FOOTBALL IN BLAENAU FFESTINIOG

  Financial re-grouping brought about a revival for the senior club in the late 60’s marking the beginning of their most successful period ever.
The highlight was the Grand Slam season of 1971-72, when they won all four North Wales trophies – the North Wales Coast FA Challenge Cup, Welsh League(North) championship by five points from Bethesda Athletic, the Cookson Cup and the Alves Cup.
The cup final details are as follows:

North Wales Coast Challenge Cup – won 4-2 against Pothmadog at Bangor.
Cookson Cup – won 4-1 against Bethesda Athletic at Bangor.
Alves Cup – won 3-0 against Connah’s Quay Nomads at Denbigh.

In 1972-73 they took the championship again by three points from Caernarfon Town but lost 0-1 to Denbigh Town at Rhyl in the Coast Challenge Cup final. They retained the Cookson Cup by beating Porthmadog 1-0 at Bangor and at the same venue held on to the Alves Cup by the same score against Penygroes based Nantlle Vale. With the hat-trick of League championships completed in 1973-74 – with Bethesda Athletic again runners-up - they became only the third club in the history of the League to win three consecutive titles.
They lost their grip on both the Cookson and the Alves Cups in this third championship season, but they managed to reach the Cookson Cup final only to lose 0-2 to Colwyn Bay at Bangor. In their third consecutive NWCFA Challenge Cup final they went down 0-3 to Porthmadog at Bangor and lost their fourth final on the trot in 1974-75 going down to the same opponents 1-5 at Pwlheli.
Again there was a price to pay for this success, gained as it was with a costly out of town squad. The threat of disbandment reared again in the mid-70’s averted only by Gwilym Roberts taking over the manager‘s job and running a purely local based squad.
A fine local side did extremely well during this period especially when one considers the opposition were following what had been a distinctively Northwalian trend of using Merseyside and Wrexham based players. This enabled the finances to improve and in the late 70’s the club once more dropped the local talent in favour of players from these areas. This was to prove fatal for the club as can be seen later. In 1976-77 the locals reached the Alves Cup final hosted by Bangor where they succumbed to a 0-2 defeat against a strong Porthmadog side. They got to the final again the following season but lost 1-3 to Caernarfon Town after extra time, this time Cae Clyd.
Their fourth North Wales Coast Challenge Cup final defeat of the 70’s came in Porthmadog at the end of the 1976-77 season where they lost 0-3 to Courtaulds Greenfield who defeated them again by three goals to two in the 1978-79 final at Pwllheli.
 
     
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