PART TWELVE
1946 – 1947: THE ALEX STOCK ERA BEGINS


The Club opened the 1946/47 season with a new name and a new manager. The name was changed from ‘Yeovil & Petters United’ to the present ‘Yeovil Town’ whilst, from over sixty applicants, the comparatively unknown Alec Stock was selected as player/manager in the place of Billy Kingdom.

Before the war, Alec Stock had played for Charlton Athletic and then Queens Park Rangers. At 27 years of age, he was the country’s youngest manager of a professional club and must have been a little awed by the enormity of the task facing him. Leading members of his playing squad were goalkeeper Rideout (local), full-backs Hickman (from Aston Villa), Doyle (Everton) and Davis (local), Half-backs Sibley (local), Afflect (Southampton), Collins (Crystal Palace) and Marshall (Cardiff City), and forwards Gore (Fulham), Smith (Fulham), Mitchenson (Plymouth Argyle), White (local), Hartburn (Bishop Auckland), Mustard (Exeter City) and Dodkin (Wells).

In Stock’s first season, Yeovil Town headed the Southern Table for a long spell, finally finishing in fourth place (out of seventeen clubs) with Gillingham taking the championship.

The Southern League Cup was played in four groups, the winners of each group going forward to the semi-finals. Yeovil won all four group matches, defeated Worcester City 2-0 in the semi-finals and lost 4-2 on aggregate to Gillingham in the final which was staged at the start of the following season.

In the FA. Cup, Yeovil Town thrashed Dartmouth 10-2 at Huish in the 4th Qualifying Round, attendance 7,000, but were held 2-2 by Peterborough United in the 1st Round, ‘gate’ 7,500. The replay at London Road was lost by a solitary goal before 9,500 spectators.

Largely as a result of transferring Johnny Hartburn to Queen’s Park Rangers for £1,000, the Club finished the season with a balance of £2,000. During the season, more local players had made first team appearances than at any time in the Club’s professional history, including Ken Sibley and Glyn White from llminster, Ken Hayward and Dennis Horlock from Yeovil and Ralph Davis from Stoke-under-Ham.


1947 – 1948

New players in Yeovil’s squad for the 1947/48 season included goalkeepers Hall (Leyton Orient) and Langford (Torquay Utd) and forwards Merritt (Bath City), Swinfen (Q.P.R.), Charles (local), Boulter (Charlton Ath.) and Rogers (local).

The season opened with a 0-0 draw at St. James’ Park against Exeter City Reserves. Yeovil then won the next eight games – half of them by a margin of at least four goals – but the magic spell wore off. The team became lethargic and finished the season in eighth place out of eighteen clubs, Merthyr Tydfil (undoubtedly the top Non-league team at the time) taking the title.

Yeovil Town did well again in the Southern League Cup, losing 4-2 on aggregate to Merthyr in the semi-finals. Merthyr went on to beat Colchester United in the final to record the ‘double’. The FA. Cup was another story, however, for Yeovil lost 2-1 at Street in the 4th Qualifying Round. The attendance was 4,300 (well over half of whom were from Yeovil) and the road between the two towns before the match was packed with a continuous procession of cars.


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