finest hour

On a recent national radio phone in the question was asked "What was your favourite team's FINEST ever 90 minutes?" to the listeners. Of course a varied debate thus ensured and it was laughable when the Manc fans, already embarrassed by admitting that although they were from the Home Counties they had been Manc fans all their life, took it completely the wrong way and quickly started quoting Barcelona '99 as their finest hour.

It took a bloke from Scouseland to bring some sanity to the proceedings when he launched into the story about the night when his Redscouse played magnificently (his words, not mine) to come back stirringly to beat St Ettiene after being two goals down from the first leg. Considering after this night they went on to win the European Cup and many other honours this quarter-final had stuck in this chap's mind as his team's finest hour.

There is no doubting that the greatest hour our club has experienced needs no mentioning from me, but for the finest hour my vote would have to go to a match that took place some five and a half years earlier.

The 15th December 1976 is not a date that anyone disinterested in the Villa would know, or remember, very much about. But for me it was the scene of the Villa's finest. The lads of the time were to turn in a performance that would have had the present day media extolling our prowess for ever and a day, and give all of us that witnessed it the mother of all Christmas presents. What did we do that night? Only beat the champions elect of England and Europe 5-1 and not only that, take only 45 minutes to do it. The Liverpool team who Villa destroyed that night is regarded in some quarters as the finest club side ever produced in the modern day era and our boys went out and slaughtered them.

As I trundled out of the old souvenir shop that night, wearing the newly purchased 'Car Rally' type Villa jacket (it was the seventies, okay?) no one, but no one, had any idea about what lay ahead. For that matter, neither did the jacket, as thanks to the haberdashery skills of mother, as time went by, it was to go travel round Europe after being in the city centre as Ron Saunders lifted the Championship trophy to an adoring assembled multitude.

At 8.15 as the half time whistle was blown, I turned to my brother and said "Punch me in the mouth or something, but just make sure that I'm alive and have just witnessed what I had just seen". It had been incredible, five goals against the cream of English football, and a performance that would have had the greatest team ever produced, Brazil 1970, struggling. It was that good, honest!! One of the goals, Brian Little's, Villa's fourth, also goes down in history as Bob's finest ever goal seen at Villa Park. (Yes, I know you think you have seen better).

The long haired one got the ball just outside the box, looked up and curled a shot round the despairing hand of England goalkeeper Ray Clemence into the corner of the net. The bend on the ball would not have looked out of place on the pitch of the Aztec Stadium amongst those Brazilians when they won their third World Cup. Years later, I would purchase Terry Weir's set of photographs containing this goal from the kiosk outside the ground and allow my mind to drift dreamingly back in time. It's got pride of place in the son's Villa decorated bedroom.

I would like to have purchased the moving pictures at some later date but the match was not even covered by the local TV company for showing on the news the next day as they had dropped what would turn out to be the biggest whoopsie for many a year. The head of sport at ATV at that time was a certain Trevor East, a prize pillock who loved to appear on Tiswas, every Saturday morning, clad in his Derby County replica shirt.

For this momentous night he had made the decision earlier in the day to send his sports outside broadcast unit, Hugh Johns and all, to the Baseball Ground to witness the debut of a player named Derek Hales who had signed for a record fee for Derby from Charlton earlier that week. The result, 0-0, served him right for allowing his own favouritism to cloud his judgement and thereby miss out on the scoop of the decade.

Also sat at Derby's ground that night, in the directors box, was a chap called Bill Shankly, there at the invitation of the board to watch the game and also discuss the possibility of joining them as a director. Wouldn't you just have loved to seen his face when the half time scores came through? Mind you, it's a bit like the present day really isn't it? TV executives showing us what they think we want to see and not having a clue on our real wishes.

Apart from Brian's goal I have not gone into detail on the content of the game very much. You can read about it in most of the books dealing with the history of the club. But in none of them will you find the quote from a 20 year old Holte Ender named Bob Moore who said as the teams came out for the second half "Let's hope the scousers don't get a early goal to make it 5-2. I can see them pulling this back" Yes, Liverpool were at the time respected so highly that such a feat was thought to be within their capabilities. It put into perspective just how good the Villa's first half performance was.

Another development of that night came regarding the reaction from Liverpool the day after the game. Working as I did at the time in the wholesale newspaper trade, I managed to see a copy of the Liverpool Echo for the day after containing the match report and the headline read: "Annihilation, Utter and Complete".

Sorry Winston, but I've just got to borrow your line: "This was their finest hour"

I don't think any more needs to be said, does it?

Bob Moore.