Due to work I was staying with a family I had not met last weekend and we got chatting about football. They are a big Charlton family, but he had a friend who had an R's season ticket in the 70s and he went to a fair few games with him. As such, he said he had a stack of programmes from the 70s that he was about to throw out. What luck that I was there to take them off his hands! Having flicked through some of them, it gave me a great idea for a summer thread... Considering my first R's game was in Division One circa 1998, with rangers having recently been relegated from the Premiership (and I was under 10 then!), I have no idea who half our players are/were in these programmees. Who was Ian Gillard? Dave Webb? Don Givens? Frank McLintock? Now, I realise many of you will maybe laugh at me for not having heard of them, but that's exactly why I want to hear your memories of those players!! Let's educate the younger generation of R's about our history during the off season. What was it like to win the Milk Cup? What can you remember of the season when Liverpool pipped us to the title? And what about some of the players I have heard of? Gerry Francis, Stan Bowles, Dave Thomas et al.? What were they like to watch and what are your favourite memories? I realise that some of this could be looked up on wiki or other sites, but that wouldn't give us nearly as much of a personal perspective. Who's keen to get stuck in?! I haven't thought about any form of structure, maybe we could do a player at a time? Talking about our history has to be more interesting than continuous, mindless drivel based upon newspaper speculation!
Put simply, Stan was my boyhood hero. A naturally-gifted showman maverick the likes of which we sadly just don't see today. I remember watching the Rs down at The Dell in Southampton - must've been the very late 70s - and we won a corner. It was a tight little ground with very little run up for the corner, so Stan stepped over the advertising hoardings. When the crowd laughed, he then sat down (I think it might even have been in the invalid section), put his feet up and nicked a matchday programme from another punter. I may be wrong, but I think the referee might have booked him for it, but it was really funny all the same. There is also a story (I wasn't there, but perhaps another poster could tell it better) about when Sunderland won the FA Cup in 1973. The league campaign hadn't finished and the Mackem had the trophy on a table pride-of-place beside the pitch on the halfway line. The story goes that Stan took on a bet (nothing new there) and knocked the cup off the table with the ball the first chance he got. They used to say that if Bowles could've passed a betting shop like he passed the ball, he'd have been a very rich man. Look him up on YouTube, total genius.
Yeah, 1986. The Rs had done all the hard work by beating Liverpool over two legs in the Semis, only to get stuffed well and truly by Oxford United and Trevor Hebberd 3-0 at Wembley. This is rather what being an Rs fan is like.
Milk cup final was abysmal. Until that point I was used to being let down by the rangers but that day they broke my heart
Are you sure you're Oirish? To be sure To be sure! [video=youtube;uXauYVy_dws]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXauYVy_dws&feature=related[/video]
Good question ................... summer of '76, QPR training ground was at Polish War memorial, right behind my junior school. Spent every day ( just wandering in) of the summer hols over there fetching water and balls for them. In between sessions, Bowles and Francis helping us learn keepie uppies and taking pens against Phil Parkes and Derek Richardson when they were standing around. Dave Sexton turning a blind eye when we used their goals after they had finished for the day. Thats my memory of that era ............ oh and thinking Terry Mancini was really Max Wall
Swords,there was a poll in Ireland a few years ago about 'who was the most famous Irishman that ever lived'. The result was. 1,John F Kennedy(born in America) 2,James Connolly(born in Edinburgh) 3,Dev(born in America) So why have a go at Ray and Tony,they did their duty for Mother Eireann.
I sure was mate, no doubt. But every time I turn on the radio, hes rattlin' on. Every time I look at the highlights on TV, hes there rabbiting away like a wound up Leprechaun. Every time I pick up the Sports Supplement, his mug his there grinning back at me. I can't open my eyes without him popping out like a hairy little gremlin. He gives me the creeps that wee bloke.
'sparkrangers: Don't you think you're asking a bit much... the history of Rangers between the League Final (67) till the time you stepped in (98) - including all the players - in one thread?!!! We got people on here that could tell you the ins and outs of a blue and white hooped duck's arse (ROLLER!!) - but if you really want yarns from our history, start threads naming a specific era, player, manager etc. and I'm sure we'd be only too pleased to indulge you.
