Swindon Town were finally put out of our misery this afternoon with a 3-1 defeat at Sheffield Wednesday.

The defeat meant the season couldn’t be salvaged with only 2 games now to play. Even a draw today would’ve been too little too late as results elsewhere made it impossible for Town to finish 20th.

Swindon now become the 5th third tier play-off final runner up since the inception of the Football League Play-Offs in 1986/87 to be relegated the following season.

The previous culprits being:

1995/96 – Notts County beaten by Bradford City, then finished 24th and relegated

1996/97 – Brentford beaten by Crewe, then finished 21st and relegated

1997/98 – Northampton beaten by Grimsby, then finished 22nd and relegated

2004/05 – Hartlepool beaten by Sheffield Wednesday, then finished 21st and relegated

The next statistic certainly raised a wry smile…

All four of these clubs then managed to bounce back at the first attempt in the following season in the fourth tier…all finishing in the automatic promotion places.

Both Notts County and Brentford won the fourth tier Championship, Northampton finished 3rd and Hartlepool finished 2nd in the 2006/07 season when Swindon secured 3rd position.

Why shouldn’t this trend continue for Swindon in League Two in 2011/2012?

Let’s now get positive and fully look forward to next season and forget this terrible 12 months.

Buy your season tickets and support the team to promotion.

Come on You Reds!