Third Division or nowadays?

[dave.woodhall]

I think we'd look back at the seventies with ond memories whatever division we'd been in. Maybe da yoof will look back on today with the same feelings as they get ready for an away trip to Boston in the 2037 World League.

[Dave Clark Five]

Then, of course, there was 'The Special' to away games. The buzz of excitement as the train disgorged its mob onto the unwary streets of the strange town that we were visiting. Villa, Villa echoing around cavernous stations such as York and Bristol. The mob were running along the platform before the train had even stopped, such was the excitement.
The Football League Review inside the programmes with some pictures of teams in lower leagues (there was one lower than us). I remember one with a picture of the Workington Club Shop. It was just a painted garden shed with people standing around it with scarves tied to their wrists.
The cloud of dust that went up as we jumped up and down at Chesterfield and Shrewsbury. Vic Crowe coming on the pitch to calm us down.
Adrenalin ran high in those days and not just in the sense associated with hooligans, although that was probably how we were perceived.
Getting back to New Street to read The Argus and scanning it to see what it said about our huge away support.
All little things that come to mind when I remember those marvellous days.

[vespavillan]

Sorry, there is no comparison, them day's were very special and can never be replicated........long live the past.

[terrytini]

There was so little variation in peoples lives - EVERYONE read the Argos, everyone watched Star Soccer and MOTD and Sportsnight, everyone watched the Cup Final, and it mattered .  Villa in the 3rd divisiopn was glorious, and so was being young.  Yes I miss being that young again but at any age I would still want that football played that way with those crowds and with that atmosphere

[andyaston]

Aston Villa fans in 'Life on Mars'

[Dave Clark Five]

Looks like us old farts are in the majority here. In all fairness, can anyone say that the atmosphere these days is anywhere like the Third Division days? The fact is that there is no atmosphere in Villa Park now.

The rumble from the Trinity Road that preceded a corner has gone. The Holte were never any good on their own. I know that as I stood there and waited for the rest of the ground to join in.

Away games are now my favourite day out and I cannot see that changing.

General/Lerner/O'Neill. I am sorry but I think you will have a lot to do to get this ground buzzing again. It is like a morgue at the moment.

[Oscar Arce]

I agree Dave.
The stamping of the feet in the Old Trinity Road stand when a  build up of Villa pressure was also loud.
The "Villa, Villa" chant was usually started in the Trinity lower and built around to the Holte, it was so loud it made your ears hurt.
I don't think Villa Park will ever recreate that noise, most of the people around me seem to be at the match to keep getting up every two minutes to get more chips !
Them REALLY were the days.

[SteveN]

The third division was great but I wonder if it's our youth that we're missing more than the football?

I loved the football in the 70s.  Difficult to put into words but to me much as I still love Villa and football in general the game has moved away from me the older I get, and I don't think it's just because I'm getting older.  

It's the change from Stan Lynn getting on the same no. 11 bus after the game as me and my mates to the money dominated baby bentley culture that exists at the top today.  My dad is 88 and feels the same as me, but reckons that the rate of change from the 30's through to the 70's was nothing as compared to the changes since the formation of the Premiership.

Sod it - Chris is probably right.

[Dave Clark Five]

Just having a trawl through old threads. There is no doubt that the Third Division days were great. We were singing 'Andy Lochhead in the air' in Portugal. 

[Andy_Lochhead_in_the_air]

Im glad to have seen the whole range. To be able to go and watch us lose a midweek league game in the third division at torquay in 1972 and just 10 years later to have risen to be crowned the kings of europe is quite a change.
I guess those of us of a certain age look back on the 3rd division with fondness for two reasons.
I was in my carefree happy mid teens and Villa meant so much to me (they still do along with other things) and I was also lucky enough to be able to go to nearly all the games home and away.
But it wasnt just an age thing, there was a feeling the tide was turning for the Villa and the heights we could rise to unlimited (as proved to be the case, see above example period April 1972 - May 26th 1982). My Mom and Dad went to most the games too and always looked on that time at Villa as their favourite, even though they had been watching since before the war and would then have been in their late 40s.
I doubt such an experience would be the same now. The nearest examples of big clubs in the third tier would be Leeds and a few years back Manchester City. Im sure some of their fans will come to look back with affection in years to come but not quite as much as we do. I think it was more special because of the time and what football was like then, and of course we are Aston Villa.

Couldnt find an image of Shoots League ladders for 70-71 or 71-72, but this is another thing showing what football was like then.

[Oscar Arce]

I started a thread on the old board about the third division, just wondered where it went , there were some interesting comments on there from various old(ish) villains about away days to The Shay, Saltergate and Vetch Field.

[darren woolley]

I would have liked the chance to have gone to the matches in the Third Division but i was only two at the time, it seems everybody had fun going Home and Away were as now it's just about money.  I do like to read about us when we were in the Third and Second Divisions, aswell as the present i like to remember bygone eras. 

[adrenachrome]

The Third Division days coincided with my most active support in terms of attending games: in 1971/72 I think I only missed 2 games all season. 

There was definitely a sense of belonging, of being part of something. The scarf was worn with honour, and would attract plenty of sneers. It was us against the world. Where I grew up in the Selly Oak/Northfield area, there were plenty of Wolves and Albion fans; remember, they were the glamour teams in the First Division. Even Small Heath were more  glamorous than us.

If I am honest, the aggro was a part of it too, although this was usually rival groups charging at each other and one or the other running off.  You can't imagine "If your proud to a brummie clap your hands" being sung at a game by the Villa fans now, could you? Then again, you can't imagine "Divsion Two Welcomes You, Aston Villa"
being sung with musch gusto either.

DC5's post reminded me of the charms of the "special" trains; by the way, it wasn't just the mob on specials that jumped off trains as they they were pulling in to the platform, most adolescent males seemed to disembark in this dubious fashion,  as though it would be effete to do otherwise. Very strange, looking back.






 

[E I Adio]

Just read this thread from the beginning. Think I must have a speck of dust in my eye.

[Captain Trips]

40 years ago? Is it that long. OMG I am old!! I would definitely go back to that time. You had to be there to realise how good that period was.

Wembley where we should have won, Manchester Utd semi-final where we did, Pele, away days, taking over grounds, going away to Shrewsbury after missing out on a six horse accumulator because I could not be bothered to queue at the bookies (800 quid!!), being chased by Tranmere, Liverpool and Everton fans who combined together, Notts County in the old wooden stand which I was sure was going to collapse, Bournemouth at home, the special trains, drinking at the pub at New Street station, Rochdale, where the terracing was sleepers with ashes to stand on. not worrying about the results cos we generally won, have i mentioned Bournemouth :-) the arrival of Sir Brian, Andy Lochead, George Curtis, Brian Tiler, the Bee Gees, the youth cup winners, i could go on all night!

edit, I forgot Bruce Rioch!!!!!