The season a club and its fans will never forget

RAISE THE ROOF.. Matt Smith climbs high to score a last-gasp equaliser against Everton.

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FROM pitch problems in Portugal to peril at Preston; from Simon Corney's coruscating criticisms of his players to unbridled Boundary Park bedlam after Matt Smith's equaliser against Everton, this has been some season.

Athletic have been both utterly abject and completely brilliant.

Pre-season training might have been an omen; the only match on a scorching, week-long tour was called off before it had even started.

Nothing went smoothly from the start. There was one win in the first two months and that was thanks to an own goal at Portsmouth.

The pressure on manager Paul Dickov's shoulders eased with a quite brilliant victory at Crewe and another immediately afterwards against Preston, which featured the mercurial Jose Baxter's first goal from the starting XI.

On the pitch, troubles eased when Matt Smith prodded home what was to become his speciality, a last-gasp equaliser, at Sheffield United.

Off it, Lee Croft suffered the effects of an unfounded accusation of racist abuse by a ball-boy.

Athletic continued to bob around the lower end of mid-table until the end of the year. Eight defeats in 13 matches to the turn of the year prompted Corney to act.

"I'm gutted," Dickov said before the Scunthorpe match on New Year's Day, "but we get on with it." That would be the royal "we", given that his backroom staff had all just been put out to grass.

Tony Philliskirk cut short his New Year's Eve celebrations and next day was issuing commands from the dug-out at Scunthorpe alongside Dickov.

Despite Baxter committing himself to the club, problems continued unabated. Athletic took one point from the first five games of 2013.

Enough was enough for Corney; Dickov kept his dignity and said his goodbyes.

The Scot's sign-off was suitably bizarre. Athletic had played like Barcelona on heat for seven glorious second-half minutes at Nottingham Forest to march into the fourth round of the FA Cup. Then a magnificent 3-2 defeat of Liverpool put the club into the national football consciousness for the first time since the Joe Royle 'pinch me' days.

How could this team play so well, and so badly?

Philliskirk manfully stepped into Dickov’s shoes, and never has the term ‘caretaker” applied so well: the stand-in combined driving the youth team minibus with putting out cones and formulating tactical instructions for the first team.

Results under the game's busiest man suddenly spiked, even in the league. Wins over MK Dons, Stevenage and Portsmouth added fuel to the tank as Athletic tried to drive up the table.

In between, the FA Cup continued to write itself as fantasy. Matt Smith was proving as big a draw as his Doctor Who namesake. After battering Liverpool's defenders, he barged home a header in a packed Everton penalty area to instigate one of the loudest roars ever heard at Boundary Park.

Pinch me? This was punch-me territory. Fists were flying everywhere, from Dean Bouzanis flinging his arms towards the ball in the opposition box to supporters in the stand pawing the air in celebration. But back in the league, Athletic continued to fail. A 1-0 loss at home to Bournemouth signalled the introduction of a new, permanent manager.

Few were as surprised it was to be rookie Lee Johnson as the man himself. The 31 year old from Newmarket wasn't thought to be in the race. The former Bristol City midfielder guided Athletic to safety with a bit to spare.

Safety assured hearts were able to go back to beating at a normal rate for the first time in months.

Millions were banked while fortunes were threatened. Voices were ruined, on the terraces and in dressing rooms. Dark clouds gathered as quickly as new dawns broke. It was quite a ride.

mattchambers@oldham-chronicle.co.uk