Tony Books team - late 1970's

One point to those mentioning the disastrous appointment of Alan Ball: We went down in 83, came up in 85, went down in 87, came up in 89 and had six years in the top division before bloody Ball arrived. I've always believed it was the chaos in the 80s that led to our problems in the late 90s even though we finished 5th in 1991 and 1992.
Would we have done any better in 93-94 had we replaced Reid with someone other than Horton? And then came Ball, Coppell, Neal, Clarke, Royle and the third division. And while a lot won't like seeing Royle in that list he had a third of the season to lift us just one place from 22nd to 21st.
 
gordondaviesmoustache said:
By 1979 that team was ageing and when discussing this people often forget that we performed poorly in the league in the 1978/9 season. Skip had signed the Futcher twins and Colin Vilgoen that summer (1978) iirc, which was hardly inspiring. Our run in the UEFA Cup was an achievement, but up to playing AC Milan, the opposition (FC Twente and Standard Liege) was pretty average. We were destroyed by Simenson's Borussia Monchengladbach in the Quarters.

I think a degree of surgery was required. Dave Watson was a truly great player, but it may be that the club had to sell him in any event. I have heard that he needed to move abroad for financial reasons. Owen and Barnes were favourites but neither could be said to have had stellar careers.

There was gong to be work required whoever was in the box seat imo, but I doubt they could have made much worse a job of it than Big Mal.
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1978 was an awful year. I was only 7 (coming 8) at the time and Watson and Barnes going left me devestated. Simonsen (European Player of the Year at the time) was simply different class when Gladbach came. Bizarrely, I was never that arsed about Owen, but then again probably too young to understand.
 
stockportblue said:
One board member at the time wanted Bobby Robson but he was over ruled by the pro-Allison faction.
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The club was rife with factional infighting between Swales, Alexander and Niven all through those dark days, which didn't help matters.
They used to hold democratic meetings to decide what was in the best interests of the club.
A frank, open and honest exchange of ideas and opinions.
And then do what Swales told them to.
 
It's all relative, of course, but the Tony Book side of the late 1970s was current-day Barcelona compared to the utter shite that followed.

Bottom line is we were in the classic situation of a club with a great team that has grown old and needs to be restructured/replaced. We fucked up badly. Bringing back Allison was our 'King Kenny' moment, but far more destructive. For this debacle alone, Peter Swales and the lickspittles who surrounded him deserve perpetual condemnation.
 
My favourite period of watching City,we did get found out by Moenchengladbach in the UEFA cup.
Tueart going to the Cosmos hurt us,but you can't blame him for the money on offer and the chance to play with some of the worlds best players,albiet in the twighlight of their careers.
Owen and Barnes did nothing really after leaving,Watson's injuries were catching up with him,we hadn't had a decent right back since 1970,Ged Keegan?.
The replacements brought in Viljoen,Channon,the Futchers and Jimmy Conway hardly inspired confidence,but were nothing on the Alison debacle.
 
For me - the "turn" for that team was when Dennis Tueart left. We were pretty poor for the whole period from end of winter 1977-1978 right through to the summer clear out of 1979 under Big Mal - so for me the thing to note is that even with the "Book players" we were doing as badly as we did with the "Mal players" the following year. In particular - we went months without a win (or was it home win?) under Book in 1978/1979 and seemingly had lost the ability to defend and also to score goals at home. Perhaps then - the previous couple of seasons had been a flash in the pan, what with the young unknown Barnes coming into prominence, and we had been sussed by 1978? If you look at any of the You Tube footage from 1978/1979 even before Mal came back- City look absolutely clueless.
If we had kept Bookie and Bill Taylor - this is the kind of surgery (with benefit of hindsight, big style!) which might have kept us moving forward:

Joe Corrigan - keep
Kenny Clements - flog (not v good), probably Ray Ranson was about as good a young RB as was around at the time so give him a go
Dave Watson - keep longer and pay him wages needed to keep him from abroad
Terry Butcher - offer Ipswich £750k for their young defender instead of buying Robinson for that price
Willie Donachie - flog as past his best; buy Kenny Sansom from Palace for £1 million
Peter Barnes - flog for 750k as too one dimensional - buy someone like Arnold Muhren for 500k
Asa Hartford - keep
Garry Owen - flog for 400k and buy Bryan Robson for 1 million
Paul Power - keep
Strikers - all flog
Buy Rush £300k
Buy Peter Withe for £200k
 
As not only City fan but Widzew Lodz as well :) am still with a good relationship with footballers who played v City in UEFA Cup. They say that it was very strong team these days...and absolutely massive Club.

ps

I'm still looking for a dvd of home match
 
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