Back in 1967, both Barnet and Nuneaton Borough were challenging for the Southern League Premier Division title. The two clubs met at Underhill on 20/3/67. At the time, Nuneaton were 3rd in the table and Barnet 5th. The top of the table was as follows:
Wimbledon P31 PTS 40
Weymouth P30 PTS 36
Nuneaton P27 PTS 35
Cambridge Utd P29 PTS 35
Barnet P28 PTS 34
As can be seen, Nuneaton were well placed 5 points adrift from the leaders, Wimbledon but with 4 games in hand, but Barnet were still in the running too, 6 points from the top but having played 3 games less than the Dons.
The two teams lined up as follows:
Barnet: Goymer, Voyce, Jenkins, Picking, Roach, King, Whyte, Eason, Figg, Smith, Turley.
Nuneaton: Crump, Thompson, Wilson, Davis, Ball, Watts, Ashe, Hope, Richards, Allen, Hails.
Barnet made a bright start and Roger Figg had a goal disallowed on 12 minutes, Seven minutes later, a Les Eason effort appeared to have crossed the goal line before Thompson cleared it but the referee only awarded the Bees a corner.
Nuneaton striker, Richards was causng Bees’ centre half, Dennis Roach a lot of trouble and he missed a good chance to give Borough the lead before Barnet went ahead on 26 minutes whe the referee awarded the home side a penalty after Ball was adjudged to have handled in the area Les EASON stepped up to drill a well taken penalty past Crump to put the Bees ahead,
However, somewhat against the run of play, Borough equalised three minutes before half time when Allen crossed for Watts to beat an unsighted Brian Goymer in the Barnet goal with a well placed shot.
HT: Barnet 1 Nuneaton 1
Barnet started the second half playing down the famous Underhill slope and on 56 minutes the Bees went 2-1 up just a minute after Keith Smith had gone close for the home side. Eason ran onto a through ball from Roger Figg and Crump, who was a bit slow coming out of his goal, was well beate by the Barnet striker’s shot.
Ten minutes later, Crump atoned for his mistake by making a spectacular save from Figg’s fine shot, turning it safely around for a corner. And it was the visitors that scored the next goal, again rather against the run of play, when a cross from winger, Hails was well controlled by Ashe who then angled a fine shot past Goymer into the corner of the net for Borough’s second equaliser of the match.
FT: Barnet 2 Nuneaton 2
At the end of the season, the Southern League title went to Romford who finished just one point above Borough, who had a superior goal difference, so had they won at Underhill the Nuneaton would have ended up as champions. Barnet ended up in 5th place, three points behind Romford. Wimbledon, the league leaders at the time of this match, ended up finishing 4th.