People always say that the three teams relegated will go straight back up but they rarely do. A bit like everyone says the three teams promoted will get relegated. Up until the last game Ipswich who came up from the division below were mixing it very well.
As for whether the games is better these days in terms of levels of skill, fitness, etc I think anyone who tries to argue that is living in cloud cuckoo land. Sorry mad as well. But you’ll be saying sprinters were just as fast 50 years ago. The games quicker, the general level of skill is a much higher level (as someone said look at all the players from abroad playing in our league). Of course that doesn’t mean it wasn’t entertaining to watch then but frankly although people talk about this clip as ‘brief’ it’s very typical of standards you see from any clips of the period. We went up in 72 with a back four of Tommy Carroll, Roger Hynd, Stand Harland and Gary Pendrey…
As for mad’s slighting remark about cricket I think that’s a bit silly too. Of course fielding has improved massively, it’s getting rarer and rarer to see unfit cricketers and that’s how it should be. The fielding across the board is far superior and I have to say a lot more of a spectacle. Gone are the days of seeing a pig with ‘Eddie’ on one flank and ‘Botham’ on the other running around the outfield in Australia. None of this is to say there weren’t great players then - actually, one of the things that distinguished both the WI and Australia from say us then was that they were actually fit and athletic. I don’t pine for the days of just over 2 runs an over in test matches though or weak touring teams with a handful of test quality players. NZ are immeasurably stronger all round and most teams have a decent pace attack these days. Plus people didn’t watch the county game in large numbers then either. None of this is to say that those best performers in either football or cricket wouldn’t have thrived today. Of course they would.
People really do love a bit of nostalgia though.
Disappointed - thought this would be about the famous white adidas kit.
mr_crosbyWatched too much of Francis and Franny bastard Lee 😉IanTThey wouldn’t as none of the current players would stay on their feet long enoughnewblueCan’t believe people are saying that. There’s barely a pass goes to a member of the same side. The defensive mistakes are utterly comical.
The standard of play in the championship today is stratospherically better than it was in Division 2 back then. It doesn’t mean that games weren’t enjoyable but the quality has improved. Same in every sport, on the standards of fitness alone. Fielding in cricket is unrecognisable from where it was.
It's like watching a different sport.
I watched Boro v Sunderland earlier. Not a great game but either of those two sides would murder the Blues side in that video.
You get it in a lot of things though, don't you?
Football was better, music, comedy, television in general.....none of which is true.
It's just (mostly) old men thinking life was better when they were young, which is understandable I guess.
Some people even think the railways were better in the 70s! 😜
Let’s not get completely unreasonable 😁.
While it’s not true that ‘everything gets better’ by any means, it’s a bit hard to argue that things related to physical performance haven’t improved out of sight. There were a few comments about Barry John and his genius the other day, rightly so. I read he was 11 and a half stone - he’d be an absolute midget in the modern game of rugby. The amount of time, money, attention to behaviour, etc is just on a totally different level.
newblueAs for whether the games is better these days in terms of levels of skill, fitness, etc I think anyone who tries to argue that is living in cloud cuckoo land. Sorry mad as well. But you’ll be saying sprinters were just as fast 50 years ago. The games quicker, the general level of skill is a much higher level (as someone said look at all the players from abroad playing in our league). Of course that doesn’t mean it wasn’t entertaining to watch then but frankly although people talk about this clip as ‘brief’ it’s very typical of standards you see from any clips of the period. We went up in 72 with a back four of Tommy Carroll, Roger Hynd, Stand Harland and Gary Pendrey…
.
And it was still the second best defensive record in the division, averaging about 0.75 goals per game conceded!
I don't think that there's much doubt that the skill, conditioning and fitness levels, technical and tactical ability of today's players are superior. There'd be something wrong if it wasn't so. really. As to whether it's more entertaining to watch, that's debatable - I don't enjoy watching it as much, but I'm looking at today's football with the eyes of a 63 year old, and not a 13 year old. I sued to enjoy watching games being slogged out on mudbaths of pitches, with players giving no quarter when it came to challenges. I don't enjoy the time wasting and delaying tactics that are prevalent these days, and I don't like the refs being conned, and players feeling the need to fall over at faint touches.
I'd also say, though, that I've watched a recent '70's Blues game ( 3-3 again Leicester away, I think) and was quite surprised at how good some of the football was, but I still firmly believe that the overall quality of football these days is far superior in technical terms, at least.
I didn't enjoy watching some of the criminally crude challenges that went unpunished back in those days (well, at least with hindsight, watching them again recently) - I don't like how little protection was given to talented players against absolute cloggers. Again, this is looking back on it - it seemed quite normal at the time.
Was it more entertaining? Well, I THINK so, but it really was through young lad's eyes. Was it better quality then? No. Absolutely not.
