I KNOW that, technically, it’s a different club. I know that, technically, the Wimbledon of Fashanu and Jones, of prototype geezerdom and unbridled thuggery, came to a messy end in 2004 when it relocated to the exotic climes of Milton Keynes and became known as MK Dons. I know that the team we’ll face tomorrow night are called AFC Wimbledon and, technically, have only existed for 12 years.
I know all this. Yet still I felt a chill run down my spine when the draw for the third round of the FA Cup, performed at the home of football, ‘The Deep’ in Hull, paired Liverpool with the plucky League Two minnows (as contractual obligations insist we refer to them).
Brings back a lot of bad memories, you see. Memories I had long since buried. Memories that serve no other purpose than to remind us that football teams are never invincible, and that on occasion, giant-killers, far from being selfless romantic heroes, are some of the most obnoxious buggers around.
We all know about the Liverpool of 1987-88. Of Barnes and Beardsley, Houghton and Aldridge, Hansen and McMahon. A team widely viewed as one of the finest exponents of attacking football since the war. And it’s all true. It was an absolute pleasure to watch them lay waste to the rest of the division, scoring picture-book goals by the bucketful, carving out moments of rare beauty through one-touch passing, untethered movement and moments of individual genius.
We would turn up at Anfield expecting the opposition, whoever they might be, to be dismantled and demolished. We were seldom disappointed.
And so, when it transpired that we would face Wimbledon in the 1988 FA Cup Final, little Wimbledon, ale-house Wimbledon, a team that housed players called Eric and Clive and could probably fit all its fans in the back of a Vauxhall Nova, thoughts instinctively turned to rewriting the record books. The general consensus was that we’d score five. Some saw that as an overly-cautious prediction.
There had never been a hotter favourite in FA Cup history. That alone should have set the alarm bells ringing.
If there was one thing that Wimbledon team relished, it was being seen as no-hopers. For all their unsophisticated brutality and their eschewing of tactical subtleties, they had managed to engender an unbreakable sense of unity, fostered by the kind of ‘No-one likes us, we don’t care’ attitude beloved of dickless Neanderthals everywhere. It’s widely forgotten that they finished the season in seventh place, above the likes of Chelsea, Tottenham and Newcastle. They were never going to just lie down and let us draw fancy footballing patterns all over the Wembley turf. It was never going to be pretty.
At this point, in the name of full disclosure, I need to make a declaration of personal interest. I have a family connection to one of the Wimbledon players who wrecked the dreams of football purists across the land that sweltering May afternoon. To be slightly more specific, I have a family connection to the most infamous Wimbledon player of all, a man notorious for executing the most widely-reported bollock squeeze in sporting history and for possessing the acting range of a broken fridge.
Vinnie Jones is my second cousin. There, I said it. His grandmother was my grandmother’s sister; his dad and my dad were cousins. Whereas most of the family remained in Liverpool, Vinnie’s grandma married and moved down south some decades ago. Over the years, I’ve not trumpeted this familial link too loudly. Forget the red cards and the self-aggrandising hardman image and the boorish bullying and the glorification of macho bone-headedness. The lad’s a Tory. I don’t want that kind of shame brought to my door.
It didn’t alter my view of Wimbledon or their approach, nor does it affect my reading of that terrible game. But it was a weird feeling, turning up to a Cup Final and seeing one of your relatives roundly abused by everyone around you. And it was even weirder to join in with that abuse.
If you believe Vinnie and fellow pantomime dame, John Fashanu, Wimbledon won the match in the tunnel before kick-off. They love to tell how they intimidated the cowering Liverpool players with their screams and war chants, gleefully describing the fear they have convinced themselves they saw in Liverpudlian faces. And it’s certainly not for me to say that men like Alan Hansen, who had excelled in Europe’s fiercest cauldrons for over 10 years, or Bruce Grobbelaar, who fought in an actual real-life war in his native Zimbabwe, *weren’t* shaken to their very core by the sight of the Gladiators co-presenter yelling “Awooga!” It must surely have been an infinitely distressing spectacle.
However, there is a valid argument that Liverpool lost the game before a ball was kicked, though not in the way the self-styled Crazy Gang imagined. For perhaps the first time I can remember, we were guilty of complacency. We were, if anything, overly relaxed. We had believed the pre-match publicity and felt we had only to turn up to receive our reward, to be crowned double winners again. You can see it in the players as they chat with the guest of honour, the preternaturally fragrant Princess Di. Laughing, flirtatious, eager to please. Hardly the gibbering wrecks Wimbledon’s Poundshop Mitchell Brothers would have you believe.
