Tuesday night which was un heard of,and Coventry were only getting 10k in the first division.

One night in the fourth division we got a higher crowd against Bradford than European champions Liverpool got against Birmingham in Division One the same evening.

 

[Cheets]

Thinking about it, the decline in crowds in 1982/83 must have freaked Brealey out. The proportion of fans who were season-ticket holders in those days was far lower so the club must have been reliant on match-day revenue.

 

[Revolution]

One night in the fourth division we got a higher crowd against Bradford than European champions Liverpool got against Birmingham in Division One the same evening.

That was our biggest gate of the season.

I read once that when we played Scunthorpe or Colchester early that season our gate of 11,000 odd was bigger than a gate in the first division the same day. That was apparently the first time that had happened.

United's average gate that year was not only the highest in the division but also higher than any in the division above.

 

[Dnblade]

One night in the fourth division we got a higher crowd against Bradford than European champions Liverpool got against Birmingham in Division One the same evening.

I think that was the Tuesday night I was thinking of Cheets,crowds were down all over the country at that time...fantastic support.

 

[Revolution]

I think that was the Tuesday night I was thinking of Cheets,crowds were down all over the country at that time...fantastic support.

1985-6 was the lowest aggregate attendance post war. Almost every club has higher crowds now, many far higher. One exception, funnily enough, is Wednesday.

 

[JJ Sefton]

Well, it's a mixed legacy (we had a 3 sided ground and were bottom of the league when he left), but we were 2 divisions higher than when he arrived and had a 4 year spell in the top flight.

I think that, if McCabe sold the club today, Brealey should be regarded as having the more successful tenure.

The point at which to judge him is, I think, when he sold up to Woolhouse. He only came back because Woolhouse couldn't actually pay him and that second Brealey period was a shambles, but he inherited a mess.

 

[grafikhaus]

A combination of all those things,there was a recession on,and I remember getting laid off from work and having a few bad months out of work...On the whole our attendances were first class in the fourth tier...the odd crowds over 20k..I remember a crowd of around 16/17k turning up at Anfield one Tuesday night which was un heard of,and Coventry were only getting 10k in the first division.

Strangely, the crowds in the 2002-03 fabulous 'Triple Assault' season with 13, 14 and 15k aplenty were often poor. The famous 2-1 home win in the Worthingon (League) Cup where we were 0-1 down and the announcer said 'There will be four minutes of extra time' and we won 2-1 had a crowd of 26,663 for a night match. Four days later in the League and on Saturday the home match with Ipswich was 15,884.

I'm certain that, in years to come, we'll look back on the crowds we're getting nowadays with amazement, disbelief and pride.

 

[Revolution]

Strangely, the crowds in the 2002-03 fabulous 'Triple Assault' season with 13, 14 and 15k aplenty were often poor. The famous 2-1 home win in the Worthingon (League) Cup where we were 0-1 down and the announcer said 'There will be four minutes of extra time' and we won 2-1 had a crowd of 26,663 for a night match. Four days later in the League and on Saturday the home match with Ipswich was 15,884.

I'm certain that, in years to come, we'll look back on the crowds we're getting nowadays with amazement, disbelief and pride.

home game v Barnsley in the 5th round of the cup in 1990 - 34,000
home game v Barnsley in the league, a few weeks later - about 14,000

 

[Cheets]

Yes but don't forget that attendance figures were allegedly massaged downwards in the 80s whereas now they are massaged upwards (cue a hundred posts about whether season-ticket holders who don't attend are included in the attendance figures).

 

[Revolution]

Yes but don't forget that attendance figures were allegedly massaged downwards in the 80s whereas now they are massaged upwards (cue a hundred posts about whether season-ticket holders who don't attend are included in the attendance figures).

United were one of the last teams to include tickets sold to people who didn't show up.

I remember 2 games in particular - Coventry on Boxing Day 1991 (supposed attendance 19,000) and Swansea at the end of the Division 3 promotion season (supposed attendance 15,800) where the actual attendance looked much bigger than the announced crowd. The John Street terrace was so full on Boxing Day that I was moved, along with dozens of others, into the John Street seats.

 

[BushBlade]

Yes but don't forget that attendance figures were allegedly massaged downwards in the 80s whereas now they are massaged upwards (cue a hundred posts about whether season-ticket holders who don't attend are included in the attendance figures).

Good point. Some of those attendance figures in the eighties were bollocks.

 

[grafikhaus]

Yes but don't forget that attendance figures were allegedly massaged downwards in the 80s whereas now they are massaged upwards (cue a hundred posts about whether season-ticket holders who don't attend are included in the attendance figures).

We'll probably never know but what can't be used as an excuse nowadays was that 'there was nothing else to do.' There has probably never been a time when there has been so many counter attractions, but our loyal fans keep turning up in numbers.

United were one of the last teams to include tickets sold to people who didn't show up.

