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Posted: |
May 7, 2013 - 5:14 AM
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By: |
Tall Guy
(Member)
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Hey Tall Guy, speaking of parochial...while watching the Sunderland-Stoke City match today, I learned that yesterday marked 40 years since Sunderland stunned Leeds United 1-0 in the FA Cup Final. The announcer said that in today's parlance, that would be like Derby County defeating Manchester United today.
In case this historical note slipped your mind:
http://www.thefa.com/Competitions/FACompetitions/TheFACup/History/historyofthefacup/1973sunderlandleeds
"One doesn't easily forget, Herr Baron, an arm torn out by the roots."
Nor when your football team, allegedly the best in the country at the time, is beaten by a lower league side in a major cup final...
What's worse, I was at school in Newcastle at the time. For background, Newcastle United fans and Sunderland FC fans HATE each other and each other's clubs, only being about 15 miles from each other. I was the only Leeds fan amongst about 1,200 kids at my school (if there were others, they had the sense to keep their heads down and their mouths shut), and on the day before the game, the playground conversation went something like this:
Sunderland fans - "If Leeds win tomorrow, we're going to kick your head in"
Newcastle fans - "If you let Sunderland win tomorrow, we're going to kick your head in"
Luckily, my 14 year-old self was clearly so distraught on the Monday that I got away without being brayed. So, yes, I remember it in all its putrid detail, thanks very much!
TG
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A Sunderland draw sets it up nicely for a Wigan win tonight and consequently Newcastle dumped into the bottom three with two games to go - QPR and Arsenal!! They will probably beat QPR and get enough points to survive, but I hope they dont.
Champs league place probable decider tomorrow!! Chel v Tott. Could be a good one.
Or rather Chelsea v Gareth Bale.
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Posted: |
May 7, 2013 - 8:44 AM
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By: |
Jim Phelps
(Member)
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Now THIS is the kind of story that has endeared me to the game. "Losing feels worse than winning feels good." I love hearing the tales out of school about how a win or a loss affects a fan, though the thought of our Tall Guy (vintage '73) being thrown like a harpoon by hooligans doesn't make me happy one bit. However, the fact that you remember a result of a football match from 40 years ago and have a snapshot of the time and place in your life when it happened is good stuff.
Now, to focus on a more upbeat tale from yesteryear--and this is a question for all concerned in this thread--what do you remember as your team's finest moment? I hope at least some of you chip in with your memories. 
"One doesn't easily forget, Herr Baron, an arm torn out by the roots."
Nor when your football team, allegedly the best in the country at the time, is beaten by a lower league side in a major cup final...
What's worse, I was at school in Newcastle at the time. For background, Newcastle United fans and Sunderland FC fans HATE each other and each other's clubs, only being about 15 miles from each other. I was the only Leeds fan amongst about 1,200 kids at my school (if there were others, they had the sense to keep their heads down and their mouths shut), and on the day before the game, the playground conversation went something like this:
Sunderland fans - "If Leeds win tomorrow, we're going to kick your head in"
Newcastle fans - "If you let Sunderland win tomorrow, we're going to kick your head in"
Luckily, my 14 year-old self was clearly so distraught on the Monday that I got away without being brayed. So, yes, I remember it in all its putrid detail, thanks very much!
TG
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Yeah, cheers, Jim, thanks for torturing poor old TG and making him re-live probably one of his most hideous memories from schooldays!! ha ha. You just put back 30 years of bullying therapy!!
Well, choosing the west ham one is tough, Mr Phelps. There has been a lot of magic but fleeting moments, although much crud inbetween.
Villa Park 1990 was special. We lost 4-0 to Clough's Forest but our fans chanted throughout the second half, so much so they drowned out the cheer for the fourth Forest goal. Forest fans were open-mouthed in awe. Nobody sings when theyre losing. Not like that. We were singing and dancing and clapping like we'd won the league!!
Tactically outfoxing and beating Arsenal at Wembley was sweet, when we were in the next tier down and considered fodder for the big Wembley occasion.
Also stopping Man Utd winning the title twice - especially the one where we, already relegated, according to Ferguson, showed "obscene commitment". We even have a chant about 'obscene commitment' to this day.
64 cup final, 65 cup winners cup, 86 coming third with Cottee and McAvennie....
But, overall, probably the year we won the World Cup, in 66....
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Posted: |
May 8, 2013 - 12:24 AM
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By: |
Tall Guy
(Member)
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I loved the "Loser's Chant" story, Bill. That's what football is all about; cheering on your team no matter what--and winning trophies, of course. 
If you have the appetite for more...
In 1973 and 1975 Leeds United played in the finals of the European Cup Winners' Cup and The European Cup respectively. In both cases, appalling refereeing decisions cost us the game (look them up on Youtube if you don't believe me!) and how this hurt us in perpetuity is probably best shown by me being invited as recently as last week to sign an online petition demanding that Leeds be retrospectively awarded the Cup Winners Cup on the 40th anniversary of the first debacle. Incidentally, the ref's cheating was so clear that the local Greek fans were booing him and chanting "cheat" in the language of Plato and Pythagoras.
