The history of football (part 4)

The history of football (part 4)

F.A.CUP

I’ve touched  upon the origins of this competition, earlier.
The actual competition itself kicked-off in season 1871/72 with just fifteen teams involved.( These days, in excess of SIX HUNDRED is the norm).

The sides in those days were all amateur and the original trophy was valued at only £20. Unfortunately. it was not to be played for, for many more seasons. In 1895 Aston Villa were the winners and they allowed the Cup to be displayed in a Birmingham sports outfitters window. Bad move. It was stolen and never saw the light of day again.
This was the first of FOUR cups. The size and design have changed somewhat, although the present trophy is an exact replica of the third.

The finals have been played in many different venues. Twenty of the first twenty one finals were held on the Kennington Oval, ( the odd one out was played at Lillie Bridge 1873), followed by Fallowfield,(one year) and Goodison Park, also a one-off. The next "home" was to be Crystal Palace for twenty years. With the Great War in full swing 1915′s final at Old Trafford was to be the last, before it ended. From 1920 to 1922 Stamford Bridge became the temporary venue. Then in !923 " Football Came Home", to WEMBLEY. The official attendance, at what has always been known as "The White Horse Final", was One Hundred Thousand. Unofficial estimates, which many pundits of the time were more inclined to accept, were double that total.The honour of scoring the first ever goal at the stadium went to David Jack of Bolton Wanderers, who beat West Ham United 2 – 0.

It was here, at Wembley that the most memorable games have been played.
1926, the Cup went out of England for the one and only time when Arsenal were turned over by a much inferior team, (according to popular thought), Cardiff City. 1 – 0.

1933.
Everton v Man City. This was the first occasion when the players wore numbers on their shirts.Everton were numberd 1 to 11 and City 12 to 22.
Theoretically, Everton were managerless at this time and the team selectors included Dixie Dean. Everton were 3 – 0 winners.

1934.
City were back to try again. This time they had a new goalkeeper, one Frank Swift. At that time the youngest ever goalkeeper to play in  a cup final.The game was played through a thunderstorm and quite early on Swift couldn’t hold a Rutherford shot and it spun into the corner of the net. Despite this set-back City turned it round in the second half to win 2 – 1. At the final whistle Frank Swift, ( a future England captain) feinted. The match was refereed by Stanley Rous. Later to be knighted and also become President of F.I.F.A.

1938.
A minute of extra time was left when the commentator announced, "if a goal is scored now, I’ll eat my hat". Preston were immediately awarded a penalty. George Mutch converted and the commentator did indeed eat his hat. This result reversed the 1922 final when Huddersfield also won with a penalty.Unbelievably this was the FIRST cup final to be TELEVISED.

1939.
The last final before the Second World War. With Wolves red-hot favourites. A star-struck member of the Portsmouth staff went into the Wolves dressing room to ask for their autographs. When he returned to his own dressing room he showed the book to anyone who was interested. This included the selectors. When they saw the state of the hand writing in the book they told their players that their opponents were scared out of their wits. At least, that’s how the story goes. Pompey won 4 – 1.
Many more great matches have been played since, of course, but these seem to have a magic of their own.