About this match programme
By Richard Snowball This programme was published for York City’s match against Chester, played at Bootham Crescent on March 4, 1939. This match was played six months before the outbreak of WW11, when the League programme was suspended until August 1946. Three matches were played the following season before the war started on 3rd September, 1939, but they were expunged from the records. After York's amazing F.A.Cup run to the 6th Round in the previous 1937-38 season they were exempt until the 3rd Round, but could not repeat their success and lost heavily 5-0 away to Millwall. This match against Chester ended in a 2-2 draw, but City had a very poor season finishing third from the bottom on Division 3 North. One of the goals was scored by Bob Mortimer who had been signed at the beginning of the season from Blackburn Rovers for a then club record fee of £300. The money proved to be well spent as he scored 22 goals in 35 games, but he did not play for the club again after the war. The other scorer was Bert Brenen who was making his debut in this game and he went on to spend 13 years at York including war-time matches playing in every position including goal keeper in one. Acknowledgement This facsimile of the match programme was created by the publisher of There’s Only One Arthur Bottom, the daily email newsletter for fans of York City FC. www.tooab.com