From the first whistle, the intensity and fluidity we had shown all season were missing. We never got started. Beardsley and Houghton looked bright for a while but grew increasingly ineffective. Barnes, the man who had terrorised right backs with almost sadistic relish and was now the established focal point of our attacking threat, couldn’t get into the game. Aldridge was anonymous.
McMahon attempted to impose himself but seemed at times to be side-tracked by the need to respond to Wimbledon’s physical challenge. Another piece of Vinnie Jones self-mythologising has it that McMahon was effectively neutered early on by a typically agricultural Jones tackle which, if his version is to believed, left the Liverpool player cowed and broken and paved the way for Wimbledon’s victory. It’s a seductive tale but, again, is essentially the work of an overactive imagination. McMahon was straight back to his feet with little fuss, and immediately looking to receive the ball. Jones emerged from the floor with a nasty looking cut under one eye. It may have taken the battle to the heart of Liverpool’s midfield, but it was a battle McMahon was happy to meet. Liverpool had bigger problems to solve. It was their failure to do so that defined the game.
If credit is to be given to Wimbledon, and, grudgingly, I suppose it must, it should be linked to their admirable defensive organisation and inestimable team ethic. Flying in the face of their reputation, they were canny, too. Dennis Wise was employed just in front of Barnes and cut off his familiar supply lines. The back four acted as a blanket across the edge of the penalty area, repelling all incursions, with the space in front smothered by Jones and Sanchez. And, most crucially, they managed to expose Liverpool’s perennial Achilles Heel — aerial vulnerability at set-pieces.
Of course, we were denied a perfectly good goal a minute before Sanchez glanced in the winner, with Beardsley chipping home only to find play had been stopped and a free-kick awarded in his favour for an earlier offence. And when we finally got a break, a fortuitous penalty given for as clean a tackle as Wimbledon have ever managed, Aldridge’s nervous spot-kick was pushed aside by Beasant. Although half an hour remained, the writing was on the wall. We wouldn’t have scored if we’d played all week.
Exactly seven days earlier, I had been at Hillsborough to see Liverpool destroy Sheffield Wednesday 5-1 — as perfect a display of free-flowing football as you could ever dream of. Fast-forward a week and we had a Liverpool short of ideas, frustrated, perpetually crashing on the rocks of a well-marshalled defence. In a spectacularly productive season, it was one game too many.
If you look closely enough, it’s possible to trace the seeds of Liverpool’s eventual fall from grace to that exasperating encounter at Wembley in 1988. In the course of 90 minutes our air of invincibility, painstakingly built up over the previous 25 years, was shredded. We could be got at. There was a chink in the armour. Two years later, Crystal Palace smashed through it with a sledgehammer. And we’ve never recovered. Not really.
So, yeah, technically it isn’t the same Wimbledon we’ll be facing on Monday night. Technically, it’s a different club. But Gobshite Fashanu and My Cousin Vinnie are going to be watching and they’ll love it if we get beat. I reckon we owe them one.
Pics: PA Images
This was a game we all thought we could only win and win well. Remember hearing an interview with Ron Yeats, then chief scout, on the old Clubcall. He’d watched Wimbledon and more or less laughed at their chances. Can’t help but think that attitude permeated the whole club. It made me realise from that day forward never to take anything in football for granted (and its earned me a few bob backing against hot favs on the way).
Also remember seeing the great Joe Mercer leaving the ground that day. Although he needed help getting around by that time, he still managed a smile and wave when I yelled “Alright Joe lad”. Great old gent of the game.
I wish you hadn’t posted this Neil! Bad memories. I got obnoxiously drunk after the game much to my regret. I think we’d been spoiled and, as fans at least, a little entitled. People forget that about the 80s, we got so used to winning that it really wasn’t that exciting. That’s what made last season such fun: it was so unexpected. Reminded me of the late 70s when we’d started winning things but didn’t yet take anything for granted.
