Matchday Memories: On This Day 2004 – See Peter’s Palace Success Start Off CCFC Career

Peter at Highfield Road

On this day (9th May) in 2004 the Sky Blues were, somewhat surprisingly, under new management as they faced their last Division One game of the season. Eric Black had been dramatically sacked, with the Sky Blues playing reasonably well in twelfth place in the second tier, immediately after a fantastic 5-2 away win at Gillingham in their penultimate league game of the season. Eric had stepped up to the managerial plate from assistant to Gary McAllister early in the year when Gary resigned to look after his seriously ill wife.

Eric at Highfield Rd

For today’s game Eric’s replacement (now fellow CCFPA member) Peter Reid had been installed. Many fans wore black in tribute to Eric’s tenure at the home of the Sky Blues and Peter must have known he had much to prove! The new ‘gaffer’ got his inaugural win as the Sky Blues took on Crystal Palace at Highfield Road in front of a curious crowd of 22,202.  Perhaps this was not surprising given the same starting XI that had won at the Gills was chosen. The Sky Blues put on a great show for their last outing of the season beating the Glaziers by the odd goal in three. Future Sky Blue gaffer Iain Dowie was in charge of the Palace that day. Young Stuart Giddings (now a CCFPA member) made his Sky Blue debut in this game.

‘Big Mo’ Konjic in the Sky Blue

Our popular and mountainous Bosnian centre-half Mo Konjic gave the Sky Blues a great start with a thunderous downward headed goal after only four minutes and Michael Doyle, later to skipper the club in a second spell at CCFC, notched a second after 25 minutes running onto a pass from Gary McSheffrey.

Doyler in the Sky Blue

Half-time came with City 2-0 to the good and things looked fairly comfortable for the home side until three minutes after the hour when Palace’s Dougie Freedman came off the bench and pulled one back netting from a superb cross by Andy Johnson. City were forced to hang on for a last desperate twenty minutes against a resurgent Eagles’ team who still had play-off pretensions. The Sky Blues were relieved to hear the whistle blow as they collected all the points at the nub end of the season.

Thanks to Former CCFPA committee member Dean Nelson you can watch some of the action by clicking on the image below:-

The Sky Blues fielded the following team that day (CCFPA members underlined):-

Scott Shearer, Eric Deloumeaux, Stephen Warnock (sub. Stuart Giddings -90), Youssef Safri, Mo Konjic, Calum Davenport, Bjarni Gudjonsson, Michael Doyle, Andy Morrell (sub. Richard Shaw -72), Gary McSheffrey and Graham Barrett (sub. Claus Bech Jorgensen -78).   Unused Subs. Andy Whing and Richard Brush (gk)

Iain Dowie‘s Crystal Palace side comprosed:-

Nico Vaesen, Danny Butterfield, Danny Granville, Aki Riihilahti (sub. Shaun Derry -59), Mikele Leigertwood (sub. Dougie Freedman -59), Tony Popovic, Wayne Routledge, Michael Hughes, Neil Shipperley (sub. Tommy Black -83), Andy Johnson and Julian Gray  Unused Subs. Gary Borrowdale and Cedric Berthelin (gk)   Referee:- A.Butler (Nottinghamshire)

Apart from Iain Dowie, Michael Hughes would go on to play for the Sky Blues in 2007-08 and Julian Gray in 2007-09 as did defender Gary Borrowdale who was on the Eagles books at this time.

CCFC 2003-04

The Sky Blues maintained their twelfth spot and Crystal Palace, with whom we had drawn 1-1 in London at the end of November, not only made the playoffs in sixth place but won that mini-competition and got themselves promoted along with champions Norwich City and West Bromwich Albion.

Walsall, Bradford City and Wimbledon all suffered the drop to Division Two.

Thanks to CCFPA’s Mike Young for sourcing the images.