The Golden Years (1959 – 1976)
The 60s and 70s were the golden age of local football. Reading boosted 2 hugely popular Saturday leagues (The Reading & District League and Combination League) with many games attracting attendances that would not disgrace today’s Conference League clubs.
Reading YMCA were one of the top teams during this period and recognised throughout Reading as a major force in local football.
The basis of YM’s success was a flourishing youth system that saw the club produce many of the town’s most promising youngsters. During the 1950s, 60s and early 70s there were not the leisure options that exist for young people today and many were attracted to the YMCA which ran youth clubs and also boasted excellent sports facilities.
The YMCA (which by now had moved to its current base in Parkside Road) had a gym, an outdoor football court and ran various sports teams, all of which were available to members of the YMCA. These kinds of facilities were rare in Reading and consequently many youngsters joined up.
The result of this is that Reading YMCA were renowned as being a young team with a fresh crop of young players progressing to the club’s senior side each season.
Reading YMCA’s first season back in the top flight in 1959/60 was deemed as a success – finishing 6th out of 13. But nobody could have envisaged what was to come next!
YM pulled off a major coup at the start of the 1960/61 season by signing ex-Crystal Palace and Southend player Ray Hancox as well as prolific Wokingham Town striker Charlie Watkiss.
These 2 players proved to be the missing ingredient as YM won their first 16 league games (still a club record) and did not lose a league game until 19 February 1961. Despite stuttering towards the end of the season, Reading YMCA had done enough to lift their first, and to date only, top flight title. YM were Champions!
Despite Bill Piercey retiring at the end of the season, YM maintained the majority of the title winning squad and made a valiant attempt to retain the title in 1961/62 before finishing 3rd to eventual winners West Reading.
Reading YMCA received a boost in 1962 when Reading Borough Council chose the club as the tenants of the newly constructed Palmer Park Stadium. The Palmer Park Track pitch would be YM’s home for the next 20 years.
However, by the start of the 1962/63 season many of the players from the championship side of 2 years ago had left or retired and YM had the task of building a new team.
Fortunately, long serving players like Colin Brunsden, Brian Maskell, Fred Farina and Brian Sayers remained to form the spine of a new look YMCA. These players were supplemented by a new crop of youngsters led by the McMillan brothers (Terry and Mick), Alistair Lewis (England Boys Club International), Ray Clement and Geoff Weller.
The new-look team finished a creditable 6th place but the season was most notable for a fantastic cup run by the Reserve side that saw them negotiate 6 rounds of the Reading Junior Cup before eventually beating Old Maidonians in the Reading Junior Cup Final. The only ever Cup win by a Reading YMCA side!
YM spent the next couple of seasons in mid-table before in 1965/66 an excellent season saw the club finish runners-up to West Reading and reach the final of the Reading Senior Cup. Although YM were beaten 2-1 in the final by Slough Town Res the future was again bright for YM with youngsters like Bill Maule and Chris Hill breaking into the team.
That YM did not build on this success over the next few years can probably be explained by 2 factors: 1) The dominance of West Reading and Rabson Rovers and 2) The loss of several good youngsters to rival clubs.
West Reading are without doubt the most successful side in Reading League history. From 1961/62 to 1975/76 they won 11 Senior Division titles (then called Premier Division), numerous cups and regularly took on the top amateur sides of the day in the Berks and Bucks Senior Cup and won!
Although Rabson Rovers only won 2 titles in that same period they would invariably finish runners-up meaning that the league was virtually a closed shop for anyone else during that period.
With success hard to come by for Reading YMCA, the club started to find that it could no longer hold on to its promising youngsters and many left to join other clubs. It is also possible that YM could have become complacent that there would always be youngsters coming through the youth system and consequently did not try as hard as they might to keep these players at the club.
As the 1960s turned into the 70s, YM were no longer competing at the top end of the table and began to be a regular fixture in the bottom half. In the 1969/70 the club even had to be saved from relegation by the league committee after finishing second from bottom.
Although YM still had some top quality players – the McMillan brothers, Terry Martin, Geoff Weller, Mel Tuson and Bobby Crowe – stalwarts like Colin Brunsden and Brian Maskell had now retired and could not be replaced.
There were some signs of improvement in the early 1970s as YM began to push back towards the middle of the table with John Burbedge, Kenny Jay, Brain Gilmartin and Colin Bishop the stars of the day.
But it proved to be shortlived when YM followed up a poor season in 1974/75 by failing to win a single league game in the subsequent 1975/76 season until February 1976. YM eventually finished with just 8 points from 28 games and were duly relegated out of the top flight for the first time in 17 years.