Neither referee officiated another game as far as I recall, such was the obviousness of their bias to the then authorities, yet nothing was done by UEFA or the gutless Football League. The European Cup Final in 1975 hurt in particular, as Leeds had been (on their day, which was generally a Saturday, fortunately) amongst the best teams in Europe for a few years up to that point. An opening Leeds goal was disallowed for a phantom offside, and two CLEAR penalties for fouls on the great poacher Allan Clarke weren't given. And, bang bang, two Gerd Mueller goals saw Bayern home. The Leeds fans who had travelled to the game (and I was chatting to one over a pint a couple of weeks ago) were distraught, of course, and several of them took it out on the stadium and in the streets. It was said - perhaps with hyperbole - that Leeds fans did more damage to Paris that evening than the Nazis had done during the occupation.
We had a better excuse...
To this day, at some point during most Leeds games, a lone fan will start the ironic chant: "We are the Champions, Champions of Europe", and it'll be taken up by thousands of others to the puzzlement of the younger Brighton or Peterborough or Palace fans who only know the 70s through the record books.
TG
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"Was Liverpool the hated team of choice when they were the dominant force in English football?"
------------------------------
I don't think ANY team is, or has been hated more than Man U down the years!
When Liverpool were winning all before them**, both domestically and in Europe, they had likeable, respected managers who didn't bully, intimidate or manipulate their way to achieve things like Fergus has. While no one will dispute what he's achieved over the past 20+ years, the fact he did it in a bitter, unsporting, belligerent and conniving way will always undermine those achievements for me (and many others, I'm sure). No question, as Taggart would say himself. Also, his record in Europe is quite disappointing for such a renowned winner domestically.
On the subject of great memories, as a Kopite, I feel quite greedy in the amount of joyous occasions that LFC have afforded me down the years.
My first 'special memory' was when I was 11, at Anfield, watching Liverpool beat St Etienne in the Quarter Finals of the European Cup (now Champions League). We'd lost 1-0 in the first leg in France and got that goal back quite quickly at Anfield. Then the French team scored to go 2-1 up on aggregate, but more importantly, had an away goal which meant we had to score 2. With time running out and still needing one more goal, on came super-sub David Fairclough (who had gained a habit of scoring late winners from the bench) and when he fired in the winner, the stadium went mental (I still remember it like yesterday).
Then in May that same year (1977) I opened my present on my 12th birthday (20th May) from my older brother and it was tickets to see Liverpool play Borussia Moenchengladbach in Rome on May 25th!
We won the European Cup by beating the German team 3-1 and went on to dine at the top table for many, many years AND I WAS THERE TO SEE IT!!!
Although we haven't won the League title for many years now, LFC fans still get special days and nights with our many Cup victories, two of the most famous and recent being the Gerrard Final in Istanbul when we came back from 3 goals down to beat Milan on penalties and win the European Cup for the fifth time and keep it (only 3 teams have managed that feat - Real Madrid and Milan being the other two - although Bayern Munich will join us and also keep it if they win it this year) and the FA Cup Final against Bill's beloved West Hammmm innit, also a Gerrard Final, as we were down and out with seconds to go when he blasted in a stunning equaliser and we went on to also win that cup on pennogs.
Somehow, LFC have managed to win trophies, even during the lean times.
**even when LFC were the top dogs, Man U remained the media darlings and seemed to get most of the press and publicity, despite doing nothing for years!! This really rankled with Kopites during those times and is another reason we hate them so much.
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Posted: |
May 9, 2013 - 3:48 PM
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By: |
Tall Guy
(Member)
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It looks like I have a ton of football history to catch up on! I'd never heard of the UEFA Winner's Cup before and there was something about England being banned from the competition?
I'm sure that 1975 Champions League Final is the worst of them all, being the most prestigious tournament.
Was Liverpool the hated team of choice when they were the dominant force in English football? Manchester United were crap during that time so they were no real threat, right? You only hate them when they're winning.
Kev's right - Liverpool weren't remotely as despised as Man United are now, and the Fergie factor weighs heavily in that equation. But the glory hunting non-local support plays its part, too.
The Cup Winners Cup was a European tournament for teams that had won their country's most prestigious cup in the previous season. In England it was of course the FACup, so Leeds only got to play the one time. To be cheated out of it was particularly galling.
In those days, the main European club tournament was called The European Cup, and only the championship from each country qualified, not the top two, three or four as it is now. It was also straight knockout tournament over two legs. It's only the idea of the amount of money to be made that caused the evolution of the current format of Champions League and Europa Cup.
As for your remaining query, English clubs were banned for five years following Heysel. Look it up for more detail.
To make a final point, it'll be harder to dislike Man United now that David Moyes is going to be in charge. But I dare say that I'll manage...
TG
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