We’re following the Saints on their last successful promotion campaign. Back in the Spring of 1978. At the end of January we were dumped out of the Cup by Bristol Rovers, leaving us free to concentrate on the League!

Our first game in February was a 3-3 draw at Burnley which left us 3rd in Div 2, a point adrift of Spurs and Bolton and 4 ahead of the Seagulls.

On the 11th February we met Millwall at The Dell. I have both the programme for this match and my complimentary ticket (thanks Basil), West Stand centre, row B, seat 84. The programme has our team as Turner, Waldron, Peach, Williams, Nicholl, Pickering, Ball, Boyer, MacDougall, Holmes and Andruszewski and the Ref was Ray Lewis of Great Bookham. There are no annotations at all on this programme, probably because Millwall completed the double over us with a 3-2 win. I guess I was sulking. I know our scorers that day were McDougall and Peach but can find no match report on the internet to fill in the other blanks. By the way, Lex had still not flogged that Jaguar.

Saints bounced back with two home wins and two 0-0 away draws, one of which was at table-toppers Bolton. Over the Easter weekend they pummelled Charlton and Bristol Rovers before going down to a 1-0 defeat at Cardiff.

Into the last month of the season, Saints had 7 more games to play. On 1st April they laid down a marker against Blackburn. Rovers had been flirting with the promotion race all season but were soundly thrashed at The Dell - goals from MacDougal, Funnell, Holmes and another Boyer brace set up a 5-0 win.

Tricky away games at Fulham (1-1) and Hull (3-0) were negotiated before Saints stumbled to a 2-2 draw with Oldham in their penultimate home game. Our last 3 fixtures were away at Luton and Orient, then home to Spurs. I resolved to go to them all. I booked the time off work and made my ferry bookings.

My brother Drew was working nights at West Middlesex Hospital so couldn’t make the Orient match, but our mate Neil (with a house in Leytonstone) was up to go to all three matches.

The morning of 22 April 1978 was bright and sunny. I took my white Vauxhall Viva over on an early ferry and headed up the A3 to London. I remember this journey vividly because a lorry load of straw was on fire at the side of the road north of Guildford. As I passed, giving it a wide berth, there was an enormous explosion and I watched huge yellow flames engulf the cab in my rear view mirror. For miles ahead, the pall of black smoke hung in the sky.

Pre congestion charging, the quickest way through London at weekends was right through the middle so I followed the A3 to the Thames then headed east along Embankment, through the City to Leytonstone where I picked up Neil. Neither Drew nor I can remember where we met him that lunchtime but meet him we did. We then made our way to Luton.

My memory of Luton is row upon row of back to back terracing. We parked as close to Kenilworth Road as we could and walked. The entrance to the away end was through one such terrace and it was already fairly full of Saints fans when we arrived. Indeed, our abiding memory is there were more of us than them in the 14,302 crowd, but I’ve since realised that the excitement of major footballing occasions sometimes causes you to lose your grip on reality.

Back in January, Luton had fired manager Harry Haslam and promoted his young assistant, David Pleat. In the coming years, David would give Luton their finest years and produce an exciting side that held their own in the top flight for several seasons. In the spring of ‘78 however, he was settling in to his new role and Luton were safely sat in mid table.

I was unable to buy a programme for this match but the Saints team that

afternoon comprised Wells, Andruszewski, Peach, Williams, Nicholl, Pickering, Ball, Boyer, MacDougal, Holmes and Funnell with Hebberd on the bench. I seem to recall we were better than Luton that day but that counts for nothing of course if you fail to stick the bladder in the onion bag. Tension was eased when David Peach put us ahead. Sorry - I remember absolutely nothing about that goal. Nor do I remember Luton’s equaliser which arrived on queue.

What I’ll never forget is Ted MacDougal’s second half winner. Saints got a free kick on the right and Bally sized it up as our big men moved into the box. The cross was an absolute gem, away from their keeper and drifting invitingly across the goalmouth. Ted rose, like the proverbial salmon, and buried a bullet header into the back of the net.

There was a moment of silence - you could have heard a pin drop. Ted had been brought in to snaffle goals from close range. He’d scored with his arse, his shin, indeed most of his anatomy. What he didn’t do was out jump defenders and powerfully head home - until that afternoon. Then the away end erupted and I sensed then that everything was going to turn out OK. We held the lead and finished 2-1 winners. On reaching the car and turning on Sports Report, our joy turned to ecstasy. Both Spurs and Bolton had dropped points and, with a week of the season left, Saints were sat top of the table for the first time!

The trip home was funny. As we cut through London on our way to Neil’s house he asked “Anyone fancy a kebab?” Of course we did, so he guided us to one he knew near NE London Polytechnic where he was studying. We were out of the car, ordering take aways when we suddenly felt hundreds of eyes upon our backs. It seemed the whole restaurant was full of Spurs fans, fresh from their afternoon’s disappointment. Here were we in their backyard, clad in Saints garb, laughing and joking. We grabbed our Doners and beat a hasty retreat.

