Around the 92
in the 1980s

By Giles Goford

“We’re on the wrong road, dad.
We need to turn around if we want
to get to Oakwell.”

Dad slowed down, stopped
and reversed the car.

Crunch…

“Oh no!”, he exclaimed.

“What the heck was that?”

We were stuck, his BMW immobile. We got out and found he’d reversed over a steep dropped kerb, and the back of the car was dangling over the edge. Not quite in an ‘Italian Job’ style, but we definitely weren’t going anywhere fast.

This was 1988. No mobile phones, no apps to contact a rescue service, no sat-nav to tell us exactly where we were.

Oakwell, the home of Barnsley Football Club, seemed a long way off now. We were stuck outside of a town neither of us knew, trying to reach yet another of England and Wales’ 92 Football League grounds.

It was a journey my father and I had mapped out, to indulge my thirst for all things football. I had been obsessed with the sport since I could remember. Panini sticker albums were my pride and joy. I would write down all the season’s transfers in my Rothmans Football Yearbook. I would re-enact the previous weekend’s goals in the garden on my own, taking the scant details from Match magazine - all the way down to Bury v Reading in the Fourth Division. As well as Paul Mariner or Ian Rush, I wanted to be Craig Madden or Trevor Senior.

It was football that had inspired this trip and it was football that got it back on the road.

Help came in the form of two Barnsley fans. Despite the pouring rain, we managed to flag them down, and told them of our odyssey. They may have been bemused, but they recognised how desperate we were to get to the ground.

With super-human strength, they lifted the car from its resting place and back on to the road. My grateful dad handed over £10 to buy them both a couple of drinks and we were back on our way – the two of us, to Oakwell and beyond.

Thank you David Price

I was seven and a half when I went to my first match. My father wasn’t a natural football fan, and I don’t think he had been to a match before I started pestering him with my love for the game. But through a friend who knew Arsenal midfielder David Price, he secured two tickets for Arsenal v Ipswich Town at Highbury. The date was 27 December 1980. The result was 1-1. The experience set me on a path I’m still on to this day.

Dad’s interest grew. We spent a season watching Watford gain promotion to the First Division, under Graham Taylor, in 1981-82. I loved seeing him becoming more engaged in the weekly drama and sometimes joining in with the old lady who sat next to us, as she needled the opposition manager. I was desperate to get my birthday mentioned in lights on the huge scoreboard.

This was my time with him. We would occasionally venture off to other grounds, such as Leicester’s Filbert Street and The Dell at Southampton.

By 1988, we were spending less time together, so he suggested we visit all 92 league grounds. A new football adventure was a lifeline for this awkward 15-year old.

Our single guide was Simon Inglis’ book The Football Grounds of Great Britain and we set off up the M6 to Carlisle from our Buckinghamshire home to start the pilgrimage in England’s far north.

Our plan was simple - look for the floodlights and head in that direction.

It all starts with Carlisle...

After a quick photo at Hadrian’s Wall, probably our only cultural aside on the trip, Carlisle’s Brunton Park was our first stop. The Easter holidays gave us three days to cram in as many grounds as we could.

The plan was to take a photo of me outside the club sign at each venue, which was not so easy in those pre-branding days. Any further photo opportunities, whether pitchside, in the stands or elsewhere, were a bonus.

Carlisle weren’t too compliant. We snatched a shot of the pitch from behind a locked gate, and were off to Newcastle. This was far more successful - we actually got on to the pitch. St James’ Park then looked very different to the grand arena it is now. The image of the club shop sums up what football was to most fans in the late ‘80s - crumbling, unwelcoming, without a sense of the golden commercial opportunities of the imminent Premier League era.

This was Newcastle eight years before Kevin Keegan’s entertainers almost won the Premier League. It was before the Gallowgate end was redeveloped. The average home attendance in the season we visited was 21,038. And we could just walk in and take our own tour.

Then it was on to Sunderland’s Roker Park, Darlington’s Feethams and Middlesbrough’s Ayresome Park - a trio of grounds that no longer exist. Housing now sits on all three sites. In total, 33 of the stadiums we visited are now consigned to history. 

I was growing very fond of the individuality of the stadiums, the way the terraces reflected the communities we were passing through. That first day, we went back north to Hartlepool, down to the coast to Scarborough’s McCain Stadium and on to York City’s Bootham Crescent, the latter two now demolished. We actually saw some football played too. That night, we drove to Crewe and were among the 1,833 fans who endured a goalless draw against Hereford United.

