Porthmadog and problems

The '92-3 Promotion Season: Part 2

Nigel Hanks continues his feel-good stroll...

The next game I saw Wrexham play was on Saturday 20 March 1993 at Glanford Park, Scunthorpe. I originally couldn’t get to this game, but at the last moment Yorkshire Television decided to screen Barnsley versus Sunderland live on the Sunday - thus leaving Saturday blank. Setting off at 1pm and arriving at Glanford Park at 1.45pm, I once again saw loads of Wrexham fans on the motorway and outside the ground. The game ended 0-0 with neither side having many chances. So, home I went feeling a little disappointed. By the way, on the Sunday Barnsley beat Sunderland 2-0.

The following Friday - 26 March - saw me make another one-hour journey to watch Wrexham; this time in West Yorkshire at the Shay (Halifax Town FC). My Barnsley FC-supporting mate, Ged Thornton, had accompanied me on this trip. We has set off at 5.30pm, arriving at the ground at 6.30pm. Programmes were bought; then into the ground at the away end. The kick-off was delayed to let the travelling Red Army get into the ground safely. The attendance was 3,920 - more than double any other gate Halifax had attracted that season.

The following week - 2 April - Wrexham had arranged to play on the Friday night. This gave me the perfect opportunity to visit my sister and stop in Wales for the weekend, seeing as Barnsley were away at Charlton on the Saturday. So, we set off on Friday morning and everything was going fine until I felt a small miss on the car engine. I dismissed it, thinking I had taken my foot off the accelerator and put it on again quickly - thus making it jerk (at least that’s what I wanted to think). But no - it just got worse and at the end of the M56 it was really bad. Pulling into a garage, I was told that it was the points on the car and the garage didn’t have any in stock; still, they said, they would try to repair the car. Credit to them - they did. But, 10 miles later on the familiar juddering noise was back. Well, I was 40 miles from Barmouth. It was another 50 miles back to Wrexham from there - so I knew I wouldn’t make the game. I pulled into Barmouth at 5pm doing a speed of 20mph. I ended up listening to the game on Radio Wales while sat at my sister’s house. To make matters worse, my brother-in-law Kevin Inglis had got my car repaired within 10 minutes the following morning. All was not lost as I saw my first League of Wales game: Portmadog 2 Maesteg Park Athletic 1. Barnsley drew 0-0 with Charlton and Sheffield United lost 2-1 to Sheffield Wednesday in the FA Cup semi-final.  RP