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PRESTON NORTH END - BLAST FROM THE PAST
The last time we played Preston North End in the League was 1974, and we have only played them once since, in the 1987 FA Cup third round. So it comes as little surprise that there are few memories of encounters against this famous Lancastrian side. However there are still some, and although we have not had enough games between us for a strong rivalry to build up in recent times, many of your recollections still involve an air of spirited competition.
Bob End
Preston North End 2-4 Middlesbrough, 27/04/1974
If I remember rightly it was the final match of the magically victorious 1973-1974 season under Big Jack. Bob End is sixteen & lovin' life & his footy.
Orft we jolly well go in a mini bus to Preston. Twelve louts who come from backgrounds that contradict their behaviour. Thousands of Boro went that day. For you young guns, Bobby Charlton wasn't always a director of Man U after he finished being maybe the best player this country has ever produced - he was manager of Preston North End, a club probably about the same as the Boro in many ways, except that they have a hugely illustrious past. Problem for them was they were going down - Big Jack was being made Mayor of the World & Bobby was to be sacked a short while later. Jack may have enjoyed this a bit - I don't think there's much love lost between them - and Jackie had spent his life as the lanky clumsy centre-half while Bobby was a truly beautiful player.
I remember running sort of kid-stakes daft around some shopping centre. I also remember wearing a scarf on each wrist, as was the fashion in the 19th century. Then we went off to Deepdale.
We went in their end and booted out the fifteen Preston hooligans in there. They walked round the track & launched into inaudible support. Meanwhile what was a large end filled up with Boro, covered in scarves & flags. The atmosphere was 'magnificent' and Boro ran out 4-2 winners I think. No idea who scored [Brine 2, Foggon, Hickton if you care - Ed]. I think that result was the one that did it for Preston, i.e. they weren't already down so there was some problem with us having a half-lap of honour. If I'm right we charged onto the pitch and had a jamboree instead.
Afterwards involved a peed off bus driver with about six extra passengers bouncing back across The Pennines.
Once again, 'A Grand Day Out'.
Donny Boro
Preston North End 2-4 Middlesbrough, 27/04/1974
I remember the game in 1974 very dimly. A mass of Boro fans travelled over, many of them with me on the "League Liner", a specially chartered train which wandered through Yorkshire & Lancashire.
I can remember the walk from the station with a stream of Boro Fans watched over by a throng of police.
The match atmosphere was fantastic with non-stop singing. The open stand was made of WOOD and sounded like a drum. I remember we won well. Jack Charlton went to the top division and Bobby's team went down.
Lots of the team and Big Jack too travelled back with us on the train. I had a photo autographed by many of them. I wonder where it is now.
The Oort Cloud
Middlesbrough 0-1 Preston North End, 10/01/1987
January the 10th 1987 was a strange time to be alive on the third planet. Aretha Franklin had become the first woman inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. US President Ronald Reagan had undergone prostate surgery causing worries about his health, although on reflection, his prostate was the least of his health worries. And Terry Waite, the special envoy of the Archbishop of Canterbury in Lebanon, was kidnapped in Beirut and spent the next four years doing an impression of a pen in a bank.
George Foreman and Rod Stewart were celebrating birthdays, and January the 10th is also 'Margaret Thatcher Day' in the Falkland Islands - a day when people are probably complete cunts to each other in celebration of her existence. 'Reet Petite' by Jackie Wilson was riding high in the UK charts (yes it was THAT exciting to be alive people), and 'Walk Like An Egyptian' by The Bangles was number one in the US. A month after this game, the Unabomber started having fun in Salt Lake City, and we can't help but think he was just a bit more honest and brave than the rest of us.
Oh, and the Boro lost 1-0 at home against Preston North End, Preston then being a division below us in the Football League like they are now. Indeed I guess we were just desperate to get out of Division Three but was there a valid excuse in losing to a team in a lower division to us, despite their pushing for promotion that season? I don't know, maybe it was a fixture problem - being in the Third meant we had had two FA Cup games before this third round tie, maybe we were just tired. Or maybe we were just shit. I can't really remember.
Scarborosmoggy
Middlesbrough 0-1 Preston North End, 10/01/1987
I remember that Preston game in 87, 1-0 to them, Ronnie Hildersley scored a corker into the top corner of the East End goal. He was smaller than Juninho that bloke. Preston fans were in the East End seats for that game and the Boro fans in the South Stand upper seats were tearing the seats out and throwing them at the Preston lot. Then a load of Boro came on the pitch from the Holgate and confronted the Preston lot in the East End by offering them out on the pitch.
After the game (I was in the South terrace) the police charged us all back down the road on horse back towards the Holgate End - the twats, me and me sister got knocked over in the stampede (if it wasn't for her husband and my uncle making a cordon around us by linking arms we would have been trampled on to fuck).
A game which sticks in the memory for me.
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