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1976–77 Stoke City F.C. season

Field	Value
club	Stoke City
season	1976–77
manager	Tony Waddington,
George Eastham
chairman	Albert Henshall
stadium	Victoria Ground
league	Football League First Division
league result	21st (34 Points)
cup1	FA Cup
cup1 result	Third Round
cup2	League Cup
cup2 result	Third Round
league topscorer	Garth Crooks
(6)
season topscorer	Garth Crooks
(6)
highest attendance	29,905 vs Liverpool
(11 April 1977)
lowest attendance	12,225 vs Coventry City
(16 February 1977)
average attendance	19,027
prevseason	1975–76
nextseason	1977–78
pattern_la1	_red_stripes
pattern_b1	_red_stripes
pattern_ra1	_red_stripes
pattern_sh1	_red_stripes
shorts1	FFFFFF
socks1	FFFFFF

George Eastham (6) (6) (11 April 1977) (16 February 1977) The 1976–77 season was Stoke City's 70th season in the Football League and the 46th in the First Division.

The roof of the Butler Street Stand was rebuilt at a massive cost of £250,000 and with the club unable to pay off the insurers they turned to the playing staff to generate the required funds and with the likes of Jimmy Greenhoff, Alan Hudson and Mike Pejic being sold off Tony Waddington had a threadbare squad and he left the club in March 1977. Former player George Eastham took over but was unable to prevent Stoke losing their First Division status, going down by a single point.

Season review

League

The 1976–77 season opened with a new all steel Butler Street roof in place which would cost the sum of £250,000. With the club struggling to pay the cost they had to begin a fire sale of their best players. Those who left the club included Sean Haslegrave to Nottingham Forest for £35,000, Ian Moores to Tottenham Hotspur for £75,000, Jimmy Greenhoff to Manchester United for £100,000, Alan Hudson to Arsenal for £200,000 and Mike Pejic to Everton for £140,000. These were indeed, body blows none more so than Jimmy Greenhoff leaving after he scored just over 100 goals for the club and was idolised by the supporters.

The Stoke fans were totally confused at what was happening to their team and looked for someone to blame. Goals were again in short supply, Stoke failed to find the back of the net for five successive league matches from late November to early January and in fact they managed just 28 goals all season, 21 at home and seven away. Waddington's gambles on experienced player like John Tudor and Alan Suddick were not successful and after an awful defeat at home to Leicester City on 19 March 1977 Waddington's time at Stoke City was up. He had spent 25 years at the Victoria Ground as manager, assistant and coach and is considered to be the club's greatest manager having helped them win their first major trophy in 1972. He remained an avid supporter of the club until his death in 1994.

Waddington's assistant George Eastham was put in temporary charge with coach Alan A'Court his assistant. With the transfer deadline passed with no new players arrived, so Eastham turned towards the youth team to try to advert the drop, all to no avail and on a Monday evening at Villa Park in front of 29,000 fans, Stoke needing a win to stay up, lost 1–0 and were duly relegated to the second tier.

FA Cup

Everton beat Stoke 2–0 in the third round on their way to the semi-final.

League Cup

Stoke beat Leeds United 2–1 and then lost badly 3–0 to Newcastle United.

Final league table

Results

Stoke's score comes first

Legend

Win	Draw	Loss

Football League First Division

Main article: 1976–77 Football League

Match	Date	Opponent	Venue	Result	Attendance	Scorers
1	21 August 1976	Sunderland	H	0–0	27,244
2	24 August 1976	Bristol City	A	1–1	25,316	Smith 86'
3	28 August 1976	Manchester City	A	0–0	39,875
4	4 September 1976	West Ham United	H	2–1	19,131	Crooks 32', Conroy 52'
5	11 September 1976	Everton	A	0–3	22,277
6	18 September 1976	Ipswich Town	H	2–1	20,171	Tudor (2) 2', 19'
7	25 September 1976	Queens Park Rangers	A	0–2	21,621
8	29 September 1976	Leicester City	A	0–1	15,391
9	2 October 1976	Aston Villa	H	1–0	26,652	Conroy 37'
10	16 October 1976	Arsenal	A	0–2	28,507
11	23 October 1976	Derby County	H	1–0	20,916	Tudor 70'
12	30 October 1976	Newcastle United	A	0–1	28,251
13	6 November 1976	Middlesbrough	H	3–1	16,068	Waddington 20', Greenhoff (2) 47', 54'
14	10 November 1976	Leeds United	A	1–1	29,199	Dodd 86'
15	20 November 1976	Birmingham City	H	1–0	21,486	Crooks 70'
16	27 November 1976	Tottenham Hotspur	A	0–2	22,230
17	18 December 1976	West Bromwich Albion	H	0–2	15,989
18	27 December 1976	Liverpool	A	0–4	50,371
19	1 January 1977	Middlesbrough	A	0–0	21,140
20	22 January 1977	Sunderland	A	0–0	22,901
21	29 January 1977	Norwich City	A	1–1	18,408	Salmons 48'
22	5 February 1977	Manchester City	H	0–2	27,139
23	12 February 1977	West Ham United	A	0–1	20,106
24	16 February 1977	Coventry City	H	2–0	12,255	Conroy (2) 1', 55' (pen)
25	19 February 1977	Everton	H	0–1	19,586
26	26 February 1977	Ipswich Town	A	1–0	25,865	Goodwin 37'
27	5 March 1977	Queens Park Rangers	H	1–0	15,454	Bowers 47'
28	15 March 1977	Newcastle United	H	0–0	12,708
29	19 March 1977	Leicester City	H	0–1	14,087
30	23 March 1977	Arsenal	H	1–1	13,951	Conroy 7'
31	2 April 1977	Derby County	A	0–2	23,161
32	9 April 1977	Manchester United	A	0–3	53,102
33	11 April 1977	Liverpool	H	0–0	29,905
34	12 April 1977	Leeds United	H	2–1	17,960	Crooks (2) 67', 76'
35	16 April 1977	Birmingham City	A	0–2	19,554
36	20 April 1977	Bristol City	H	2–2	12,277	Smith 56', Bloor 70'
37	23 April 1977	Tottenham Hotspur	H	0–0	15,641
38	30 April 1977	Coventry City	A	2–5	15,720	Ruggiero (2) 40', 66' (pen)
39	7 May 1977	Norwich City	H	0–0	13,202
40	11 May 1977	Manchester United	H	3–3	24,632	Crooks (2) 40', 65', Bloor 49'
41	14 May 1977	West Bromwich Albion	A	1–3	22,772	Suddick 22'
42	16 May 1977	Aston Villa	A	0–1	28,931

