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Why do we yo yo ?


Cork Jag
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I would date Thistle's decline from their historic norm at Season 1981/82 -  we stayed in the smaller Top League of 10 teams (with 2 relegated  every season) from 1976 and without too much difficulty.  Only under Lambie and Archie have we returned to that level.

Head-to-Head statistics can be distorted by sides not being in the same divisions over several seasons but there are some interesting comparisons with the teams in our peer group.

We have significant deficits against Dundee (79-101), Dunfermline (29-50) and St Johnstone (42-52).

We have however won more games than we have lost against Motherwell ( 85-82), Kilmarnock (95-79),  St Mirren (77-67), Falkirk (85-60) & Hamilton (59-58).

I think our core fan base has dropped over the last 25 years in comparison with these clubs - Hamilton from a lower base have also declined and they share with us a quite awful cup record.

My conclusion is that we have been pretty rubbish for most of the last 30 years...I don't know what the reason is but prior to that period we  regularly produced players who went on to play for Scotland  (Mo Johnston was the last in a long line) but since then we have seldom brought though players good enough to play for very ordinary Thistle teams. Maybe concentrating on developing our own players is the way forward.

 

 

Edited by Winter of '63
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2 hours ago, Winter of '63 said:

I would date Thistle's decline from their historic norm at Season 1981/82 -  we stayed in the smaller Top League of 10 teams (with 2 relegated  every season) from 1976 and without too much difficulty.  Only under Lambie and Archie have we returned to that level.

Head-to-Head statistics can be distorted by sides not being in the same divisions over several seasons but there are some interesting comparisons with the teams in our peer group.

We have significant deficits against Dundee (79-101), Dunfermline (29-50) and St Johnstone (42-52).

We have however won more games than we have lost against Motherwell ( 85-82), Kilmarnock (95-79),  St Mirren (77-67), Falkirk (85-60) & Hamilton (59-58).

I think our core fan base has dropped over the last 25 years in comparison with these clubs - Hamilton from a lower base have also declined and they share with us a quite awful cup record.

My conclusion is that we have been pretty rubbish for most of the last 30 years...I don't know what the reason is but prior to that period we  regularly produced players who went on to play for Scotland  (Mo Johnston was the last in a long line) but since then we have seldom brought though players good enough to play for very ordinary Thistle teams. Maybe concentrating on developing our own players is the way forward.

 

 

Interesting head to head records but is that points or games? And since 1982?

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5 hours ago, Auld Jag said:

Hope your visit to the dentist was less painful than watching Thistle on Saturday.

Strangely the toothache began on Saturday. Now one tooth lighter, but pain free!

Just wish the dentist had been on Maryhill Road, so that I could take pride in my Maryhill extraction.

Back to the thread. Some really interesting posts and great to have constructive discussion rather than  destructive dismantling.

After a  temporary Firhill flirtation when attending with school friends in the mid/late 1970s  (including a semi yo-yo as we failed to make the original Top 10, but immediately bounced back into the Premier League), my serious Thistle supporting began in 1996. I cannot believe how naive I was then in the ways of football and finance. While the experienced and intelligent Thistle fans were devastated by the Tannadice debacle, I was relatively relaxed, thinking that after a season of drudgery and regular defeat, it would be refreshing to be winning games at a lower level and challenging for a quick return. How wrong I was, and it took just two seasons to realise that hammering in a piton while sliding down a slippery slope is a virtual impossibility. 

Thistle seem to career downhill faster than any other team with a recent Premiership pedigree (the other serial sliders such as Cowdenbeath, Stenhousemuir and Brechin City have started from a lower level). I have seen three landslides in my two decades, and amazingly the present poor show is the least disastrous of the trio. It is nothing short of a miracle that we clawed our way back twice after dropping two leagues, and I question whether we would be lucky enough to return on a third occasion if the trap door to League 1 were to open. Hopefully we have already plumbed the depths of the current trough and are once again rising to the surface.

Just cannot ever see us being a stodgily reliable St Johnstone or a Hamilton with their tepid supports. Somehow that is not the Thistle way and like Sisyphus of old I suspect we will be destined to keep pushing that boulder up the hill and then having to chase back to recover it again. The yo-yo is built into the DNA of our circle of life. 

 

 

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17 hours ago, partickthedog said:

Just cheering myself while waiting at the dentist by pondering the interesting concept of a yo-yo club as a chocolate biscuit combination.

Wouldn’t apply to Thistle though as we couldn’t be an orange or a green (mint) yo-yo.

 

Edited by Cork Jag
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On 1/14/2020 at 9:47 AM, JAG1970 said:

. So the solution seems to be to be perpetually in 3rd, 2nd, 1st spot...........

That would be ideal. The grind of the Premier League certainly wore me down. I can barely remember a decent match since the first season back. Even the Top 6 season was pretty forgettable entertainment wise.

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4 hours ago, Lenziejag said:

It has probably been mentioned in previous posts that the yoyoing began when the league structure changed. When there were only 2 divisions we probably fluctuated between 12th and 16th each season. 
We aren’t really that far adrift from that at the moment. 

