That Rangers game

[Rip Van We Go Again]

I went to this with my mate Gareth. At that time

Good find!  Found this on there too:

Benny meets Ron Saunders

Great find. Never seen that before.

John Swallow was always entertaining on ATV.

[Andy_Lochhead_in_the_air]

I went to the game with my mate Gareth. My Dad had a car park ticket in the official car park at that time, luckily as he wasnt going we drove down and used his pass.
As usual we were going to stand on the Holte, as we drove down Trinity Road quite early there were crowds of Rangers trying to get into the Holte. I said to my mate Gareth, I think we will go in the seats today, his response was `why ?'. Anyway we took our places in the `blue seats' (lower trinity). It was hard to see the pitch at first, Villa fans were entering the Holte End and then coming straight onto the track and being taken down to the Witton end.  As the match progressed the chant I remember to this day was "Fuck the Pope and the IRA...Fuck the Pope and the IRA" over and over again. Villa went 1-0 up which provoked a pitch invasion of sorts and a short stoppage but the police got it cleared and we carried on. When Villa went 2-0 up on about the hour (was it Morty who scored?) there was a mass pitch invasion, players went off and things were now out of control. Waves of drunken Rangers fans rushing towards the Witton, police reinforcements with dogs trying to repel them. It seemed to be about 3 to 4 reduced waves of fans across the pitch, until the police finally got them back. Leaving us looking on bemused at the playing field, police with dogs and a mess of flags and other assorted items strewn around a handful of semi conscious people lying on the pitch. I turned to my mate Gareth and said "come on I think we should go" to which his response was "why?". After convincing him that there wasnt going to be any more football today, we legged it out the ground through the little gate down the side of the old supporters club to the car park, in the car, drove out turned right, immediate right again down Nelson Road, and took a left at the bottom (even though we lived in Erdington) and got as much distance between us and Villa Park as quickly as possible.
My mate Gareth never had a clue at football games in the 70s, its a wonder we survived. From not shutting up at Spurs when we were 4-1 up and surrounded by cockneys to throwing a bacon sandwich back at an Everton fan after a Brian Little wonder goal at Goodison. Gareths response to the scouser when he asked him out was " I dont want sauce on my jacket but I'm not looking for a fight either, I'd rather watch the match". His best one was at Villa Park though, we stood about half way up the Holte and an egg landed on his head. He went to the back to try and find who had thrown it ! We told him, any one of about 10,000 ! Not surprisingly, he didnt find the phantom egg flinger. 

[Rip Van We Go Again]

One that also sticks in my mind is us beating Man Utd 2-1 in season 75/76 (the season where we didn't win an away game) The Manure fans charged down Yew Tree Road and smashed every other window in.
Luckily we got away with it.
Their fans had a fierce reputation back in those days.

[Andy_Lochhead_in_the_air]

One that also sticks in my mind is us beating Man Utd 2-1 in season 75/76 (the season where we didn't win an away game) The Manure fans charged down Yew Tree Road and smashed every other window in.
Luckily we got away with it.
Their fans had a fierce reputation back in those days.

They were bastards, going to Old Trafford in the 1970s was throughly unpleasant and the sheer numbers of them travelling away with pay at the gate and no controlled  ticket allocation meant riots. e.g Norwich 1975.

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[Rip Van We Go Again]

Was that the one where those two lads on the roof went crashing through?

[Simon Ward]

I have tried to blot out the events at the Rangers "friendly" over the years! Their so called fans made some of the firms from London look like a kids party!

[Andy_Lochhead_in_the_air]

This was the programme for the Villa v Glasgow Rangers friendly.
Look at the balloons. Look at the lovely images of family friendly football in the 1970s being promoted.

[The Left Side]

Thanks for sharing those accounts!

[flybo]

I also went to the game got to witton station about 1 did not feel safe so I went a little walk along the track and found myself walking along the cut. I eventually found my way on to Aston lane and walking down every bin you passed was full to overflowing.  Found my way to the serpentine car park and coaches where still arriving at half past two. When I eventually got into Villa park it was 2:45 got into the holte about ten minutes before kick-off. Had a look round all you could see was Rangers fans so I quickly decided that it was not safe and evacuated myself to the witton end. When we got our second the pitch invasion by rangers soon followed. I did stay till the game was abandoned and when it was I moved at a far rate of knots back to witton station.
But I do not care that some of you hate rangers I have problems with a club a lot closer than rangers.(tesco-bags) I AM A RANGERS FAN THAT USED TO GO. WATP

[Corleone]

what sort of attendance was it that day?

[flybo]

about 17,000 about 9,000 of them where Rangers

[Flamingo Lane]

The attendance was recorded as 17,000, which looking at the photos of the game in the next match programme looked about right.  My guess would be that there were about 6,000 Villa and 11,000 Rangers.  Strange thing was, despite being played against the vilest of atmospheres, the game itself was actually pretty good.  Frank Carrodus scored Villa's second goal that then led to the pitch invasion.

Elaine Mills - if you're reading this, I'm really sorry I legged it out the ground so fast, leaving you and your mum behind.

[Pat McMahon]

My Dad, a Dubliner, wouldn't let me go to that game alone as a 13 year old, and he said there was no way he would have gone even if he hadn't been working on the building site that day. I went down to our nan's in Newtown and I remember Rangers fans by the Crown & Cushion in Perry Barr lobbing stuff on to cars in the underpass. My mom and sisters were shopping in town and said the anti English stuff and abuse aimed at women from pissed Scots was pretty intense.

A couple of my school mates went and everything that people have said above sounds in line with what they recounted. One of my memories of the papers that weekend was that there were a couple of stabbings at the game and the Mirror / Sunday Mirror ran a headline "The Day the Villa Ran Wild", which seemed faintly ironic.

Oft overlooked is that Blues played a friendly with Celtic the year before to celebrate their centenary and had a fair bit of trouble too. As it was a midweek game the numbers of Celtic fans were much lower, but they had plenty of problems nonetheless. I think those 2 games contributed to many Villa fans of my age preferring Celtic to Rangers, and Blues siding more with Rangers, regardless of religion.

I met some Celtic fans on their way to the UEFA final in Seville in 2003 and they confirmed that in Glasgow Villa are seen as a pro Celtic club. Then again, Celtic fans seem to have a perception of every club in England being pro Rangers or pro Celtic - Simon Kuiper mentioned this in his excellent book Football Against the Enemy.

[Brend'Watkins]

There was plenty of talk the week before the game about the extent of trouble there would be. We weren't wrong.  It put me off attending so I opted to go into town instead on the bus. Every pub on the Lichfield Rd and there were far more of them then was littered with Rangers fans.  Drunken fans were everywhere, I seen kids no more than 13 or 14 swigging from bottles of Whiskey.  Fans poking up all over the place, It was as though for one day law and order didn't matter.

Then we had the stories of those who did attend. 

Rangers should never be forgiven for what happened that day and it's one of the reasons I despise that club as much as I do.  A lot was said about how sorry they were the way it turned out but nothing was done about it.  They didn't give a shit really.  In fact, if I remember correctly some of the blame was laid at our door.

[Witton Warrior]

One that also sticks in my mind is us beating Man Utd 2-1 in season 75/76 (the season where we didn't win an away game) The Manure fans charged down Yew Tree Road and smashed every other window in.
Luckily we got away with it.
Their fans had a fierce reputation back in those days.

Is that the match they assaulted the Villa chaplain? Revenge was taken later in the season when they visited another local team as I recall...