Marking 20 years since Uncle Jack made our dreams come true.

Inside:

What happened throughout the 94/95 title winning season.

A look back on the life of Uncle Jack.

Interview with former Rovers and Scotland forward Kevin Gallacher

Credit: Getty Images

Any die-hard Blackburn Rov-ers fan will tell you that 14th

May 1995 marks the most impor-tant day in their time supporting the club. The day they won the Premier League. Led by the Glaswegian who made

his name at Liverpool, and bank-rolled by Rovers greatest fan, Jack Walker, the 94/95 season had the ingredients to be a special one. And it duly delivered.The spine of the team that year

was Tim Flowers; The ‘Braveheart’ himself Colin Hendry; Tim Sher-wood; and THE real SAS – Shear-er and Sutton. And what a team it was.Shearer and Sutton scoring nearly

50 goals between them set the benchmark for success, the rest of them just had to follow suit. Berg and Hendry were rocks in the defence and Sherwood was a mid-field dynamo who just controlled play for fun.

Anyone you ask to summarise that season will recall Jack Walk-ers wealth as one of the main reasons for success. To win such a competitive league requires investment in playing staff (obvi-ously) and this was emphasised when they parted with £8.3 mil-lion to break the British transfer record twice, and Tim Flowers signing in a record deal for a goalkeeper.

But based on the combined price for rough starting XI’s, Black-burn’s comes in at £14.7m, com-parably low when you line it up against the £19.3m that Manches-

Special Service: SAS (Shearer and Sutton) accounted for over half of Blackburns goals in the 1994/95 season.

By Lewis Horsfield

ter United had spent.Leeds United spent more on Carl-

ton Palmer than Walker did on the whole of Rovers starting midfield four.

Newcastle also forked out more for Darren Peacock than Rovers did on their entire back four.

While most of the outlay was spent on the SAS partnership, a number of astute signings helped cover the losses throughout the season. Atkins, for example cost a measly £45,000 from Scunthorpe who went on to become an important player in the midfield, playing 30 games in the league and contributing with 6 goals in the absence of David Batty.

Henning Berg for under half a million and wide man Wilcox, who came through the academy also proves that the popoular saying - ‘Rovers bought the league’ is a false accusation, and most people like to turn a blind eye to Dalglish’s keen eye in the transfer market.

However, there is no doubt that Rovers were able to offer substantial wages to stave off any competitors in the transfer market. but com-pared to the Liverpool and Totten-ham sides of today, they bought wisely rather than overly.

The success never really came after the 94/95 season though as man-ager Kenny Dalglish moved on to a

The Rovers Revolution

Then vs. now: Picture above compares the average/best starting XI of both teams from 2014/15 and 1994/95

Special Service: SAS (Shearer and Sutton) accounted for over half of Blackburns goals in the 1994/95 season.

Credit: www.footballfancast.com

director of football role and was replaced by his former assistant Ray Harford.

The season started badly with a defeat to Manchester United and patches of bad form here and there stopped them from gaining any real momentum and ended up finishing seventh 21 points off the pace.

Greatest Ever Fan

When Rovers’ greatest ever supporter took over his boyhood club, they were rooted in the second tier of English football. Known simply as ‘Uncle Jack’, his love for Blackburn Rovers shines

bright still to this day.The state of the art stands at

Ewood and the prestige Brockhall Academy are just little remind-ers of how much he helped his club. The replica Premier League trophy in the clubs trophy cabi-net epitomises the influence Jack Walker had on his beloved club.

It all started in 1986 when chairman Bill Fox invited then Vice-chairman Jack Walker to donate funds to build a new stand at Ewood Park, The WalkerSteel Stand (now known as the River-side) was erected and it was just beginning of a boyhood dream for Uncle Jack. His money nev- Tribute: The memorial statue was

unveiled in 2004 in remembrance.

The Rovers Revolution er stopped helping his club as it is believed that his money also paid for purchase and wages of Steve Archi-bald and Ossie Ardiles in the 87/88 season.

