“FC Twente have just won the Eerste Divisie (Dutch second tier) less than 10 years after their 2010 Eredivisie title. Is this the shortest time between a team winning a top-flight league and a second-tier title in that order?” wonders Alex Guttenplan. “Teams demoted (eg Juventus) don’t count.”
Strap in for plenty of examples. In fact, so many that it’s time to break out the bullet points:
Eight seasons: Manchester United won Division One in 1966-67, Division Two in 1974-75 (also winning the European Cup in 1968).
Six seasons: Atlético Madrid won the Primera División in 1995-96, the Segunda in 2001-02; Kaiserslautern won the Bundesliga in 1990-91, Bundesliga 2 in 1996-97 (and for good measure the Bundesliga again in 1997-98); Dundalk won the League of Ireland Premier Division in 1994-95, the First Division in 2000-01.
Four seasons: Liverpool won Division One in 1900-01, Division Two in 1904-05; Milan won Serie A in 1978-79, Serie B in 1982-83; Stade de Reims won Ligue 1 in 1961-62, then Ligue 2 in 1965-66.
Three seasons: Manchester City won Division One in 1936-37, Division Two in 1946-47 (with the break from 1939-46); Everton won Division One in 1927-28, Division Two in 1930-31; Herfølge BK won the Danish Superliga in 1999-2000, First Division in 2002-03;
Two seasons: Entente Plastique de Sétif won the Algerian Championnat National Division 1 in 1986-87, the Algerian Championnat National Division 2 in 1988-89 (they also won the CAF Champions Cup in the season they got relegated, 1987-88); Universidad Católica won the Chilean Primera Division in 1954, the Segunda Division in 1956; B71 won the Faroe Islands Premier League in 1989 (the season after winning promotion), the Faroe Islands 1. Deild in 1991; FC Haka won the Veikkausliiga in 1995, the Ykkönen in 1997.
As a post-script Liam McGuigan, who pointed out many of the two-season wonders, adds: “To beat that, you’d need to get relegated in the same season you win the league, then win the second tier right after. This almost happened to the Bolivian side Jorge Westermann, thanks to the Apertura-Clausura system used in many South American leagues. In 2010, they won the Apertura title, but got relegated after the Clausura based on their total points tally over the previous two years. In the 2011-12 National B, they reached the final four-team group to decide the title, but missed out by a point on the title, settling for promotion via the play-offs.”
Thanks, in no particular order, to Garry Brogden, Michael Haughey, Will Dawson, Russell Connor, Tom Aldous, Adam Webster, Jonas Neivelt and Opeyami Ajala.
Strange donations
“After Leeds v Villa, what is the weirdest reason for clearly giving an opposition team a goal?” mails Nicola Haughton.
Graeme Thorne suggests Paul Smith (then Forest goalkeeper) scoring “against Leicester in the 2007 League Cup after 15 seconds, in a rearranged match. The first was abandoned with Forest 1-0 up after Clive Clarke collapsed at half-time. Leicester felt Forest shouldn’t be penalised for the abandonment, so allowed them to score.”
Rit Nanda mentions a game in 2015, when Bury goalkeeper Christian Walton kicked the ball out for a throw after an injury, but when a Doncaster player tried to return it the ball accidentally went in. Doncaster manager Paul Dickov insisted that Bury’s Leon Clarke was allowed to walk the ball in to equalise.
This is incredible (part 2/2)#Doncaster #Bury pic.twitter.com/hbi5xGYG06
— IDontLikeSpurs (@IDontLikeSpurs) August 8, 2015
And finally, here’s Paul Fulcher: “Steve McMahon scoring a deliberate own goal at the start of England v Sardinia XI in a friendly prior to the 1990 World Cup has to be up there. It was intended to be a symbolic gesture to represent the ‘own goal’ that England fans would inflict if they engaged in hooliganism during the tournament, but instead left everyone rather bemused. The stunt had been explained to the press but not to the watching fans.”
What’s the difference?
“In this season’s Scottish Highland League the bottom club, Fort William, ended up with a goal difference of -224,” writes Allan Bremner. “In the course of the 34-game season they shipped 245 goals and scored 21 – that’s an average of just over seven goals against in each game. What is the worst goal difference a team have had at the end of a season? And, what is the biggest difference between a top team’s goal difference and that of the bottom team? The top team, Cove Rangers, had a goal difference of 88 making the difference between top and bottom 312 goals.”
Harry Shave is deep in the weeds: “According to rsssf.com, in the 1995-96 season of the Belgian 4th Provincial league A, Antwerpen (eighth level – the lowest tier), SSA Antwerpen finished with a -259 goal difference, conceding 271 and only scoring 12 in a 30-game season. Conversely, Meer won that division with a +85 goal difference (aided by a 20-0 victory over SSA Antwerpen in the final game) for a total difference between the top and bottom teams of 344.”
Knowledge archive
“With Madrid having a team in each European final,” wrote Josh McGarry, one year ago, “I wondered if both trophies have been won by teams from the same city in the same season before?”
In 1994 Milan was the place to be, with Fabio Capello’s side having won the Champions League by getting the better of Johan Cruyff’s Barcelona, while across town Internazionale beat the admittedly less glitzy Casino Salzburg to lift the Uefa Cup. If we throw the sadly departed Cup Winners’ Cup into the mix, no two teams from the same city have ever won that and one of the others in the same season, but if we spool back to 1989-90 then all three resided in northern Italy: Milan held the big pot, Sampdoria won the Cup Winners’ Cup and Juventus beat Fiorentina in the final of the Uefa Cup.
• For thousands more questions and answers look through our archive.
Can you help?
“Liverpool could end with a nine-game winning run and not win the Premier League; what are the longest season-ending winning runs by a team that didn’t finish in first place?” asks Derek McHugh.
“What is the highest number of points a team have scored after their relegation has been mathematically confirmed?” ponders Russell Goodwin.
Norwich won the league this season despite missing 6 out of the 7 penalties they were awarded - has a title winning side ever had a worse record?
— Nat (@Antiisocialites) May 7, 2019
“Of the 15 points Huddersfield have accrued, six have come courtesy of Wolves,” begins Philip Rebbeck. “If the Terriers lose at Southampton that will mean 40% of their season’s tally will have come from one opponent; even if they win the figure will be 33%. Has something comparable happened before?”
“What is the earliest goal scored in a league season that went on to win goal of the season?” wonders Tom Kingsbury. “Similarly for individual club goal of the season winners, has there been a winner from the first goal/match?”
@oilysailor @TheKnowledge_GU Has a goalkeeper ever taken a corner in a competitive match?
— Tim Berry (@timplified) May 7, 2019
“Bury were promoted for the second time in four years at Prenton Park,” writes David Triggs. Has there been a shorter gap between promotions at the same away ground for the same team?” Also: which team has won most promotions at a specific away ground?
Hi, @TheKnowledge_GU; a question for your column. Arsenal are out of the race for the top four, barring "a freakish swing in goal difference", but what's the most freakish swing in goal difference on the final day of a season that has affected a relegation/promotion/title issue?
— Alastair Horne (@pressfuturist) May 5, 2019
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