information on ex player please - John McGoldrick

[Shaun]

Recently met this friendly old Scottish fella, and he reckons he played some games for Barrow circa 1972/73 at fullback.

Can someone please give any info/stats on this fella - anyone with the old Bible to hand?

[pjdaly]

Shaun, I remember the name John McGoldrick but only somewhat vaguely. In checking the stats he seems to have had a smattering of games for us across a period of a couple of years so perhaps this indicates he played in our reserve team for much of that time? As far as I can see (from gleaning the stats) he played as follows in the first team:

1972-73 (our first season in non-League):
His name seems to have first appeared as a sub for a home match against Bradford PA on 17th March 1973. We lost 0-4 and there is no indication of whether he came off the bench that day for his debut.

Other than that, he played just three matches, all of them away and all near the end of the season in April 1973 (away at Altrincham, Lancaster and Bangor). All three performances were at left full-back (though our usual left full-back that season was the truly unforgettable Stuart Liddell).

1973-74:
McGoldrick then seemed to disappear for the best part of a whole year, with Pete Carthy being our usual left-back in 73-74. However, he then re-emerged for the last four games of 73-74 wearing the number 10 shirt! On 13-4-15 he played in the home match against Runcorn, followed by away matches at Netherfield and Bangor, and finally the home match against Scarborough.

1974-75:
This was the season where McGoldrick made most of his appearances, nine as far as I can see and all at left full-back. This time he didn’t leave it till right at the end of the season to appear! His first appearance in 74-75 came on 23rd November 1974 against Darwen (Lancs Junior Cup) followed by four more consecutive appearances against Bangor, Worksop, Buxton and Matlock. He then disappeared again for a spell but returned on 29th March 1975 for four consecutive performances against South Liverpool, Stafford, Macclesfield and Skelmersdale (believe it or not, four league matches in a row all at Holker Street).

As far as I can make out that’s the lot, but his appearances are so scattered over quite a period of time that I might have missed the odd one.

So now it’s over to you, Shaun, what did he have to say about his time at the club? I wonder, given that he was apparently Scottish, if he was one of the contingent who first arrived here under Peter Kane’s “Scots Drive” in our first season in non-league? A whole horde of Scots descended on Holker Street during our first season in non-League and maybe McGoldrick was one of them? The best ones amongst them were Dave Grant, an imposing centre-half, and James (Jimmy) Logan who was a decent player who could play in a variety of roles. So, is McGoldrick still living in Barrow then after all these years??

[Steelworks End]

Some impressive research there, pjdaly!

I've looked at my away programmes for the 1972-73 season but there is no mention of John McGoldrick in the pen pics or team. That said, they were all for games played before the Bradford PA game you mention so maybe he was a new signing around that time? I didn't go to the three away games in which he seems to have played, or to any away matches in the following two seasons.

I'm not sure that we had a reserves team at that time - weren't they disbanded when (or before) we dropped out of the League?

Like you, I do vaguely remember the name, but as I had moved to London in late 1973 I can't have seen him play more than once or twice. He must have made an impression, either good or not to good!

[Shaun]

pjdaly, that is just fantastic. Thank you.

All he said was he was young when he came here (about 17 I think) and was very homesick (he's from just north of Glasgow) but anyway the then manager talked him into staying around because he really wanted to go back home.
He then only mentioned that he "only played a few times in the first team" so I think you've probably nailed the lot with that research above. A bit of a Google also threw up an old HSN which mentions the Darwen Lancs cup game you mention, and he scored an own goal in a 4-2 home defeat.

Spot on. Thanks again.

[supporter for life]

If he's the John McGoldrick I'm thinking of, there were a few brothers, Tom being another one of them and maybe James but not too sure about that. As far as I know Tom still lives in Barrow and maybe John.Tom frequents the Greengate Club I believe. There's a lad called Jamie McGoldrick who plays locally and he's the son of one of those brothers. I don't think they came to play football but for work iirc. Perhaps someone can confirm or refute this?

[DIXIE]

I think John was an apprentice at Barrow when we lost our league status.

[snowdog71]

Barrow AFC reserves played in the Lancashire League division 1 for the 1972-1973 season and John McGoldrick is named in the Barrow starting line-up for the fixture away to Stockport County 'A' on 3rd February.

