Former European Champions and general European nightmare team Red Star are next up for Rochdale after a good start to the season. We’re still in the domestic cups too, so plenty of chances to bag our first cup as well as a third league title.
What is it about dodgy penalties being awarded in European competitions? Their No.9 “falls in the box” and the ref gives a penalty. Sigh. He picks himself up having made a recovery and scores. We try not to let it get to us and before half time that man Betts pulls us level. We try and find a way through in the second half, but get caught on the break as their No.9 races clear again to give them 2 away goals and us an uphill task in the second leg.
There’s no European hangover as we host relegation threatened Bournemouth and put them to the sword convincingly 5-0. We give another great display at Goodison Park to beat Everton 3-1, before our closest challengers Derby visit to try and catch us. Betts gives us the perfect start after 4 minutes and we restrict the Rams to 1 shot at half time. Tommy Johnson scores almost immediately after the break with their only other chance of the match as they try and hold out for a draw. We lay siege to their goal and Betts eventually manages to bundle the ball in with 7 minutes to go to extend our lead at the top!
Off to Red Star with a tall order, that is only made harder as Limbert gets himself sent off after just after 10 minutes with a rash challenge that see’s their No.10 go off injured. Substitute A comes on and gives a man of the match performance, scoring a magnificent last minute goal to give them a 2-0 win after their No.3 had scored on the stroke of half time.
So we’re out again in the second round of the European cup, knockouts maybe not our strongest area, but we’re still in 2 domestic cups so a chance to change things! We host Tranmere in the FA Cup and give the squad players a run out after the 1st XI’s tough time in Europe and get a good result, dominating them in a 5-0 win, McPherson bagging 2, to get Birmingham in the next round.
The games are coming thick and fast now League, FA Cup, League, League cup, League, FA Cup, League, so we try and rotate the squad a bit to keep everyone 95%+ fitness. A quick 1-0 visit to Villa Park in the league then down the road to Filbert Street to see off Leicester in the Coca-Cola 3-1 and we’re into the semi finals again! Then back to Dale where 2nd place chasing Swindon hand us a 2-0 defeat as everyone underperforms.
We struggle a bit against Birmingham in the FA Cup going in 1-0 up at half time thanks to Betts, then former player Junior Hunter comes back to haunt his old club in true cup cliché action, coming off the bench in the second half to equalise, before Carter gets away to give us a narrow 2-1 win and set up a 5th round tie with Stockport. Roy Evans finally goes as Liverpool are still propping up the table and don’t look like turning it around!
We have a brief midweek breather before hosting West Ham in a 3-1 win, then lose our 2nd league game in 3, Arsenal frustrating us and nicking a 1-0 win, as we go in to our League Cup Semi Final 1st Leg against Newcastle, followed by Stockport in the FA Cup.
We lay siege to the Magpies goal right from the start, but they manage to hold us off until just before half time when Mulrain bundles the ball past Hallworth. Early in the second half Hancox adds a second, and the floodgates open as Howard, Betts and Robinson all score. Andy Cole scores a late consolation and we take a 5-1 lead into the second leg.
We shuffle the squad round a bit to face the 3rd division team Stockport. It’s a fairly straight forward 3-1 win with Nigel Clough scoring a late consolation as we progress to the Quarter Finals against Stoke. Seems like we’re finally becoming a cup team!
We scrape draws against Liverpool and Man City as it seems we lose our focus on the league in favour of the cups, and go to St James Park to hold on to our 5-1 lead to get to our first cup final. We outplay them but concede first as Dominic Iorfa gives the Magpies a glimpse of hope. Lee Small quickly equalises to snuff out that brief comeback and we see the game out 1-1, 6-2 on aggregate. We’re off to Wembley to play Man Utd!
Stoke offer little resistance in the FA Cup Quarter Final, we’re 3-0 up at half time and finish up 5-0 winners. We face last seasons league runners up Tottenham in the Semi Final as we push for another cup final!
We find our way again in the league after a small dip in form (W1 D2 L2) to beat Barnsley and Liecester, then face our cup semi and final opponents in the league respectively beating Spurs 2-0 and drawing with Man Utd 1-1.
We travel to Goodison park to face Tottenham again in the FA Cup Semi with a full squad and dominate the early exchanges, having a string of chances and a goal disallowed, but get sucker punched by Jan Age Fjortoft who sends us in 1-0 down at the break. We keep going at them in the second half and get our reward as Henderson gets the equaliser, and in the 77th minute Carter goes clean through and scores to send us to Wembley again where we’ll face West Ham!
A short trip to Oldham and a great 2-0 win sets us up nicely for our first cup final against Man Utd. We’ve got a full squad and go in full strength. It’s one way traffic in our favour in the opening 25 minutes as we squander a good few chances, then our Captain Andy Howard takes things in hand and smashes one in to give us the lead. We’re just too good for United as they can barely find a way out of their half, and though we continue to create numerous chances we can’t find a second. It’s fine though as they offer little more threat and we win our first knockout trophy thanks to Captain Howards goal!
We go to St James Park knowing a win will make us uncatchable and give us the title, and our confidence is sky high following our cup triumph, and it shows as we completely dominate Newcastle, not giving them a sniff of a chance and going in 2-0 up at the break thanks to Henderson and Betts. Mulrain gets a third after half time and we see out the game in perfect fashion, 10’s across the board! Champions once again!
Our run in is a bit of a party as we win 3, draw 1, beating Forest 2-0 to dent their survival hopes, smashing Palace in a 5-2 goalfest, and finishing off with a great 4-0 defeat of Leeds, Robinson scoring a hattrick and giving us hope there’s life without Betts next season! We ultimately finish 20 points ahead of Derby, who themselves are 10 points ahead of 3rd and 4th place Swindon and Newcastle.
Liverpool have 4 games to save themselves but can only manage 1 draw and are relegated with 2 games to go. They’re joined on the final day by 2 of last seasons promoted teams Bournemouth and Forest who just couldn’t do enough to climb out of the relegation zone, despite Villa doing their best to help them losing 2 and drawing 2 of their remaining games and staying up on goal difference.
Partizan win the Cup Winners Cup against Benfica then it’s our turn in another final, playing against West Ham for the FA Cup. It follows a similar pattern to our last final, dominating the early exchanges and on 25 minutes again, just like in the league cup final, Howard bangs one in. He loves a big game and a cup final! We restrict the Hammers to a couple of half chances and are under no real threat, and Robinson makes sure towards the end with a second to seal the win and give us an unprecedented domestic treble!
Sheffield Wednesday make an immediate return to the top flight winning division 1, joined by W.B.A. and Peterborough who managed to stay in the playoff spots for the majority of the season and deservedly win the playoff final. Norwich Notts County and Wimbledon all drop down to Division 2. Northampton who re-joined the league a few seasons back go down by 11 points. We rescued their most promising player, Paul Chamberlain, just before the transfer window shut and hope he’ll do well next season.
Kenny Betts is the standout player of the season, having scored 47 goals in 53 games, winning MotM 35 times and getting an average rating of 9.28! He will be sorely missed next season as he goes to Nantes for £5.1 Million! Wayne Ripley is Young Player of the Year and still just 20! Nii Lamptey and Rob Bowman also go to Europe for £4M and £2.1M.
Will Rochdale survive life after Betts? Will Robinson, Howard or Henderson step up to fill the gap, have Rochdale peaked with a domestic treble? Find Out next week!
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