29 Minutes from Wembley

Steve Phelps

Description

On 10 February 1981 Coventry City stood 29 minutes from Wembley in the League Cup semi-final second leg at West Ham United's Upton Park. Victories over Manchester United, Brighton and Hove Albion, Cambridge United and Watford had taken Gordon Milne's side to the first semi-final in the club's 97-year history. City's youngsters missed out on a trip to Wembley in the cruellest of circumstances after a fantastic first leg at Highfield Road in front of 36,000 fans. For the first time, the cast of 1981 are reunited to tell their stories. 29 Minutes From Wembley features exclusive interviews with players, management, supporters and opposition stars. Contemporary media reports appear alongside memories and retrospectives to recall a wonderful time in Sky Blue history, the team's age averaging just 21. By the summer of 1983 the majority had left the club; here, they tell their individual stories of their time at Coventry City, a club still close to their hearts after all these years. Just how good could that team have been?

Sujets

• Midlands Occidentales
• West Midlands
• Warwickshire
• Midlands de l'Ouest

Informations

• Publié par: Pitch Publishing Ltd
• Date de parution: 01 octobre 2017
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781785313738
• Langue: English

Extrait

First published by Pitch Publishing, 2017
Pitch Publishing
A2 Yeoman Gate
Yeoman Way
Durrington
BN13 3QZ
www.pitchpublishing.co.uk
Steve Phelps, 2017
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the Publisher.
A CIP catalogue record is available for this book from the British Library
Print ISBN 978-1-78531-303-5 eBook ISBN 978-1-78531-373-8
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Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction
The Cast
Welcome to Coventry City Football Club
Pre-season 1980/81
The Goal That Never Was
Farewell to Hutch
From the Abbey to the Connexion
Bodak s The Name, Goals Are My Game
And They All Run to Little Danny Thomas
Seats For All At Highfield Road
Just How Good Could That Team Have Been?
Photographs
Acknowledgements
Andy Blair, Garry Thompson, Danny Thomas, Brian Harry Roberts, Mick Coop, Paul Dyson, Gary Gillespie, Peter Bodak, Gerry Daly, Mark Hateley, Steve Hunt, Steve Jacobs, Jim Blyth, Ian Wallace, Mick Ferguson, Tommy Hutchison, Roger Van Gool, Graham Oakey, David Cross, Steve Ogrizovic, Clive Allen, Keith Hackett, John Motson, Gordon Milne and John Sillett. Thank you for your time and individual contributions which have woven together a very special time in Coventry City s history.
If it wasn t for the regular contact and help from Andy Blair and Garry Thompson this book would not have been written. Over the last 16 months nothing was too much trouble and their enthusiasm for the project was fantastic. Thank you.
Jim Brown, Dean Nelson, Dave Long, Mike Young, Billy Bell, Raj Athwal, Rudi Kaiser, Glenn Burdett (friend of Graham Oakey) and Alan Biggs have provided invaluable assistance along the way. Jim, Dean and Dave thank you for your memories.
Coventry Evening Telegraph for the match reports. All other acknowledgements for the text are in the book itself.
Photograph section - thanks to Coventry City Football Club and the Coventry Evening Telegraph , Newham Recorder , Brighton and Hove Albion, Brighton Sports Argus and The Hammer , West Ham United s matchday programme.
John Hewitson and History Centre colleagues at the Herbert Art Gallery for archive material.
Paul, Jane, Derek, Duncan and Gareth at Pitch Publishing.
My wife Emma and our teenage daughters, Aimee and Jolie.
Introduction
F EBRUARY 2016 saw the Coventry City Former Players Association (CCFPA) host the annual Legends Day as the club s former stars returned to the club. With former Sky Blue Brian Harry Roberts hosting proceedings on behalf of the CCFPA, each player present, including a number of 1987 FA Cup winners, was asked to stand as their name was read out to take the acclaim of hundreds of supporters.
The table next to us saw applause for Ian Wallace, Barry Powell and Dennis Mortimer before the decibel level was raised with the next two: Andy Blair and Garry Thompson. Their popularity among the Sky Blue army, 35 years on from the League Cup run, told me there was a story, as yet unheard in its entirety, from the squad of 1980/81, the first Coventry City side to reach the semi-final of a major competition.
It s taken time, 16 months in all, to bring their story together; some of the players haven t seen each other for 30 years. Roger Van Gool was located, via Rudi Kaiser, in Bruges. Over in Florida, thanks to Garry Thompson, I spoke with Danny Thomas. Raj Athwal, former Commercial Manager at Coventry City, used contacts from his time at Rangers to point me in the direction of Mark Hateley. Andy Blair and Garry Thompson, between them, are still in contact with Peter Bodak, Paul Dyson, Gary Gillespie, Gerry Daly, Brian Roberts, Jim Blyth, Mick Coop, Gordon Milne and Clive Allen. Twitter located former Sky Blue and, for this era, Hammer David Cross while Mick Ferguson via his work at Leeds United was added to the growing list.