In the unbroken sequence of 61 seasons in the top flight (1902-03 to 1969-70 #) Thistle averaged just under 9th place.  In that period the number of teams in the league averaged just over 18.  Pretty much right down the middle.  36 of these seasons saw us finishing no worse than 9th.  (# Excludes wartime football)

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1 hour ago, a f kincaid said:

In the unbroken sequence of 61 seasons in the top flight (1902-03 to 1969-70 #) Thistle averaged just under 9th place.  In that period the number of teams in the league averaged just over 18.  Pretty much right down the middle.  36 of these seasons saw us finishing no worse than 9th.  (# Excludes wartime football)

I am surprised that our record is so good.  I started watching Thistle in the early 60s. So maybe for the 10 to 12 years until reconstruction we were in the bottom half more regularly?

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13 hours ago, Lenziejag said:

I am surprised that our record is so good.  I started watching Thistle in the early 60s. So maybe for the 10 to 12 years until reconstruction we were in the bottom half more regularly?

From 1959-60 to 1974-75 Thistle's final placings were as follows.

59-60. 10th

60-61. 11th

61-62. 7th

62-63. 3rd

63-64. 7th

64-65. 11th.

65-66. 12th

66-67. 12th

67-68. 10th.

68-69. 14th.

69-70. 18th(relegation)

70-71. 1st (promotion)

71-72. 7th.

72-73. 13th.

73-74. 11th

74-75. 13th.

Reconstruction followed and we were in 2nd tier.

Only 4 times in the top half of a division of 18 for these years. 19 in our promotion year.

Edited by Garscube Road End
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Thanks for that GRE. In a way that shows our recent run (10-8-9-6-11) in the top flight favourably. It also shows just how much of a yo-yo club we would've been under today's league set up. Realise you can't match like for like but by my reckoning there's at least* four relegations and three promotions within that spell.  

*more if we lost imaginary play offs in '61 & '65.

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26 minutes ago, lady-isobel-barnett said:

Thanks for that GRE. In a way that shows our recent run (10-8-9-6-11) in the top flight favourably. It also shows just how much of a yo-yo club we would've been under today's league set up. Realise you can't match like for like but by my reckoning there's at least* four relegations and three promotions within that spell.  

*more if we lost imaginary play offs in '61 & '65.

Only Thistle could lose an imaginary play off!

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You also have to take into account the "shock" of relegation. It easier to bounce back up from 16th in a 18 team league than to gain promotion.

I also think that it's interesting that despite our yo-yo status since 1975 we have not, at any time since 1970-71, played in the bottom tier of the Scottish league while clubs such as Dunfermline, Kilmarnock, St. Johnstone and Morton have.

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1 hour ago, Dunfermline Jag said:

You also have to take into account the "shock" of relegation. It easier to bounce back up from 16th in a 18 team league than to gain promotion.

I also think that it's interesting that despite our yo-yo status since 1975 we have not, at any time since 1970-71, played in the bottom tier of the Scottish league while clubs such as Dunfermline, Kilmarnock, St. Johnstone and Morton have.

I am sure that Hamilton can be added to that list.

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Unless there are ancient examples from over 100 years ago (and I think that relegations and promotions may have worked differently then, depending on votes/elections as well as or instead of league points), only two managers have led us to immediate bouncebacks. Step forward David McParland in 1971 and Dick Campbell in 2006, although only the former restored us to the top level. 

A near equivalent would have been Bertie Auld in 1976 who led the promotion campaign from the second tier in the first season of the new three division set up. Strictly speaking, we had not been relegated in failing to make the initial top ten, but this did immediately bring us back again to the top flight.

John Lambie engineered our only consecutive promotions in 2001 and 2002, while a variety of managers masterminded our consecutive relegations in 2004 and 2005, Gerry Collins, Gerry Britton and Derek Whyte, and the aforementioned Dick Campbell.

So golden Yo-yos awarded to Messrs McParland and Lambie, and an honourable Club biscuit with plenty of chocolate on it to Bertie.  :worship::clapping:

Empty wrappers to the others mentioned. :getmecoat::sarcastic:

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5 hours ago, partickthedog said:

Unless there are ancient examples from over 100 years ago (and I think that relegations and promotions may have worked differently then, depending on votes/elections as well as or instead of league points), only two managers have led us to immediate bouncebacks. Step forward David McParland in 1971 and Dick Campbell in 2006, although only the former restored us to the top level. 

A near equivalent would have been Bertie Auld in 1976 who led the promotion campaign from the second tier in the first season of the new three division set up. Strictly speaking, we had not been relegated in failing to make the initial top ten, but this did immediately bring us back again to the top flight.

John Lambie engineered our only consecutive promotions in 2001 and 2002, while a variety of managers masterminded our consecutive relegations in 2004 and 2005, Gerry Collins, Gerry Britton and Derek Whyte, and the aforementioned Dick Campbell.

So golden Yo-yos awarded to Messrs McParland and Lambie, and an honourable Club biscuit with plenty of chocolate on it to Bertie.  :worship::clapping:

Empty wrappers to the others mentioned. :getmecoat::sarcastic:

As you say promotion/ relegation until 1922 was decided on club casting votes. It was called elected and demoted.

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