RIP Barrie Thomas

I remember this but I thought it was in the Ponty End. Was it against Doncaster?

Thomas was a bit of a showman. It was sad that injury meant that his time with us was somewhat limited.
A great signing by Johnny Steele.

 

I'm surprised that you never saw him. You are not that much younger than me.

 

RIP Barrie , some of my first happy BFC memories!

 

I was at Oakwell to see him get his 200th career goal, against Halifax Town. Such a remarkable feat that is rarely repeated these days.

 

I kept scrap books from the early 1960s and still remember the chilling Green Un headline on our club page: “Crisis May Be The End Of The Reds”.

Yes, we really were that close to losing the club altogether. The Joe Richards tenure as Chairman had become a slow decline to likely oblivion and, but for that cash injection by Mr Dennis and Mr Buckle, the club would surely have gone to the wall.

It’s incredible to think that the modest purchase of two forwards could turn things around, but it did.

 

Just looked on a financial site that calculated 10000 pounds in the late 60s would come in around 250 grand today !

 

That wouldn’t go very far nowadays when looking for a pair of strikers of that quality, would it? Barrie came with a great goalscoring record for about £7,000 and John Evans was snapped up from Exeter City for £3,000. Both had a huge impact on our subsequent revival.

 

But monetry inflation is not the equivalent of football player inflation. It is imo far less and the equivalent would be a lot more than £250k

 

Just to put into context the quality of player Barry Thomas was he was named in the provisional squad of 40 players to be considered for the 1962 World Cup in Chile. Four years later he's helping Barnsleys revival.

 

Wonderful post and thanks very much for taking the time. It's very enjoyable to read in such detail about things before I was born.

Barrie Thomas clearly brought people a lot of joy in his long life.

 

RIP sir.

 

That is a great post. You have not underestimated the the effect of those signings on the team and the town. We thought that we would finish bottom of the league, which in those days would not have meant relegation, as we would have been voted back in by the other clubs, but we did think that we that going out of business was a massive possibility.

I can remember their debuts, but its the cup run that is still crystal clear in my mind. The win against Southport and the arrogant Fryatt was amazing. I stood on the cop for the one and only time. Don't remember much of the Port Vale home game, but the replay was amazing the side totally transformed. It was one of those fantastic games where the team played out of their skin. PV crashed a shot against the crossbar at 2-1 before Hewitt scored with a last minute penalty. It was a great ride back to Elsecar. The Cardiff game was really special to me as I had met a girl just before Christmas and I took her to watch the game, her first ever football match. We were 1-0 down and the 90 mins were almost up and so I thought it would be wise to leave just before the end so my girlfriend would not be in the inevitable crush. We just got out of the ground when there was an almighty roar, which could only mean that we had scored. I have never left a match before the final whistle since. It was probably worth it as my girlfriend is now my wife of 56 years, who whilst doesn't quite have my passion for the reds, is still a supporter. I went to the replay in Cardiff with colleagues from the drawing office at Fox's in Stocksbridge, but it took us so long that we didn't get there until after the second half had started, if fact we scored just as we were walking up to the steps to get into the ground. Unfortunately they came back with two goals and we were out. RIP Barrie and condolences to his family. They should never underestimate what he did for our club in such a short time that he played for us.

 

Exactly as I remember it.
"T-T-T-Thomas, T-T-T-Thomas,
Is the greatest centre -forward in the land!"
On 10th September 1966, before we signed Thomas and Evans, following a run of 5 games with no points, we finally managed a win against Luton, in front of a crowd of 2,041at Oakwell. This was in Division 4, of course.
We actually strung one or two decent results together, after taking just 5 points from our first 12 games, and the signing of Thomas and Johnny "O-level" Evans, as one journalist referred to him, in recognition of his passing GCE O-level exams in 5 subjects (which led to his allegedly being called "The Prof" by his teammates) really did spark a massive amount of interest. We had over 8000 at Oakwell for the duo's debut against Port Vale, and things were on an upward spiral from that point.

 

Just as I remember it. I kept on attending Oakwell through thick and thin, though the fact that I lived only ten minutes' walk away from the ground made that a lot easier for me than for most.

 

Thanks for mentioning the cup run.

I begged my dad to take me to the Port Vale game for my first ever match. It was foggy, so he fobbed me off saying they wouldn’t be playing. They did, of course. Come the Cardiff game, he’d no excuse so took me.

Standing on the Ponty right at the front leaning on the perimeter wall, immediately behind the goal. Their goal zipped into the net in front of me, scored by their “Danger Man” - every team had one in those days.

Barrie scored the equaliser at the Kop end, so we couldn’t tell if it was a goal initially.

A true legend of our club. Inevitably, he doesn’t get the recognition of a Redders, Higgy or The King, but his contribution shouldn’t be underestimated.

 

Correction - it was Johnny Evans who scored the equaliser at the kop end against Cardiff. It was in injury time, as it was then called, and I remember George Hamstead racing over to the left wing to take the corner. He whipped it in and Cardiff only half cleared it straight towards Barrie Thomas. He must have got a shout from Johnny Evans, as he let it through his legs to Evans, who was behind him and little Johnny smashed it home. It was the very last kick of the game - they did not even have time to kick off and I remember Evans sprinting back towards the ref with arms outstretched - 'did it count?' or similar. They quickly made the tannoy announcement that the reply would be at Ninian Park and we all went home happy. The Port Vale game was the Dick Hewitt show, playing left half. Vale had a goalie called Stuart Sharratt, who was like a piece of human elastic and made save after save. I hated Vale - they were one of the teams like Halifax Town who came of stuck ten men behind the ball for ninety minutes in the hope of getting a goal on the break, which happened quite a lot. I also remember the controversy over Vale's goal, a free kick about twenty-twenty five yards out and struck home by ex Scotland and Blackpool international, Jackie Mudie. When the ball was in flight, there was whistle and Ray Wood let the ball into the goal (he might not have stopped it anyway). The reds players were incensed and surrounded the ref, but the goal stood. The paper report read: 'Barnsley players were incensed that the goal was allowed to stand, but the reason for their anger was not clear.' Well, it was to me, even if the whistle had come from the crowd. Happy days. Ten thousand there for Southport in round one; fifteen thousand for Port Vale in round two and over twenty thousand for Cardiff in round three, to whom we lost the Ninian Park replay. Ah! I can still smell the woodbines.

 

Lovely post!!

 

Small correction - it was over 11,000 to watch the Southport first round tie. We were up against the league leaders and the Seasiders had a proper battering ram at centre forward in big Jim Fryatt. They would have fancied their chances but the Reds Revival meant that we could beat them comfortably with our new forward pairing leading the way.