BRENTFORD legend Tommy Higginson was made captain for the day when York City visited Griffin Park late in February 1967, to mark his 250th appearance for the Bees. Another legend, the Middleses Chronicle's George Sands, was there to report on a draw which really should have been two points for the Bees.
YORK City, on two of their previous three visits, shocked Brentford by going away winners when all form said said that both points should have stayed at Griffin Park; and for over an hour on Saturday there was more than a chance that those doleful passages in the Bees' history would be repeated. As it was, a Lawther goal in the 65th minute saved Brentford from adding to the day's total of unexpected home defeats. But it was a disappointing show against a club still to record a first away win of the season, and who are faced with a hard struggle to avoid an application for re-election.
With Norwich settling Manchester United's hash at Old Trafford and Southampton falling to Bristol City at Ashton Gate, Brentford's inability to do better than draw 1-1 with the Fourth Division stragglers would hardly raise an eyebrow. But it was a frustrating follow-up to their fine performance against Bradford City. Such, however, are the vagaries of football form, Who, for instance, would have expected that Bradford City, who looked so effete at Griffin Park, would go to Aldershot a week later and win by three goals to nil?
With Tom Higginson as skipper for the day on making his 250th league appearance, the following teams took the field in almost ideal soccer conditions:-
Brentford: Phillips, Hawley, Jones, Higginson, Gelson, Thomson, Docherty, Lawther, Ross, Richardson, Curley.
York City: Walker, Baker, Turner, Collinson, Jackson, Burrows, Horrey, Caulfield, Spencer, Goodchild, Provan.
For a good deal of the first half the Bees played as though they were experiencing that Monday morning feeling five days late. At times they moved brightly and cleverly, but their play in general lacked that little bit of extra snap and sparkle which featured their football of the previous Saturday; and 7,620 spectators, eager to cheer anything remotely cheerable, found little opportunity or excuse to give their vocal chords an airing. Admittedly, the Bees did not have a lot of luck near goal, and their best intentioned centres from either flank seemed to fall at anybody's feet except those of a team-mate.
But much of the play was scrappy, some of it not as good as that. Meeting the reobund from his own free-kick, Curley cracked the ball over the top before Walker could move, and three corners in quick time had an element of danger for York. Meanwhile, the City forwards had been so rarely in the picture in the opening quarter of an hour that their goal, in the 16th minute, came as a bolt from the blue in more senses than one. Over came a centre from the left flank, and the ball ran loose - very loose - just inside the penalty line. It bounced conveniently for Provan, who picked his spot and aimed accurately.
The Bees returned to the attacking business without putting a real threat into the near-goal efforts, a shot from Thomson which skimmed the bar giving Walker his biggest moment of unease. Phillips did his familiar run-out-and-smother act to prevent another Provan goal, and then off went skipper Ross, with blood streaming from a cut above his eye. As Eddie Reeve, the stand-by sub, was not called into action, it was apparent that Ross would return; and he did so five minutes before the interval with a strip of plaster on his forehead, but otherwise none the worse for his mishap.
When the interval came with York still claiming the only goal, there were grim forebodings that they might stage an encore of last season's performance for an unappreciative audience; and although the Bees got down to it with more thrust and purpose on turning out for the second act, there still wasn't much bite in the penalty box. And the fat was nearly in the fire when Spencer went through unchallenged, with a second York goal there for the taking. But as Phillips dashed out to narrow the target, the City No 9 slammed the ball into the palings.
Corners have brought Brentford quite a few goals this season, and Brentford's equaliser in the 63rd minute added to the list. Taking a flag-kick on the right, Ross tapped the ball tow yards to Hawley, and, taking, a prompt return, put over a centre. Keeper Walker fluffed his catch, and Lawther slammed the ball into the net. York must still be wondering how they survived the last 27 minutes. Their goal had what is commonly understood to be a charmed life, and on that reckoning the Citizens must have stroked every black cat and picked every four-leaved clover between Bootham Crescent and Griffin Park. In a few quarters the visitors salvage of a point was attributed to a gallant defence. Gallant it may have been; and Walker did his best by way of atonement by making a really magnificent save from Lawther. But the fact that shot after Brentford shot sneaked just outside or over the woodwork was evidence of anything but sound defence.
Everybody but Phillips and the linesmen seemed to have a pot at the York goal, either with boot or head. On one occassion, Walker, yards out of his goal, lost the ball to Docherty in a skirmish on the bye-line. Johnny sent it low across an empty goal-line, but after appearing likely to spin into the net, the ball changed its mind and travelled harmlessly beyond the far post. Just afterwards Docherty, closely challenged by two Citizens and unable to make a pass, chipped the ball cheekily through the almost non-esxistent space between them, only to see it miss that same far post by a whisker.
York's defenders, run almost to a standstill (in some cases you could omit the 'almost') acted on the assumption that the ball cannot sail over the stand and into their net at the same time, and twice in five minutes the referee had to call for a spare. In the closing minutes the City defenders were so leg-weary that they were glad to put the ball behind for a corner because they hadn't enough left in their legs to biff it into touch. But the final whistle sounded with the Bees having played their fifth draw of 1967. It could have been worse, I suppose. But when you get considerably more than 48 penny-worth for your four bob one week, the let-down is disconcerting, to say the least.
ALSO IN THE NEWS:
Chairman Jack Dunnett, the villain of the piece as Brentford fight to stave off a takeover by QPR, sells his shares and resigns as Brentford chairman. The club is acquired by a syndicate, ensuring its future as an indepedent club, rather than being swallowed up by their west London rivals, who had designs on Griffin Park.
Three Hounslow schoolboys are chosen for the London Schools squad to take on the Midlands Schools at Wembley, as a curtain-raiser to the League Cup Final between QPR and West Bromwich Albion. They are Michael Soley (Spring Grove Grammar), Ken Reed (De Brome) and Nigel Hicks (Woodfield).