I remember 2 games in particular - Coventry on Boxing Day 1991 (supposed attendance 19,000) and Swansea at the end of the Division 3 promotion season (supposed attendance 15,800) where the actual attendance looked much bigger than the announced crowd. The John Street terrace was so full on Boxing Day that I was moved, along with dozens of others, into the John Street seats.

I've been to many games at The Lane in years gone by where the crowds were obviously massaged down. A case in point was on 11 May 1991 at home to Norwich. The old kop roof had been removed and it was the last game where you could stand on the kop. It seemed that everybody wanted to be on the kop that day. The 'published' crowd? 21,019 and Norwich brought a fair few.

​

 

[Cheets]

I always remember our purple patch in Autumn 1985. We were second in the old division two having beaten league leaders Portsmouth 3-0 away. We had home games against Blackburn and Palace and the Lane was absolutely rammed. You could hardly move on the Kop. The official attendance for both matches was something like 13,600. We never had an official league crowd above 14,000 all season.

 

[Dnblade]

I always remember our purple patch in Autumn 1985. We were second in the old division two having beaten league leaders Portsmouth 3-0 away. We had home games against Blackburn and Palace and the Lane was absolutely rammed. You could hardly move on the Kop. The official attendance for both matches was something like 13,600. We never had an official league crowd above 14,000 all season.

Good year for the turnstile operators I think.

 

[Revolution]

I always remember our purple patch in Autumn 1985. We were second in the old division two having beaten league leaders Portsmouth 3-0 away. We had home games against Blackburn and Palace and the Lane was absolutely rammed. You could hardly move on the Kop. The official attendance for both matches was something like 13,600. We never had an official league crowd above 14,000 all season.

The biggest was for Huddersfield, which was 13,000 odd as you say.

It wasn't rammed for Palace. That was the 0-0 draw played in the fog where you couldn't see one end of the pitch from the other. The crowd wasn't that big.

We had 22,000 in the Cup v Derby but that was because of their enormous away support. They brought at least 10,000 and may well have outnumbered us.

 

[Bert]

Good year for the turnstile operators I think.

A lot of clubs gave players backhanders in those days. Cash in a brown envelope was standard practice. It doesn't take a genius to work out where the cash came from.

 

[JJ Sefton]

A lot of clubs gave players backhanders in those days. Cash in a brown envelope was standard practice. It doesn't take a genius to work out where the cash came from.

God?

 

[Bert]

For a long time I thought I went to that but as I've got older I'm not sure. At the time it didn't seem that significant. Just another shit game under Heath. Then he got the boot.
Maybe I was, maybe I wasn't, hard to care now.

Kozluk crossing high into the Kop is the abiding memory of that game for most of us. A low point almost as bad as when we went into the 4th division.

 

[Bert]

God?

It was Murdoch.

 

[BushBlade]

Kozluk crossing high into the Kop is the abiding memory of that game for most of us. A low point almost as bad as when we went into the 4th division.

From memory that could have been a number of games. In fact, most of the ones Kozzy played in.

 

[grafikhaus]

A lot of clubs gave players backhanders in those days. Cash in a brown envelope was standard practice. It doesn't take a genius to work out where the cash came from.

A bit like Hammond starting (but not finishing) 30 games last season. Some things never change.

 

[BushBlade]

A lot of clubs gave players backhanders in those days. Cash in a brown envelope was standard practice. It doesn't take a genius to work out where the cash came from.

Wasn't just the players.

 

[SUFC Handsworth]

Have to disagree with the opening credits on the film. For summer 1982 money wasn't tight at the Lane, with £300k spent on players (a lot of money at the time, especially for a third division club) and the one's released being deemed surplus to requirements rather than financial reasons; Givens was released the year previously after relegation to the fourth, Hatton, Neville, Matthews, Richardson and King were out of favour (Hatton unjustly imo, he went to Cardiff and helped them secure promotion from our division and King for shall we say an ongoing off field incident - allegedly obviously!!), Conroy would have been out of favour but number one Keith Waugh broke his collar bone (I seem to remember) pre-season at Lincoln. MacPhail played most of the season before being allowed to leave to go to York if memory serves, to be replaced by Stancliffe during summer '83. Arnott, McHale and Curran were allowed to go out on loan as they had been poor, out of form or out of the team.

Brealey funded all the spending (to that point, very generous spending) and only lost interest on this front when the council back-heeled our plans of a mega-stadium at the Lane. That decision from the Sheffield (Wednesday) Council probably cost the tax payers of Sheffield £millions over the next 30+ years (and we're still paying for it to this date - our dreadful roads are testament to this) as the mega-stadium at the Lane would have meant no need for the Don Valley Stadium.

 

[Sean Thornton]

Yes but don't forget that attendance figures were allegedly massaged downwards in the 80s whereas now they are massaged upwards (cue a hundred posts about whether season-ticket holders who don't attend are included in the attendance figures).

Are posts about season ticket holders not attending counted in posters totals?