Boro' History

Last Updated: 23 September 2020

For a Boro' side adapting to life in the Football League, one of the men that Graham Westley looked to for that bit extra was Marvin Williams

Marvin Williams

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For a Boro’ side adapting to life in the Football League, one of the men that Graham Westley looked to for that bit extra was Marvin Williams. After storming to the 2009-10 Blue Square Premier title, we pretty much kept faith with the same band of brothers who had earned …

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In front of nearly 6,000 spectators at Nene Park, Rushden & Diamonds 2-1 Stevenage Borough was a full-blooded, festive fight at Christmas 1999

Rushden & Diamonds 2-1 Stevenage Borough

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In front of almost 6,000 spectators up at Nene Park, Rushden & Diamonds 2-1 Stevenage Borough was a full-blooded, festive fight at Christmas 1999. With the Diamonds coming to Broadhall Way a week later (03 January), Richard Hill’s side headed for Northamptonshire hoping to put a dent in their promotion hopes. Our own ambitions? Well, they’d faded long before Christmas came around.

Rushden & Diamonds 2-1 Stevenage Borough: Match Details

After six straight wins at the start of the 1999-00 campaign, Boro’ had been – at very best – inconsistent. We’d gone from being unstoppable to being actually quite stoppable indeed; claiming only two league wins in September, October and November combined. December had, to be fair, started better thanks to wins at Doncaster and indoors versus Dover.

But then we lost to Woking the weekend before Christmas. FFS.

As Christmas fell on a Saturday, there was a nine-day gap until our trip to Nene Park; a big-spending club with big ambitions. Add in that (sort of) local edge and you had yourself a big crunch clash; a match that Boro’ could use to make a real statement. Ex-Diamonds forward and Boro’ goal machine Carl Alford thought so; apparently claiming he’d score two here.

Boro’ fans turned out in force. We’re 99% sure that one of the reasons Why We Bother – taking more than the 950 allocated tickets, with fans having to sit on each others’ laps – is about this game. And we’re also sure another reason – Billy Turley inciting the crowd at Nene Park – does too; the Diamonds keeper using his fingers to indicate how many people were sat on some seats. Nothing gets past him.

In the end, it was a gritty display on a bobbly pitch. Alford got one of his two promised goals. But we ended up losing thanks to late winner scored by Jon Brady. With his head! The win sent Diamonds top – but it’d end up being Kidderminster who won the title and went up.

Rushden & Diamonds 2-1 Stevenage Borough: Match Timeline

  • 1-0 – Collins (17)
  • 1-1 – Alford (60)
  • 2-1 – Brady (79)
Think of the name Gittings and we bet that Martin comes to mind. But the service Peter Gittings gave to Boro' also deserves recognition...

Peter Gittings

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“At least I’m the best player in my own family” – it says much about England’s 2001 Ashes team that bowler Jimmy Ormond’s best moment in a two-Test career is the withering put-down he delivered to Australia’s Mark Waugh. In much the same way, we can understand how Peter Gittings …

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With the 2009-10 title push on, Grays Athletic 1-2 Stevenage Borough was a fifth straight league win for us. But we had to do it the hard way...

Grays Athletic 1-2 Stevenage Borough

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A title push was very much on the cards by late March 2010. Or, at least, back on track; a bit of a wobble in February saw us lose twice (at Tamworth and Rushden). With four league wins and a place in the FA Trophy Final now under our belt, 23 March saw us make a midweek trip to Essex. The Blues were cast adrift at the foot of the table and, when all’s said and done, our archives show Grays Athletic 1-2 Stevenage Borough; a fifth straight league win for us.

But it ain’t as straightforward as that. It never bloody is.

Grays Athletic 1-2 Stevenage Borough: Match Details

Just because the home side were heading for the Blue Square Premier exit door, it didn’t mean we were getting a free ride. In fact, we came up against a side with a real desire to upset the applecart. And that became pretty clear when Jamie Guy put them into a shock lead just before the break. It prompted GW (or at least proved he’d made the right call) to make a double switch at the break; Cole and Sills on for Byrom and Beardo.

Boro’ were now chasing the game; an unfamiliar place for much of that season. It took 20 minutes of huffing and puffing until Bozzie headed us level from Andy Drury‘s corner. The pressure started to mount on the home side. But time was starting to run out for us; Yemi Odubade off and Charlie Griffin on for the final 15 minutes. And we can only describe it as an inspired call by the gaffer.

