Saturday sees Rovers travel to Oakwell, home of Barnsley, where they have not won a league match since 9th November 1991, so a win is long overdue!
Mind you, that’s quite a deceiving statistic as we have only played four league games at that venue since!
Saturday will see the 35th league meeting between the sides, with Rovers having won 12, Barnsley 11 while the remaining 11 games have ended all square. Both sides have scored 47 goals in those games.
Darrell Clarke, who led Rovers to back to back promotions, is now in charge at Oakwell and he will be facing us with his fourth different club having been in charge at Walsall, Port Vale and Cheltenham Town since leaving the Mem.
Darrell isn’t the first manager to take charge of both clubs, though. Brough Fletcher was appointed manager of Rovers in January 1938 having spent seven years in charge at Oakwell.
He was still in charge when football resumed following the Second World War but was sacked in December 1949, allegedly by a letter pushed under his door one night following a Board Meeting!
A number of players have turned out for both clubs, one of whom is Luke Thomas who will be facing his former club this coming weekend. Now a firm favourite with Rovers supporters, Luke appeared in 85 league games for Barnsley, scoring three goals. To date he has scored five goals in 69 league games for Rovers.
Others to have turned out for both clubs include Jamie Cureton, Keith Curle, Scott Jones, Oli McBurnie and Kevin Miller.
Kenny Stephens, Gordon Fearnley and Colin Gordon all made their Rovers league debuts against Barnsley. Stephens and Fearnley were, of course, members of the 1973/74 Rovers promotion side, while Gordon’s time with Rovers was very short. On loan from Birmingham, he appeared in just four league games for the club, three of which were from the bench. Rovers, by the way, were his ninth club at the time!
By my reckoning Barnsley is 197 miles from Bristol so whether you are travelling with the Supporters Club, driving up, letting the train take the strain, or going by private coach, please travel safely and let’s hope for three points on the road!
By Keith Brookman