| Question about the 85/86 season. 19:24 - Feb 3 with 1470 views | Enigma_Blue |
If we had managed at least a draw against Oxford in that now infamous 4-3 defeat and avoided relegation does anyone think we would have remained a top flight club for years after that? Or would escaping relegation that season only have delayed the inevitable for another season or two?
I only started supporting Ipswich the following season, so I have no idea how good or bad the 85/86 squad was. [Post edited 3 Feb 2021 19:27]
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| Question about the 85/86 season. on 19:50 - Feb 3 with 1374 views | ParisBlue |
Interesting question. Probably our unluckiest relegation, the ones in 95, 02 & 19 were more deserved.
Would Butcher have stayed? We had the stand to pay for, there wasn't the TV money at the time but the big 5 were starting to appear.
Had we stayed up we'd have had much the same team the following year as we had anyway in division 2 (the other player we lost was Putney) so probably similar battles against relegation until the inevitable happened. |  |
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| Question about the 85/86 season. on 20:04 - Feb 3 with 1334 views | Churchman |
We were nearly relegated the year before (thanks Mark Stein!). We weren’t the best and without a lot of change, I think there was a strong* possibility we would have fallen out of Div 1 the following season anyway. |  | | |
| Question about the 85/86 season. on 20:09 - Feb 3 with 1308 views | Enigma_Blue |
| Question about the 85/86 season. on 19:50 - Feb 3 by ParisBlue |
Interesting question. Probably our unluckiest relegation, the ones in 95, 02 & 19 were more deserved.
Would Butcher have stayed? We had the stand to pay for, there wasn't the TV money at the time but the big 5 were starting to appear.
Had we stayed up we'd have had much the same team the following year as we had anyway in division 2 (the other player we lost was Putney) so probably similar battles against relegation until the inevitable happened. |
Yes I believe Butcher had to be sold after relegation in order to make up the shortfall in TV revenue. Even if we had stayed up would he have been happy to continue playing for a team that was battling relegation every season? Perhaps he would have handed in a transfer request anyway. Even with Butcher, McCall, Burley & Cooper left from the 81uefa cup winning side, we were still struggling.
Bigger teams than us such as Aston Villa, Chelsea, Leeds & Newcastle all got relegated at some point during the late 80s so it would have been a tough ask for us to remain in the top flight much longer even if we had avoided relegation that season. Although Dozzell was improving, & the likes of Atkinson, Kiwomya, Johnson & Forrest were coming through the youth set up so you never know. [Post edited 3 Feb 2021 20:13]
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| Question about the 85/86 season. on 20:28 - Feb 3 with 1260 views | Bluespeed225 |
| Question about the 85/86 season. on 20:04 - Feb 3 by Churchman |
We were nearly relegated the year before (thanks Mark Stein!). We weren’t the best and without a lot of change, I think there was a strong* possibility we would have fallen out of Div 1 the following season anyway. |
94’, me and a mate thought we’d drink our relegation away in the Black Adder. We were down and ordering a ‘relegation beer’, then, from nowhere, Stein pops up, and Sheffield United, who were not even in the equation go down! Drinks all round!
A decent run in 84’ saved us that year. Cant recall 85’s run in. | | | |
| Question about the 85/86 season. on 20:31 - Feb 3 with 1255 views | Edmundo |
| Question about the 85/86 season. on 19:50 - Feb 3 by ParisBlue |
Interesting question. Probably our unluckiest relegation, the ones in 95, 02 & 19 were more deserved.
Would Butcher have stayed? We had the stand to pay for, there wasn't the TV money at the time but the big 5 were starting to appear.
Had we stayed up we'd have had much the same team the following year as we had anyway in division 2 (the other player we lost was Putney) so probably similar battles against relegation until the inevitable happened. |
Do you think it was more unlucky than 2002? I think if we hadn't had the 4 week break in Feb just when we were getting a run going maybe we would have got the 4 or 5points needed. We had a very strong squad then, more or less the same as 2001, bar a couple of differences. |  |
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| Question about the 85/86 season. on 20:33 - Feb 3 with 1246 views | ketton_itfc |
If we’d drawn the Oxford 4-3 we would have stayed up. I think Oxford also beat Arsenal when they were already on there hols 3-0. Relegation was probably inevitable, we were skint and had been knocking on the door the previous couple of years.
We had chances to stay up, defensively pretty good. But we just didn’t score enough goals. I think Wilson and D’Avray were good up top, We put too much on Dozzell and Mark Brennan. We probably needed an old head in the centre of midfield, someone like David Armstrong at Southampton. I mention him because I always think he was so underrated but way out of our price range.
The massive thing was missing Butch until November. That was what cost us in my eyes. |  | | |
| Question about the 85/86 season. on 20:36 - Feb 3 with 1233 views | Nthsuffolkblue |
| Question about the 85/86 season. on 19:50 - Feb 3 by ParisBlue |
Interesting question. Probably our unluckiest relegation, the ones in 95, 02 & 19 were more deserved.
Would Butcher have stayed? We had the stand to pay for, there wasn't the TV money at the time but the big 5 were starting to appear.
Had we stayed up we'd have had much the same team the following year as we had anyway in division 2 (the other player we lost was Putney) so probably similar battles against relegation until the inevitable happened. |
That's the way I see it too.
The issue was the inability to finance a team that was competitive due to payments on the stands.
