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I wish I could but most teams do not publish the actual attendance but tickets sold. I suppose there’s an argument to say that if you’ve bought a ticket for any event you should be counted. A theatre full house sign will go up even if someone doesn’t make it. Also, so long as all clubs report in...

I have a recording from an interview I did with Bernard many years ago in which he admits how the last ‘official’ crowd of over 54,000 at Maine Rd was actually considerably more. It was v Sunderland and his first game as Secretary.

It does make you wonder. These people tried to create clubs, playing fields and so on but in recent decades sports grounds have been sold off and opportunities in areas of poverty have decreased. Those people all felt part of the community and saw it as their mission to help their neighbours -...

In the talk I mention about the Shameless TV series… in the first series the area was used as their set and the parade of shops featured was approximately where the church was. It was demolished in the 70s and that area has been redeveloped again since. The stretch of Clowes St that passed the...

For those wondering what it’s all about here’s a brief trailer:

I’ve got an article coming up on Parlby. Each Monday for next few weeks I’ve got a written article on some of the key early figures. Last Monday was Lawrence Furniss and Parlby is soon. Also, worth searching through my site like this search on name Parlby: https://gjfootballarchive.com/?s=Parlby...

Yes and they are for many decades of the club’s existence. In simple terms City never included season tickets in their attendances submitted to the League. So every game pre about 1960 is understated by however many season tickets had been sold. The figure given to the league was those who had...

Thanks. Glad you enjoyed it.

Glad you like it. I’m planning on doing more of these so if there are any topics you think need addressing just let me know. Thanks

True but in the modern era most PL clubs claim sell outs every season but usually that’s below the actual stated capacity so, to avoid fans of club X saying ‘but our capacity wasn’t really xx,xxx it was so much lower’ I’ve gone with a club’s best as the most a club could get. The truth is that...

The whole ’Empty Seats’ stuff bugs me so I’ve been doing some analysis comparing attendances at PL clubs recently. I’ve just published this article which includes some stats that City fans may want to remember, especially when being challenged by Villa, Everton or LFC fans...

Last night I did a free 1 hour long talk on the origins of City in Gorton 1880-1887 with the latest research and challenging some myths. I‘ve recorded it and you can watch it here for the next few days: https://gjfootballarchive.com/2023/02/02/history-talk-video-the-origins-of-mcfc/ Thanks to...

Here you go https://gjfootballarchive.com/2023/02/02/history-talk-video-the-origins-of-mcfc/

I‘m never certain about resurrecting threads but this seemed about the most logical place for this post. Anyway, Bluemooners may be interested in the free zoom talk I’m doing later today (1 Feb at 6pm UK time) on the pre-1887 origins of MCFC. I’ll be correcting a few myths, talking about the...

Yep! In my 2012 history of the club I quoted some of those involved from that era, including signings that followed like Steve Daley, and included the line: ‘ Despite the indications that there were some issues with judgement, Peter Swales continued to back his management team…’ Ego of many...

The floodlit game was at the athletics stadium that eventually became the speedway stadium. It had a long history before it became speedway. I included this map from 1905 with some of the sites on it in my 1997 book Manchester The Greatest City. Some of my research in recent years had...

No. I’m saying the exact opposite.

Read the book - I quote Ken in that. He’s mostly critical about Niven though. Peter Authorised every word in the book too.

Keegan was taking the p*** out if him with the other LFC players. It was Davies who said ‘say anything….’. Peter tells a few stories about that night in the book. My favourite is his mum watching at home and thinking the sound had gone on the tv.

Have a read of the book, I think you’ll read less diplomatic stuff about Swales and City’s ownership during that period. Frank comments from several there at the time and Ken certainly challenged Swales & Niven.