1995 – First Division Trophy

Our first silverware of the North West Counties League era

1995 Formby win the NWCFL First Division Trophy

Note: The North West Counties League’s First Division and its trophy were known as the Second Division back in 1995 (and what we now call the Premier was known as the First). To save confusion, throughout this article the divisions are known by their current names.

Britain had traditionally been a land of bitter drinkers; brown ales staying comfortably about 3.5% or 4% alcohol. But throughout the 1970s lager took hold and by the 1980s the higher strength versions made it easy to misjudge your intake and end up making some humiliating behavioural choices.

At 6%, Lamot Pils was one of the main culprits. ‘Seek Out The Lager Of Lamot’ ran the slogan, but most people wisely chose not to. Thankfully, along with many of its equally flavourless contemporaries like Slalom and Hofmeister, Lamot Pils has been consigned to the bottle bank of history.

Indeed we would not remember it at all except that its makers, Bass brewers, were the North West Counties Football League’s sponsors and so the First Division Trophy was, when we won it in April 1995, known as the Lamot Pils Trophy. The League Challenge Cup, being the more prestigious trophy, was named the after a better Bass beer, the Worthington Challenge Trophy.

At the start of the 1994/95 season Formby were an established First Division side, having finished a respectable 10th in the league the previous season. The Squirrels were, however, in the longest barren run in their history. It had been 17 years since 1978’s Liverpool Senior Cup triumph. It was time to lift some more silverware. Although, being a wooden shield, the First Division Trophy was actually more carpentry than silverware. Whatever material, it’s just as good to win it.

The First Division had been reduced to 16 teams so the NWCFL decided on a new format for the Lamot Pils Trophy. Following the format of UEFA’s European Championships, the League opted to go with four groups of four teams.

Formby were drawn in Group D with Cheadle Town, Castleton Gabriels (later known as Rochdale Town) and newcomers to the NWCFL, Daisy Hill. The winners of each group would go through to a two legged semi-final to earn a place in the final at Burscough’s Victoria Park ground.

A Winning Cup Run Starts with Defeat

Given that the winners would play nine games before lifting the trophy, the league wanted to get the competition underway before summer reached its end. And so it was that Cheadle Town came to Brows Lane for the opening home game of the season.

Formby were in confident mood, having finished above Cheadle in the First Division the previous term. However, things were not going to go their way. Russell Brierly opened the scoring for Cheadle on 16 minutes, a lead they were to hold for an hour before Colin Williams equalised for Formby.

Shortly after the goal, Formby’s stalwart midfielder Dave Webster (a different Dave Webster to the one who owned the club in the late noughties!) was sent off for stamping on an opponent, meaning Formby had to see the game out with 10 men. They managed to keep Cheadle at bay until the 89th minute when that man Brierly popped up to score the winning goal.

Losing 2-1 at home to a lowly side hardly seems like the first step on the path to glory, but part of the eternal captivating beauty of football is its relentless unpredictability.

A week later the Squirrels went to Cheadle to exact revenge in another controversial match. Formby’s Colin Beck was no stranger to the scoresheet, having netted four against Irlam Town earlier in the season, and he gave Formby the lead in the first minute.

Midway through the first half the Squirrels were reduced to ten men when Kevin Humphreys was sent off for handball on the line that prevented a certain equaliser. However, Ian Plumbley pulled off a spectacular save from the resulting penalty and Formby were able to see the game out as 1-0 winners.

In early September, Castleton Gabriels were Formby’s next opponents and they secured a comfortable 3-0 win at Brows Lane with goals from Colin Williams and Colin Beck. With the games coming thick and fast, Formby travelled to Daisy Hill and were pleased to come away with a point after a dour, goalless draw.

Next up was the return match with Castleton Gabriels. Formby raced into a two goal lead with strikes from unlikely sources, midfielder Jason Bridge and handballing defender Kevin Humphreys. Castleton pulled one back before half time and grabbed an equaliser with a quarter of an hour left. However Ian McNab, another goalscoring defender, restored Formby’s lead.

Despite ten minutes of added time they were able to hold on and, with this 3-2 away win, take all three points and ignite the hope that just maybe they were serious contenders for the trophy.

