Best away league performance in living memory? | Vital Football

Best away league performance in living memory?

Chesterimp

Chesterimp

Vital Football Hero
Mulling my way back north on Tuesday through the interminable 50mph roadworks on the M6. The performance and result was the best away league performance I've personally witnessed in 50 years following the mighty Imps, but that's a relatively low bar, my matches have been largely confined to the NW/midlands and fairly irregular, bordering on random, I usually manage Chester but missed last season's destruction of the hosts.

But: in terms of timing and significance, is Coventry the best in living memory, end of? This needs one of the more organised stattos I think (hello Scottie) but off the top of my head :-

I can think of 4-0 at Shrewsbury in 74-75, we p****d off a young manager (Alan Durban) with our 'direct' methods under GT, but that was autumn, they ultimately went up, we missed out.

75-76, 4-2 at Donny (Christmas) and 5-1 (?) near the end of the season at Bradford?

Murphy's years are vaguer for me, must have been something significant in the promotion year and subsequent near miss, and the GMVC year.

Likewise in the B**k years and promotion? A soggy night and 2-0 win at Shrewsbury (again) sticks in my mind but they were mid table or worse I think.

2002-03, 1-0 at Bournemouth was late in the season and crucial for the for the first play-off.

Schoey's side had important wins at Swindon and Walsall and demolition jobs at Barnet and Mansfield.

Last season's wins at Tranmere and FGR also crucial but both realtively early, the latter possibly a season defining one however.

Over to better memories and experience!
 
Great post chesterimp.

When I first read the title, I thought this might be a bit of post-game hyperbole, but actually, in my 27 years, I’m not sure I can come up with any away performance or result as good, or indeed as pivotal, as Coventry on Tuesday evening.

I can remember great days at Chesterfield in 1992 (5-1 win from 1-0 down at half time), and spoiling champions Carlisle’s promotion party in 1995 (the Walsall and Barnet games you mention definitely deserve a mention... I also loved the 3-2 Valentines Day win at Underhill in 2006). But I don’t think there’s been any away league game when we’ve delivered when it really mattered like we did the other night. And in a truly wonderful atmosphere with 3,000 Imps too.

On away performances in total that I’ve had the pleasure of seeing, the 5-4 against Fulham in the League Cup in 2005 would take some beating. But league games? I’m with chesterimp on this one.
 
Not quite up to the FGR game last year.

That was unexpected, intimate in terms of the numbers there and proximity to the pitch; and a win concocted in the last few minutes having been 2-0 down. A Woodyard rarity, Waterfall volley and Raggett bullet header put paid to Cooper's arrogant smugness. What a game, what drama; and the result that changed our season.

Coventry is up there though, at the moment probably our second favourite away league game of all time.
 
berksimps said:
Not quite up to the FGR game last year.

That was unexpected, intimate in terms of the numbers there and proximity to the pitch; and a win concocted in the last few minutes having been 2-0 down. A Woodyard rarity, Waterfall volley and Raggett bullet header put paid to Cooper's arrogant smugness. What a game, what drama; and the result that changed our season.

Coventry is up there though, at the moment probably our second favourite away league game of all time.
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To be fair, that must have been some game to have been at. I was watching in Malaysia and I’d still put that in my top ten favourite Imps matches... the first and original of the magic Cowley games we’ve had in the last 18 months. Oldham, Ipswich and Burnley all followed from there.
 
Great goals... our support turning it into a home fixture... beating a 'bigger' team... revenge for the loss at Sinny... Ollie Palmer... massive result in terms of league positions.

Yep, up there with the best.
 
Off hand I'd also give the 4-0 win at Shrewsbury in 1974/75 a mention. It may have been at the beginning of November, but Shrewsbury were in second place at the time and we were seventh. We'd won 4-1 at mid-table Darlington the Saturday before but to come away with such a big win at one of the promotion favourites made people realise that something special was starting, with a real promotion challenge - even if it didn't quite work out in the end.
 
In terms of "perfect storm" then last night probably tops the lot in terms of league (key word!) away results.

Fantastic away following, game which gained significant status, superb game management and tactics from DC/NC and placed a play off position entirely in our hands.
 
Depends what the criteria for judging it are i.e. importance, cup shock, style, size of victory etc. I'll stick with FGR. As dramatic as it was unexpected. I was going to put Burnley until I re read the title and saw the word league - Doh.
 
I remember a 4-1 win at Burnley when Hobbo took them apart and scored a hat trick but to win 4-2 at a team who throughout most of my adult life have been top flight and with the numbers supporting will take some beating.
 
Bit longer memory than some on here, but after the real downer of the 3-2 defeat at Southport on the last day of the 74/75 season, missing out on promotion by 0.00000001 of a goal or something like it , I had to personally do something about that. It was a long summer but Southport away on the evening of September 24th 1975 seemed 'attractive' and the ideal way to get my 'revenge'. I was living in Lincoln at the time and promised my girlfriend a day at the seaside. Little did she know that it was a trip across the Pennines for a very wet evening game at an 'end of season' seaside resort. Drab ! Well Percy and John Ward restored my faith in football justice, and along with about ten other mad Imps saw us run out 2-1 winners. Crowd 871, rather than the 10,000 said to be at the previous game !! What the win did was continue the fantastic start to the 75/76 season and all that lead to, and erased the dreadful memory for me of April 28th 1975. The journey home seemed to take about ten minutes ! UTI.
 
In terms of performances, I'm not sure I remember enough about each game to gauge!

Results wise, most of 2006/07 were good away results - Barnet, Swindon and Walsall spring to mind. The Ryan Amoo Game, too.

Huddersfield in the PO's was a good performance, I thought. Done by a dodgy penalty.

Probably others I've forgot.
 
Too many to consider, and you can't really compare them.

Notts County (81), Leicester (82), West Ham (82), Chesterfield (82), Chesterfield (92), Man City (96), Southampton (96), FGR (16), Ipswich (17), Burnley (17), Gateshead (17) etc.

The thing that strikes me about that is the sheer length of time between some of them. That doesn't mean there weren't good away performances in between, but it does warn you to enjoy the good times.
 
I wasn't able to go to Cov, but I always think of the Walsall game under Schoey, and half time at Huddersfield in the POs, as when I have been really buzzing. Obviously Burnley is up there, West Brom in the cup even though we lost, and poss Derby in the League Cup
 
I’d like to go down memory lane to Saturday 12th April 1958. City were at Doncaster having on the Tuesday previous won 3-1 at Barnsley to end a run of 17 league games without a win, but still apparently hopelessly marooned at the foot of division 2 (Championship nowadays). In the Midland League the reserves were at home, and in those days the only score information came from alphabet boards with the key in the programme which gave halftimes from other games and had a slot labelled ‘Home Team’ for the club the first team were away to, and ‘City’ for our score. This was updated, presumably as news was telephoned through. We scored twice, and most of the crowd were watching the board rather than the game. When the two was taken down all you could hear was ‘It’s goin’ three, it’s goin’ three’. We won 3-1, still the only time I ever got goosebumps over a City game. The rest is part of City legend.
 
Im going to give Scunny away in the early 80's a mention, not for the best team performance, far from it, but for what still has to be one of the best individual perfomances ever seen, i give you David Felgate, who by some sort of miracle kept the final score to 0 0 when it could quite easily have been 15 nil to Scunny. There were plenty of imps there that day who will know what im on about.
 
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