DID YOU KNOW....

CENTURIES of LEAGUE GOALS CONCEDED 
in a SEASON

Football has a million and one stories and just as many facts and figures. Here are a few of them - the record-breaking, unusual and bizarre.

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See also Centuries of League goals scored in a season.

My guess would have been that clubs conceded a century of goals more often than clubs have scored 100 or more - I've seen a lot more rubbish defences than brilliant forwards! But the stats prove different. While 67 different clubs have scored a century or more goals 139 times only 64 clubs have let in 100 or more goals just 119 times since 1888.

Scroll down to find the 119 by season, by goals conceded and by club or click on the category as a short cut.

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Mind you those who are bad are really bad. The top scorers in a league season scored 134 times but on four occasions that figure has been exceeded in the goals against column, Darwen being the worst of the lot.

In the 1891/92 season Darwen became the first side to concede a century of League goals, letting in 112 in 26 matches in the single division Football League, an average of over 4 a match. One of those was a 12-0 defeat although amazingly they also won a match 9-3! Results & table. Worse was to follow for the Lancashire side and in 1898/99 they shipped 141 goals in 34 Second Division matches. Three times they let in ten in a match, twice nine and another couple of times eight were conceded and in away matches alone they conceded a century of goals which is the only time that has happened. They finished a distant bottom of the table and didn't bother to seek re-election to the League and have never got back into the competition. Results & table.

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Not surprisingly most clubs who let in a century of goals have ended the season in a relegation (or needing to seek re-election). But not always so. The highest-placed club to have let in a century was Manchester City in the 1957/58 season when they finished an amazing  5th in the old First Division despite conceding exactly 100 goals. They managed it by themselves scoring 104 goals - the only time a club as both scored and conceded a century of League goals in a season. Results and table.

In the 1960/61 Chelsea came close to equalling Manchester City feat when they let in 100 but only manager to score 98, again in the old First Division. Results and table.

Only one club in the past 50 years has let in a century without finishing in a relegation or re-election position - Exeter City in 1982/83 in the Third Division.

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I suppose they have better defences - and they play fewer matches - so its perhaps not surprising that top division sides have only ever conceded a century or more of League goals on 23 occasions, and only one of those was in the Premier League. The worst defence belonged to Blackpool who let in 125 goals in the First Division in 1930/31 (results). Blackpool finished the season with 71 goals for and 125 against. Leeds United scored 68 goals and let in considerably fewer than Blackpool, just 81, but Blackpool finished one place above Leeds. Leeds were relegated and amazingly Blackpool stayed up.

Blackpool finished the following season with goals for 65 and goals against 102 and again stayed up. The season after that though they scored more (69) and let in a lot less (85)....but were relegated!

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In 1963/64 Ipswich Town let in a mahoosive 121 goals when suffering relegation from the First Division, just two seasons after they had finished as Football League champions. .

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The only Premier side to concede a century was Swindon Town with exactly 100 goals against in their one and only top-flight season in 1993/94. Results.

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It is certainly a lot rarer for clubs to to concede - or score - a century of League goals in a season. In just one season in 1927/28 8 clubs conceded 100 or more goals while 7 scored a century or more. By contrast no club has conceded a century or more since Stockport in 2001/02 and only 10 have suffered that indignity since the end of the 1970s.

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The most common conceders of a century of League goals have been Hartlepools United and Newport County who have both recorded the dubious honour seven times. Hartlepools (they didn't drop the 's' until 1968) have have the worst consecutive sequence conceding three figures four times on the trot in the Fourth Division from the 1959/60 season, each time needing to be re-elected to the Football League.

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