Result: 2-1 Win (HT 0-0) Ritchie 48, Hinch 51; Harvey 65.
Attendance: 6,659
Hereford United: Hughes, Radford, Bell, McLaughlin, Tucker, Jones, Rudge, Hinch, Ritchie, Brown, Emery.
Rochdale: Poole, Bradbury, Horne, Taylor, Arnold, Hanvey, Carrick (Grummett), Gowans, Brennan, Tobin, Downes.
League Position: Hereford end the day in 17th position, 9 points above the drop with only 8 games to go. With only 2 points for a win, they are all but safe. Rochdale are bottom of the league and were already gone going into the game.
Click on photos to enlarge.
Colin's Comments: Colin uses the column to acknowledge the level of support that Hereford had received (just north of 8,000 on average), whilst flagging that they hadn't been able to deliver decent home form. WDLWDDWLLWLLWLWWLLW P19 W8 D3 L8 F26 A22. Not awful. Hereford would see out the season with further home form of WDDW.
Third Division Round Up: As the season enters its last month, the column focuses on the positive impact the fledgling league careers Hereford and Cambridge United have had on the prospects of non-league teams bidding for election. Unsuccessfully, as it goes, which was the norm given the 'turkeys voting for Christmas' nature of the election/re-election system. Hereford fans would grow a bit too familiar with the system during the early 80's. Of the three occasions that Hereford would be successfully reliant on votes from their fellow football league members (79-80, 80-81 and 82-83), the last one would have seen rock-bottom Hereford relegated under the current system.
Ted Woodriffe gives an almost perfect summary of where non-league football was heading, albeit by revealing that there had been a breakdown in plans to introduce a National League for top non-league teams that could possibly allow automatic promotion/relegation between the two worlds.
This national league would first take place during the 1979-80 season - called the Alliance Premier League (or the Gola League, going by memory), automatic promotion/relegation would (thankfully) have to wait until the 1986-87 season, with Scarborough/Lincoln City being the first beneficiaries/victims respectively. That same season also saw the introduction of the play-offs throughout the bottom three divisions.
In the Opposition: The programme has Rochdale down as the Vallians. Like most football fans I would fancy my quiz chances with football club nick names, but if that name came up, I wouldn't be going home with a speedboat.
Mike Poole was one of the many 70's players that gave the US a go; after a decent stint at Rochdale, where he played almost 200 league games, he spent three seasons across the pond, playing both outdoor and indoor "soccer," before spending one last season back at Rochdale in 81-82 and retiring in his late 20's.
Stan Horne was the first black player to play for both Man City and Fulham, and only the second to play for Villa; he finished his career off at Rochdale before having to stop due to high blood pressure. Keith Hanvey also played for Man City, he turned out only once, though, in the short lived Texaco Cup, a competition played between clubs in England/Scotland/Ireland that hadn't qualified for Europe. Alan Taylor would at the end of '74 get a move to Hereford's familiar "big club" West Ham for, signed by John Lyall for £40k.
Keith Bebbington was the first ever Stoke player to score in a Cup Final (1964 League Cup, a two-legged affair during its early years). Steve Arnold had played twice for Liverpool, though one appearance was when they got fined for fielding a weakened team two days before a Fairs Cup semi final tie against Leeds in 1971 - the fine thankfully nipped that sort of nonsense in the bud. Leeds qualified for the final anyway. Finally Graham Smith played over 300 league games for Rochdale in an 8-year spell, before playing a further 150 times for Stockport.
Edgar Street Chatter: No Edgar Street chatter this week - I guess with this being sat inbetween two Saturday home games they have got everything covered. I feel like I should issue some kind of warning about making sure kids aren't about before clicking on the photo as replacing it is an article about 1970s soccer hardmen. I think we can conclude from the below excerpt that this pre-dated the first footballer wearing an alice-band.
Even if some of the fans feel that players should be shrinking violets when it comes to physical contact and that the game should be played in the exhibition style of the Harlem Globetrotters, footballers and their managers accept it for what it is - a grim struggle either for success or against failure in which men have got to be hard to survive.
I could have just asked AI what the National League North is I suppose?
Anyway, going back to the 1930s, the author touches on a Leeds player called Wilf Copping, who sounded like he could look after himself. Definitely worth a Google; below is one article that it threw up...
Supporters' Corner: Phil knows how to exploit your average '70s fan, trying to lure them into doing a bingo round with money to buy booze and fags. Quite worryingly, he then chucks in the potential to win 100 gallons of petrol. 1970s H&S right there.
Vital Statistics: A Pewter Tankard anyone? It would have set you back £4 mind. To put that into context, an adult meadow end season ticket for the 74-75 season was going to cost £10.
In the News: Finally some good news. 1st of April 1974 saw the birth of the popular county of Hereford and Worcester.
In the Singles Charts: Billy Don't be a Hero by Paper Lace is at No.1.
In the Album Charts: The Singles 1969-1973 by the Carpenters is at No.1.