With four minutes left on the clock, Griffin rose highest to meet a Chris Day free-kick; Boro’ ahead and not before time. The highlights here credit it as an own goal. But the Beeb and, more importantly, we give it to Griff. As GW himself told 3CR after the game: “How you get there’s not important at this time of the season, it’s getting there that’s important”. We can only agree with that statement after this close shave.

Boro’ went on to win eight out of the last nine league outings after that; dropping just three points in a home defeat to Luton. But what if we’d been knocked out of our stride at Grays?

Oh, it almost doesn’t bear thinking about…

Grays Athletic 1-2 Stevenage Borough: Match Timeline

  • 1-0 – Guy (43)
  • 1-1 – Bostwick (65)
  • 1-2 – Griffin (86)
Good Game: A series looking at some of the more wonderful, the utterly memorable, the unbelievably dramatic and the downright ludicrous games which have Stevenage Borough over the years

Mansfield Town 2-3 Stevenage Borough

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Good Game: The series looking at the amazing, utterly memorable, unbelievably dramatic and downright ludicrous games that involved Stevenage Borough over the years. But we’ll insist that we accept no liability for memories warped by time, age or alcohol consumption at the time. We’ll never refer to any games involving …

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We're no strangers to getting on the wrong side of others. And we've wound up some teams more than most – such as these five Stevenage rivals...

Stevenage Rivals

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We’re no strangers to getting on the wrong side of others over the years. And we’ve wound up some teams more than most – such as these five Stevenage rivals. And that feeling is, of course, mutual. You aren’t proper rivals if the irrational hatred doesn’t flow both ways – …

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Kicking a ball onto the bar – nothing to it, yeah? Well, it's the theory that we put to the test when Soccer AM set us the Crossbar Challenge...

Boro’ Crossbar Challenge

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Kicking a ball onto the bar – nothing to it, yeah? Well, it’s the theory that we put to the test when Soccer AM set us the Crossbar Challenge. To be fair, “we” means the Boro’ lads. At no point was BoroGuide ever asked about it. Their loss. Anyway, let’s …

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In modern football, right backs are expected to do it all – in attack or at the back. But it's nothing new at Boro', as you'll find out now...

Right Backs

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A great philosopher* once said “nobody grows up wanting to be a Gary Neville“. But we’re not sure about that one. At Boro’, we’ve seen lads wearing the number two shirt and doing quite brilliant things while doing so. In modern football, right backs are expected to do it all …

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Like all those England one-cap wonders, we've also signed our fair share of one-outing – er – wonders? And Carel van der Velden is one of 'em...

Carel van der Velden

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If we asked you to, we bet you could name at least one of England’s one-cap wonders. Steve Guppy – he’s one. Brian Stein is another. See, it’s easy. But what about if we ask you to reel off one of Boro’s (many) one-outing wonders from over the years? Now …

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It's hard not to have great memories of the 2010-1 League Two playoffs. So, why not take some time out and relive how we made it to League One?

2010-1 League Two Playoffs – Boro’s Goals

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It’s hard not to have great memories of the 2010-1 League Two playoffs. So, why not take some time out and relive how we made it to League One? It’d be our second promotion in as many years; the mid-point of Boro’s remarkable rise to the top end of the third tier.

It’s still strange to think that, at the turn of the year, we were looking nervously towards the bottom of the table. The playoffs and the promotion battle? Well, it just wasn’t on our radar then. The first half of our first-ever Football League season had been a bit of a struggle all told. Our 4-2 win over Barnet on 3 January 2011 was our first league win in two months.

But what a second half of the campaign we had. March saw us win six on the spin as our rise up the table became sustained. Soon enough, there was the outside shot of nabbing one of the four playoff places. Then it became ours to lose – and a late stutter meant that it became a close call; our 3-3 draw against Bury on the last day of term sealing our spot.

2010-1 League Two Playoffs: Boro’s Story

It was so tight that we ended up in sixth once the dust settled on the season. That meant our double-header would be against Accrington Stanley and not a Shrewsbury Town side who’d missed out on automatic promotion by one point. Not that Accy was an easy draw; Boro’ picking up one point from a possible six. But we now know how it all unfolded…

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