Earnshaw was bought buy the board behind BD's back. Hence BD's reluctance to play the lad.

There was plenty of poor reffing back then in the PL. Take the Chelsea home game. 1-0 up and looking good. They came back to win it 1-2. Both of their goals came from poor refereeing decisions giving them free kicks in the middle of the park. The move started by the free kicks saw them get their 2 goals. Neither was a foul. More similar instances throughout the season, Not enough to think we'd have staved off relegation but we'd have had far more than 11 points.

Persuade Johnson to play another season? Seth knew that, after picking up the knee injury, not going off would see him unable to play again. He stayed on. After the final he sought medical opinion and that was that his knee was done for and he wouldn't play again. Any suggestion the club should have persuaded him to cripple himself for life is, IMO, ludicrous.