Premier League Pool: How The Gazette reported Blackpool's magnificent promotion 10 years ago today

For the past two months we’ve been retelling the story day by day of Blackpool’s promotion to the Premier League 10 years ago.
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Jimmy Armfield and Ian Holloway's parting messages before Blackpool set off for ...

Here’s STEVE CANAVAN’S Gazette report from Wembley on the greatest achievement in the club’s recent history.

It’s May 22, 2060. A bloke with a microphone stands in the sponsors lounge of the Charlie Adam Stand and shouts: “Ladies and gentleman, please welcome onto the stage, the Blackpool squad who won promotion to the Premier League exactly 50 years ago!”

The Seasiders celebrate the club's return to top-flight football after 39 years awayThe Seasiders celebrate the club's return to top-flight football after 39 years away
The Seasiders celebrate the club's return to top-flight football after 39 years away
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A group of doddery old fellas step forward to rapturous applause. But the biggest cheer of all is for the man coming in last, Ian Holloway, as he totters forward and waves to the adoring public.

He’ll be 97 then but will no doubt grab the mic, rattle off a few oneliners and leave everyone in stitches. Make no mistake, for those still around it will happen.

For this manager, these players, this day, will go down as one of the greatest the club has ever experienced.

We’re lucky to be here, witnessing history being made. Blackpool, a small seaside resort in northern England (as the radio commentator sitting behind me so patronisingly put it), are heading to Stamford Bridge, the Emirates and Old Trafford.

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And this most glorious of promotions, achieved against all the odds, isn’t just a wonderful, beautiful moment for the people of the Fylde – it is a much-needed triumph for the world of football.

It is proof that in this depressing era when money speaks loudest and the weak keep getting weaker, the rich richer, the mould can still occasionally be broken, David can still whack Goliath on the chin and knock him cold.

Words can’t describe how Blackpool fans are feeling today. Their club is in The Premier League. They’ve found the Holy Grail.

It is what every single fan of a lower league club dreams of but never believes will actually happen.

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The Seasiders were hammered 7-0 by Barnet less than a decade ago for heaven’s sake. You name me one Blackpool supporter back then who thought they’d be in the top flight now.

When Valeri Belokon appeared from Latvia, waving a bit of money and uttering statements about being in the Premier League in five years, he was almost drowned out by the howls of laughter. He’s done it in four.

The present team and their terrific manager Ian Holloway, who has changed the entire mindset and fortunes of the club, better keep their diaries free for the next 50 years for they will be invited to dinners and anniversaries galore.

Savour this thought when you watch the World Cup in the summer: about a third of those superstars on the TV screen will be heading up the M55 from August onwards. It’s frightening, but oh so marvellous.

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Alan Hansen will be making caustic remarks about the Seasiders’ offside trap every week on Match of the Day.

We’ll have to go to games on a Sunday lunchtime or a Monday night.

It is a return to the top-flight for the first time since 1971, when petrol cost 33p a gallon and no-one had heard of the mobile phone ( now those really were the days…).

Blackpool’s last game in the top division was against Manchester United. It was Jimmy Armfield’s nal match before retiring and he was given a guard of honour by both teams.

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Blackpool boss Bob Stokoe said afterwards: “It’s disappointing to be relegated but we’ll be back”. Well, the late Mr Stokoe was correct, though he probably didn’t envisage it would take 39 years for this proud club to become one of the big boys once again.

Bloomfield Road will be full to the rafters every week and Pool need to get the East Stand built sharpish to capitalise on the interest.

How the players deserve the plaudits for the season that was. They are all cracking, down-to-earth lads and that has been crucial in the club’s rise. They work hard for each other and never give in.

Just look at the last three matches: they came from behind in each game, semi-final and final, to win promotion.

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Holloway will never have to buy a drink in Blackpool again. No-one would complain if they renamed the Tower after him.

The simple truth is he has done a quite magnificent job, rethinking and refining his approach after a year out of the game and turning Pool into a potent, attacking force.

Pool have been reborn under Holloway but he couldn’t have done it without his trusted number two Steve Thompson, long-serving physio Phil Horner and goalkeeping coach Peter Fox.

Mind you, we could quite easily be recounting a sob story here for there wasn’t too much in a Wembley final which ebbed and flowed at an astonishing rate, especially during a frantic firrst half when it rained goals.

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Nine minutes in, Michael Chopra buried a low, right-footed shot past Matt Gilks after Peter Whittingham’s pass caught Pool’s defence napping.

Charlie Adam levelled on 23 minutes, curling a splendid free-kick into the corner from distance. It fizzed into the goal.

David Marshall didn’t have a chance and neither would any Premier League keeper, which bodes well.

Cardiff went ahead again on 37 minutes, Joe Ledley exchanging passes with Whittingham and sliding the ball past Gilks, the Pool keeper perhaps getting his angles slightly wrong. However, he will rightly ask where the defence in front of him disappeared to.

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But no matter: the wonderful way Blackpool play, they simply back themselves to score more.

Five minutes before the break, Ian Evatt’s spectacular shot from a corner was cleared off the line by Mark Kennedy but Gary Taylor-Fletcher bravely stuck his head on the ball and nodded in from close range.

It was just reward for hitting the post moments earlier.

And then the winner. On the stroke of half-time, DJ Campbell showed some wonderful skill and control on the edge of the area, the ball eventually ran for Brett Ormerod and he poked the ball through Marshall’s legs.

How wonderfully appropriate that it was Ormerod who scored nine years after firing the fourth in the Seasiders’ 4-2 League Two play-off final win over Leyton Orient.

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Cardiff had a goal correctly disallowed for offside moments later and Chopra hit the woodwork for a second time after the interval.

But Pool, despite getting understandably twitchy the longer the contest went, held firm to become the first club ever to win promotion from the bottom to the top divisions via three play-off triumphs.

They now become the 44th team to play in the Premier League since it began in 1992.

And there in the stand, watching it all unfold, was Jimmy Armfield.

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Was that a tear in his eye at the end? It looked like it and who can blame him? Many a grown man will have shed tears of joy at this result. Bring on Chelsea and Man U.

Embrace next season rather than fear it. It’s going to be an absolute blast, whatever happens.