14 Liverpool 1 AS Roma 1 (Liverpool win on penalties), European Cup final, May 30, 1984
A night of great tension and violence, remembered by the television audience for Bruce Grobbelaar’s crazy-legged bravado during the penalty shootout and by those who were in Rome for the sustained assault on Liverpool fans before and after the match, events barely reported in Britain. A day that showed how ugly European football could be. It would get worse.
13 Last day of the Kop, April 30, 1994
The terraces were about to become history at Anfield but the Kop had one last fling when Norwich City arrived for the final day of the season. Designated a ‘Flag Day,’ the old terrace rocked like on the great nights as the game went on barely noticed in front of a full house. An era was ending but, in the vibrancy of the flags and banners, a new age was starting. The ethos of the Kop could not be as easily demolished as those concrete steps
12 Liverpool 3 Everton 2, FA Cup Final, May 20, 1989
What should have been a festive occasion was overshadowed by events five weeks earlier. An exciting match but better remembered for the collective sadness of a city. 'Abide With Me' sung in a Scouse accent was a first – normally it was only our own communal songs - and the eeriness of the minute’s silence, broken only by the cackle of police radios, lives in the mind longer than the action on the pitch.
11 Liverpool 3 Everton 1, FA Cup Final, May 10, 1986
A year earlier, Kenny Dalglish had taken over as manager amid the debris of Heysel. Seven days before the first all-Merseyside Cup Final, the player-manager had scored the only goal against Chelsea to take the title from under Everton’s noses. Now, on a frenzied day in the old stadium, Everton took the lead and Liverpool looked about to disintegrate when Jim Beglin and Bruce Grobbelaar squared up. Then Jan Molby took over, Ian Rush scored twice and the Double was secured. And the trains, coaches, minibuses and cars rolled northwards still decked in red and blue with little hint of trouble. Sadly, it could not happen now.
10 Johnny Todd at Anfield, Liverpool v Toulouse, August 28, 2007
You know it as the Z-Cars theme. It is the song that Everton run out to at Goodison Park. It is anathema across Stanley Park. When 11-year-old Rhys Jones was shot, the city was appalled. At Anfield, they showed their respect for the young Evertonian – and the anger at the killers – by playing his team’s song. Driven by Tony Barrett, a local journalist, the ensuing show of Scouse solidarity at once moved and inspired pride.
9 Heysel, May 29, 1985
Drunks, anger, charges, dead bodies. A sickening night, forever shrouded in a fog of tear gas and fear. Uefa’s choice of stadium set up a disaster, Liverpool fans did the rest. A night few can look back on with pride. A low point.
8 Liverpool 1 Chelsea 0, Champions League semi-final, second leg, Anfield, May 3, 2005
After a 0-0 draw at Stamford Bridge, Jose Mourinho brought his side north confident that they would reach Istanbul. That was until they met the wall of noise waiting at Anfield. After four minutes, Liverpool were up by a disputed Luis Garcia goal that Chelsea claimed did not cross the line. Did the crowd’s ferocity influence the referee and linesman? Only they know but anyone who was there as the six minutes of stoppage time ticked away knows the meaning of the word atmosphere.
7 Winning and losing, 1989
Seconds to go at Anfield and another double looming. Although the team are 1-0 down to Arsenal, unless the London club score a second, then the title is coming home. Then Michael Thomas gets the run of the ball, get clear through on goal and delivers the championship to Highbury in the final seconds of the season. Anfield is stunned into silence. Then, a voice says: “You know what? Worse things happen. We know.” Two months on from Hillsborough, thousands of voices said the same thing around the ground and no tears were shed for a losing team. Arsenal and their fans were visibly shocked by their reception.
6 Liverpool 3 St Etienne 1, European Cup quarter final, 1977
Things were going so well. Just 1-0 down from the away leg, Kevin Keegan evened the game up in the first minute. The place exploded – the gates had been locked more than an hour before kick-off and the anticipation had been building. Then things got tight and, after half-time, when Fabien Bathenay scored from distance, everything seemed to be going wrong. Ray Kennedy lifted hopes with a headed goal but, with 10 minutes left, Liverpool were out on away goals. Enter David Fairclough, supersub. With six minutes left, Kennedy knocked the ball long. It seemed that the rake-thin Fairclough could neither outrace the St Etienne defence, nor stay on his feet as the centre half bundled into him. Yet he did, and struck the ball towards the goal. It seemed to bobble yet it found the net. Chaos. The roof almost came off the Kop. The old ground would not shake like this until Chelsea arrived nearly three decades later.
