Category Archives: Seasons

Forest Defeated

On this day (8 October) in 1975 I celebrated my birthday by watching Manchester City defeat Nottingham Forest 2-1 with goals from Colin Bell and Joe Royle in the 3rd round of the successful League Cup campaign. Pre-match Forest manager Brian Clough told the press:  ‘I was praying Manchester City would beat Norwich [in the previous round] because I wanted to play the best. City are one of the most entertaining and talented sides in the First Division at home.  We have no serious thoughts of shocking City but we hope to give a good account of ourselves against a side that is potentially one of the best in the land.’ He added:

‘When I last came to Maine Road it was with Leeds United and we lost 2-1.  If we keep the score down to 2-1 tonight then I think we’ll show the strides that Nottingham Forest have taken.’

Clough, one of football’s most knowledgeable men, predicted the score accurately with goals from Bell and Royle helping City achieve the 2-1 result.  That win put City into the fourth round and set Manchester up for a League Cup derby match for the second successive year.

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Managerial Merry Go Round

On this day (7th October) in 1997 Steve Coppell became Manchester City’s manager. Here’s the story of that period with quotes from exclusive interviews I have performed with Coppell’s assistant Phil Neal.

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Coventry Defeated

On this day (6 October) in 1966 Niall Quinn was born and on this day in 1990 he scored for Manchester City in a 2-0 win against Coventry. Alan Harper scored the other goal. You can watch them both here:

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If you’ve enjoyed this then why not subscribe? Every subscription directly helps support my research and provides the subscriber with access to everything posted on this site, including the entire Manchester A Football History and From Maine Men To Banana Citizens books, plus interviews, articles and more. I am not employed by anyone and all my research is self funded or comes from subscriptions to this site.

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Away Run Ends: Wolves v City

On this day (6 October) in 1987 Manchester City defeated Wolves 2-0 away from home in the second leg of the second round League Cup tie. It was a weird period for City as the Blues had gone 37 games without an away win and the mood amongst fans was such that you simply had to be there when the win came. I travelled down with my future brother-in-law and father-in-law though at this time I still hadn’t met my future wife. I used to go to games with her brother and it was December 1987 before I actually met her. As for the football… the Blues had lost the first leg 2-1 but the scorelines for both games do not do this tie justice. Here’s a match report and key points from the day…

Wolves thought they had the tie sewn up after their 2-1 win at Maine Road but Andy Hinchcliffe netted after 11 minutes to make it 2-2. Wolves threw everything they had at City with a Midlands based reporter claiming that Wolves had: ‘City’s defence fumbling like geriatric slip fielders;. They hit the woodwork frequently and as fans stood on the away end we were convinced this would not be our day but, of course, City being City it was when you least expected something that it happened. Typical City used to work in positive ways as well as negative ones!

In the end John Gidman scored from a free kick in the 86th minute to guarantee a City victory on aggregate and end our winless away run. However, it was soon pointed out that we’d still not won away from home in the League for a ridiculously long time and so that became the next mission and, as fans, we kept travelling to those games waiting and hoping things would change.

Have a read of this report. There are some great lines in here comparing City to bunny rabbits and other stuff. I particularly like Mel Machin’s comment about the woodwork.

Allison’s Red and Black

On this day in 1968 Manchester City wore Red & Black stripes for the first time. Malcolm Allison had suggested adopting AC Milan’s colours and City first wore them for their meeting at Everton on October 5th 1968. Sadly, City were defeated 2-0 at Goodison and the colour change wasn’t popular with fans at first. However, due to a colour clash with Leicester, the new colours were worn in the 1969 FA Cup final. The club won that trophy and the kit soon entered City folklore as an important kit.

City chose to wear the new style for all the successful major finals that followed during Joe Mercer & Malcolm Allison’s time, including the club’s first European trophy in 1970.  At one point Allison suggested making red and black the first choice kit.

There were however plenty of complaints about City adopting the colours. Take a look at an earlier post I made on those complaints here:

Complaints About MCFC Kits!

A Dominant Derby Performance

On this day (4 October) in 1930 the Manchester derby ended City 4 United 1. It was
the Reds’ ninth straight defeat of the season and they were relegated at the end of it.  The Athletic News claimed:  “City obviously grew sympathetic and declined to rub it in.” That’s the kind of wording they could have used again to describe the October 2022 derby when City were leading 6-1! Here’s the detailed story of that day:

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Read more of this content when you subscribe today. You can subscribe at either £20 per year (above) or at £3 per month here (cancel any time). For those subscribing £3 per month you will be able to access all content from October 2022 onwards for as long as you are a subscriber. Those subscribing £20 a year have access to everything posted since December 2020.

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Bananas, Leicester and City

On this day (3 October) in 1987 Paul Stewart & Imre Varadi both scored twice as Manchester City beat Leicester City 4-2 at Maine Road. Games with Leicester were often newsworthy in the 1980s. Sadly, there was the match in March 1989 when Paul Lake swallowed his tongue and there was the FA Cup tie in January 1989 which saw the City players take to the field carrying large inflatable bananas which they then threw into the crowd.  This was not a regular occurrence! You can read more on the banana craze here:

https://wordpress.com/post/gjfootballarchive.com/5646

Sunday Morning Blues

Everton, so often a bogey team back then for Manchester City, were defeated 2-0 on this day (2 October) in 2005.  This was the first Sunday morning kick off in the Premier League and the match commenced at 11.15 with some fans making a point of the early start by wearing pyjamas.  It was also Stephen Ireland’s first full Premiership game.  Before the match he admitted to being “very nervous” and post-match he commented that the rest of the team had supported him:  “That helped me ease my nerves and settle in as one of them.” You can see highlights and read more about the game below:

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If you’ve enjoyed this then why not subscribe? Every subscription directly helps support my research and provides the subscriber with access to everything posted on this site, including the entire Manchester A Football History and From Maine Men To Banana Citizens books, plus interviews, articles and more. I am not employed by anyone and all my research is self funded or comes from subscriptions to this site.

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If you’ve enjoyed this then why not subscribe? You can subscribe at either £20 per year (above) or at £3 per month here (cancel any time). For those subscribing £3 per month you will be able to access all content from October 2022 onwards for as long as you are a subscriber. Those subscribing £20 a year have access to everything posted since December 2020.

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City 3 Bilbao 0

On this day (1 October) in 1969 Manchester City’s first home tie in the ECWC ended 3-0 (6-3 on aggregate) as the Blues defeated Athletic Bilbao.  City scorers were Alan Oakes, Colin Bell and Ian Bowyer.  Attendance 49,665. You can read more (and watch a video) about the game here:

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Read more of this content when you subscribe today. You can subscribe at either £20 per year (above) or at £3 per month here (cancel any time). For those subscribing £3 per month you will be able to access all content from October 2022 onwards for as long as you are a subscriber. Those subscribing £20 a year have access to everything posted since December 2020.

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Sterling Double

On this day (30 September) in 2020 Manchester City defeated Burnley 3-0 in the League Cup at Turf Moor. City’s scorers were Raheem Sterling (2) and Ferran Torres. Here are some highlights of the game:

https://www.mancity.com/citytv/mens/burnley-0-3-city-match-highlights-63737092