It was English football at its very best. And I loved it. Seeing these grounds for the first time in person was special, where my football heroes produced their magic each week, where the fans swayed and sang in unison.

Day two, Saturday 2 April 1988, was an exciting one for me. It was my first trip to Old Trafford to watch Manchester United. First, we ticked off Port Vale, Stoke and Shrewsbury (the Victoria Ground and Gay Meadow now out of commission) before driving to Manchester. This was a very different United from the huge global organisation of today. They hadn’t won the league title for more than 20 years when we visited. We bought two tickets for £10 from a tout just before kick-off and were in, albeit to a bare pitch that would be inconceivable today. It didn’t stop Brian McClair scoring a hat-trick past Peter Shilton as Derby were beaten 4-1.

But too much football and not enough ground-hopping! We went across town to Manchester City’s Maine Road home, which was fully locked up, and to Stockport and Oldham, then rested before a big day in Yorkshire. We stayed at the Brown Cow pub in Bingley, at a time when just going to the pub was a thrilling new experience. Our conversation would have revolved around football, although my dad would have reminded me to keep my focus on academic studies as well.

On day three, we covered 18 clubs, which included our unforeseen accident outside Barnsley. There was not too much time to stop and smell the grass at Leeds or Bradford, but we got through the gates at Grimsby and Sheffield United. I remember my dad had to stand on top of the car at Halifax to get a photo of The Shay. We were now 34 clubs into our journey. My father’s football education was growing and growing.

Back on the road

My own actual education continued too. Because of school, we had to wait until the summer of 1988 to continue the journey. Newport County had been relegated from Division Four, replaced on the itinerary by Lincoln City.

Day four took place that summer, and started at Watford, where our football relationship developed so beautifully under the influence of Luther Blissett’s goals. But there was little time to reminisce. We were off to Colchester and then Ipswich Town - my club, where the football gods shone on us. If there had been a Portman Road stadium tour then, we would have gladly booked ourselves on. But a quick nod from the groundsman and we gained access to the pitch, and the dugout from where Bobby Robson had masterminded their run to winning the Uefa Cup seven years previously. I wish now we had been a bit braver and asked to see the trophy cabinet and changing rooms.

On to Norwich, Peterborough and Cambridge, then a long drive down to Southampton and Bournemouth before a big south-west sweep. A trip of similar proportions today would mean constant updates on social media and a catalogue of digital photos at each ground. I look back fondly at the innocence of it all, just turn up, and hope there was a gate open or a friendly face to let us in. Once in Bournemouth, the iconic design of the Dean Court Jubilee gates caught my eye, and I’m glad they were incorporated into the stadium refit.

The 1988-89 pre-season was in full swing as we continued the journey, so it was easy to gain access at Exeter, Torquay and Plymouth, then to the two Bristol clubs, although Rovers were playing at Twerton Park in Bath at the time. Swindon and Reading completed an exhausting day.

Day six was for London and the south-east. We started at Southend United. Roots Hall was extremely welcoming and I got to pose for photos all around the ground as if I was a new signing. On to Gillingham, then a double-header as Charlton were lodging with Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park.

It seemed as if we could just park outside any London stadium that day, as we drove between Millwall, West Ham and Leyton Orient. I had already experienced a couple of matches at the evocative Plough Lane home of Wimbledon, who were FA Cup holders at the time. After Fulham and Chelsea, we had visited 63 clubs, but the rest would have to wait.

A year's break

A whole year passed until we were able to resume. It was the summer of 1989, I had graduated to being a proper indie kid, with haircut to match. I was probably giving my dad some typical teen angst, but he was very keen to complete the remaining grounds.

We had lost Darlington from the Football League. Maidstone United were the newcomers, but based at Dartford’s Watling Street ground. After visits to Aldershot, Portsmouth and Brighton’s Goldstone Ground, we ended the day at the plastic pitch of Luton’s Kenilworth Road, as we prepared to go west and then north for the final push.

