From Chapter 11 - 2003/4 - We DID Overcome.
And so it was upon us: The League Cup, or, to give
it its sponsor’s name, the Carling Cup Final. Could it happen this time? Could
128 years of hurt finally come to an end? The portents were good, not least in
the fact that we would be playing at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff
I managed to get myself a ticket, having made the
prudent decision to buy a season ticket halfway through the season and thus improve
my chances if we’d got there. There was a decent allocation for real fans at
League Cup finals in Cardiff
In the weeks leading up to the game I had been asked
if I wanted to go to a BBC Radio 5 Live fans’ forum being held on a midweek
night at a pub in Bolton, so I joined about a dozen other people who ran,
contributed to or posted on FMTTM’s messageboard, including the likes of Rob
Nichols and the legend they call Uncle Harry. We made our way over the Pennines with a “pies and peace” offering of some local
pork products and found the venue. It was a large, modern pub with a cavernous
open area. A group of tables was set up at one end of the room where the
presenter, Jonathan Pearce, took up his central hosting position between Mark
Lawrenson, Craig Hignett, Stan Collymore and Bolton legend, John McGinlay. In
front of them were several rows of chairs seating Bolton
fans. The small Boro contingent was ushered upstairs to a mezzanine area
overlooking the main floor.
The show was lively and the banter was
good-spirited. There was a roving reporter called Clem (himself a Teessider)
who mingled with the fans when prompted, asking various questions and wandering
around with the obligatory large microphone and headphones worn on one ear.
During one such walkabout, Clem came towards me and thrust the microphone under
my mouth, asking who I most feared from Bolton. My first, instinctive answer of
“Peter Kay” raised a laugh in the crowd, although Mr. Pearce didn’t look too
impressed down on the main floor, but I soon gave a real answer and named Kevin
Davies as someone who would definitely cause us problems in the game. He had
been a thorn in our sides before, and I knew he was the kind of player
defenders hate to face: a big, bustling nuisance who doesn’t know the meaning
of a lost cause.
After the show we found out that the actual League
Cup trophy was there (it could have been a replica, of course, but it looked
real enough) and a few of us had our photos taken gurning over the trophy with
thumbs aloft and so on. Craig Hignett, ex-member of the dynamic strike duo of
1995-96 named the Midget Gems (partnered by Nick Barmby), came and chatted with
us for a while and posed for more photos. A few drinks were imbibed and it was
soon time to head back to the North East.
For the match itself, I decided to head down the
night before the match and stay in a Travelodge just off the M4. This meant I
could get into Cardiff nice and early without worrying about driving a long way
twice in a day, especially as the weather had turned wintry. I gave another
couple of Boro fans a lift down as well, and they stayed at the same hotel. Next
morning we ate a hearty breakfast in the Little Chef next door and headed into
Welsh Wales. I had never been to Wales in my entire life, and hoped I wouldn’t
be accosted by enormous unintelligible signs emblazoned with thirty-letter
place names (made up of the letters H, L and U, mostly). It wasn’t like that at
all, of course, and it didn’t take long to cross the Severn and get to Cardiff
We were directed to car parks on the outskirts of
the Welsh capital city, from where we could catch buses to the city centre. It
was all fairly well organised and we got into the heart of the city with a good
few hours to spare, and found that it was already buzzing with football fans.
The strange thing was that it seemed to be all Boro. There were very few Bolton
fans to be found, and all the pubs were awash with the reds and whites of Middlesbrough . There was a convivial and excited party
atmosphere all around.
I headed to the Cardiff branch of the British Legion
where a few people I knew where going to be meeting up for a few drinks. When I
got there I found that they had a German beer called Bitburger which I hadn’t
tasted since I was a young slip of a lad back in the late 1980s. My excitement
abated a tad when I found out that it was an alcohol-free version, but I still
drank it. I was high enough on expectation as it was, and had to drive home
after the game anyway.
Everyone was itching to get to the match, and there
was an amazing feeling of optimism amongst the Boro fans. It was more
optimistic than the feeling I’d witnessed back in 1997. It wasn’t just
optimism, actually, it was belief.
This was our time, and I don’t think we’d ever felt so sure of it. As kick-off
time approached people finished their drinks, exchanged handshakes, hugs and
back-pats and headed towards the venue for the cup final.
The Millennium stadium is an impressive venue, with
high, white steel columns in each corner and polished black cladding around the
top of the stands. On the day of our final it had Carling Cup banners draped
from various structures. I made my way into the ground and up to my seat, which
was high up at the back of one of the end stands. The retractable roof was
closed for the match, and from the roof hung two huge banners bearing the club
crests of Bolton and Boro. The centre circle
was covered with a huge circle of cloth bearing the name of the sponsors. The
stands were soon full of hopeful fans, decked out in their red and white
shirts, hats and scarves and waving their flags. The atmosphere was crackling
with expectancy and nails were bitten as news of the team selections came
through. Hopes and dreams by the thousand were ready to pour out onto the pitch
when the teams appeared.