Drew had to work Sunday but I met up with him again on Monday while Neil was at lectures. We visited Hampton Court. The next evening Neil and I went to watch Saints at Orient. They reckon the crowd was 18000 and certainly the whole side of the ground where I was stood was all Saints. We were crammed in and further along the terrace a wall collapsed onto the running track.

I’ve got the Orient programme for that match. Saints were unaltered for the 6th game running and Orient (they’d temporarily dropped the Leyton) had stalwarts like John Jackson, Phil Hoadley, Glenn Roeder and Tony Grealish in their side. On the left wing was the splendidly named Tunji Banjo. Don’t remember much about the match apart from Tony Funnell’s goal that earned us a 1-1 draw.

When we went to bed that night, Saints still topped the League. We were 2 points clear of Brighton in 3rd place with a far better goal difference. (You young folk should know it was just 2 points for a win back then.) The job was just about done - 1 more point would confirm it. On the Wednesday, Spurs won their game in hand and Bolton clinched promotion by winning at Blackburn so on the morning of the last day of the season, the table read:

Pts.

58 - Bolton

56 - Saints

55 - Spurs

54 - Brighton

Neil and Drew arrived from London and we met up with the lads from Drew’s old flat at 101 Atherley Road. We were on the West Stand terracing that afternoon. Saints made the first team change of April bringing in Malcolm Waldron for Mike Pickering. Spurs also fielded a strong side that afternoon: Daines, Naylor, Holmes, Hoddle, McAllister, Perryman, Pratt, Duncan, Jones, McNab and the tricky Peter Taylor wide left.

Unfortunately the game was somewhat of an anticlimax. Bolton were up, we were virtually up - the main point of interest was whether Brighton could pip Spurs for 3rd place. Had we beaten Tottenham, a Brighton win against Blackpool would see them promoted instead but from kick-off both sides at The Dell played as if the draw would suit them. So we took our pleasure from passing false scorelines to away fans in the Archers. “Brighton 5-0 up“. “Now it is 6!” we lied.

Brighton were indeed winning, but not by enough to trouble Tottenham at 0-0. The final minutes of the season must have been agony for their fans as a goal for Saints would scupper their chances. We even struck their post late on but the goal never came and the draw saw us both promoted back to the top flight. We later heard Frank Worthington and his Bolton team mates, after partying hard since Wednesday, got nothing from their final game. So if Saints had scored we’d have gone up as champions! Que Sera.

In Atherley Road afterwards a party of Spurs fans were taking their picnic gear in the boot of their car and uncorking Champagne as we passed. “Thought you’d be keeping that on ice” quipped Neil. They smiled and raised their glasses.

Saints were back in the first division. Lawrie had righted the wrongs of 1974 and achieved a bonus FA Cup win too. During the coming seasons we would see Saints challenging the best teams in the land, signing established Internationals and playing regularly in Europe.

My football life was about to blossom.

Photo: Action Images

SaintNick added 22:33 - Mar 9 Just a quick footnote, my memory of the Luton game was fairly the same as Spots, we did have more than them in the ground, we took around 8-9000 supporters that day, although in fairness to them their local non league side was at wembley in one of the non league finals so their was a stream of coaches leaving the town as we went in. But we did outnumber them around about 2-1. But there our memories slightly differ Spot has got the goals the wrong way round, Ted McDougal opened the scoring on 52 minutes in front of the saints supporters then on 64 minutes Luton equalised, the winner came in the 87th minute when Alan Ball was brought down and David Peach netted the penalty, my memory is of peach running into the net and being buried by his teammates who were promptly buried by a mini pitch invasion of fans, it was a truly great moment