FA Cup

Main article: 1976–77 FA Cup

Round	Date	Opponent	Venue	Result	Attendance	Scorers
	R3	8 January 1977	Everton	A	0–2	32,981

League Cup

Main article: 1976–77 Football League Cup

Round	Date	Opponent	Venue	Result	Attendance	Scorers
	R2	1 September 1976	Leeds United	H	2–1	22,550	Conroy 75', Greenhoff 89'
	R3	22 September 1976	Newcastle United	A	0–3	25,126

Friendlies

Match	Opponent	Venue	Result
1	Śląsk Wrocław	A	1–0
2	Indonesia XI	A	1–1
3	Persebaya Surabaya	A	2–0
4	Ajax	A	1–2
5	AS Cannes	A	2–0
6	AS Monaco	A	0–1
7	Olympique Lyonnais	A	1–2
8	FC Porto	A	0–1
9	Genoa	A	0–0
10	Chirk AAA	A	6–0
11	Hibernian	A	1–0
12	Blackpool	A	4–2
13	Hereford United	A	0–1

Squad statistics

Pos.	Name	League	FA Cup	League Cup	Apps	Goals	Apps	Goals
GK	ENG Roger Jones	2	0	0	0	0	2	0
GK	ENG Peter Shilton	40	0	1	2	0	43	0
DF	ENG Alan Bloor	37	2	1	2	0	40	2
DF	ENG Danny Bowers	13(2)	1	1	1(1)	0	15(3)	1
DF	ENG Alan Dodd	42	1	1	2	0	45	1
DF	ENG Paul Johnson	8	0	0	0	0	8	0
DF	ENG John Lumsdon	12(1)	0	0	0	0	12(1)	0
DF	ENG Jackie Marsh	16(1)	0	1	2	0	19(1)	0
DF	ENG Mike Pejic	21	0	0	2	0	23	0
DF	ENG Denis Smith	30	2	1	0	0	31	2
MF	ENG Brian Bithell	16(1)	0	1	0	0	17(1)	0
MF	IRE Terry Conroy	34(2)	5	0	2	1	36(2)	6
MF	ENG Alan Hudson	11	0	0	2	0	13	0
MF	WAL John Mahoney	22	0	0	2	0	24	0
MF	SCO Jimmy Robertson	14	0	1	0	0	15	0
MF	ENG Kevin Sheldon	7(2)	0	0	0	0	7(2)	0
MF	ENG Alan Suddick	9	1	0	0	0	9	1
MF	ENG John Tudor	28(2)	3	1	0	0	29(2)	3
MF	ENG Steve Waddington	11(1)	1	1	0	0	12(1)	1
FW	ENG Geoff Salmons	33(2)	1	1	2	0	36(2)	1
FW	ENG Garth Crooks	20(3)	6	0(1)	1(1)	0	21(5)	6
FW	ENG Dave Goodwin	12(1)	1	0	0	0	12(1)	1
FW	ENG Jimmy Greenhoff	14	2	0	2	1	16	3
FW	ENG John Ruggiero	9	2	0	0	0	9	2
FW	ENG Dennis Thorley	1	0	0	0	0	1	0

References

Matthews, Tony. (1994). "The Encyclopaedia of Stoke City". Lion Press.

Info: Wikipedia Source

This article was imported from Wikipedia and is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Content has been adapted to SurfDoc format. Original contributors can be found on the article history page.

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