With Cheadle’s characteristic famine-or-feast approach, they battered second-placed Castleton 5-0 and so with Formby already through to the semis, the final group game at home to Daisy Hill was a formality. As with the first match at New Sirs, there was little to choose between the teams. Two goals in two minutes late in the game from Jason Bridge and Gary Keenan secured victory for Formby and ensured they topped the group by four points. ‘Trophy Trail’ screamed the headline in that week’s Formby Times.

Semi-final

Moving to the two-legged semi final, Formby’s hearts must have plummeted to see that they were paired with Stantondale, who had won the trophy two seasons earlier. The Squirrels’ fellow Merseysiders had lost only once at their Orrell Lane home and had never been out of the top five in the league.
The first leg took place on 4th February 1995 at Orrell Lane and it only took 30 seconds for Stantondale to make their mark as Vinnie Coonie thundered a shot against the bar. Stantondale kept up the pressure and took a deserved lead on 33 minutes when Bernie Cooper’s shot was deflected past Formby keeper Alistair Pike.

Formby started the second half as quickly as Stantondale started the first. With just 36 seconds gone Jason Bridge shot at Winstanley in the Stantondale goal and he fumbled the save allowing Shaun McIlwaine to poke home the equaliser. Formby became the dominant side and had clearly unsettled Winstanley.

On 64 minutes Mark Fletcher charged down an attempted clearance and ran the ball into an empty net giving Formby a 2-1 lead which they were able to hold on to. This shock result was not just a win but also gave the Squirrels an advantage on away goals that was to prove vital.

The second leg at Brows Lane was a tense, bad tempered affair. Billy O’Callaghan gave Stantondale the lead on 39 minutes, meaning the tie was balanced at 2-2. Both sides had a player sent off in the second half but neither could find a way through the other’s defence. With the aggregate score level at full time, the teams endured 30 minutes of extra time. Again both defences proved impenetrable, so Formby progressed to the final on away goals.

Stantondale, sadly, were poised on a turning point in their history. The following two seasons brought mid-table results and, on losing their Orrell Lane ground in Bootle, they shared Brows Lane with Formby for two seasons before eventually dropping out of the NWCFL and folding.

The Final

Second Division leaders Flixton had come through the other half of the draw and were to be Formby’s opponents in the final. They were Premier Division tenants on a one-season drop to the First Division. They were to be runaway winners of the division and would not only win promotion, but the following season they would win the Premier Division title too. Having vanquished Stantondale, surely Formby couldn’t kill two giants on the trot. Could they?

The Squirrels were not daunted. They prepared properly and treated the occasion as a cup final should be, travelling together on a team coach to the ground despite it only being in Burscough. Flixton however, arrived late, were slightly cocky in their response and waltzed in. Formby had been given the smaller away changing room which only acted as greater motivation to prove their point.

In the game itself, the crowd of 318 were treated to a proper thrilling cup final in which Formby dominated from start to finish. Five minutes in Shaun McIlwaine scored for Formby only to see it ruled out for offside. But we didn’t have long to wait.

With barely quarter of an hour on the clock, midfielder Steve Byrne scored an outrageous goal with a speculative shot from around the half way line which got deflected and sailed over Flixton keeper Kurt Edgington into the net, only hitting the back stanchion and bouncing out. The referee and liner were so far away they couldn’t see it clearly (although the rest of the crowd did, including Edgington!)

Flixton fought back, a shot hitting the post and bouncing off Squirrels’ keeper Ian Plumbley before going out, but Formby went in to the dressing room at half time with their 1-0 lead intact.

Peter Lowe had been Formby’s top scorer in the 1990/91 season and after a long spell out through injury he was back in 1994/95, though without a return to the tremendous goal scoring form of yore. He hit when it counted though. Just past the one hour mark Colin Beck swung a corner in and Lowe rose to head it home and give Formby a 2-0 lead.

With Formby all over Flixton throughout the game the score could easily have been higher but keeping a clean sheet for 90 minutes was a huge achievement. Flixton’s Ged Manning pulled back a consolation goal in stoppage time to make it 2-1, but when the final whistle blew that narrowest of margins was all that was needed to see the Squirrels lift their first trophy in nearly two decades.

– Adrian Cork

Thanks to Paul Lawler for sharing his memories of the final for this article.