Football writing, thoughts and more by Gary James
Forty years ago today (11 December 1985) a 2-0 victory (3-2 on aggregate) by Billy McNeill’s Manchester City over Brian Horton’s Hull sent the Blues to Wembley for the inaugural Full Members’ Cup Final. City’s scorers at Maine Road were David Phillips and Jim Melrose before the largest crowd (by any club) of the entire tournament, excluding the final, of 10,180. Here’s a contemporary report by Patrick Barclay of the game:
You can read more on the Full Members Cup and what it was all about here:
During my tidy-up of my writing space I’ve rediscovered items I’ve used in my research over the years and thought I’d post some on here. Today here are some images and information from the Topical Times Sporting Annual 1934-35. There’s some interesting aspects and information that I’m sure some of you will find interesting. let’s start with the cover…
The player in the blue shirt is Manchester City’s Matt Busby who the yearbook regarded as one of the 6 sporting stars of 1934. Here’s what they said about him:
The book included a small section on each team. City’s looked like this (notice the record attendance has a typo; it should be 84,569. Also, look at Middlesbrough’s record crowd. It has since been passed though!):
For those wondering why this alphabetical list of clubs went from City to Middlesbrough and not Manchester United, the list was by division. At that time City were in the top tier and United were in the second. Here’s their profile:
At that time United’s record crowd was for a game staged at Old Trafford but not featuring United. That has since been surpassed but Old Trafford’s record is still for a game not featuring United (Wolves v Grimsby FAC tie). Note also the official colours of United.
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DonateAlmost 46 years since their first ever meeting Manchester City and Real Madrid meet tomorrow (10 December 2025) in the Champions League. I doubt anyone in the media covering the game will mention the first meeting but if there is anyone interested it took place on 19 December in 1979. Back in 1979 the game was considered a prestigious friendly, or at least that’s what it was supposed to be, but it turned out to be a controversial game with implications for the Blues for some time. Here for subscribers is an 1800 word article with images of that game and the controversy surrounding it.
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Here’s a photo from this day (9 December) in 1967 and it shows Tony Coleman scoring City’s third goal in a remarkable game that took place at Maine Road. It became known as the Ballet On Ice. Manchester United supporter Bobby Greenroyd watched the game on Match of the Day and wrote to City afterwards: ‘I am a regular Manchester United fan, but after Saturday’s game your next home gate will be increased by one.’ High praise, particularly as United themselves were on the verge of European Cup glory.
Why and how did this happen and which leading MCFC figure sneaked out to buy a bag of chips while the club celebrated its 1968 League title success? Here for subscribers is an article that explains all….
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Today’s (8 December 2025) FA Cup third round draw has resulted in Manchester City and Exeter being drawn against each for what will be the first competitive fixture ever between the clubs. It’s always satisfying when the FA Cup throws up a unique occasion like this. Looking forward to it.
During my tidy-up of my writing space I’ve rediscovered items I’ve used in my research over the years and thought I’d post some on here. Today here are a couple of images taken of parts of the Whalley Range AFC Diamond Jubilee Booklet. First a team photo from 1900-01. Anybody related to any of these players?
Next some text mentioning a game between Whalley Range and Manchester City:
I’ve checked the usually comprehensive records compiled by statistician Ray Goble (given to me shortly before his death) and there’s no mention of this game. I’ve also searched several newspapers looking for a report of it and haven’t yet found one (no doubt there’d be a report in a local newspaper in the Whalley Range area), proving that there are still many unknowns in City’s history.
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DonateOn this day (7 December) in 1968 reigning Champions Manchester City defeated Burnley 7-0 at Maine Road with goals from Bell (2), Young (2), Doyle, Lee, and Coleman.
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On this day (6 December) in 2004 Bradley Wright-Phillips marks his first League appearance for Manchester Cuty with an 80th minute goal against Middlesbrough. The game ended in a 3-2 defeat for City (Robbie Fowler scored the other City goal) but, if you fancy a flashback, you can watch highlights here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYEYZF118Ao
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DonateNow that Erling Haaland has joined an exclusive group of Manchester City players who have scored 100 League goals for the club I thought I’d post a table of all those players. I’ve also listed them in a goals per game format (I’d love to do goals per minutes but we simply don’t have that information for all players). Here goes…
The goals per game ratios for all Manchester City players who have scored 100 league goals or more…
| Goals | First Name | Surname | Goals Per Game | Total League Appearances |
| 100 | Erling | Haaland | 0.9009 | 111 |
| 184 | Sergio | Aguero | 0.6691 | 275 |
| 126 | Billy | Gillespie | 0.5780 | 218 |
| 120 | Horace | Barnes | 0.5530 | 217 |
| 122 | Tommy | Browell | 0.5495 | 222 |
| 116 | Frank | Roberts | 0.5370 | 216 |
| 158 | Tommy | Johnson | 0.4817 | 328 |
| 112 | Francis | Lee | 0.4498 | 249 |
| 110 | Fred | Tilson | 0.4472 | 246 |
| 142 | Joe | Hayes | 0.4290 | 331 |
| 107 | Alec | Herd | 0.4163 | 257 |
| 146 | Billy | Meredith | 0.3989 | 366 |
| 158 | Eric | Brook | 0.3511 | 450 |
| 117 | Colin | Bell | 0.2970 | 394 |
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DonateI’ve been sorting out my writing area and have been going through my collection. I’ll post a few odd bits on here over the coming weeks but I spotted this earlier today and thought I’d get this posted straight away. It’s the first issue of King of the Kippax and I remember buying it when it first came out in 1988. I’d previously bought Blueprint, which had included material from Dave and Sue Wallace (the editors of King of the Kippax), and used to eagerly look for any new fanzine back then. This copy remains part of my collection and probably will do for as long as I have a collection.