I agree with Neil on the broader issue. This game marked the beginning (there are so many beginnings…) of the end in many ways: we were, to an extent, found out. We’d suffered the odd defeat to crack outfits from Sofia and, closer to home, Forest, but hadn’t been comprehensively undone by a style (I use the word loosely) of football since the mid 70s. Wimbledon demonstrated that there was a way to beat us and Kenny never really came to terms with physical, long-ball teams (I think Bob would have, but Kenny didn’t). His approach, from memory, become increasingly craven (Alex Watson anyone?) in consequence. He did find a solution in the end, he aped the approach at Blackburn!
I remember me and a mate getting let down on tickets at literally the last minute. Stupidly, we had no contingency plans, so we plotted up at a boozer in town (which was, of course empty) for a few consolation jars. Somehow we managed to persuade the landlord to lock us in at closing so we could watch the match on the telly. This was before the days of all-day opening, and he graciously agreed. It turned out he was a Blue. God, did he enjoy himself that day. One of the most miserable afternoons of my life as an LFC fan, followed by an equally miserable evening. Ever since then, I’ve cheered at every last misery wrought upon anyone associated with either of those rotten clubs. I hope we batter them tomorrow.
One horrible memory for me was that after the game we trudged to our coach in the coach park. In those days it was pot luck if you got away handily from Wembley or you were there hours and last out. That day….you guessed it we were last away. It seemed like we were stuck there for hours. To cap it all the Wimbledon team emerged on an open top bus to parade the trophy just as we were about to get going. Horrendous.
Wow, that story took an unexpected twist. Fascinating. Makes me wonder what ‘Vinnie’ would have turned out like had he been a Scouser.
I wasn’t at the game (thank god), I’d been to the quarters at City and Hillsborough for the semi but at that time I hadn’t realised if you stand at the bottom of the tube steps with a sign saying ‘ticket needed’ it never fails.
I watched it on TV though and Wimbledon were fairly aggressive in their play but the whole myth about the Crazy Gang has got out of hand. Like they say, history is written by the winners. I read an interview with one of the players recently and he said it was all exaggerated. The fight in the dressing room that cousin Vinnie and Fashanu talk so lovingly of was a toy fight where whilst messing about someone caught his shin on a bench and cut it. I didn’t see the BT Sports documentary about them but it seemed to be glorifying the whole myth and the truth is, we love these kind of stories whether true or not.
Surely, we’ll have too much for them tomorrow but then I’ve heard that before.
This Terry Gibson’s account of the final. As you can tell, he has no time for Fashanu and Vinnie either: http://www.terrygibson.london/#!Crazy-Gang-Documentary/c1zqn/90957FC4-BAF2-4F60-8BCE-D4094277F586
Thanks for posting that. Good to hear the ‘truth’ from an objective person.
The only words I can summon from reading this article are ‘arrogant’; at the time of the Cup & ‘bitter’ afterwards.
Certainly there are a lot of untruths from that day but for example, like today, when you haven’t got £115m,as it turns out, wasted on poor talent, you play to your strengths.
I’m presuming none of you on here who have posted comments will be at the game….whereas I will…my Grandad was a proper supporter of the Dons from their non-league days in the forties to late seventies.
Just because as fans we didn’t have the comfort of supporting a top four club, the Dons of ’88’ deserve their time, just as you boys glorify your past history with the Champions League. Every dog has his day….
Bit of a weird pop about whether we’re going to be there or not when the tickets were like gold dust.
To qualify you had to attend: Burnley (January 18, 2005); Luton Town (January 7, 2006); Portsmouth (January 29, 2006); Birmingham City (March 21, 2006); Luton Town (January 6, 2008); Preston North End (January 3, 2009); Everton (February 4, 2009); Reading (January 2, 2010); Manchester United (January 9, 2011); Mansfield Town (January 6, 2013); Oldham Athletic (January 27, 2013); Bournemouth (January 25, 2014); Arsenal (February 16, 2014).
Well,err, no I won’t be one of the 300 or so lucky ones with a ticket so you’re right on that point. Yes we were a bit arrogant, but it’s difficult not to have been considering what we won in the 70s and 80s. Maybe that became complacency on the day. But bitter, never. Really sick at the time, but life’s far too short to be bitter about any football match. If you beat us again tomorrow most on here will give you full credit – as we did in 88.
Does arrogance not have negative connotations?
I may have not got my point across quite as well as I hoped; I felt the article was ‘bitter’, not so much the other posts & I have found most Liverpool fans to be brilliant.
