RETRO: A Spireites visit to Bolton in 1972

As Chesterfield prepare to visit the Macron, this week's retro image shows action from a game between the Spireites and Bolton 45 years ago.
Action from Chesterfield's visit to Burnden Park on March 4th, 1972. Ron Tilsed collects a through ball intended for the bearded Roy Greaves. Keith Stott, Charlie Bell, Dave Pugh and Albert Holmes are the other Chesterfield players.Action from Chesterfield's visit to Burnden Park on March 4th, 1972. Ron Tilsed collects a through ball intended for the bearded Roy Greaves. Keith Stott, Charlie Bell, Dave Pugh and Albert Holmes are the other Chesterfield players.
Action from Chesterfield's visit to Burnden Park on March 4th, 1972. Ron Tilsed collects a through ball intended for the bearded Roy Greaves. Keith Stott, Charlie Bell, Dave Pugh and Albert Holmes are the other Chesterfield players.

Town visited Burnden Park on 4th March 1972.

Ron Tilsed goes down in the mud to collect a through ball intended for Roy Greaves.

Keith Stott has done just enough to impede the Bolton forward and the danger passes.

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Charlie Bell, Dave Pugh and Albert Holmes are the other Chesterfield players.

As if to indicate some of the problems that were looming for English football, only 5,987 were recorded as attending in a stadium which once held 69,912.

Bolton’s 1-0 win helped consolidate both sides as mid-table finishers, with 15 games to go.

Chesterfield were ninth after the game, and Bolton 14th, but by the end of the season those positions had been reversed.

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Still, the club’s 13th-placed finish represented a respectable conclusion to what is often a difficult season year for a promoted side – Chesterfield had, of course, gone up as Fourth Division champions two years earlier.

While Chesterfield took several years to rebuild and settled into a long spell of Third Division football, Wanderers were crowned champions a season later.