Another Great Escape !

Oldham V Notts

3rd May 2014 was the last day of the League One season and the culmination of Shaun Derry's campaign to save football's oldest league club from continuing its run as the most well-travelled team in the country - up and down the divisions at least. Few thought it was possible we would still be in contention by this stage. With nine games remaining, we were seven points adrift of safety and sitting right on the bottom. What followed was reminiscenof Dearden's Great Escape in 2001. Notts lost only two more games and won six to leave themselves just needing  a point from the last fixture - against Oldham. Unusually, they didn't have the advantage of being at Meadow Lane but more than three and a half thousand made the trip up north so the ground had it's own Kop, just for a day. Above them, Crewe and Tranmere both had to win but against teams with nothing to play for meaning, realistically, that it was down to them.

For all the fans actually at the game, there were many more at home, listening via the commentary of 'Uncle Colin' Slater. A fan since the start of BBC local radio, he was the only voice to trust.When the game began, it was he that counted down the minutes of a goaless first half when the team went in at half time on level terms. Notts just needed to find a point - the more so because the opposition were both winning. Crewe were beating already promoted Preston and Tranmere leading Bradford but even so, everything would be OK if we took a draw....

Come on ! This is Notts. Simple ? As if ! Sixty-eight minutes in and Lockwood scored to give the home side a well-earned lead. Oldham had nothing to play for. Why were they so interested ?

The team arrives at Oldham, with

more than 3,500 fans in support.

On-loan Grealish tests the opposition and fans look on.

For six agonising minutes, the unthinkable was happening. Notts were losing and both teams beneath them were winning. Such a combination undid all the work of The Great Escape to that point. The winning run counted for nothing. Notts were going down..... Then in the 74th minute, a penalty to The Pies and a welcome lifeline.

Sheehan was the only man for the job. As Baudet had done before him, he stepped up to the spot and made no mistake.

Notts levelled at 1-1 and suddenly lifted two places up and out of the danger zone. There were no further scares. Tranmere, down to ten players by now, surrendered their fragile lead to Bradford and finally lost. Crewe beat PNE but by then, who cared ? The most unlikely escape since 2001 had been completed, masterminded by 'one of our own' Shaun Derry and put into action by a group of players loaned, revitalised or rejuvenated by only him. The big party got underway....

Grealish lifted shoulder-high looking every bit the image of Bobby Moore in '66 - more 'Escape to Victory' than 'The Great Escape' maybe. Derry grabs the influential McGregor and Campbell-Ryce who was reinvigorated by the new manager's arrival. Right, a happy Sheehan.

Fans quickly recognised how important the Notts goalie was to the teams survival.

Been here before ?

Anyone experiencing a feeling of de ja vu ?

Well not for nothing do surveys show Notts fans as the most stressed in the country and their team as the one with the most ups and downs in the league. This site has only been running for fifteen years but guess how many times we've been here on the last day......

2001

2006

2011

and this time makes

         FOUR !

    why do we put ourselves through it ?

...anyone going to the youth squad match tomorrow afternoon  ?

2014