Dave and Sue created something special with this fanzine and who would have thought that decades later they would still be producing it. I missed the deadline for the last print edition of King of the Kippax sadly, but here’s something I wrote back in 2013 when there was a series of football anniversaries. I hope it gives a feel of how I felt about fanzines and the role of King of the Kippax over the decades.
It’s a season of footballing anniversaries this year (2013). The FA celebrates 150 years, the Football League 125 and King of the Kippax an amazing 25 years. Of these three anniversaries KK is inevitably getting the least focus but in many ways its significance to football, or at least our team, has been greater during its first 25 years than the FA’s first 25.
The FA did little to support football in Manchester for decades and it wasn’t until Manchester’s clubs started to take the FA Cup seriously that the organisation began to matter. But even then the FA did its upmost to prevent our professional clubs from challenging properly. In 1904 when City became Manchester’s first FA Cup winners how did the FA react? They decided we must be doing something illegal and sent auditors to the club to determine if we had ‘bought’ success. Okay, so they found a few irregularities with a transfer from Glossop, but for the following year or so they relentlessly pursued our club (and to be fair did something similar with Newton Heath, who became United, and with Glossop). Ultimately, we received a devastating punishment and the club could have died. I won’t go on about how unjust all of this was – City were no worse than most sides the difference being that the FA was determined to catch us out! – but if you do want to read an account of it dig out my latest book “Manchester The City Years”.
Despite all of this the FA Cup actually gave City our first success and we should ensure we celebrate 23 April 1904 (the date of the final) every year – make St George’s Day City’s day!
The Football League was more supportive of City during those early years, but prior to 1892 the League had no involvement from either Manchester side despite the League holding its first meeting in Manchester. Our celebrations of the League should really come in 4 years’ time when it’ll be 125 years since City (as Ardwick) joined the League. Although it’s worth pointing out that Ardwick and Manchester City were two separate organisations – and stressed as such at the time – and even existed alongside each other for a short while (personally though, I see MCFC as a continuation of Ardwick in spirit if not in legal terms). From 1892 to 2002 (when City last competed in the Football League) the Football League was central to City’s life. The competition became City’s lifeblood as far as competition was concerned.
What about KK? Well, unlike the other two KK was significant to City and City fans from the start. It was born in an era when fans had much to say but little opportunity to be heard. Alongside the other fanzines born in the late 1980s KK gave us a voice and a shared understanding of what the issues at City and in football were. Before the fanzines our only real outlet was the Piccadilly Radio phone-in on Saturdays which came in to its own during the time James H Reeve was at the helm. We had no forums, blogs, tweets etc. We didn’t have phone-in shows on national radio or fan columns in newspapers. We didn’t have interaction with the club, other than via supporters clubs meetings which some fans saw as being too weak to challenge the club on key issues (I won’t get into all of that here, but it’s worth noting that some fans did feel the Supporters Club was too close to Peter Swales and, as he was often the cause of fan concerns, that caused some issues).
We did also have the Pink postbag in the Saturday sports paper, sadly no longer with us. Unfortunately, journalists on the paper in the late 80s would contact the club to get their views before publishing a controversial or critical letter (this happened with one from me in 1987 which presented evidence about an issue that mattered to fans but was ultimately swept under the carpet). Censorship and club propaganda was an issue at a time when the game was dying and fans were being treated appallingly.
King of the Kippax helped to give us a voice and helped highlight the issues. Staff at City would be sent out to buy the fanzine in its early days, while others would do all they could to limit the fanzine’s opportunity to question what was going on – proving the significance of the fanzine. I don’t want to get too giddy about what KK and the other fanzines achieved but it is important that we all understand what has been achieved. It’s a bit like the electoral system – people fought hard to get the vote in the face of adversity but today we take it all for granted. We think it’s always been like this. Now with social media it would be easy to forget what KK and the other fanzines have achieved. Many fanzines have stopped being produced, which makes it all the more important to celebrate KK’s 25th anniversary and to congratulate Dave, Sue and all the contributors over the years for what they’ve achieved. I still read KK from cover to cover and find all the regular contributors interesting. I don’t always agree with everything I read but, I guess, that’s always been the point. KK has promoted debate and encouraged fans to think about issues, and that’s how it should be.
I hope King Of The Kippax continues to provide a powerful outlet for fans for years to come. It’s important that we remember that before the fanzines we didn’t have a voice. Thanks Dave & Sue, and the others, for all you’ve done and continue to do for us.
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