Donny, Donny, Donny

On Tuesday 1st April, after 3,682 days, game 27 became 28 when I finally saw Doncaster Rovers play at home again. This is no April’s Fool, merely an acknowledgement that for largely ten years of my life I had given up on travels south, and indeed north to my beloved Inverness too, who had only been seen a handful of times at home in that period as well. Relief from my carer duties wouldn’t see me looking at the fixtures in England or the Highlands either. Instead, I would be planning my next sojourn to Bella Italia.

One last bastion of my earlier life that has also run over the 3,650 day mark without visiting are my trips to South America. From 1999 to 2011, I went every year, sometimes twice, and while a 4 year hiatus then popped up, none of my friends in Buenos Aires would have imagined that 2015 was my last trip down that way. I racked up more than 70 games in Argentina and Uruguay long before it became a thing. However, although it isn’t such an amazing watch now, as games without away fans are dull in comparison. 

It has hardly been a wasted decade, on the contrary, I wouldn’t have missed a minute of it. Yes, priorities changed, but I have no regrets. It has taken me a few months to get my head around the idea that I am now totally free. Losing both my mother and my partner last year drained me, but in a twisted version, “I got knocked down, but I got up again” seems appropriate, and returning to Doncaster felt like a long overdue rite of passage on that journey.

In order to make the occasion a little more special, I decided to forego the Travelodge very close to the stadium, and push the boat out to stay at the Hilton Garden, which forms part of the vast buildings at Doncaster Racecourse. I even paid a wee bit more so that I could have a room with a view of the course. I have never been to horse racing, and I may never go, but waking up to see a quiet paddock and home straight at such a venue will be both surreal and pleasant. The race course is the home to the famous St Ledger race, when this arena doubtlessly comes alive ever September.

Doncaster race track is literally across the road from where it all started, Belle Vue. I went to my first match here in November 2002 when Donny hosted Hereford United in the now named National League. I have no idea why it took me so long to adopt an English team, and in time honoured fashion with me, it took a TV news story about the demise of the club in 1998 to spark interest. The fans were carrying a coffin around the streets, essentially waving goodbye to their club. Having been going for nearly 120 years, they thought the end was nigh. 

Belle Vue was a ramshackle, down at heel venue. The club had no money, its previous owner had tried to get his money back by purposely setting fire to the stand to claim insurance. His ploy was rumbled, and with him to an extent went the fortunes of Doncaster Rovers, who after an awful set of results waved goodbye to league football with a 0-1 loss to Colchester United in May 1998, when a larger than any other crowd that season, 3,572 came to watch them put out of their misery.   

It is extraordinary to look at the foot of League Division Three as it was that season, with Rovers 15 points adrift, but the next club was Brighton & Hove Albion, with Hull City, Swansea City and Cardiff City just above them! How times have changed, but Brighton were in a state of upheaval themselves, where by curious coincidence, the season before Doncaster played the Seagulls in their last ever game at the Goldstone Ground in Hove. It was an occasion that forged a bond between the two sets of fans. I quite like that, especially as my first ever match in England was at the Goldstone Ground in the ‘80’s. 

My initially interest was piqued by that news story, but pleasingly a white knight in the form of John Ryan was persuaded to get involved, and his business acumen and a band of experienced players, including Neville Southall and Stevie Nicol, get a team together by the skin of their teeth to participate in the Conference the following season. The unlikely surroundings of Dover Athletic is where Doncaster first sampled non-league football. Just playing again was all that mattered, and it was largely a struggle that first season. They avoided going any further down, which was important, and by 2002/03, something was brewing under the guidance of Dave Penney. It was time to get involved, and head for Doncaster. 

The Viking on the Rovers badge was partly another reason for my support. My nordic roots were certainly drawn to that aspect, although this is a Yorkshire club through and through. Poking fun at Middlesbrough for not being Yorkshire any more at a Championship match I attended years later certainly opened wounds, and saw some fisty cuffs outside the Riverside after that clash, but I am getting ahead of myself. Indeed, while in the realm of badges and odd quirks, a few years ago, an historian discovered that Doncaster had never been officially signed back to England following occupation way back in the day by William Wallace and his marauding Scots army. Here might have been a point of humour, even a tourist attraction, trading off this hilarious notion of Scotland in England, but as I said before, this is Yorkshire and that goes above anything else in these proud parts. 

A local non-league side, Doncaster City did seek to utilise this historical lack of paperwork to participate in the Scottish Cup. Nothing has come of it so far, but I hope they are still knocking on the Scottish football authorities door as wee quirks like this deserve to be celebrated. In a world where money is ruining our game, something like this would be re-assuring and worthy news. Wick Academy versus Doncaster City, bring it on.