The teams emerged a few minutes before kick-off to a
background of vivid, moving colour and colossal noise. Fireworks erupted from
the pitch and flash-bulbs by the thousand lit up the stands. The two teams
lined up along the pitch, one on each side of the half-way line and did all the
pre-match presentation stuff they like to torture us all with. Get on with it,
will ya?
When it did start, it started better than anyone
could have dared to imagine. In only the second minute Danny Mills knocked a
long ball forward from right back. It was headed back into midfield where
Mendieta suddenly had acres of space. He curled a gorgeous ball out to Zenden
on the left wing, and Zenden whipped a wicked low cross into the six-yard box
where Job slammed it home to give Boro the lead.
If that was good, better was to follow. French World
Cup winner Djorkaeff had a chance for Bolton, saved well by Schwarzer to his
right, and from the resulting corner Boro won a free kick for Bolton naughtiness
in the area. A bit of head tennis ensued before Mendieta slid the ball in
towards Job who was lurking in the area with his back to goal. As he tried to
take the ball to one side, he was floored by a clumsy tackle from behind and referee
Mr. Riley pointed to the spot. Oh. My. God. We had a penalty.
Zenden took the responsibility on his shoulders and
stepped up to take the penalty kick. As he kicked his standing foot slipped and
he did actually strike the ball twice, but the contacts were so close together
it was only visible on a slow-mo replay, and the ball ended up in the net. Only
six minutes had passed, and the Boro fans could barely contain themselves. I
found myself hugging the bloke next to me, who I’d never seen before and have
never seen since. I would have apologised, but he was hugging back with great
enthusiasm.
On 21 minutes Bolton
woke from their stunned stupor and hit back. It was a goal out of nothing by
Kevin Bloody Davies (didn’t I warn them?) with a weak, long-range shot from
wide on the right. Schwarzer made a bit of a boo-boo of it, misjudging the
bounce and letting the ball in at his near post. He was visibly annoyed by the
mistake, kicking the goalpost in frustration.
Of course Bolton came at us hard after
that. They launched a series of attacks in their usual, Big-Sam-drilled way,
but we stood firm. Schwarzer was a man possessed, making a series of great
saves to quell the white-shirted hordes, and we made it to half time with the
lead intact.
The second half wasn’t half as hairy for Boro as it
could have been. Bolton soon ran out of steam. They kept pressing for the
equaliser, but Boro kept breaking quickly, and could well have scored a couple
of goals up at the end of the ground where our nervous fans were seated.
Mendieta had a couple of good chances and Juninho made a couple of trademark
mazy runs, but the third goal wouldn’t come. Ricketts came on for a bumbling
cameo and our nerves were shot. Regulation time ran out and Bolton
had four minutes of injury time to try and draw level. They threw everything
forward, and there was a horrible, heart-in-the-mouth moment when Ehiogu’s arm
was struck by a goal-bound shot as he lunged across to block it from almost
point-blank range. Mike Riley waved play on and we were so, so close to Paradise . The strains of “We Shall Overcome”, that
protest song of the civil rights movement adopted as an anthem of valiant
defeat by Boro fans in the past, wasn’t going to get an airing today. Please
God, I can’t say I really believe in you, but please: not today.
The roar at the final whistle was like nothing I’ve
heard before or since. The release was immeasurable. Finally, finally, Middlesbrough had won a real trophy. Mickey Mouse trophy
my arse. I stood with arms aloft and screamed until my lungs burned and my head
span, then had to sit down to get my breath back. It was then that I wept like
a big bloody baby, and I’m not ashamed to admit it. I’d not been a Boro fan for
very long compared to many of those around me, but at that moment I felt 100%
Teessider.
I’d seen cup final defeats and relegations, and this
was sweeter and more real than
anything I’d ever felt as a football fan, even in my foolish and misguided
younger years. I can’t imagine a Manchester United or Chelsea fan knowing how
this moment feels. They win trophies all the time, so they get used to it. Hard
times for them are going a season without winning a pot, whilst the majority of
clubs just want to survive and go on the odd cup run, hoping to get a few
crumbs thrown their way now and again by Sky Television.
The celebrations were long, lusty and loud. Long
after the Bolton fans had vacated their half
of the stadium to trudge home feeling hard done by (been there, done that), the
stadium rocked to the Boro rhythm. The players partied on the pitch as much the
fans did in the stands, with a beaming Juninho laying the ghosts of Elland Road
The spectacular trophy presentation ceremony saw
Gareth Southgate lift that glittering piece of silverware high above his head
as fireworks shot towards the dark voids of the roof. Steve Gibson, the lad who
came from the tough, working-class Middlesbrough estate of Park End to become
one of the most popular chairmen in the modern game, was persuaded to come up
to the podium and was lifted shoulder-high by the players. As for Steve
McClaren, he hadn’t been universally popular with fans of the club, but he had
done the one thing no other manager had managed before: won a cup.
It was all
just flipping fantastic, and I am so glad and I feel so privileged that I was
there to see history being made.
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