fevnut's musings 2025/#34: Bradford, Play-Offs and Blue Plaque

Last Sunday we did something that we have never, ever, done before at a Fev Match and our first ever match was back in October 1970. We left at half-time and let’s make it clear our decision to leave was nothing to do with what had been happening on the pitch.

Nowadays we have to walk with a stick and stairs are quite a problem. We arrived in plenty of time and, thanks to a very helpful, kind lady in the Bradford Office we had spoken to on the phone a few days earlier, we were able to park reasonably close to the main stand.

We made our way into the main stand and found ourselves faced with a long walk down many, many steps to our designated seat. For the first few steps there was a railing down the middle of the steps that we could hold onto, but then the railings stopped, and we had to make most of the way down with no support. It was perilous and frightening. When we finally got to the seat, it was filthy and we had to spend time cleaning it with tissues before being able to sit down.

The match started and to be honest we were quite surprised how well our patched-up team were coping. A penalty, having made it 2-0 to Fev in the 16th minute, we were delighted at how we managed to keep that lead until moments before half-time when Bradford equalised. That was even though we had some more appalling misfortune when Josh Hardcastle had to go off for an HIA which he failed. He was replaced by Connor Jones who took his place at centre only for Connor also having to go off minutes later for an HIA which he, too, failed. That brought on James Glover who had been named as 18th man.

We have been searching but as far as we can see that was the first time that Fev had used an 18th man. We’re pretty confident that someone will correct us if we are wrong.

But as we said, the problems were not with what was happening on the pitch. Just a few minutes into the game we found ourselves surrounded by abusive shouting predominantly aimed at the referee. Every imaginable expletive was being used but the commonest to describe both the referee and our players was ‘c***’. This chorus greeted every single decision from the referee that wasn’t in Bradford’s favour. It was horrible.

When the half-time hooter sounded we, unfortunately, needed to go to the toilet. This time it was up the steps which was even worse than going down and when we got to the top we had to lean against a wall and use an inhaler several times.

There was a long queue to get into the toilets but fortunately a nice Bradford fan (they are not all horrible!) saw that I was in distress and let me in much further up the queue.

When I came out into some fresh air (it wasn’t very fresh in the toilets!) I went back to the stand but worrying about getting down again to my seat and the prospect of getting back up at the end, combined with the fact that I would almost certainly have to face another 40 minutes of the foul and abusive chorus lad me to turn around, clamber up the hill to my car and to begin the journey home.

NEVER AGAIN!

One in the car I had to rest whilst my breathing settled down but I was pleased to turn on Radio Leeds and discover there was almost uninterrupted commentary on the match. We were amazed as we heard us take an 8-2 lead with a Connor Barley try converted by Danny Addy.

The longer the match went on we began to believe that we could do it with the huge bonus, as far as we were concerned, of meeting Oldham in the play-offs rather than another trip to Odsal which we certainly wouldn’t attend.

Sadly Fev’s valiant efforts couldn’t hold out in the end and three converted Bradford tries in the last nine minutes gave them a win with a scoreline that doesn’t do justice to our valiant team.

Friday night is likely to be even more difficult with the Bradford side enhanced by several top-quality players who didn’t play on Sunday while we face yet more trial and tribulations with Connor Jones out because of his failed HIA. We are amazed that Josh is named in Friday’s squad but cannot believe that he will play which would surely bring big trouble upon Paul Cooke and the club. We have seen how seriously the RFL judge that after what happened to Mark Aston.

 

Play-Offs

We decided to take a look back at Fev’s involvement in Play-Offs rather than concentrating on the one about to come.

The first time Fev were ever involved in end of season play-offs was way back in 1928. After finishing 15th in the table in 1926-27 and then 11th in 1926-27, Fev finished 3rd in 1927-28 and earned themselves a place in the 4 team play-offs. In the semi-final they had to go to Leeds who had finished 2nd and magnificently won 15-12. Sadly they lost to the League Leaders, Swinton in the final. Hardly surprising as that was the year when Swinton, as well as winning the Championship Final, also won the Challenge Cup, the Lancashire Cup and the Lancashire League. A feat  known as ‘4 cups’, The only other time it was achieved was by Hunslet in 1908.

Here are the details for our first ever play-off match:

It’s worth making mention of a few of the Fev players on that day. The Denton brothers played an amazing total of 789 games for Fev between them, Sid (349) and Jim (440), which is the record for Fev appearances.

Not far behind Jim Denton is prop forward is prop forward Ernest Barraclough on 435 and would probably have taken the record but for a few suspensions. Ernest Barraclough also has the distinction of being Fev’s Heritage Number 1.

Jack Hirst was the first Fev player to play for England, when he was picked against Wales in October 1923.

Joe Morgan was the oldest of four brothers who all played for Fev. On three occasions Joe, Tommy and Luke played together in the same match. He was one of the most versatile of players. He most commonly played at loose-forward but he also appeared for Fev at centre, stand-off, scrumhalf, second row and wing!

The first play-offs of the summer era took place in 1998. What a rollercoaster it was for Fev. Going into the final round of league fixtures it looked as if Fev would have to beat Leigh by at least 32 points to qualify for the 5 team play-offs. We accomplished that winning 58-4. In fact finished 4th with that big win pushing us above Swinton on points difference. We started the play-offs by beating Swinton and then had to go to Dewsbury who had finished 3rd. No problem! We beat them 20-10. Fev were on a roll, but next up, in the preliminary final it was across to Hull to play Hull KR who had finished 2nd and already beaten Fev 3 times that year. Everyone but the most diehard Fev fans had Hull KR down as easy winners. This is what happened!

So, we got through to the Grand Final with the prospect of winning promotion to Super League. The match against Wakefield was played at Huddersfield. As the game was nearing the end Fev were in the lead and then Karl Pratt appeared to score a try running in from the halfway line. The referee was about to award it when he saw the touch judge waving his flag and the try was ruled out for a knock on. Had it been given then there would have been no way back for Trinity.

Lots of Fev fans think we were cheated but we have watched it many times and sadly have to admit that the touch judge was correct.

During the Summer Era Fev have made the 2nd tier play-offs on 17 occasions, more than anyone else.

The 2nd tier was renamed as the Championship in 2009. We thought we would take a look at the record of the qualifiers for the play-offs in 2025 in all the Championship seasons and this is what we found.

Between 2015 and 2018 there were no play-offs as we know them with the introduction of the Super 8s. In 2020 there were no play-offs because of Covid.

As you can see Fev have the proud record of taking part in every single Championship play-offs.

 

Blue Plaque

We were thrilled to be at the unveiling, this week, of a blue plaque to recognise Featherstone Rovers very special place in the community.

It was a project from the Featherstone Rovers Foundation who were assisted with a grant from Wakefield Council.

The final location for the plaque is still to be decided but we hope it will be on the Freddie Miller Memorial gate.

The justifiable reverence for the Fev Heritage meant that quite a few former great Fev players were present at the unveiling including those in the photo below.