Cod Almighty | Article
by Simon Wilson
18 July 2003
Relationship with Division Two
May 2000 - Barnsley get slapped 4-2 by a free-flowing Ipswich side to lose the first division play-off final. Twenty-four months later and the Tykes were spending the summer contemplating second division football. Their stay in the second almost proved a brief one. Glyn Hodges took over the club halfway through last season and managed to avoid a second successive relegation by the skin of his teeth.
Biggest achievement
Like the ever-growing number of clubs that have entered administration in the past three years, the continued existence of the club is a marked achievement. On the pitch, Danny Wilson's oft-lauded feat of taking a modestly assembled side up to the Premiership playing organised, on-the-floor football with a fair dash of guile must rank amongst the club's greatest feats - and against pre-season expectations of a mid-table finish. Shame that feat seems to have manifested the current situation at the club (more of which later).
Antipathies
Any other club in Yorkshire, it seems - the two Sheffield teams, Huddersfield, Bradford, and especially Leeds (Barnsley's main oppenent when it comes to vying for support in the town). Cast your eye wider at the local community and you'll find that Margaret Thatcher's hand in destroying most of the local livelihood ranks her among the most hated of the hated.
Squad
California-based businessman Sean Lewis took control of the club a couple of weeks ago and immediately replaced an aggrieved Glyn Hodges as manager with Gudjon Thordarson. Ex-Barnsley hero Ronnie Galvin was brought in from Emley & Wakefield to assist the former Stoke boss. The pair are currently assessing the playing staff after the upheaval of the past 12 months, which has left a threadbare squad made up mainly of youngsters with a smattering of more experienced pros. The managerial team have already proclaimed that a quality keeper is needed, but the club can't bring any new faces in until a Football League transfer embargo is lifted.
Bruce Dyer's departure to Watford on a Bosman will deprive the team of the goals that were the difference between relegation and survival. What is left? The unfulfilled potential of Isiah Rankin - remember when he moved from Arsenal to Bradford for £1.3million, touted as a raw talent for the future? Thirty-year-old poacher Mike Sheron was bought with a third of the £4.5 million received for Ashley Ward in 1999 and should still be able to net into double figures at this level. It's time tricky winger Kevin Betsy repaid the faith of those who thought the Tykes had a bargain when they paid Fulham £200,000 for his services. And talking of tricky wingers - remember Kevin Donovan? He's still at "a club going places", you'll be pleased to know.
Rough guide
During his Tour Through The Whole Island of Great Britain Daniel Defoe left Rotherham for Wakefield, travelling over "vast, almost waste moors...passing a town called Black Barnsley. The town looks as black and smoky as if they were all smiths that lived in it; though it is not called Black Barnsley on that account, but for the black hue or colour of the moors, which being covered with heath...look all black." Take the train between Sheffield and Leeds via Barnsley and you can see what Defoe was getting at as the train snakes, ambling between the stops, lurching across the barren land. After Defoe's time the town's reputation for blackness was secured by the now-defunct coal industry. When the football club will be able to dub itself back in the black is another matter altogether.
Wilson's success was built largely around a work ethic that echoed the burly, hardy nature of the town - epitomised by captain Gerry Taggart. Grafted onto an organised and well-drilled team pattern was the stubbornness and guile to wear sides down and catch them with unexpected turns of pace. The present-day Barnsley fan now seems to expect this as the norm. Unfortunately this norm also includes football played in (or as close to) the top flight as possible. The club's current predicament isn't going to allow for that; and there is a feeling that the past 12 months have served as a reality check to supporters. Hard up after the failure of Dave Bassett's inglorious promotion gamble, the club was clearly still spending more than it could afford (or rather overinflated figures on terminally mediocre players).
New manager Thordarson has a reputation for preferring the more 'acceptable' kind of football and his track record at Stoke was steady - remember, this is the man who convinced Peter Handyside to drop down a division (which is funny, because as I type this Handyside is rumoured to be training with Barnsley). Bringing in Glavin is a shrewd move, giving the fans someone to look up to, a hero from a more steady time, and possibly acting as a buffer between the foreign manager and the fans.
Despite diminished attendances there's more of a togetherness among the crowd at Oakwell. Some fans have upped sticks (citing their disagreement at the way the club has been run) and "done a Wimbledon", setting up their own AFC Barsnley. Is it just me or are these the types of fans who whinge when something goes wrong, like your club being right up the creek, but were all too happy in the past to see them splashing out sums beyond their means on the latest mis-shaped piece in the big-time jigsaw?
Trivia
England fast bowler Darren Gough hails from Barnsley, though opinion is divided as to whether the Dazzler supports the Tykes or Leeds. [Although I swear I once heard him on the radio professing a lifelong love for Tottenham - Ed.]
Ken Loach filmed Kes in and around Barnsley. If he made it today, I'd hope it'd be accompanied with subtitles like his last cinematic release Sweet Sixteen (Scottish; deepest Yorkshire - pretty impenetrable as languages go). Stirling Prize winner Will Alsop wants to reinvent Barnsley as a Tuscan hill town - complete with town walls with towers.
Oh, and Barnsley's first ever away win in the league was at Blundell Park in 1898.
How will they do?
Haven't a clue. If the transfer embargo is lifted then it's a matter of how much money they have in the coffers to pay for wages. Some depth needs to be added to the squad. If the embargo isn't lifted... relegation. Much depends on how matters progress at Oakwell before the start of the season.
Links
For a change I'm going to plump for the official site. I quite enjoyed reading something official with such a strong sense of community. Grimsby's own official site could learn a thing or two from it.