Apparently David supersub Fairclough signed for us in 1985 and did not make one single appearence
David Fairclough - Wikipedia
en.m.wikipedia.org
Have no recollection of this at all
I remember him playing in the reserves. My old man and I used to go and watch them back then. City were looking for extra squad depth in second half of the 1984/85 promotion season and he was a free agent. I think we gave him a month's deal, in effect a trial to prove himself in training and the reserves, but he looked a shadow of the exciting young player he'd been at Liverpool. We didn't offer him a follow-up deal, not even a short-term one until the end of the season.
We had one or two experienced players from other teams play in our reserves at that time. One I remember was Mel Eves of Wolves, but we don't seem to be listed online as one of his clubs so he was probably formally on trial with us rather than our player under a short-term contract. I thought he looked OK but IIRC we let him join Sheffield United without making a counter-offer, so Billy McNeill was obviously less impressed than I was.