A demotion, relegations, a decade of crowds under 2,000 and a car-crash played out on TV - these are the worst seasons in Peterborough United history

But it still doesn’t come anywhere near the worst season in the club’s 65-year Football League history.

These are the worst…

1967-68.

Imagine you knew you were to be relegated seven months before the end of the season.

Well that’s exactly what happened to Third Division Posh who were told of their impending demotion by the Football League on November 21, 1967 after a Football Association investigation. The FA Commission had looked into alleged accounting discrepancies including illegal bonus payment offers to Posh players ahead of an FA Cup tie at Sunderland the previous season as well as illegal signing-on fees to players, and it was an open and shut case as the acts had been recorded in boardroom minutes and in the club’s accounts.

Ironically the illegal bonus offers didn’t work as Sunderland thrashed Posh 7-1. Frustratingly similar discrepancies found in the accounts of Sunderland and Manchester United resulted in fines rather than demotions.

Highly-rated manager Gordon Clark had already quit and been replaced by Norman Rigby before the punishment was handed down and once Posh had been knocked out of the FA Cup by Portsmouth – a match remembered for a remarkable own goal miss by Stewart Brace – Posh had 19 ‘dead’ League One games to play.

Remarkably they managed to finish ninth to add weight to Rugby’s argument they would bounce straight back the following season. They didn’t and indeed it took the arrival of a ‘Messiah’ to make a difference.

1972-73

This Fourth Division season has to be in this list because it yielded the worst finishing position, 19th in Division Four, in Posh Football League history, a record that still stands. Posh finished just five points above the re-election zone (back then the bottom four in Division Four had to beg for votes from the rest of the Football League clubs to retain their status).

This campaign started under disastrous Posh boss Jim Iley and included a club record 8-2 defeat at Chester (it was 2-1 at half-time), while popular winger Bobby Moss was carried off on a stretcher on what would be his last appearance for the club. Posh also lost at home to Northampton Town and started the season with one win in 14 competitive matches and finished it with one win in the last seven.

But Noel ‘The Messiah’ Cantwell had arrived as manager and he had signed a striker called John Cozens. The following season Posh won the Fourth Division title.

1978-79

Posh had gone within a whisker of promotion to the second tier for the first time in the club’s history the season before, but 12 months later they were relegated from the third tier.

The sale of legend Chris Turner in the summer didn’t help. The resignation of manager John Barnwell didn’t help either. He cited a lack of ambition in the boardroom. Posh were 10th at the time, but in the middle of a club record run of 17 games without a win from which they never recovered. The club had promoted physio Billy Hails to the manager’s job and by the time he was replaced by Peter Morris the damage was done.

Posh were relegated to Division Four for the first time in the club’s history with two games to spare.

1988-89

Low attendances were a feature of the 1980s at London Road. The 11 lowest Football League crowds in Posh history arrived in the decade and all were below 2,000 as Posh stayed in the bottom tier throughout.

The 1988/1989 campaign saw Posh flirt with a bottom four finish again under the management of Mick Jones, a solid player in the club’s 1973-74 title-winning side.

‘You don’t know what you are doing’ was sung regularly by Posh fans who saw their side lose 5-1 at York City, 4-1 at home to Scarborough and 5-1 at home to Chris Turner’s Cambridge United. Posh didn’t win any of their first six Division Four games and lost their best player Mick Gooding to Wolves after just five games.

Posh finished 17th, after a season of grim football, and just four points above the bottom four.

1996-97

Barry Fry thought he had bought Posh and he didn’t realise he hadn’t until he’d splashed out on a few players. In November Fry told the Evening Telegraph the club was at least £2.5 million in debt and that he’d realised the deal in place for him to purchase Posh hadn’t actually been completed.

Bad news had been preceded by bad results as Posh has already slumped to 20th and now players had to be sold to balance the books.

Fry, who was also managing the club, sacked assistants Lil Fucillo and club legend Mick Halsall, and a car-crash season was all filmed by Anglia TV who were making a documentary called ‘There’s Only One Barry Fry.’ It was all rather embarrassing.

Relegation from the third tier was confirmed on the penultimate weekend of the season.

POSH IN THE FOOTBALL LEAGUE

(65 seasons)

Fourth tier: 25

Third tier: 34

Second tier: 6.

Counting 2025-26, Posh have not played in the bottom tier of the Football League for a club record 16 seasons (the previous longest absence was 7 seasons, 1961-62 to 1967-68).

The highest Football League finishing position in Posh history is 10th in the second tier in 1992-93.

The lowest Football League finishing position in Posh history is 19th in the fourth tier in 1972-73.

The following season in 1973-74 Posh won the fourth tier title which remains the last time the club finished top of a table. The only other title win was achieved in the first season as a Football League club (1960-61) when Posh again won the fourth division.

Apart from the title wins Posh have been automatically promoted on four other occasions, from the fourth tier in 1990-91 & 2007-08 and from the third tier in 2008-09 & 2020-21. They have been promoted through the play-offs three times, from the third tier in 1991-92 & 2010-11 and from the fourth tier in 1999-2000.

Posh have been relegated/demoted on eight occasions from the second tier in 1993-94, 2009-10, 2012-13 & 2021-22 and from the third tier in 1967-68, 1978-79, 1996-97 & 2004-05.

The fewest wins in a Posh Football League season is eight achieved by the second tier sides of 1993-94 and 2009-10.

The most wins in a Posh Football League season is 28 achieved by the fourth tier sides of 1960-61 and 2007-08.