Until the West Midlanders complained, the Matchman of the year was 80 peggers. John Dean had a record number of points, I think he won it twice and was runner-up. Simply, absolutely, brilliant on stick and waggler. Even Allerton, whose record spans many more years and wins, couldn't live with Dean at his sublime best. You have to look at the detailed Trent match results on 300 peg matches of 1979, 1980, 1981 to get the real idea of how good he was. My regret is that I only watched him once. Watching the Div. 1 Trent Nationals of 80, 83 and 87 made me realise that the chasm between ordinary extremely good match anglers and the sublimely brilliant Notts Fed that even Barnsley couldn't even get near on the Trent was huge.