The main event in Doncaster, the Rovers, are rightly part of the fabric of the English game. I was blown away by the atmosphere at Belle Vue on my first visit. They comfortably ran out 2-0 winners versus Hereford to maintain their place near the top of the league. Yeovil would become the runaway winners, promoted to the Football League for the first time, but this was the inaugural season when play offs were introduced and interest was held with second to fifth place all getting involved. 

I didn’t necessarily badly time my second visit for April 2003, but by then visitors Morecambe and Donny were already confirmed in the playoffs, with both playing a little within themselves (drawing 1-1, and avoiding each other by finishing second and third) ahead of imminent double headers versus Chester for Rovers and Dagenham & Redbridge for Morecambe. Many of these matches were televised, and they were tighter than anyone could have envisaged. Both ties would go to penalty kicks with Donny and the Daggers coming out on top, headed to Stoke for the final. Even that was a close run affair, but penalty kicks were spared when, despite blowing a two goal lead, Francis Tierney blasted home a golden goal winner ten minutes from the end of extra-time. After four years out of the Football League, Doncaster were back where they belonged, and a town that once mourned the impending loss of its club, were all on board.

I was quicker off the mark to visit in the first season back in Division Three, with a Bank Holiday Monday fixture at the end of August versus Huddersfield Town, a fellow Yorkshire side, with a huge following. This one would end 1-1, but what was quite an odd circumstance, on the very same holiday Monday of 2004 and 2005, Huddersfield would be the visitors to Belle Vue as well, with Rovers winning 3-1 the following season, and losing 2-1 the year after that. I would witness all three, even if I have never seen Huddersfield play since.

The impetus and momentum of the playoff win saw Doncaster in sensational form in 2003/04, and I watched them thrash Bristol Rovers 5-1, a side that would feature in our story further down the line when silverware was on roster. By April 2004 it seemed as though Doncaster were going to skip through Division Three, and an odd set of results ahead of Easter meant that victory on Easter Monday versus Cambridge United would see them promoted automatically. The club didn’t have time to implement tickets, and so I made sure I was at the ground more than an hour before kick off. The small band of U’s fans would be housed in a section of the stand, leaving the away end open for home fans. I watched my only game from that end that day, and felt sorry for those who ultimately were unable to get in as the gates closed when the stadium was full. Doncaster didn’t disappoint, putting on a show. They clinched promotion amid spectacular scenes of joy. The old stadium had seen the worst of times just 6 years earlier, and now they were headed for the third tier. Rovers would be confirmed as Champions, stepping up with Hull City and Torquay United, while Huddersfield made sure the Bank Holiday Monday fixture would still be available by coming through the play offs. These were days to remember. 

Having been promoted two seasons on the spin, without the money at the disposal of some who are currently climbing through the leagues, meant an upper mid-table finish in 2004/05 was probably just what was needed. Dave Penney was always obsessed with getting 50 points on the board as quickly as possible to ensure safety. They managed 66 and a 10th place finish, very respectable indeed, but Torquay, who had also come up would be unlucky to be going straight back down having accumulated 51 points. The Devon side would find it harder and harder to stop a slow slide, as did another relegated side that term, Wrexham, but for them, times they are a changing. 

The following season, the last of the great trio of Bank Holiday Monday derby matches with Huddersfield, saw Donny rise to 8th with 2 more points than the previous season, in the upper half along with Nottingham Forest and Bristol City, who both missed out on promotion playoffs too. Remarkably, 2005/06 saw Southend and Colchester head automatically to the Championship!

For 2006/07, the last half season at Belle Vue for the club would see me make my last of 12 trips to the grand old lady for a match versus Oldham Athletic in October 2006 ending 1-1. Nottingham Forest would have the honour of playing the last ever game at the stadium. Just two days before Christmas, Theo Streete would be the unlikely scorer of the last ever goal here, as Rovers beat Forest 1-0. Donny would go on to finish 11th, with 5 points less than the previous term, but the change of venue midseason saw the more expansive Keepmoat pitch requiring a bit of getting used to. The Keepmoat was inaugurated on January 1st, when those old foes Huddersfield came to town again. The opening game was another success for Rovers with a thumping 3-0 win. Alas, the season would simper out into mid-table. Curiously, Scunthorpe United would be Champions, heading for the second tier, who like Southend before them, looking back, these were remarkable highs.

The new stadium would bring with it a serious upturn in fortunes the following term. Having steadied the ship in League One, Dave Penney who had stepped aside before the stadium move, went to Darlington, letting fresh blood see if they could take the club higher. He had remained loyal to a small knot of players, but a new boss and a fresh broom, it brought some new, exciting players to the club that aided the likes of James Coppinger, who will forever be Mr Doncaster Rovers. Andy Warrington was replaced in goal by ex Scottish International Neil Sullivan, James Hayter and Richie Welens became the midfield dynamos, with Paul Heffernan always getting amongst the goals. Sean O’Driscoll would be the man at the helm, and under his guidance for the next five years, he took Rovers on a journey that no one could have envisaged when they played at Dover in August 1998. 