5 Truth Day, Liverpool v Arsenal, FA Cup third round, January 6, 2007
Kelvin McKenzie, short of publicity, decided to recycle his Hillsborough lies. The BBC, mistaking bombast for opinion, decided to give the man an outlet on television. The Kop responded by spending the first six minutes of this BBC-televised tie standing up and displaying a mosaic saying: The Truth. During this time – the game at Hillsborough was six minutes old before it was stopped – the crowd chanted ‘Justice for the 96’. The teams, reduced to bit-part players, wandered around the pitch unnoticed. It was a protest the like of which has never been seen before at a football ground and, watching, I have never been prouder.
4 Liverpool 3 Borussia Mönchengladbach 1, European Cup final, Rome, May 25, 1977
They came every way they could to the Eternal City, more that 20,000 fanatics, some taking a nightmare five-day train journey that would today provoke a human-rights lawsuit. What they saw was an immense performance from Kevin Keegan against a fine German side, stunning goals from local boys Terry McDermott and Tommy Smith to set up a victory that was sealed by a Phil Neal penalty. They danced in the streets and fountains and waved those red chequered flags with glee. European adventures come no better.
3 Half-time, Liverpool v AC Milan, European Cup final, Istanbul, May 25, 2005
“That’s it. Game over,” Andy Gray said, unable to keep the tone of satisfaction out of his voice. Of course, no one in the Ataturk could hear the television commentary but, at 3-0 down as the break loomed, Liverpool looked beaten. Then, with the players trooped down the tunnel, someone started singing You’ll Never Walk Alone. It started hesitantly, with an undertone of anger, but suddenly turned into the ultimate assertion of culture and belief. When it finished, the tension had lifted and the 40,000 Liverpool fans were no longer broken and defeated, even if the team was. Did this act of faith inspire the subsequent comeback from the team? If it didn’t, they don’t have a shred of soul between them.
2 Bill Shankly arrives, December 1, 1959
The man from Glenbuck came to Anfield, via Huddersfield Town, to find a club in almost terminal decline. Mired in the second tier for five years, Liverpool were going nowhere. “Quite a character,” the local paper mused. But it was a little bit more than that. This was year zero: nothing would ever be the same again. In the book Here We Go Gathering Cups in May, John Maguire, one of the writers, says: “Who knows what type of person I’d be now if that Scottish fella hadn’t walked into Anfield on a cold December day in 1959…” Maguire was not even born when Shankly left the club, but he understands his legacy. It would be a perfect ending if this was the most important moment to Liverpool fans. If only.
1 April 15, 1989. Hillsborough
First the objections. Why is this more important than Heysel? It is not a case of one set of dead being more valued than another. People were called to account for Heysel – not enough, sure, but an attempt was made to apportion responsibility. People were jailed, the Belgian government held an inquiry. Officials lost their jobs. There was justice of sorts. That disaster would not have happened without the dreadful behaviour of Liverpool fans. We accept that. It was a peculiar set of circumstances that, removing any one link in a causal chain, could have been avoided.
Hillsborough was different. It could have happened to anyone – ask Tottenham Hotspur fans, who had a lucky escape when they played Wolves in 1981.
But it happened to us and, instead of trying to get to the bottom of the problem and ensure the safety of fans, those charged with the protection of the public found it easier to blacken the name of innocent supporters – a libel that lingers on today. The consequences linger with the lies – the lack of standing, the prohibitive ticket prices. And knowing the sectarian nature of football support and its uncritical biases, it was easy to convince people that we stole from our own dead and urinated on the bodies and the police. Would you do it? Then why are you happy to believe I did. This was not just Liverpool’s disaster, it was all supporters’ disaster. And no game worth 96 bodies – or 39. The most important moment in our history. Let’s hope the 96 get justice one day, then maybe it will be knocked off the top. |