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Author Topic: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.  (Read 12062 times)

Offline Damo70

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #45 on: October 31, 2019, 07:56:37 PM »
I was one of the million at Highbury and Rotterdam.  The Highbury game was my greatest experience of following the Villa...ever!  Just beats Rotterdam.  It was a day when I'm sure I experienced most human emotions all rolled up together in the space of an hour and a half.  I never, ever thought I would see my beloved Villa win the first division title and just ten years earlier we'd been in the third division.  A tremendous, wonderful day.  The joy of being with tens of thousands of Villa fans both at Highbury and on foreign shores at Rotterdam has never been surpassed.

Agree with this. I was at both as a 16 and 17 year old. Magical days


I wasn't at Highbury, I was following the game on BRMB. But as an eleven year old I was in Rotterdam in the front row of the top tier behind the goal we scored in. Does anyone have a reasonably accurate attendance for how many Villa fans were at each occasion? Apparently Arsenal's highest home attendance in 1980/1981 was against Spurs at the beginning of the season (54,045). The total attendance in Rotterdam was a nice round figure of 46,000.

Online dave shelley

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #46 on: October 31, 2019, 08:01:04 PM »
ThisDamo, this is what I always thought the attendance at Highbury was, I also heard the figure 59k bandied about too.

Offline PeterWithesShin

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #47 on: October 31, 2019, 08:21:03 PM »
Pretty sure most estimates have it as around 10k Villa fans in Rotterdam.

Offline Pat McMahon

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #48 on: October 31, 2019, 10:41:30 PM »
My recollection is that numbers In the press varied between 10-13k.

I was among the last to buy my coach and match ticket as I rushed back from university in Sheffield to beat the deadline ( if I recall it was the Friday of the Swansea game). I asked the ticket office how many had been sold and they told me 11.5 - 12k ( remember this was pre. Computers so not completely accurate. ).

A neighbour worked at Villa Park and that weekend he told me the head of security (John Hood?) told him the club knew of fans who had gone over and had already bought tickets in Rotterdam. Given the shenanigans in Anderlecht it was amazing that the police and UEFA did not clamp down on this.

I met a number of people in the Double Diamond in Rotterdam on the day of the game who had bought tickets locally. There were a few big Dutch blokes stood next to me in the game too and they had just bought tickets from Feyenoord and said they had sold a few that afternoon to Villa fans,

Offline West Derby Villan

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #49 on: October 31, 2019, 10:46:33 PM »
My recollection is that numbers In the press varied between 10-13k.

I was among the last to buy my coach and match ticket as I rushed back from university in Sheffield to beat the deadline ( if I recall it was the Friday of the Swansea game). I asked the ticket office how many had been sold and they told me 11.5 - 12k ( remember this was pre. Computers so not completely accurate. ).

A neighbour worked at Villa Park and that weekend he told me the head of security (John Hood?) told him the club knew of fans who had gone over and had already bought tickets in Rotterdam. Given the shenanigans in Anderlecht it was amazing that the police and UEFA did not clamp down on this.

I met a number of people in the Double Diamond in Rotterdam on the day of the game who had bought tickets locally. There were a few big Dutch blokes stood next to me in the game too and they had just bought tickets from Feyenoord and said they had sold a few that afternoon to Villa fans,

Yeah there were a fair few Dutch fans in our end. When I asked them why they said they supported anyone playing against the Germans

Offline Brassneck

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #50 on: October 31, 2019, 11:15:01 PM »
I was in Amsterdam from the Monday.  Most people who bought tickets from Feyenoord caught trains from Amsterdam to Rotterdam to buy tickets on the Monday and/or Tuesday.  They then returned to Amsterdam.

Offline wittonwarrior

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #51 on: November 01, 2019, 07:31:50 PM »
I travelled with a fair few from the London lions we all began and ended up in Amsterdam- due to a cancellation of the boat train at Harwich we all jumped the commuter train back to Liverpool Street - some of the looks we got

Offline TonyD

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #52 on: November 14, 2019, 06:55:42 PM »
There was a fair few of us at the Milk Cup semi away to Everton in 84.
Highbury was c22,000 to 25,000
Rotterdam was c13,000

Offline Damo70

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #53 on: November 14, 2019, 07:23:26 PM »
There was a fair few of us at the Milk Cup semi away to Everton in 84.
Highbury was c22,000 to 25,000
Rotterdam was c13,000

My mum stopped me from going to the semi final at Goodison. I was thirteen but had the measles. I wasn't happy.

Offline Rudy Can't Fail

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #54 on: November 16, 2019, 12:16:10 AM »
I was one of the million at Highbury and Rotterdam.  The Highbury game was my greatest experience of following the Villa...ever!  Just beats Rotterdam.  It was a day when I'm sure I experienced most human emotions all rolled up together in the space of an hour and a half.  I never, ever thought I would see my beloved Villa win the first division title and just ten years earlier we'd been in the third division.  A tremendous, wonderful day.  The joy of being with tens of thousands of Villa fans both at Highbury and on foreign shores at Rotterdam has never been surpassed.

Agree with this. I was at both as a 16 and 17 year old. Magical days

A tad younger but fully agree. Hillsborough 75 was up there too. Old Trafford 88 was more fun than anything, Norwich three times in a week with the 3rd a away trip midweek in the cup was crazy. One of those days when you thought you were one of the Chosen Few and thousands turned up.

Offline Rudy Can't Fail

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #55 on: November 16, 2019, 12:18:54 AM »
There was a fair few of us at the Milk Cup semi away to Everton in 84.
Highbury was c22,000 to 25,000
Rotterdam was c13,000

My mum stopped me from going to the semi final at Goodison. I was thirteen but had the measles. I wasn't happy.

Not our greatest moment. Possibly the angriest I've seen Villa fans away from home.

Offline tony scott

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #56 on: November 16, 2019, 01:24:43 AM »
I remember going to Wolves on Boxing Day in the early 1960s. I think we had a lot there ,we won 1 0 it was also the day they signed Ken Wagstaff .

Online dcdavecollett

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #57 on: November 18, 2019, 10:46:11 PM »
Shouldn't that be Dave Wagstaffe?

Offline clash city rocker

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #58 on: December 01, 2019, 12:12:02 PM »
For me it was the cup replay at Coventry vs palace. But plenty of other games where we pushing the 20k mark

Offline wittonwarrior

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Re: Largest away following with the Villa - non Wembley.
« Reply #59 on: December 25, 2019, 09:57:58 PM »
There was a fair few of us at the Milk Cup semi away to Everton in 84.
Highbury was c22,000 to 25,000
Rotterdam was c13,000

My mum stopped me from going to the semi final at Goodison. I was thirteen but had the measles. I wasn't happy.

Not our greatest moment. Possibly the angriest I've seen Villa fans away from home.

Think it was the police horse in the blue house after the brawl that did it for me

 


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