DIVISION 1    1997/98
 

Leading goalscorers:
Pierre Van Hooijdonk (Nottingham Forest) &
Kevin Phillips 
(Sunderland)
 29 goals

It was not the first season at their new Britannia Stadium that Stoke City would have hoped for. The stadium was officially opened by Sir Stanley Matthews when it staged its first League match, against Swindon on Saturday 30th August 1997. Stoke lost that match and another 9 League matches at the Britannia including 7-0 and 5-2 home defeats by Birmingham and Manchester City. Stoke were relegated.

Manchester City also made the drop to play in the third tier of the League for the first time. But had City's Jamie Pollock not scored an amazing own goal for QPR in the last few days of the season City wouold have stayed up and QPR would have gone down.
Own goals

   P W D L F A Pts
    1 Nottingham Forest 46 28 10 8 82 42 94 Promoted
    2 Middlesbrough 46 27 10 9 77 41 91 Promoted
    3 Sunderland 46 26 12 8 86 50 90 Play Off
    4 Charlton Athletic 46 26 10 10 80 49 88 Promoted
    5 Ipswich Town 46 23 14 9 77 43 83 Play Off
    6 Sheffield United 46 19 17 10 69 54 74 Play Off
    7 Birmingham City 46 19 17 10 60 35 74
    8 Stockport County 46 19 8 19 71 69 65
    9 Wolverhampton W. 46 18 11 17 57 53 65
    10 West Bromwich Albion 46 16 13 17 50 56 61
    11 Crewe Alexandra 46 18 5 23 58 65 59
    12 Oxford United 46 16 10 20 60 64 58
    13 Bradford City 46 14 15 17 46 59 57
    14 Tranmere Rovers 46 14 14 18 54 57 56
    15 Norwich City 46 14 13 19 52 69 55
    16 Huddersfield Town 46 14 11 21 50 72 53
    17 Bury 46 11 19 16 42 58 52
    18 Swindon Town 46 14 10 22 42 73 52
    19 Port Vale 46 13 10 23 56 66 49
    20 Portsmouth 46 13 10 23 51 63 49
    21 Queens Park Rangers 46 10 19 17 51 63 49
    22 Manchester City 46 12 12 22 56 57 48 Relegated
    23 Stoke City 46 11 13 22 44 74 46 Relegated
    24 Reading 46 11 9 26 39 78 42 Relegated
   
   
Play Off Semi-Finals    Play Off
1st Leg
Sun May 10 Ipswich Town 0 - 1 Charlton Athletic
Sun May 10 Sheffield United 2 - 1 Sunderland
2nd Leg
Wed May 13 Charlton Athletic 1 - 0 Ipswich Town
Wed May 13 Sunderland 2 - 0 Sheffield United
Aggregate scores
Charlton Athletic 2 - 0 Ipswich Town
Sunderland 3 - 2 Sheffield United
Play Off Final (at Wembley)
Mon May 25 Charlton Athletic 4 - 4 Sunderland
    (Charlton won 7-6 on penalties)
Charlton Athletic were promoted to the Premier Division