In hindsight, the tickets comment was a little rash & I was aware of the difficulty in obtaining them from an overly stringent LFC. I think the number was closer to 850.
On the flip side it wasn’t easy to obtain my ticket. Rules were pretty strict this end too.
Going back to the article, I also see no point in mentioning the Jones connection. It has little relation to ’88’ or the current game. It is obviously a very biased & personal point of view. It clouds the evaluation that was being made & was very one-sided.
Win, lose, or draw tomorrow it makes no odds for us Dons fans but ’88’ should be remembered for what it was:
A giant-killing achievement that made other ‘lesser’ teams believe that through very limited resources, hard work & team work would get you through. Team work failed Liverpool that day & that is why Wimbledon FC prevailed & deservedly so.
“And it’s certainly not for me to say that men like Alan Hansen, who had excelled in Europe’s fiercest cauldrons for over 10 years, or Bruce Grobbelaar, who fought in an actual real-life war in his native Zimbabwe, *weren’t* shaken to their very core by the sight of the Gladiators co-presenter yelling “Awooga!” It must surely have been an infinitely distressing spectacle.”
I laughed out loud in the chipper at this. Great piece.
A bad day for us, but this was a great FA Cup story. A club with no resources, triumphing by sheer will and team spirit.
I wish we had a 25 year-old Vinnie Jones in our midfield right now, preferably as captain. I don’t think we would be throwing away a 2 goal lead to the bottom of the table club, if he was.
If Jones was a Scouser and had played for us, he would have been an absolute legend.
If we were to play that Wimbledon side in our upcoming FA Cup tie, I think we all know what would happen. We currently have a group of very skillful players, who do not understand that they have to first earn the right to play by showing guts and desire.
Well said Lady in the Van. You summed it up well. Jones was in fact a very good player behind all the bravado. A little-known fact.
No, Jones was an okay player. He wasn’t without his qualities even though he tried to cultivate this image as a clogger, but “very good” is overstating things.
you must be fucking joking. Did you ever see the idiot actually play?
Oh this.
I was so confident we’d win easy I bet my mate a tenner, more that I would walk in to our local (The Horseshoes in Newmarket – pretty rough boozer at the time) undress to my birthday suit fold, up my clothes and sit them on a bar stool whilst I ordered and drank a pint.
We lost. I did. No one batted an eyelid.
Not the weather for that kind of bet now, but I learned to take nothing for granted that day.
Team for this match I have been reliably informed will be…… Migs, Can, Skrtel, Sakho, Manquillo, Hendo, Lucas, Markovic, Gerrard, Coutinho, Lambert.
Personally I thought it would have been the perfect time to use more youngsters/fringe players.
Spot on with the team. Keep paying your source
I remember getting caught crying after the match by my brothers and mates. Bad memories, that game.
I have good memories after the game. We had been drinking in Swiss Cottage pre match and got chatting to some Wimbledon lads. We arranged to meet up with them after the match and they could not believe it when we showed up – we demanded they get the first round in – which of course they did!
Alas, the whole country knew where Aldo was going to put that penalty. Even before he took it everyone I was with felt it would be saved. ;-(
To this day, I still blame the defeat on the ridiculous headbands that Gillespie and Spackman had to wear to protect head injuries they had inflicted on each other during the week. Spackman in particular looked like his vision was hampered as a result and it was a mistake to play him instead of Whelan.
Wimbledon had been nothing but awkward in the two league games we played against them that season. We drew 1-1 at Plough Lane in a game we dominated. Ray Houghton came off the bench to score in one of his first games for the club, and we only just edged the game at Anfield 2-1 a week after we’d lost that projected record breaking 30th league game of the season at Goodison. Kenny Dalglish even brought himself on from the bench to influence the final 10 minutes or so in person, we made that much heavy weather out of them. They’d won at Anfield in late March 87, a result that saw us hit the self-destruct button in that title race, a week before we went and lost the League Cup final against Arsenal.
Wimbledon always had me breaking out in cold sweats and I was uncertain about that final as soon as they beat Luton in the other semi-final. My shoulders still go tense at the thought of them and that game. Having said all that it was criminal what the FA allowed to happen, in the shifting of them to Milton Keynes. They were a non-league club that lived the dream all the way to the top flight and cup glory. They should have been allowed to follow their own fate, whether that was a decline down the divisions or not. They were reaching League Cup semi-finals as late as 1998/99.