1999/2000 - The end of the Premier League years!

Saturday 26th September 1998.

It was the start of the decline

44 minutes into a game against Arsenal and an innocuous shove by Wim Jonk on Patrick Vieira ended in Paulo Di Canio being sent off for a shove on the referee

https://youtu.be/Ixp5AVdC2f4

There were other factors involved such as the failed floatation of stock to Charterhouse and poor investment inplaying talent, but pretty much the last 20 years worth of decline can be derived from that one moment and the total mismanagement of the situation from that time is what led to the clubs longest spell outside the top flight in its 151 year history.

The board dispensed with Big Ron at the end of the 97/98 season in an act of spite, to be replaced too much hilarity by Danny Wilson. 

Now Wilson was a nice bloke, but was completely out of his depth.

After keeping the club up following the aftermath and subsequent departure of Di Canio post Allcock, we went into the 1999/2000 season on the back of a spending splurge, adding strikers Gilles de Bilde and Gerald Sibon for a combined £5M

Added to a squad that had experienced keepers in Pressman and Srnicek, stalwart Des Walker, the dependable Emerson Thome, Dutch international Wim Jonk, Swedish star Niclas Alexandersson and internationals such as Petter Rudi & Andy Hinchcliffe + Carbone

With a splattering of workmanlike journeymen around them how could Wednesday fail to preserve their ever-present premier league tag?

Well they did. Spectacularly! Slipping out of the top flight with little fight!

Wednesday failed to win a single league game until 2nd October, when they thumped Wimbledon at Hillsborough. 

Wilson was unable to get anything out of the talent at his disposal, falling out with and eventually banishing Carbone, whilst his big signings flopped massively. When he was eventually sacked it was ultimately too late, and we were relegated after blowing a 3-1 lead at Highbury to draw 3-3

Peter Shreeves admirably took the reigns for the final run in but the damage had already been done. Despite completing a league double over Wimbledon and an impressive 1-0 home win over Chelsea three successive defeats, including a 4-1 thrashing at Coventry, meant Wednesday went into the final two games knowing they could only stay up on goal difference. 

So to the last game of the season - a 4-0 thrashing of mid table Leicester City. Looking back I could never have imagined that we would go twenty years outside the top flight. Having grown up not really remembering us being outside the Premier League I assumed after a whistle stop tour a Massive club like us would bounce straight back.

Walking out of the ground that day me and my mates decided “Let’s get season tickets next season, we don’t want to miss out on the promotion party” 😏

More on that to follow. 

Being a Wednesdayite - It's all about me...

Hello. I intend to share some of my memories from following the Wednesday and reflect on some of my times as a Wednesdayite. But first let me introduce myself.

I was born a in the spring of 1985 - A vintage year! At the back of the 80's. I grew up with Thomas the tank engine, The Real Ghostbusters and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. I also took in quality viewing such as Transformers, Thundercats and Trapdoor.

I was also around for, but unfortunately have very little memory of the most successful times in Sheffield Wednesday's history since the 60's. Promotions, winning the league cup in 1991 and the Wembley finals of '93. I can't remember when I started to follow the owls but it was certainly during my early school years. 

I came from an age when Sky Sports wasn't the monster it is today, so got my early football fixes from Channel 4's 'Football Italia' - meaning I was more versed in the scudetto than the lower leagues of English football - luckily for me Wednesday were a decent Premier League side so I was able to follow them via newspaper coverage, the green 'un, teletext & by completing my Premier League sticker collection!

I lived through the great console battles - the Sega Mega Drive my console of choice. Sensible Soccer being the game that was played to death! Moving onto the PlayStation and World Cup 98, FIFA 99/2000 or Premier Manager 98 (on the PC) were the games for me.

It was the summer of 1996 that I would get my first true football awakening; Gazza, Footballs coming home, the wonderful grey England kit and all that, but the France 98 World Cup was probably when my love for the game became an obsession. The kits, the players, the transfers - everything! For me at the time a good England team. I wagged school for the first time in my life to go home at dinner to watch the England -Tunisia game. Who can forget the South Africa, Mexico or Jamaica shirts from this classic tournament, plus France always seems a decent place for the English to go - weather wise.

As I progressed through secondary school I became friends with a couple of fellow Wednesday fans, for the purpose of this blog let's call them James & Russell. One who had been at my junior school and another kid who'd moved from out of the area. We would play football morning, noon and night. Watching any games on TV became a ritual too. Man Utd-Barcelona, Wimbledon-Blackburn or whoever. It didn't matter.

Then as the 1999/2000 season progressed I progressed to going to matches with my school mates. Bradford (2-0), Newcastle (0-2) and finally Leicester (4-0 and to this date our last Premier League games) were taken in by this new trio. It was this burgeoning friendship that was to form the basis of events that would go on to fill the next decade!

But that's another story...