Snowy Day in Title Race

On this day (4 February) in 2012 Manchester City defeated Fulham 3-0 in the Premier League as the race for the title hotted up. It was a tense period and you can read about this period and watch highlights below.

This was a 5.30pm Kick Off and the City team was:

City: Hart, Richards (c), Savic, Lescott, Kolarov, Barry, Nasri (Milner 55), A Johnson (Pizarro 90), Silva, Aguero (de Jong 80), Dzeko
Unused: Pantilimon, Zabaleta, Clichy, Rekik


Goals: Aguero (pen 11), Baird (og 31), Dzeko (72)
Referee: Mike Dean

Subscribers can read about this period and watch highlights below.

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Fagan’s First

Happy New Year! On this day (1 January) in 1947 future Liverpool manager Joe Fagan made his debut as a Manchester City player in the 4-0 victory over Fulham, watched by 49,449.

The goalscorers were Andy Black (2) and Alec Herd (2)

The 4-0 victory sent City to the top of the Second Division (2nd tier) table in style.  The Blues were playing as champions and, more importantly, looked like a typical First Division club.  Here’s a contemporary report of the game:

The only problem was the weather.  Postponements dragged the season through to mid-June, by which time City started to drop a few points but it hardly mattered.  The Blues won the title with 62 points – four more than second placed Burnley. 

You can read more on the 1946-47 season here:

https://gjfootballarchive.com/category/manchester-city/seasons/1946-47/

The Top and Bottom of History

While we look forward to the return of domestic football it’s worth remembering that before the pause for the World Cup there had already been records broken by Manchester City, such as the incredible goalscoring start to the season by Erling Haaland; results like the Manchester Derby 6-3 victory and Rico Lewis becoming the youngest player to score in his first Champions League start. In mid-August there was a flurry of excitement across social media and elsewhere when City were top of the Premier League and United were bottom. People asked when was the last time that had happened. 

It turned out that the two clubs had last been in those positions way back in November 1929 and it seemed to surprise some that it was so long ago. The truth is that no matter how poor United or City may have been in past seasons, it has been extremely rare for either club to occupy the bottom spot over the decades. It has been even rarer for the other ‘Manchester’ club to be top at the same time. 

So for this 1400 word subscriber article I’m going to talk about when one team has been top and the other bottom and then I’ll take a look at 1929 and the years that followed to highlight how the two Manchester clubs fared. Enjoy….

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Corradi’s first

On this day (18 November) in 2006 two goals from Corradi (12th & 32nd mins) and Barton (45th min) helped Manchester City to a 3-1 victory over Fulham. The first Corradi goal was his first for the club and resulted in him celebrating by going over to the South Stand corner, picking up the corner flag and knighting the other players as you can see in this video clip:

Historic Name That Ground – Week 27 Answer

It’s Christmas Eve but we’ve unfinished business… Did you recognise this ground? On Monday I asked: ‘Can you name the ground featured in the image above? This is a 1920s photo of this ground. There are at least 3 identifiable features visible on this photo that are still visible today PLUS the neighbouring streets. I don’t want to give much away but this has been a Premier League ground and is still used by the same club today that played here in the 20s.’ Well, the answer is…

Fulham’s Craven Cottage. The 3 identifiable landmarks are: the River Thames, the Fulham main stand and the cottage in the corner next to the stand. The housing and streets look very similar today.

There will be another ground to identify on Monday. As this is the last ground quiz before Christmas, I’d like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and I hope it gives everyone what they want. Have a great day and don’t forget to come back on Monday for the next ground.

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I had planned to run ‘Historic Name That Ground’ only during the close season as in previous years, but it’s proving of interest so I’ll keep it going for a little while yet. If you have an old image of a ground that you think it’d be worth including in this weekly quiz then please get in touch. They don’t have to be from the 1900s to 1960s – even ground images from the 70s and 80s may prove a challenge to identify these days. You can email me at gary@GJFootballArchive.com Thanks.