The 25/26 season represents something of a journey into the unknown for Cardiff City seeing as it’s not too far short of a quarter of a century since we competed at this level, but, equally, that applies to the seven decades quiz because we’re going to be coming up against a few teams for which it’ll be hard to set questions for each decade going back to the sixties – I’m thinking of Stevenage in particuler there, but there are some others.
Peterborough are not a bad team to begin with though, I think I’m right in saying that we’ve played them in all of the seven decades covered by the quiz apart from the sixties.
Before going on to the questions, I’d like to offer a prediction for the coming season based on us only having the players currently at the club through the season. There are plenty of predictions of a top six finish for us out there on social and traditional media, but I can’t forget how much seemed to be wrong at the club last spring as relegation was confirmed. We were a mess on and off the pitch and I was among those who felt that the most pressing need was for the introduction of the sort of off field structure that is the norm for the large majority of clubs in the 2020s.
So, what have the club hierarchy done to address the things that so many were saying were wrong at Cardiff City as we wait for the two days to pass before our competitive season starts? Well, the phrase “the bare minimum” springs to mind – they’ve done what they had to and nothing else.
We needed to either confirm Aaron Ramsey in the manager/Head coach or appoint someone else in the role and, after a tortuous search containing some wrong turns brought on by a pointless pursuit of Nathan Jones, we finally appointed someone. It was the man who, reportedly, had the best interview for the job out of those selected by a group which included one or two City employees untainted by the years of failure at the club during the present decade and representatives from the agents Wasserman and I’m hopeful that they chose well.
However, apart from appoint Brian Barry Murphy, the people who were saying ‘/we hear you” three months ago and were promising regular updates through the summer on developments at the club have done absolutely nothing.
We’re well past the eleventh hour now and stories yesterday suggesting that Copenhagen goalkeeper Nathan Trott left their squad yesterday to fly to Cardiff and join us on. a season long loan, which would become permanent if we were promoted, offers the hope that, finally, we will make a signing this summer before the real action starts.
I’ve been saying for weeks that City appear to be banking on BBM being some kind oif managerial and coaching miracle worker and the current crop of young pros emerging from the Academy , along with the likes of Cian Ashford, Rubin Colwill, Isaak Davies and Alex Robertson being good enough to impose themselves on the league and finish in the top six. The reasoning being that they are so good that they do not require the more experienced natural leaders and defenders that we were crying out for last season.
It was claimed on a messagebord yesterday that Tan and co believe that the current squad is good enough to go up automatically becauise it is bolstered this season by a group of exceptional youngsters coming through. Unfortunately, I beg to differ – I can see us being good enough for the top ten, but not the top six, with the potential for things to be worse than that if we go through the whole season with the same ownership as now.
Mind you, I’m not convinced that the plan is really to keep the newcomers down to a minimum. I reckon the club, and especially the Head Coach, want a small number of new players in (about four or five), but they cannot all arrive until we sell someone who will pay for things like loan fees. So, I expect at least one departure from the small group of players we have who could fetch a significant fee and I won’t be surprised at all if it is someone who we are reluctant to sell.
I’ll leave any prediction on how we’ll do if we can bring in the additions to the squad that I feel we need until the transfer window closes, but, for now, let’s get on with the quiz.
60s. Which Peterborough player of this decade, who lived with a male partner for the last three years of his life, wrote a novel that Melvyn Bragg said had “narrative flair” and, after he had retired from the game, stood as an Independent candidate in the 1997 General Election and almost a decade later appeared on Question Time as a representative of the UK Independence Party?
70s. Possessing a surname which he shared with at least three other players from the area of his birth, it was pretty clear that this winger had the least illustrious career of the four. However, that’s not to say that he was just a lower league journeyman despite him giving Peterborough tremendous service during a time before they made it into the second tier for the first time, Although you could say that his first club was the very definition of modest, he was with them when they went on a run which saw them living very much above their station and his form got him a move to a First Division team that was under a doctor at the time. Not having made much of an impact with his second club, he secured what must have been a dream move back to his birthplace where he made just under fifty league appearances during his three seasons with them. From there he went to Peterborough where he scored more than a century of league goals before leaving the full time game to play for Peter Whittingham’s birthplace. Sadly, he became another one of football’s motor neurone disease victims and passed away five years ago at the age of 76, can you name him?
80s. Keeper who really should have played for Northampton, but I suppose he got the next best thing when he played for Rushden and Diamonds in the nineties!
90s. Fallers near the flanks at London Road? (4,7)
00s. Saint heartened by the sound of it.
10s. This full back played for Peterborough during this decade and was representing a Welsh club in Lithunia earlier this month, who is he?
20s. Which member of the last Peterborough side to face City had an unwelcome reacquaintance with us last Saturday?
Answers:
60s. Derek Dougan wrote a novel called The Footballer in. the mid 70s (I read it and it wasn’t bad) which drew a mixed review from Melvyn Bragg. He also came seventh out of nine candidates in the East Belfast constituency in the 1997 General Election and represented UKIP on Question Time in 2006.
70s. Not as famous as Sir Bobby, Bryan and Brian (Pop), Tommy Robson was born in Gateshead, but, having been on Newcastle’s books as a teenager, moved to Northampton Town at the age of fifteen and became a member of their team that went from the Fourth Division to the First in record time under the management of Welshman Dave Bowen. Robson next moved to Tommy Docherty’s Chelsea before being resigned by Newcastle. Moving to Peterborough in 1969, Robson spent all of the seventies at London Road as he totted up nearly five hundred league appearances for them before signing for Nuneaton Borough in 1981.
80s. Kevin Shoemake.
90s. Sean Farrell.
00s. George Boyd.
10s. Besides playing for both Bristol clubs, full back Mark Little made nearly one hundred and fifty league appearances for Peterborough between 2010 and 2014. Currently with Pen – y -Bont, Little started for them in their 3-0 defeat at FK Kauno Žalgiris of Lithunia in the First Leg of a Conference League First Round tie on 10 July – Pen-y-Bont last the tie 4-1 on aggregate.
20s. Ollie Norburn started for the Peterborough team beaten 4-0 at Cardiff City Stadium on 9 February 2022 and last Saturday he came on as a sub for Notts County and inflicted an injury which looks set to keep Alex Robertson out of Saturday’s game following an ugly tackle which left the City player requiring stitches.