By way of a portent of things to come, Sean oversaw Donny’s first cup success, beating Bristol Rovers in the Johnstone Paint Trophy Final, curiously on 1st April 2007, at Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium with Wembley still out of commission. In a mirror image of the return to league football playoff versus Dagenham, Donny coughed up a comfortable two goal lead as the magnificently backed Gasheads from just over the Severn Bridge forced extra-time. Rovers found a winner versus the Daggers 20 minutes into the additional 30, and exactly at the same moment here, Graeme Lee sparked delirium amongst the red and white army to win a thriller 3-2. My mate Martin and I had a long trek north afterwards, although we powered on up the M6, where a service station employee was aghast to discover, courtesy of my Donny shirt, that only hours earlier we’d witnessed the great event.

League One in 2007/08 was full of huge clubs. Nottingham Forest were at their third attempt to get out of this level, Brighton were starting to recover, while Leeds were looking to bounce back immediately. I would make it to five matches at the new stadium that season, with my debut a 2-0 win over Crewe Alexandra, 2-0. They would beat Orient 4-2, Port Vale 2-1 and Swindon 2-0 as they tried to close down on second place, while I was present, failing once again to get the better of Oldham in another 1-1 draw. 

Swansea and Forest ultimately won automatic promotion, but Donny finished third, just two points away from going up without any additional games. Having thrashed Southend 5-1 in the second leg of the playoff semi-final, for an aggregate win of that score, they headed to Wembley to play the mother of all finals against Leeds United. With more than 75,000 Yorkshire folk in attendance, a second half header from James Hayter won it for Doncaster. They were going to the Championship for the first ever time, and the first time in the second level of English football for 50 years! What a reward for John Ryan, who might have been a reluctant participant right at the start, but he soon caught the bug and relished watching his team take another huge step up. 

Doncaster more than held their own in 2008/09 in the Championship, finishing 14th with 58 points. Norwich City and Southampton would both be heading down. My second tier debut with Doncaster was an away tie at Middlesbrough, a match alluded to previously, where the ex-Yorkshiremen got the last laugh winning 2-0. Sometimes the second season gig can prove tricky, but since 1998, Rovers had built sensibly through gradual stepping stones, and finishing 12th with 60 points at such a lofty level was proof that they could not only hold their own, but compete in the Championship. Sheffield Wednesday would be the next big casualty to drop, while Leeds still hadn’t managed to find a way back from League One.

For some reason I hadn’t been at any game the previous season, perhaps courtesy of Inverness going on a bit of journey that would take us to the Scottish Premiership, but in 2010/11, I was back for a trio of home games as the club started showing signs of a struggle. Reading and Cardiff had both left the Keepmoat with fine wins, and by the time Good Friday came around, kean to fill the stadium, at short notice the club announced entry for a pound for the game versus Crystal Palace. I was lucky to have arrived early enough to see the ticket office take pity on someone who had travelled so far, and I was given one of the last remaining “standby” briefs. The atmosphere was electric, if the game wasn’t, a nervy affair, which ended 0-0, with both just above the drop zone. In the end, Rovers would finish 4th bottom, to Palace in 5th last slot, while Preston and Sheffield United amongst others were 6 points worse off and going down. Rovers were going to have a fourth straight Championship campaign! 

The struggles the previous season continued and Sean was relieved of his duties in September 2011 to be replaced by Dean Saunders. I headed south three times that season again to cheer them on. A fine December win over Southampton gave us hope, but a 1-1 draw with Brighton wasn’t enough, with Millwall’s 3-0 win less than three weeks later almost whistling us off the bridge. We would finish last, 12 points from safety, going down with Coventry and Portsmouth.

The drop was merely to be a once season affair, although in October when Preston won 3-1 at the Keepmoat, I hadn’t envisaged what dramatic things were going to unfold in 2012/13. My second trip at Easter saw us right in the mix however when we narrowly beat Swindon 1-0. How the season ended will live in the folklore of Doncaster forever. Before a ball was kicked on the last day, Doncaster led on 81 points from Bournemouth on 80, and Brentford on 79. The last day fixtures had seen us travel to Griffin Park to take on the Bees. A tense affair was played out as you could imagine, but in the last minute when Brentford were awarded a penalty with the game level, things looked ominous. We could have dropped from first to third, and require the playoffs once more. As it was, we hadn’t reckoned on the Brentford of this era, largely always being the bridesmaid and finding new and exciting ways of not going to the Championship. That day, they found the most dramatic way ever to blow it. The solidly struck penalty smashed against the crossbar and cleared the first line of players lined up for any rebound. The ball broke to James Coppinger, it could only be James, and he broke away with Bees buzzing in his wake to score a 94th minute winner to not only seal promotion, but also the League One title! Brentford couldn’t recover in the playoffs, and Yeovil, who had come into the FL with Doncaster in 2003, were promoted to the second tier, ten years on. 

