40 Years ago today

[mal]

Please feel free to move this to memories:
Aston Villa beat the mighty Santos of Brazil, featuring the legendary Pele. This game was played on Monday 21st February 1972 at Villa Park and Villa won 2-1 with goals from McMahonan and Graydon.
Enjoy:

[Mister E]

Please feel free to move this to memories:
Aston Villa beat the mighty Santos of Brazil, featuring the legendary Pele. This game was played on Monday 21st February 1972 at Villa Park and Villa won 2-1 with goals from McMahonan and Graydon.
Enjoy:

McMahon - marvellous.

[Colhint]

oh I was there. Should have seen Pele warming up. Quite fantastic. What a good night

[jembob]

I was there with Mum & Dad. We went straight to VP from school and stood underneath the floodlight at the bottom left of the Holte. 59,000 there if I remember correctly - either way it was bloody packed!

[DB]

Superb, nice post - thanks.

[Brend'Watkins]

I was there just about.  Queued for ages, got crushed, had a police horse attempt to eat my hair but glad I seen Pele.

[Simba]

Great night that was. I remember the Santos keeper having a hissy fit because as we were running off a generator due to a power strike  only two floodlight were working. We swopped the lights at half time and so he had the lights facing him both halves!

I think the crowd was 'only' 54 thousand but someone on here will correct us I am sure.

[DesBremner]

I wasn't there but my Dad and my Uncle were
There was a tannoy announcement that my cousin was born during the game and could he leave
He stayed to the end and then went to the hospital.................Legend


Thats reminded me I need to go and buy a card

[dave shelley]

I was at it.  Wouldn't have got in if I hadn't spotted a mate in the queue and sneakily shoved in!  I have vivid memories of a police horse being used to move the crowd in towards the wall and the horse then shitting down on top of a poor bloke in front of me who was penned in between the horse and the wall.  Hapy days!

[DeKuip]

Great night that was. I remember the Santos keeper having a hissy fit because as we were running off a generator due to a power strike  only two floodlight were working. We swopped the lights at half time and so he had the lights facing him both halves!

I think the crowd was 'only' 54 thousand but someone on here will correct us I am sure.

Yes it was 54,000, but it was reported at the time that another 20,000 were locked out (although that was possibly exaggerated a little) – I know we only just made it before the they shut up the turnstiles. I think because of it being a night game during the power cuts – and all the lighting was coming from a generator specially brought in – they shut the gates early for safety reasons.
We worked our way over to the Trinity Rd side of the Witton End and my main memory is the noise of the generator during the game.
My other memory is thinking this Pele geezer is over-rated. Let's be honest, he just toured the world playing exhibition matches for Santos and raking it in - and counts all his goals from these games in his grand total.
Not a patch on Cruyff, Maradona or Messi as far as I'm concerned.

[mal]

I was there too - we were in the trinity about level with Edu and on that side of the pitch which gave us an excellent view of the radio controlled ball he scored with. Until the Roberto Carlos one much later I never saw anything like it before or after. I seem to remember Pele ball juggling his way out of a crowd of at least 5 Villa players in the centre circle late on. The offical crowd was 57,000, 8,000 more than the official attendance for the Bournemouth game a few days before when by comparison Villa Park seemed half empty. The official receipts were £35,000. Ah those were the days!

[mal]

Not a patch on Cruyff, Maradona or Messi as far as I'm concerned.

Oh dear. Its a generational thing. For me Cruyff is the only one who can be compared to Pele. Messi has only just started. Maradona doesnt deserve it.

[andrew08]

Not a patch on Cruyff, Maradona or Messi as far as I'm concerned.

Oh dear. Its a generational thing. For me Cruyff is the only one who can be compared to Pele. Messi has only just started. Maradona doesnt deserve it.

Pele doesn't like anyone being compared to him either these days I gather.

[nigel]

Didn't we play Bayern Munich as well that season?

[E I Adio]

I was there too, on the Holte.

40 years ago you say? Seems like yesterday.


Well, not actually yesterday of course.