It took him just 5 years to take full control of the club and in 1991 he did just that, in his first three years he spent almost £25 million on new players, in an attempt to build a squad that could challenge for hon-ours for years to come. Just over £8 million of that was spent on one of the most deadliest strike partnerships the premier league has ever seen in Alan Shearer and Chris Sutton.Eventually, Uncle Jack decided it was time to reconstruct Ewood Park, so he did, at a cost of over £20million. To give it a capacity of 30,000+, an immortal tribute to Rovers’ greatest ever fan.

Kenny Dalglish was brought in as manager in October 1991 and by may 1992 they had been promoted to the newly formed Premier League via the play offs.

In January 1995 Dalglish expressed a desire to sign Zinedine Zidane and Christophe Dugarry. But although many claim Blackburn ‘Bought the league title’ Jack Walker replied “Why do you want Zidane when we have Tim Sherwood?

Five years after the famous win, on 17 August 2000, Blackburn lost one of their most loved ‘family members’ as Uncle Jack lost his battle with cancer. In November 2004 the club opened the Jack Walker Memorial Garden, where, in the middle, stands the Jack Walker Memorial Statue.

Winners: Despite losing 2-1 on the final day Rovers won the league due to Man Utd drawing 1-1 on the final day meaning Rovers would seal their first PL trophy.

Somewhat a forgotten man from the class

of ‘95, Kevin Gallacher has vivid and painful memories of sitting out the majority of the season.

As Alan Shearer got injured, Blackburn Rov-ers came in and spent £1.5million bringing him in from Coventry City as cover for the England striker.

“The fee didn’t really phase me, I just wanted to get in and impress the coaches, I knew they wanted me as cover but I thought I could chal-lenge for a starting spot.”

Gallacher made an instant impact on his debut against Liverpool, scoring in a 4-1 win.

“I couldn’t believe it when I scored on my debut in front of the fans, I felt like any pressure that was put on me was quickly erased.”

After a good start to his Blackburn career, his season took a turn for the worst.

“In March 1995, the ti-tle winning season, I suf-fered a leg break against Arsenal. Surgeons told me I wouldn’t play again and I feared for my career, I thought it had ended before it had even properly started!”

“I lost a week of my life when it happened, I remember it happening but after that, nothing. I was so drugged up with painkillers. At the time I didn’t realise it was that bad. I had always thought it was just a run of the mill broken leg.”

He used his rehabilita-tion time wisely, getting everything right, doing everything by the book.

“I just wanted to play a part in that season.”

After eight and a half months out, he was able to play his part, until his comeback was halted again with another break to the same leg just a few games after his come-back.

“I broke it again in April, some people

“I thought my career had ended before it had even taken off!”

would have given up. But not me. I wanted my career to go on for as long as possible. It was another chance to prove myself up against anoth-er challenge.”

“I had come back, scored an important goal against Crystal Palace, I did a step over and John Humphreys caught me late, I thought I couldn’t break it again, but I was wrong.”

Seven years on, after he had retired, a regular meeting with his surgeon made clear how lucky he was to have played football professionally for twenty years.

“My surgeon told me that the first of two breaks could, and prob-ably should have ended my career.”

“I was teary eyed, partly because the news shocked me, but partly because I felt I was so

lucky to have even had a sniff at being part of our title winning season.”

“The boys at the club at the time were amazing with me, they backed me to the hills and back, Chris (Sutton) and Alan (Shearer), fellow forwards were always sympathetic to me, they wanted me to just get back to full fitness.”

He went on to earn 53 caps for Scotland, play-ing in Euro 92, 96 and the 1998 World Cup, feats that couldn’t have been achieved if he didn’t overcome the devasta-tion of not one, but two leg breaks and spells at Newcastle, Preston, Sheffield Wednesday and Huddersfield proved that people still rated him and believed he could carry on at the top re-gardless of the chance of his leg going again.

Credit: www.sportalink.com

Lucky: Gallacher was only told about the severity of his first break after he retired, some seven years after the incident.

Credit: www.brfcactiongroup.co.uk