After Oxford’s quirky Manor Ground, and a quick trip to Somerton Park in Newport – no longer home to a Football League club – we gained pitchside access at both Cardiff City and Swansea City before finishing the day at Edgar Street, Hereford. I looked up at these famous old stands, wishing I had watched matches from all of them, not knowing at the time that many would soon be replaced. It had only been four months since the tragic events at Hillsborough, and Lord Justice Taylor’s interim report, published in August 1989, would condemn many stadiums for their “inhospitable scene, where the atmosphere does not encourage pride in the ground”. Football needed to move on and do better.

We had an early start on day nine, at Molineux, and, as pre-season training was taking place, we were able to explore Wolves’ stadium freely, as we were at Walsall’s Fellows Park. At West Bromwich Albion, we stumbled upon the traditional pre-season photocall. So we joined the local press, under the watchful eye of manager Brian Talbot, as Don Goodman and Colin West beamed down at us from on high. This was what collecting all the Panini stickers was for, so I could identify the players on show. I was too nervous to ask for autographs, though.

Next, it was off to Villa Park, where we were allowed inside, and then to Birmingham City, where we definitely were not. After a stern ticking off from the head groundsman, we slunk out of St Andrew’s as the players ran up and down the main stand as part of their gruelling summer training.

On to Coventry, back to Crewe (as we had forgotten to take a photo under the club sign on our earlier visit), then Wrexham and Chester City before ending the day at Tranmere Rovers, where we filled up with memorabilia from the club shop.

Those souvenirs joined many others we gathered during our epic mission. Today, I have a few mugs and scarves from various clubs remaining, but sadly not the Stoke City boxer shorts.

The final few

The final day of the trip was another long haul, but dad didn’t seem to mind the driving, and I was doing the map reading to the best of my ability. Musically, I had graduated from Simply Red at the start of the 92, I was now inflicting The Smiths and The Cure on my poor dad. He preferred a bit of Gerry Rafferty.

Starting the day at Anfield, and looking at the world-famous Kop, was a treat, but next door, Everton was a closed shop. Blackpool’s Bloomfield Road was undergoing heavy construction, but we sauntered in to have a look. Preston was holding a kids’ football day where we arrived - who knows if any future professionals were on display that day?

On to Blackburn Rovers, where new signing Frank Stapleton said hello as he walked into the stadium. That meant a lot to us. Stapleton, a three-time FA Cup winner, had played for Arsenal in my very first match nine years earlier.

Memories of that first matchday are still vivid: being afraid of getting lost in the crowd on the way in through those huge metal turnstiles, the smell of Woodbines in the men’s toilets, walking next to the man with the transistor radio on the way out to hear the full-time scores on Sports Report.

Over the years, I have enjoyed the wine-and-dine experience at a few five-star Premier League grounds, and toured the changing rooms of today’s superstars, but nothing beats the memory of leaving school early one January day, and Dad driving us to Ipswich for a mid-week League Cup win over Watford. I am forever grateful for those 206 miles.

I remember being impressed after sneaking into Bolton’s Burnden Park, although my cultural knowledge at the time didn’t stretch to LS Lowry and his iconic Going to the Match masterpiece. Then to Wigan, where the first person we met was Bryan Hamilton, who had just been appointed manager for a second spell.

He welcomed me like a new signing for the then-Third Division side. Upon hearing of our adventure, he ushered us into the club shop and paid from his own pocket so we could walk away with a souvenir. Such generosity from the former Ipswich great.

Two clubs to go. We nipped up to Lincoln City, who were not in the Football League when we started our odyssey, and finally to Northampton Town, where the journey ended, not before gaining access to the County Ground pitch for one last look at football in the late 1980s.

Reflection

We were done. Looking back brings back such wonderful memories of that bonding time with my father, who fully embraced my desire to sniff out the 92. Well, 94 by the time we finished.

I feel privileged to have been able to survey the Football League landscape for what it was, a snapshot in time, great old grounds where great old goals were scored. Where children learned their love of football on the shoulders of their parents.

And all the time, my father Jeremy Goford was the one behind the camera. 

I don’t have one photo of him outside a football ground, on the trip he lovingly designed for me. 

He passed away in 2017, but we often used to talk of the trip, and what it meant to our relationship. I can sense him now, in those photos, some 35 years on, as we craned our necks and camera to get an image of the away end at Torquay.

We talked about repeating the trip one day, or doing all the Scottish grounds, but I’m glad now that we did it when we did – I think in our own ways, we needed it. It was for me, and for him, but most importantly it was for us.

And if I had the chance, I’d do it all again tomorrow.