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ericofarabia added 04:06 - Mar 10 Some of my favourite Saints games were from that era. As I said in Part 1 I can hardly remember any of the games in the 1st half of the season - but the last few months really stand out - even little details such as Peachy's penalty at Luton!!! Starting with the Burnley game, none of my buddies fancied a trek up to the frozen north in Feb, so I Billy No Mated it up by Bingo Bus, my 2nd trip with them. It had been snowing heavily and everytime they gave a list of games that had been called off we seemed to go under a bridge and lost the radio reception, but luckily their undersoil heating saved the day and the game was still on. On arrival i was surprised at how many coaches were parked their - certainly wasn't expecting that many people to make the trip up!! All was revealed when we got into the ground - due to virtually every game in the north being called off last minute everybody descended onto Turf Moor and boy were they entertained both on and off the pitch. Did we come back from 3-1 or 3-2 down? Classic game, even made MOTD - not sure it was originally scheduled, prob rushed the gear over as other games were called off. Off the pitch, in the away supporters part weas a whole array of different teams colours. I seem to remembe Liverpool, Man U, and Halifax being the biggest contingents but little pockets of punch ups were breaking out all over the show, not sure if any involved Saints fans though!! In March I made another billy no mate Bingo bus trip oop north this time to Notlob. Big open terrace, very lairy for the few hundred hardy souls who made the trip. A very gritty 0-0 draw. Easter always seemed to be sunny weather goal bonanzas back then and a 4-1 win over Charlton and 3-1 over Brizzle Rvrs carried on a good run It was pretty lively in The Archers for the Rovers game. A 1-0 defeat at struggling Cardiff took the gloss of things a bit, but then ellow promotion hopefuls Blackurn came to town. In a really bad tempered game earlier on at Ewood Park Ossie got sent off and we were never to see him again to get a chance to say goodbye. Stevie Williams also saw Red and loads more were booked..... virtualy all the incidents seem to involve one player - John Bailey. I have never in all my life seen such hate and vitriol poured down on a single player from every single part of the ground, even old grannys along the East and west stands touchlines were giving it large to him. I think he got booked and eventually subbed as we stuffed them by 5 goals - an absolute corker of a day. It was hilarious when a few years later he was back at The Dell with Everton and was still getting huge abuse - the Everton fans didn't have a clue what was going on!! Then came the massive Saints Road Show - Fulham, Luton and Orient each saw a huge Saints following. I missed Fulham but luton was atop day out. Free from the shackles of The Bingo bus we went up on a bit of a rowdy coach and were well steamed by the time we got to Luton. As Nick says as many coaches were heading the opposite way to us as a local non league team were at wembley. All the pubs were closed so we joined a massive queue at Tescos? and got loads of tinnies. Due to the long queue we didn't hacve much drinking time left so made our way to the ground supping as we went. We still had a couple of cans left when we reached the ground, and naturally PC Plod wouldn't let us take them in - told us we had to drink them up before we could go in!!! We could barely stand and they happily watched us chuck back 2 cans each in a couple of mins and then let us in LOL!!! Peachy's Pen right at the end of the game bang in front of us was one of the most mental celebrations ever. At one stage there was a crutch being chucked about!! Orient away, all the rumours about every firm going to be turning up to get us .... well somebody did turn up (Spurs?) as Orient didn't (have they ever ??) have a mob and there was a fair few bundles going on not to mention the wall going over. The draw just about sign sealed and delivered our return to the hallowed land. The final game was such a flop and even with the Spurs fans caged in by huge fences the post match promotion celebration on the pitch and lap of honour/ wave from the east stand couldn't happen as the fences were slowly being ripped apart. A real damp suib to what should have been a wonderful moment. But apart from that wonderful memories of a great time to be a Saint.

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SaintNick added 08:52 - Mar 10 The celebration pitch invasion after the spurs game did happen, and the team appeared in the directors box to wave to the fans, the echo have printed pictures in recent years and i have the saints shirt that peter wells wore under his goalkeepers shirt to prove it. Whilst Saints fans celebrated Spurs fans kicked holes in the fences like petchulant brats locked in by their mother, rather than celebrating the fact they had gone up as well

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ericofarabia added 09:25 - Mar 10 Now that you mention it, I do vaguely remember being on the pitch and there being a bit of a nasty atmosphere as the police had their hands full keeping both sets of fans apart. Just can't remember celebrating like it was the best thing ever to happen which it should have been at the time!!! Did we sing any songs about once again being particulary disappointed at not being able to go to Dean Court the following year? Peter Well's shirt - pity Razor Ruddock hadn't joined us by then - you may have got one to actually nearly fit you LOL LOL smiley winky wnaky face!!!

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Spot51 added 09:41 - Mar 10 LOL at my memory! I guess I was so impressed by Ted's powerful header that my subconcious promoted it to matchwinner. I still remember nothing about Peach's penalty. Seems the real picture was even more dramatic than the one I painted. Great days!
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StBaz added 11:23 - Mar 10 Thanks for that, Spot. This leads up nicely to when I started watching Saints in their first season back in the top division.
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SalisburySaint added 12:27 - Mar 10 This article brings home many good memories Regarding the Burnley game, it was at the time of the petrol shortage and we drove up not certain if we'd be able to fill up to get home Eric I'm pretty certain we had about 1500 up at Bolton not a few hundred. At Orient I remember a few spurs fans turned up but were put in their place by the numerous Saints fans, also remember our cars doing a U turn on Tower Bridge after we took a wrong turn on way home after lengthy celebrarions in pub afterwards Finally as Nick says there was definately a pitch invasion after the game, I was stood at Archers end of West Stand for that game, and can clearly remember Saints fans running up to the fences that had been erected at Archers in week before the game, and thumping Spurs fans at the front who were pressed up against the holes, that their fans had made in fence during the game, they just had to stand there and take it, beofrwe the police eventually stepped in.

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