Mike Young and Billy Bell at the CCFPA steered me in the direction of Ian Wallace and Tommy Hutchison while Steve Hunt s own soccer school on the Isle of Wight enabled contact to be made. My work on the 1987 FA Cup win, Sky Blue Heroes , saw dialogue resumed with Jim Brown, Dean Nelson, John Sillett and John Motson while freelance commentator Alan Biggs again came up trumps with a number for Sheffield referee Keith Hackett. Former Great Britain athlete Dave Long added his fan memories to the mix while two former players had their first contact since leaving the club in 1980 and 1984 respectively: Graham Oakey and Steve Jacobs. Steve Ogrizovic s contribution from his time at Liverpool is from my interview for, Sky Blue Heroes , in 2014.
The number of players that progressed through the youth system makes this a very unique group. Very few were bought by the club as they progressed through the ranks and played for the first team in Division One. What they have is an affinity for the club where their careers began, a group who looked out for each other, who, even after all these years, have wonderful memories of their time together, on and off the pitch.
This was the first group of footballers I ever watched live at Highfield Road and I ve weaved together their respective arrivals at the club before the focus moves to season 1980/81and the history-making League Cup run. We then look at their respective journeys post 1981 while Gordon Milne links the whole journey with his recollections. In a nutshell, this group tell the story of their time at Coventry City, a club they never wanted to leave, a club still close to their hearts after all these years.
Steve Phelps
2017
The Cast
The squad: Danny Thomas, Brian Harry Roberts, Andy Blair, Paul Dyson, Gary Gillespie, Peter Bodak, Gerry Daly, Mark Hateley, Garry Thompson, Steve Hunt, Steve Jacobs, Mick Coop, Jim Blyth, Tommy Hutchison, Roger Van Gool, Graham Oakey, Ian Wallace, Mick Ferguson
Manager: Gordon Milne
Chief scout: John Sillett
Liverpool goalkeeper: Steve Ogrizovic
Crystal Palace number nine: Clive Allen
Match of the Day commentator: John Motson
West Ham number nine: David Cross
West Ham (a) referee: Keith Hackett
Welcome to Coventry City Football Club
T HE 1970s established Coventry City in Division One of the Football League. Promoted to the top flight in 1967, they were managed by Jimmy Hill who led the sky blue revolution and took the club from Division Three to Division One upon his arrival in 1961.
Hill s sudden departure to London Weekend Television prior to the opening game at Burnley saw the appointment of Noel Cantwell as manager. The Sky Blues finished one place above the relegation zone in 1967/68 and 1968/69 before an unbelievable sixth place in 1969/70 ensured qualification for the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup.
Tenth place in 1970/71 continued the progress until March 1972 when, with the side 18th in the division, Cantwell was sacked and chief scout Bob Dennison took over as caretaker until the season s end. Jimmy Hill would return as managing director in 1975 and combined the role with presenting Match of the Day on BBC1 before, as a major shareholder, taking on the chairman s role in the summer of 1980.
In the summer of 1972, Gordon Milne, non-league Wigan Athletic s player-manager, was appointed as team manager with Joe Mercer, general manager at Manchester City, appointed to the same role at Highfield Road. Milne s playing career included seven years at Liverpool under the tutelage of Bill Shankly, one of the legendary Scot s first signings when he joined from Preston North End for 16,000 in 1960. Liverpool, it s hard to believe, were in Division Two and Milne was part of the side who won the title in 1962 to return to the top flight.
Two Division One title medals followed as he played 282 times and scored 19 goals at Anfield while Sir Alf Ramsey awarded him 14 England caps during his time on Merseyside. A knee injury put paid to his chance of appearing in the 1966 World Cup finals and a year later he moved to Blackpool for three seasons before the move to Wigan, then in the Northern Premier League, and managed them from 1970 until his move to Highfield Road.
He recalled, It was my first big job in management as a young coach. I was 35 at the time and went there with Joe Mercer, Joe being the general manager and myself the first-team coach. Joe was the big appointment as he had the reputation having won the Division One title with Manchester City along with the FA Cup, League Cup and European Cup Winners Cup in just six seasons while nobody knew who I was coming from non-league.
I was the coach and picked the team each week while Joe was the link between me, the board and the media. To ensure our First Division status was vital and this rapport moved to the pitch and saw us through at vital times. Many big clubs including Manchester United, Tottenham Hotspur and Newcastle United disappeared into Division Two and we managed to avoid the drop.
Every season we were always one of three tipped to go down but it didn t matter who we were playing whether we were away to Liverpool or home to Palace as every game was a cup tie to us. We developed a positive mentality and weren t in fear of anything as there was no point beating Liverpool and then losing the next week to Stoke City with all due respect to them.
Shortly after they took the reins, Milne went back to Blackpool in the autumn of 1972 to sign Scottish winger Tommy Hutchison for 140,000 in a swap deal with striker Billy Rafferty. The signing would prove to be one of the best in Coventry City s history, and he