There would be no stabilising in the Championship this time, while it was largely a struggle, it would ultimately only be goal difference that sent Rovers back down, with Birmingham clinging on. It had been a step too far for Yeovil who finished bottom, with Barnsley also dropping. My solitary visit was for another home Easter fixture versus Derby County, but they had designs on going back to the top table and it proved a tricky 0-2 loss.

Back in League One the next season, there would be no magic wand this time around, finishing 13th with 61 points. My last Rovers match, not that I knew it at the time, was a March 2015 loss to Posh. The clubs gradual decline continued in ‘15/16, finishing 4th bottom and headed back to League Two for the first time in over a decade. It was a one season drop, just as it had been when first relegated from the Championship. There would be no dramatic crossbar hit to clinch promotion this time, comfortably third behind Portsmouth and Plymouth to step up once more. While they held their own the following season with a mid-table finish, in 2018/19, they were desperately unlucky not to progress to the promotion playoff final, after a stirring 3-2 win at The Valley versus Charlton, having lost the first leg 2-1. A narrow defeat on penalties prevented another trip to Wembley, with Sunderland eventually losing to Charlton. 

After another couple of mid-table finishes, 2021/22 saw Doncaster relegated back to the bottom league once more, just two points adrift of safety, but enough to send them down again. An 18th place finish in 2022/23 had alarm bells starting to ring, even more so when, by January 2024, Rovers went to Sutton knowing a loss would put them into the bottom two. They avoided that fate, and what happened next was a remarkable turnaround in fortunes where a club record number of wins catapulted the side from the danger zone into the playoff places for promotion. When they then won 2-0 at Gresty Road in the semi-final first leg versus Crewe, things were looking very good for a trip to Wembley, and as completely the form horse, we’d surely be stepping up. However, that old adage, 2-0 is a dangerous score, even in a two-legged affair, the Alex had quickly snuffed that lead out and took their chances in the penalty shoot out, to progress. Grant McCann, who had guided the last promotion to League One, had taken over the helm, and his ways were the crucial aspect that turned this potentially traumatic season into something nearly magnificent. Given the clubs plight in January, it was a remarkable achievement to have come so close.

Thankfully, Doncaster continued largely in that vein of last season this term, even if they have never hit the consistent highs of last spring. However, I watched them grind out a 1-0 win at Morecambe with ten men, my first Donny game, for a decade, building up to the visit of Walsall on 1st April. The Saddlers were the runaway leaders before Christmas, but the wheels have been coming off spectacularly. It is such a close, competitive league. Everyone is taking points off everyone else, and no one has yet put that end of season run together to clinch automatic promotion. 

This encounter reignited the touch paper for me, no longer the Keepmoat, but the Eco-Power Arena, a hazard of the ground never having had a normal name, so it is one of those rare occasion I need to go with the sponsors name.

Matt Sadler’s Saddlers (only beaten by Wolfgang Wolf at Wolfsburg) led by merely one point, arriving at Doncaster on the back of seven games without a win, albeit it, five draws. They were, however, the more dangerous side throughout this engrossing clash. They have in their midst three forwards who are freakishly tall, and none of them would look out of place on a basketball court. Rovers are a much smaller, compact side who looks to do the talking on the floor, but at times, the defence was stretched containing man mountains!

Almost against the run of play following the opening salvos, Doncaster took the lead. A fine run up the right by Molyneux, a cut inside, and an exquisite finish, to the delight of the crowd. Alas, they couldn’t hold it for long, and Walsall were level shortly after, from another fine move.

The game raged from end to end until the break. The coaches then instilled a formation that kind of cancelled each other out for a while, but the substitutes brought renewed vigor, with Billy Sharp still looking dangerous. He bagged a late goal and scored again, only for the offside flag to deny him. That was the catalyst for Walsall to launch a final salvo, and the relentless pressure found the equaliser, despite a cracking save from the initial shot come cross. Once level, the Saddlers could smell blood, and they were going for it, roared on by great support. Thankfully, the ref blew for time, and they all shook on a tremendous 2-2. It didn’t go anyway to helping sort out the log jam at the top, but come the end of the season, this could be a vital point for both clubs.

It was great to be back. Neil Sullivan was even interviewed at half-time, one of the stalwarts of those modern-day highs from the era of my regularly watching. I will be back sooner rather than later.