14 years ago today!!

[Chico Hamilton III]

Jesus, time flies when you're shit. Thankfully this is just a dim and distanmt memory of a shit day at wembley


Dreaming of one last white horse final.

By David Lacey.



20 May 2000



The Guardian

GRDN



(c) 2000
 

FA Cup final

If this really is the last FA Cup final played at Wembley before the old stadium is knocked down then surely it is not asking too much for Chelsea and Aston Villa to provide a match that will be remembered for something more than the result, the fate of so many of its 71 predecessors.
 
Time and again the Cup final has failed to live up to the grandeur of the occasion. Before substitutes were allowed injuries were the problem, reducing one or other finalist to 10 men and upsetting the balance of the contest. From 1952 to 1960 five out of nine finals were affected in this way.
 
Then there were Cup final nerves. Frank Buckley's fine young Wolves side, weaned on monkey-gland tablets, were overwhelming favourites in 1939 but when they autographed a ball before kick-off their shaky signatures were barely legible. Portsmouth won 41.
 
With finals increasingly dominated by big-occasion teams such as Manchester United, Liverpool and Arsenal, pre-match nerves have become less of a problem. Yet still the Football Association's showpiece has resolutely refused to combine memorable football with a contest of such drama that the crowd has gone home with its heart racing.
 
Even the most famous Wembley final of all, the game in 1953 when Stan Mortensen and Stanley Matthews, supplied by Ernie Taylor's passes, inspired Blackpool to a 43 victory over Bolton Wanderers after they had been 31 down with 20 minutes to go, was a case of bad football redeemed by outstanding individualism.
 
Nine years later Tottenham defeated Burnley 31 in the most aesthetically pleasing of the Wembley finals but it was a relatively passionless game for all that. Asked whether he had enjoyed the match, Bill Nicholson, the Spurs manager, replied, `No, it wasn't hard enough,' and you could see what he meant.
 
The final which more than any has combined conflict and art to best effect remains the 1948 encounter between Manchester United and Blackpool when Matt Busby's first great United side came from behind to win 42.
 
Those were less cynical times. Both teams were rich in players who just wanted to demonstrate their trade as attractively as possible: Johnny Carey, Johnny Morris, Jimmy Delaney and Charlie Mitten for United, Harry Johnston, Matthews and Mortensen for Blackpool.
 
This afternoon's final, in prospect at least, has something of those qualities about it. Gianfranco Zola, Gustavo Poyet, Didier Deschamps and, yes, Dennis Wise are each capable of bringing the finest of football's arts to Chelsea's performance, and Paul Merson, Benito Carbone, Dion Dublin and Gareth Southgate can do the same for Aston Villa.
 
By no means all of the finals of the 90s were bad - although it seemed to take Arsenal and Sheffield Wednesday four years rather than four hours to settle the replayed final of 1993 - but none was outstanding.
 
The most enduring images of the past decade will be of a tear-stricken Paul Gascoigne being carried off the field in 1991 and, the previous May, Ian Wright leaping off the Crystal Palace bench to score twice and take Manchester United to a second game.
 
The 80s produced the most recent final that combined a sense of the dramatic with a genuine surprise. Who will forget the diving header by Coventry Keith Houchen to take Tottenham, who had led twice, into extra-time, the Cup eventually going to Highfield Road? Wimbledon's victory over Liverpool the following season may have been the greater shock but it was not the better match.
 
That decade was a vintage period for Wembley finals. The 1981 replay and Spurs' 32 triumph over Manchester City was an absorbing, fluctuating affair won by Ricky Villa's famous dribble through the City defence, which upstaged one of the best goals scored in a Wembley final, Steve MacKenzie's wonderful volley for City.
 
Wembley FA Cup finals have never seen more heart-warming scenes than when Sunderland, lying halfway in the old Second Division, beat Don Revie's Leeds United in 1973. Or a less likely hero than Mike Trebilcock, whose two goals turned the 1966final around for Everton against Sheffield Wednesday.
 
Yet the most tumultuous final at Wembley remains the first, in 1923, when the new stadium was engulfed by a tide of humanity that saw the game between Bolton and West Ham witnessed, unofficially, by a crowd of more than 200,000. PC George Scorey and his white horse Billy became lasting symbols of English football's sense of order and discipline even amid scenes of the utmost chaos. What a long-lost world that seems now. David Lacey.
 

[LeeB]

So drunk I thought we'd played well.

[Villan For Life]

I had managed to erase that day from my memory bank. Now you've reminded me of it and it's all coming back to me.

I still loathe Dennis Wise.

[simboy]

I broke my toe kicking the stadium when i left i was that pissed off by the result and the way we played

[PeterWithesShin]

Great day until kick off. A bunch of us hired a limo to take us there and back. The game itself means it is the worst day of my Villa life. When the final whistle went I just turned my back to the pitch, sat on the back of a seat and slumped forward with my head in my hands for a while. I still fucking hate that Madness song, as I always associate with that day.

[UK Redsox]

Terrible day, terrible view, terrible stadium.

As soon as the whistle went I ran back to the car and hightailed it out of there as fast as I could.

[Legion]

We were atrocious.

[WarszaVillan]

So drunk I thought we'd played well.

First half we didn't play too badly as I remember

[Matt C]

Shudder. Still not ready to talk about this one yet.

[Jon Crofts]

Villa fans fighting with each other in the Villa end after the game kind of summed up a shit day, add to that mouthy cockney fuckwits outside the ground and you have a recipe for a wanky day out.

[OzVilla]

Biggest anti climax of my entire life.  Never been so excited about any match and so utterly deflated afterwards.  Dennis Wise and his fucking baby - fuck off!!

To add insult to injury, the outlaws at the time where Chelsea fans and we had to meet them afterwards in London - we ended up in a pub in Chelsea FFS! 

Wiped from my memory to such a degree i'm not even sure if we lost 1-0 or 2-0.  WANKERS.

[rob_bridge]

What final was this? I can't recall.

[Pete3206]

Can't remember anything about the game and never watched any footage since. I remember getting shit faced in a pub in Paddington afterwards, but not in a good way. The train journey back on the Sunday was a miserable, alcohol sodden nightmare.

I have detested Chelsea fans and their fucking celery ever since.

[Gregorys Boy]

Yep, it was meant to be our year, I could just sense it

Since that day I have believed that like England with the WC I would never see Villa win the FA Cup during my life time, that is of course until we get a new richer backer, another decent/good manager, and start to look like contenders again of course

Maybe we should just stick to dreams of winning back the league cup..

[Dlp]

Went to this game with the missus. The only good part of the day for me was meeting a Villa legend (Dennis Mortimer) on the wembley car park and having picture taken with him. Had a shit view in the ground, thank god they demolished it and built the new stadium.