The Longest Winter -A Season with England’s Worst Ever Football Team, by Mark Hodkinson, published by Pitch Publishing, Price: £16.99
MARK Hodkinson returns to the familiar territory of his previous books with the story of Rochdale’s worst ever season. This time he contextualises the football club’s struggles with the economic and social turmoil of the early 1970s.
In 1973-74, Rochdale were in the Third Division (now League One) and under a new manager Walter Joyce. Joyce’s plan was to use only young players during the season, but it massively backfired with the club winning only twice in 46 league matches.
They closed the season with a 22-game winless run and played a match against Cambridge United in front of the lowest-ever Football League post-war crowd of 588.
Rochdale’s 2-0 home defeat to Cambridge on Tuesday, February 5, 1974 was one of the bleakest days in modern British history.
‘The country was in deep recession. The Government was in disarray. Inflation was running at 10 per cent. The three-day working week was in place. Miners had announced another national strike. Petrol was running out. And bombs were detonated across England. Supporters of Rochdale thought it fitting that the worst day in the club’s history should fall on such a wretched day.’
Rochdale’s relegation was fittingly confirmed on April Fools’ Day 1974 when Tranmere Rovers won 3-0 against Port Vale. Since that dreadful season Rochdale have survived as a Football League club, while others have fallen into Non-League, but it’s been an ongoing struggle.
‘The Longest Winter’ doesn’t quite live up to some of Hodkinson’s previous books but it still provides a vivid picture of a traumatic football season at a time of great social, economic and political unrest. Ironically, we are once again facing an economic, social and po- litical crisis – and Rochdale AFC are near the bottom of the Football League.
Rating out of 10: 7
