Looking Back.....Season 1994/95

Recounting another past Southern League campaign.

This was Hednesford Town`s year!

Just eleven seasons after joining the Southern League from the West Midlands (Regional) League and three seasons as a Premier Division side, the Pitmen won the title and promotion to the Football Conference.

And how well they did the following year! Finishing third behind champions Stevenage Borough and second-placed Woking!

John Baldwin`s men topped the table on October 24th after a hat-trick from Joe O`Connor helped them to a 5-0 thrashing of Solihull Borough and never really looked back after that.

Much of Hednesford`s success was down to their fearsome attack of O`Connor, veteran Steve Burr and the pacey Henry Wright.

O`Connor notched 44 league and cup goals in 1994/95, Burr pitched in with 24 and Wright 22.

Hednesford also celebrated receiving the massive Southern League shield by playing their final game at their Cross Keys ground on April 29th when 2,776 saw a 3-0 win against Leek Town with goals from Burr (left), centre-back Steve Essex and midfielder Gary Fitzpatrick.

They would begin life at the top of the non-League Pyramid at their new Keys Park stadium.

A tremendous run of six wins and a draw in April saw the Pitmen eventually cruise to the title by a seven-point margin.

That left Cheltenham Town licking their wounds again as, for the third consecutive season, they finished second!

And the Robins would have gained little comfort from the fact that their points tally and goal difference record would have won them the title in each of the previous two campaigns!

John Barton`s Burton Albion, who started in indifferent form with just two wins from the opening seven games, finished on a high with just one defeat in their final nineteen matches to end up in third spot ahead of Gloucester City.

The Tigers under John Murphy again promised much, but the club underwent major off-the-field changes during the year.

It was a bad campaign for Corby Town, Trowbridge Town, Sittingbourne and Solihull Borough, who were all relegated from the Premier Division.

The Steelmen had a particularly poor season, winning only four times in 42 league matches and conceding 113 goals.

Salisbury City – second two years earlier and fourth in 94/95, eventually got their hands on the South Division championship.

Although the Whites won more league games than any other team in the whole of the competition, such was the intensity of the challenge from Baldock Town that City still needed a final day 3-1 victory at home to Wealdstone, with Ian Chalk bagging a brace, to clinch the title as Baldock hammered Margate 4-0.

They may argue that the sale of striker Kevin Phillips to Watford in December 1994 for an initial £10,000, plus four additional payments of £5,000 cost them the title.

However, the Hertfordshire outfit still scored more goals (92) than Salisbury but conceded seven more than Geoff Butler`s side.

Baldock did go up to the Premier Division to spend two struggling seasons at the highest level they had ever attained.

Havant Town`s challenge faded in the final weeks of the season and finished third but their neighbours Waterlooville will have been extremely disappointed as they led the table up until February 4th and squandered a lead that extended to 11 points at some stages before finishing fourth.

What a season for Ashford Town supporters though!

Under current Folkestone Invicta boss Neil Cugley, the Nuts & Bolts reached the First Round of the FA Cup where they met and held Fulham to a 2-2 draw at their new Homelands ground in front of 3,363.

Ashford led 2-0 with goals from Dave Arter and Nicky Dent before two penalties in the final 9 minutes from Micky Adams rescued the Cottagers.

The replay at Craven Cottage was no less thrilling as a dramatic solo equaliser 2 minutes from the end of normal time by Mark Stanton sent Ashford fans into ecstasy.

Earlier goals from Stanton and Dent had pulled the Kent side back into contention after Fulham had been coasting having compiled a 2-0 lead by the 20th minute through Simon Morgan and Adams.

Adams made it 3-2 in the 87th minute and then Stanton`s heroics earned extra-time.

However, the last Southern League representatives in the competition bowed out in the extra half-hour with Mark Blake and Alan Cork making the final score 5-3.

But to say Ashford`s league form was `inconsistent` would be an understatement!

They scored 106 goals – 14 more than any other team in the division – but conceded a whopping 72 – only 7 more than third-bottom Poole Town and double Waterlooville`s tally!

In the Midland Division, Newport AFC`s rise took another upward step as they completed their fifth season as a Southern League club by winning the title and promotion to the Premier Division.

Despite AFC having the distraction of fighting a High Court action against the FA of Wales for restraint of trade.

The Exiles moved to the top of the table on December 3rd and never looked back.

Ceri Williams`s goals – 36 in league and cup – helped them to notch 106 in their 42 league games and a gap of 14 points between them and second-placed Ilkeston Town who had a league season similar to Ashford`s in netting 101 goals, whilst conceding 75!

Newport also created a record by winning fourteen successive away games, but their main battle was off-the-field and, after imposing a provisional suspension on the club and a two-year ban on the club`s officials, FIFA insisted they must join the League of Wales by July 1997.

They never did, of course, and, after an unhappy two-year stay in the Southern Premier Division, returned to the South section and then the Midland Division, where, under the name again of Newport County, they won their place back in the Premier and eventually back to the Football League in 2013/14.

Thanks largely to an incredible goal tally of 51 goals in all competitions in 1994/95, it looked as though Moor Green were going to be Newport`s main challengers for the title.

They led the table for a large part of the season but Bob Faulkner`s side, who scored 105 goals, looked odds on a rapid return to the Premier Division.

However, a disastrous spell saw them slide down the table to fourth place behind Tamworth and newcomers Ilkeston Town.

Ilkeston, who had a two-year spell in the Southern League Division One North back in 1971 to 1973, returned after winning the West Midlands (Regional) League in 1993/94.

They had a good run in the FA Trophy, reaching the Third Round where they went out to Conference side Kidderminster Harriers after a replay. But that gave them a backlog of league fixtures which, in the end, they weren`t able to cope with.

Tamworth finished third but one of their players, striker Julian Alsop, did manage to get his name into the Guinness Book of Records!

Alsop (left) was called into the Lambs` team as a late replacement for the game against neighbours Armitage `90 on February 18th.

And he smashed a hat-trick in under 2 minutes between the 11th and 13th minutes!

Alsop went on to make over 250 League appearances for the likes of Cheltenham Town, Oxford United and Swansea City.

Armitage were relegated at the end of the season and in fact folded during the next season as a Midland Alliance outfit.

Wealdstone were switched to the Isthmian League from the Southern section for the following season and the league welcomed Cinderford Town, Fleet Town and Paget Rangers, who all came up from the feeder leagues.