Longer term readers of this blog may remember the book called “The Journey Back” which I co wrote with Richard Holt in 2013. For those who were not aware of it, The Journey Back was meant to be a continuation of Official History of the Bluebirds, written by John Crooks, which was published in 1992.
Our book, broadly speaking, continued with the format used in the original in that it contained a shortish analysis of each season, backed up with a statistical breakdown giving details of matches, team line ups, attendances etc.
The original book covered each season in detail from our first in the Football League in 1920/21 right through to 1990/91, while our book then dealt with the period 1991/92 to our promotion season in 2012/13.
I wrote the season reviews, while Richard was responsible for providing the statistics and I have always said that his work was an improvement on what was offered in the, very good, original book.
I say that because, besides all of the details offered in the Official History, Richard also included opposition line ups, goal times, highlighting of former City players turning out against us, highlighting of players making debuts and second/third debuts for us and, from 1997, highlighting of players sent off in games.
The stats used in The Journey Back were part of a project Richard has been working on in recent years whereby he is looking to provide stats in the same format for every single game the club has played since that first Football League match at Stockport on 28 August 1920 right up until the present day. If and when he can complete his work, it would, surely, represent the most complete and comprehensive statistical analysis of Cardiff City Football Club ever.
Richard is now at a stage where there are just four games left where he is still looking for some data – in each case, all he needs is the opposition team line up.
All four matches were played in the Welsh Cup as follows;-
v Ebbw Vale Home 16th December 1939
v Troedyrhiw Home 12th January 1949
v Bangor City Away 7th March 1951 &
v Ebbw Vale Away 25th January 1964.
As I mention in the title of this piece, it’s a real longshot, but is there anyone out there who can provide those missing opposition line ups or offer suggestions as to how Richard could find them? It would be great if a complete statistical analysis could be in place for the centenary of our first match in just over a year’s time.
Hi Paul
I’ve got a newspaper cutting for the Ebbw Vale match, if I can email it to you.
Bob
Hello Bob and thank you for getting in touch – yes, please do send that cutting to me at paul.evans8153@hotmail.com
Many thanks Paul for putting this on your blog. Thanks to Mike Smith from Shropshire I’ve now got the Bangor lineup for the 1951 match. I’ve seen Western Mail match reports for the other three games and noted down the names of any players mentioned in the reports. In the case of the Ebbw Vale game from 1964 I’ve got 6 of the team members’ names including Israel the scorer of Vale’s goal, Best, Vater, Padfield and Walton. I would hope there’s a chance that a good number of these guys are still around and a link to one of those might do the trick. Thanks to anyone who can help anyway.