[snowdog71]

The Barrow v Bradford Park Avenue programme from the 17th March lists John McGoldrick as the substitute for the game, but there's no mention of him in the next match programme for the Altrincham home game on the 31st March.
Barrow's next fixture was away to Macclesfield Town on the 7th April, and again there's no mention of John McGoldrick, but he is listed as a team change to the starting line-up, appearing at number 3, the traditional Left Full-Back position.
Barrow's next four fixtures were away to Altrincham (9th April), Lancaster City (11th April), Runcorn (14th April) and Bangor City (16th April) and there's definitely no mention of John McGoldrick in either the starting line-up or pen pics in the Runcorn and Bangor City programmes, but these were always subject to change on the day, as my copy of the Macclesfield programme shows.
I can't comment on the Altrincham or Lancaster City programmes as I don't have these.
There's also no mention of John McGoldrick in programmes for the remaining matches all at home to Goole Town (21st April), Scarborough (23rd April) and Stafford Rangers (29th April).

[Shaun]

Some more info related to all of the above, having just had another craic with the guy:

1. Altrincham was indeed his first game.
2. He WAS one of the group of Scots that Peter Kane brought in. ( He was on trial with both Clyde and Hibs prior to this, but nothing concrete.)
3. Tom and James ARE his brothers, AND the younger Jamie is James' son.
4. He arrived 'just as' we were losing our League status, and wasn't an apprentice.

Some good stuff lads, and hopefully some of the above here will answer some of your individual queries.

[Shaun]

...just a bit more:

He's just said that when he (John) came from Scotland, our manager - Peter Kane (Scottish himself) - deliberately omitted to mention that Barrow were about to be kicked out of The Football League. At the time John was pondering over moves to either Barrow or York City, but that Mr Kane talked him into Barrow.

He also said (which we all knew anyway) that the speedway made the corners of the pitch 'a mess' and when I mentioned John Martin (another player for that time) he describes him as 'one of the best players I played with' and also that John Martin's brother, George (a well-known local referee for years) once told him that 'I would have booked yous McGoldricks a hundred times if I knew what yous were saying to me.' Hahaha.

[pjdaly]

There's something there, Shaun, which doesn't add up to me at all, that bit about Peter Kane keeping quiet about Barrow getting kicked out of the FL. Jack Crompton had been in charge for the last 6 months of the 71-72 season and he remained our manager and resigned only when we failed to get re-elected. Crompton added the excuse that he was going to resign anyway but left it till after the votes so as to not rock the boat. This information was plastered all over the infamous Sports Final edition under the heading "Out Of League but Barrow To Fight On". Peter Kane only came in after it was national knowledge that we had failed in our bid to remain in the FL so he can't have been guilty of misleading prospective signings.

As for the corners; my abiding memory was watching another of the gang of Scots, a winger called Bobby Lyall, attempting to take a corner at the Holker Street traffic lights corner. The squares of turf were laid loose on wooden boards and when Lyall tried to take a corner the ball died and only went about five yards and a loose square of turf travelled considerably further. How humiliating was that? I have often thought that even if we had beaten Hereford on the vote and stayed in the FL how long would it have been before we were forcibly ejected from the FL? Even the lowly NPL wanted rid of us and it's hard to disagree when we witnessed fiascos such as the Lyall corner. The ground was wrecked. The pitch was wrecked.

Johnny Martin was a phenomenal player in a pretty bad team and only he can perhaps reason why he didn't become a FL player with the talent he had.

[Shaun]

A young lad though, AND importantly I think, from Scotland. So what might've been 'national' news to us in England might have been trivial or 'non-news' up there? Just a thought. And we're only talking about a bottom tier side after all (as we were then). Perhaps he just assumed he was coming to a league side because he had heard of us as such, and that's what he's talking about.

[greenarmour]

Peter Kane was indeed our first manager after we lost league status, he brought a few scots lads down here...memory fades a bit, Pete Carty, Stuart Liddel dirtiest player i ever saw in a Barrow kit....did a " Cantona" at Skem once after being sent off, and snotted a local whom gave him grief.
Terry Kendall, Big Ernie, and Sid Blain may have better memories than me.

[Steelworks End]

My main memory of Skem is my mate Tony and me being mistaken in the pub near the ground for journalists from the national press.

The only reason I can think of is that we were both behaving like journalists - knocking the ale back.

[Nigel Bamford]

Coincidentally, there was a guy on Beeb4 last night called John McGoldrick in a programme about the history of the railway. He was Curator at York Rail Museum, I think. Not the same fella by any chance, is it Shaun?