It's irrelevant really.it doesn't matter if it was better or not, people enjoyed it, and judging from the sourpuss bastards who infest message boards and that, enjoyed it a lot more than the connoisseurs of today
Fitness isn't necessarily what made the West Indies better cricketers than England. It will have had as much to do with the meticulous planning and preparation those sides had under astute leadership, the system of identification of talent in the various parts of the Caribbean coupled with their exposure individually to English county cricket and club cricket from a young age and then as a team their professionalisation during the Kerry Packer years the world series cricket down under.
Fitness sure has been modernised. Although I'd argue that hasn't necessarily translated into better cricketers. Two years ago we saw perhaps the most one sided test series of all time. I'm not talking about Bangladesh v Sri Lanka I'm on about when England were annihilated down under. Ben Stokes is the difference there just like Clive Lloyd/Viv were for Windies
I don’t disagree Tam, as a competitive game is a competitive game and I think on the whole there were fewer things which disrupted the flow of the game then. We have to remember though that Clough was lauded for declaring football is played ‘on grass’ (who knew - well I don’t suppose it was much at Derby and our pitch was more sand than grass by season’s end). When I used to go with my old man back then he used to lament how soft the game had become 😁. Must admit seeing Trevor Cherry commit physical assault on Colin Harvey and finishing his career changed my view somewhat.
I was arguing though that the standard of play is stratospherically better. On the whole the players who are remembered with most respect are those who could really play the game though, so somewhere along the line I guess our expectations have risen.
madFitness isn't necessarily what made the West Indies better cricketers than England. It will have had as much to do with the meticulous planning and preparation those sides had under astute leadership, the system of identification of talent in the various parts of the Caribbean coupled with their exposure individually to English county cricket and club cricket from a young age and then as a team their professionalisation during the Kerry Packer years the world series cricket down under.
Fitness sure has been modernised. Although I'd argue that hasn't necessarily translated into better cricketers. Two years ago we saw perhaps the most one sided test series of all time. I'm not talking about Bangladesh v Sri Lanka I'm on about when England were annihilated down under. Ben Stokes is the difference there just like Clive Lloyd/Viv were for Windies
I didn’t say it was the only thing, I said it contributed to it. The pace and power of that WI side contributed to their overall dominance - tbh I think the annihilations they handed out to us and others overshadow your example quite starkly. Pretty painful they were for some too. I remember when SA toured before they got banned - there were features on Colin Bkanf fielding at cover as he was exceptional. Turned out he practised his fielding a lot, which seemed to surprise a lot of people.
The way cricketers hit the ball has changed with recent times too, as KP has acknowledged. Partly to do with kit but they practice that. Great cricketers are great cricketers in any age bit for me it’s surely a prerequisite of being a professional sports player that you get yourself into the best condition to perform.
newblueI don’t disagree Tam, as a competitive game is a competitive game and I think on the whole there were fewer things which disrupted the flow of the game then. We have to remember though that Clough was lauded for declaring football is played ‘on grass’ (who knew - well I don’t suppose it was much at Derby and our pitch was more sand than grass by season’s end). When I used to go with my old man back then he used to lament how soft the game had become 😁. Must admit seeing Trevor Cherry commit physical assault on Colin Harvey and finishing his career changed my view somewhat.
I was arguing though that the standard of play is stratospherically better. On the whole the players who are remembered with most respect are those who could really play the game though, so somewhere along the line I guess our expectations have risen.
Yes, I agree entirely that the standard is better. After all, it should be really, shouldn't it? It's had another fifty years to advance, fifty years more of sports science in all ways, from physical fitness to groundkeeping. It would be rare to find a sport that hadn't advanced in terms of technique, I guess.
I'm not having it that Ollie Lee was better than Howard Kendall though. 😁
For sure and from time to time some sides will have slight advantages over other sides in this regard. Australia with the Rodney Marsh (there's that household name again) school in Adelaide, England caught up a bit later Bell went there etc... Generally however the sides will be pretty even stevens fitness wise at test level in any given era whether that's;
Gower, Border & Haynes
Or
Jimmy, Mitchell & Kemar
The England sides who've been walloped in Aus last 3 trips were no less physically fit than Watson, Mitchell Johnson or Boland.
Producing competitive cricketers for the era to come depends on marginal gains in fitness levels for perhaps 5% and other factors for 95%. We've deviated from topic quite a bit there though
IanTFat Buddha CBEYet 30000 turned up to watch it
Only 'cos there was literally feck all else to do.
They went because they were Blues supporters and did not need the club to beg them to go. Saturday was for football.
I know even less about rugger than I do about cricket but thought I'd throw this quote into the mix from Barry John just for the giggles;
It used to be a game you played to find space and run into it. Now they look for people to run into. It used to be a game for all shapes and sizes. It's not a question of would I play but would I want to play. No, I wouldn't.
Also saw some grainy footage of Princess Anne on the telly the other day and concluded that the standard of equestrian was awful back then compared to how it is today.
What a weird thing to write.
I think peoples recollection of what rugby was like to watch is probably even more rosy-hued. The ball was endlessly being kicked to touch. It was a game for all shapes and sizes, including enormous sadistic fat b*stards with zero ball skills.