If we had managed to get in an astute manager who could build a team on a very tight budget who knows? But we didn't even after relegation so it was never going to happen. |  |
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| Question about the 85/86 season. on 20:42 - Feb 3 with 1224 views | Trequartista |
Delayed the inevitable I think, we were declining each season selling stars and replacing them with youth players, of which some were decent but not at the standard of Osman/Butcher/Gates/Brazil etc, and i would think Terry Butcher would still have joined Rangers. |  |
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| Question about the 85/86 season. on 21:26 - Feb 3 with 1118 views | The_Last_Baron |
| Question about the 85/86 season. on 19:50 - Feb 3 by ParisBlue |
Interesting question. Probably our unluckiest relegation, the ones in 95, 02 & 19 were more deserved.
Would Butcher have stayed? We had the stand to pay for, there wasn't the TV money at the time but the big 5 were starting to appear.
Had we stayed up we'd have had much the same team the following year as we had anyway in division 2 (the other player we lost was Putney) so probably similar battles against relegation until the inevitable happened. |
'02 wasn't deserved, in the middle part of the season we were in tremendous form, title winning form in fact. We had much better players overall than in 1985-86, how we got relegated I'll never know.
We had 30 points from 25 games after we won 2-1 at Everton. 12th position. Then we fell away and only won one more game. Our start to the season killed us.
In the 1994-95 season we were hopeless and the worst relegation was the last one in 2019.
We didn't score enough goals in 1985-86, but we should have stayed up after beating Oxford 3-2. I feel relegation was going to happen sooner or later as the side was getting weaker every season. Apart from Butcher, Cooper and McCall all the stars had left. Osman was replaced by Ian Atkins, Mariner by D'Avray, Brazil by Kevin Wilson, Burley by Yallop, Wark by Mark Brennan. All downgrades.
The previous two seasons we were in deeper trouble but got out of it comfortably with incredible finishes to the season. In '83-'84 we looked dead and buried with ten games to go. We drew at Anfield, won at Old Trafford, drew at home to Forest beat Norwich - 6 wins and 3 draws in the final ten games saw us finish 14th which was incredible considering how bad we had been in the middle part of the season
In 84-85 in the last dozen or so games we found form and won a lot of games and stayed up by a point.
I believe the major reason for Town's fall from grace was appointing Bobby Ferguson as manager after Robson. He was a very good coach but not a good manager. We should have went for Alex Ferguson, John Lyall, David Pleat or Terry Venables. There were lots of good managers around who would have jumped at the chance to move to the second best team in England. |  |
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| Question about the 85/86 season. on 21:57 - Feb 3 with 1050 views | BluedanW |
| Question about the 85/86 season. on 20:33 - Feb 3 by ketton_itfc |
If we’d drawn the Oxford 4-3 we would have stayed up. I think Oxford also beat Arsenal when they were already on there hols 3-0. Relegation was probably inevitable, we were skint and had been knocking on the door the previous couple of years.
We had chances to stay up, defensively pretty good. But we just didn’t score enough goals. I think Wilson and D’Avray were good up top, We put too much on Dozzell and Mark Brennan. We probably needed an old head in the centre of midfield, someone like David Armstrong at Southampton. I mention him because I always think he was so underrated but way out of our price range.
The massive thing was missing Butch until November. That was what cost us in my eyes. |
My Dad was an Arsenal fan and told me quite categorically not to worry as Arsenal would beat Oxford. Shame all last games of the season weren't played at the same time back then.
I remember crying my eyes out that day and only stopped when the ice cream van turned up.
Obviously arsenal were accepting brown envelopes even before George Graham turned up | | | |
| Question about the 85/86 season. on 23:17 - Feb 3 with 942 views | Enigma_Blue |
| Question about the 85/86 season. on 21:26 - Feb 3 by The_Last_Baron |
'02 wasn't deserved, in the middle part of the season we were in tremendous form, title winning form in fact. We had much better players overall than in 1985-86, how we got relegated I'll never know.
We had 30 points from 25 games after we won 2-1 at Everton. 12th position. Then we fell away and only won one more game. Our start to the season killed us.
In the 1994-95 season we were hopeless and the worst relegation was the last one in 2019.
We didn't score enough goals in 1985-86, but we should have stayed up after beating Oxford 3-2. I feel relegation was going to happen sooner or later as the side was getting weaker every season. Apart from Butcher, Cooper and McCall all the stars had left. Osman was replaced by Ian Atkins, Mariner by D'Avray, Brazil by Kevin Wilson, Burley by Yallop, Wark by Mark Brennan. All downgrades.
The previous two seasons we were in deeper trouble but got out of it comfortably with incredible finishes to the season. In '83-'84 we looked dead and buried with ten games to go. We drew at Anfield, won at Old Trafford, drew at home to Forest beat Norwich - 6 wins and 3 draws in the final ten games saw us finish 14th which was incredible considering how bad we had been in the middle part of the season
In 84-85 in the last dozen or so games we found form and won a lot of games and stayed up by a point.
I believe the major reason for Town's fall from grace was appointing Bobby Ferguson as manager after Robson. He was a very good coach but not a good manager. We should have went for Alex Ferguson, John Lyall, David Pleat or Terry Venables. There were lots of good managers around who would have jumped at the chance to move to the second best team in England. |
According to records we actually finished 12th in 83/84, Norwich finished in 14th. Bragging rights for one more season at least. | | | |
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