Central League

Back in the day I used to go to lots of reserve games at Burnden Park. With all this weeks fuss over the development of English players has the loss of a genuine reserve team been part of the problem? The way I remember it was games were played mostly on Saturdays when the first team were away with some midweek fixtures, the players were a mix of first team players not in the team or returning from injury and young players from youth teams that were good enough to play "men's" football.

Used to get a decent crowd in sometimes too, in fact a few of them just used to go to reserve games.

Should it be brought back and scrap the Under 21's?

As I recall, you got in free with your season ticket and it was back at the time when we were in the third division so it was a good chance to see us playing the likes of Utd, Leeds and City.

I went to quite a few Central League games back then.

Went to quite a few games.
If memory serves the Central league was split into two Divisions in the early 80's.

I used to enjoy the Anglo Italian Cup as well.

Collina reffed a game at Burnden once.

I remember the Texaco cup,later reincarnated as the Anglo Scottish cup.

Anglo Scottish cup I remember playing St Mirren.

I remember a packed Manny Road stand watching Walker returning from injury. Those were the days.

In the 60's, when we were kids, just after half time the stewards used to open all the gates between the different sections of the ground, so we used to try and get from behind the Great Lever end through the 
Manny rd stand round the Embankment and back through the Burnden terrace to our start point, small things!!
Alex Smith in goal Dennis Butler on the wing, happy days!

Breadman wrote:I used to enjoy the Anglo Italian Cup as well.

Collina reffed a game at Burnden once.

Was that the match that Gheorghe Hagi played in? Think he played for Brescia at the time.

Yes, I think it was.

A 3-3 draw.

A thriller!

Although not as good as when we pumped Ancona five nowt.

Who can forget that? Over 3,000 turned up.

The 12th of October 1993 lives long in the memory.....

Breadman wrote:The 12th of October 1993 lives long in the memory.....

It's the reason old men cry.

Sure they used to get 6ooo for United games at one time.

I used to be ball boy at the embankment end, Central league games meant you had to retrieve the ball from up the terraces a pain. The upside was you got the autographs of the big names that were returning from injury. At least then the reserves played regular competitive games.

Me and my mates used to go to reserve games all the time. As bread said, you could get in free with your season ticket. Always in the manny road stand ( not sure if that was the only one open ).

It was a great way for us footie mad youngsters to get our fix when the first team weren't at home.

NickFazer wrote:

Should it be brought back and scrap the Under 21's?

Aren't the "U21's/Development Squad" the same thing, just rebranded after the debacle with Spurs pulling out of the "prem-only" reserves/development league 5 years ago?

Struggling to see the difference apart from the obvious ones resulting from modern wages of higher profile players occasionally preventing them from playing with the plebs and our lot having to play at Lostock.