Episode 7 - The FA Cup

Once upon a time, on fields of prim and proper privilege, a people's game was bound in laws and a silver cup was cast for gentlemen. But in factory towns beneath smoky skies, men with calloused hands and muddy boots dared to dream that this could be their fairy tale, and with Olympic toil they made the cup their own. When the war drums beat, the story changed. Fields stood silent, factories left still, and so Britain's daughters laced their boots, filling the void,

filling seats as well. They danced in bonnets and heavy boots, thrilling crowds and gathering charity gold, but big bad men with suits and champagne flutes sent them off to fifty winters out in the cold. With daughters sidelined, sons arose, under Wembley Tower's bluebird sang. Wizards weaved, saints and black cats soared, and cannons

roared a fourteen-gun salute. The fairy tale dreams lived on for the sons, because for every cobbler bested, there were lilywhite screamers and amber invasions, Spireites in dreamland and unstoppable imps. Dark days too, pain, death and blame, and never-ending fights for justice. The people, together, reminding the big bad men to never forget who this game belongs to. Slowly and surely, the daughters built back. No white knight needed to save this story. Just lioness

roars, a century in the making. Tens of thousands once more crowning queens in glory. Now under equal blue skies, the final call to all. Peasants, princesses, dreamers and giant slayers are in this fabled land of football fairy tale. No result is beyond imagination. This is the Sporting Almanac

Podcast. afternoon jack afternoon ben how are you today yeah i'm good thank you um i am buzzing for this week's episode i'm not gonna lie to you uh this is our first love boyhood dreams you know our wheelhouse your wheelhouse specifically in terms of the history of it all uh but yeah this is this is one of the great the great sporting weeks all the criticism about the competition's not like what it used to be It's lost its importance,

or whatever else people say. Nonsense. As a kid, if I was dreaming about football, I was dreaming about lifting the FA Cup at Wembley. Getting given the FA Cup and lifting it. Yeah, mate. The FA Cup, that's where we are, if anybody hasn't already read between the lines. We're going to Wembley. The famous Wembley. The Arch. What was

the Towers previously, but now the Arch. objectively a great sporting weekend and subjectively for us still a great sporting weekend our favorite arguably well we'll see we'll see on saturday uh saturday evening how great it is could be very great could be very very great um should we start there should we start with the first well with this year's fa cup just to put it into context yeah so this year's fa cup final is on saturday i believe it's a 4 30 kickoff although

they can't bloody make their minds up what time it kicks off. But it's Crystal Palace versus Manchester City. All the neutrals are supporting Crystal Palace. Anyone who's a Man City fan will probably be supporting Man City, as you'd expect, but we'll forgive them for that this weekend. I like an underdog reaching the final. I say an underdog. Palace are a well -established Premier League team. They're a good team. They're solidly mid -table, but they've never won anything. Nope.

Never won anything. So when we say underdog, let's put that into proper context for people. Crystal Palace Football Club have never won any trophies. Ever. And they are in the final of the FA Cup. There's been no trophy worth winning in world football that Manchester City haven't won in the past five years. Let alone in the rest of their history. And they've done it in such a romantic way. Bankrolled by... Rags to riches. By a Middle Eastern state. It's just

what football was made for. Oh, sarcasm. Yeah. Well, it's very apt, actually, that that is the matchup for this FA Cup final, in my opinion, and probably yours too, because it really is kind of exactly what makes everybody fall in love with the FA Cup, because it is synonymous with giant killings and things like that, underdog stories, and we're going to talk about some of them. All the way to the final, yeah. Yeah, exactly.

And Palace going up against a team that's never won anything before, that has a proud history, is a well -established Premier League club now, has some very good players in its own right, but a club that's never won anything in its history going up against a superpower that's been bankrolled to all the success it could possibly wish for in the last 10 years. Yeah, won two FA Cups in that time as well, and that's probably the competition

it's been least successful in. relatively speaking other than champions league which they've only won once but apart from that yeah four four premier leagues in a row until this season yeah they are a dominant force in english football and crystal palace are the plucky underdogs in this case although they've got some very good players so i'm looking forward to it it'll be good it will be very good and um and the women's fa cup final the following day yeah uh the women's fa

cup final is on sunday And that is Chelsea versus Manchester United. And that is at 1 .30 on Sunday for some reason. And not a dissimilar matchup. I mean, Manchester United are a huge footballing institution on the men's side of things. They have a good women's team, but not a great women's team. And Chelsea are a women's juggernaut. Yes. I mean, it's not quite the same because Manchester United are also the defending champions. But

Chelsea have won multiple FA Cups. I need to get my stats out, really, but I think they've won three in a row recently. So, yeah, they are the single dominant force. Yeah, Chelsea are all conquering at the moment. Man United are good, that's the thing. They are good, but they are certainly going into this as the underdogs, even if they are the holding favourite. All we're saying is if you're neutral in picking a team, though, it wouldn't always be something we'd

encourage. supporting Manchester United I think is okay this year just as it was when they were playing Man City last year and I kept telling myself that over and over yeah but yeah Chelsea won three in a row and Manchester United won last season so these two teams in particular have both at least one of them have been in the past four finals and Chelsea Manchester United was in fact the final two years ago as well Chelsea being successful on that day so either way be

a good game It will be. And it's cool that they're being played on the same weekend. It hasn't always been the case. Very much not. As I'll get into, the Women's FA Cup's only been at Wembley for not too many years. I think, I want to say 2015 was the first one. Yep, which unsurprisingly Chelsea won. As I'll also get into, the attendances, they're really starting to match the men's final attendances now. 76 ,000 there last year, 77 ,000 there the year before. Massive attendances

in terms of women's club football. Yeah, it's cool. It's definitely growing exponentially and long may that continue. Right, I mean, I guess the challenge for this episode, Jack, is going to be transmitting our enthusiasm for this tournament, this event, to anyone who cares to listen. Without going to two hours again. Yeah, exactly. This is obviously a subject that me and you are a bit more familiar with compared to, say, our ice hockey episode or even some of the horse

racing ones. So I think the best place to start is at the beginning, as usual. In the beginning. And you take the lead on this because you are our FA Cup historian and you can probably do this more succinctly than I can and with more panache and knowledge. I mean, you're setting me up for a fall there, but I'll do my best.

I won't go through all the history of football, but in the beginning, there was football played as a popular sport by the masses, largely in the countryside, largely before the Industrial

Revolution. You'd have whole villages. chasing a blown up pig's bladder or something you know across the entire village the goalpost will be one street corner on one side and then maybe a farmhouse or something on the other side several miles in between very little rules probably quite a lot of violence uh as tends to well as happened with many sports or as happened with a lot of recreation in the 19th century people lost their recreation time because the industrial revolution

happened a lot of people moved to the cities They were working very long hours, which was gradually pared down. Gradually, they started getting time back. Gradually, half days on Saturday were the norm as opposed to just Sundays. Sundays, they always had free, but ball games on Sundays, church weren't into that. So once those half Saturdays appeared, once hours in the working week were limited, all of a sudden there was

a chance for some recreation. But the opportunity had come that those sports, which they used to play en masse back in the day, had been... stratified into some rules and some codes and that was done not in the working class streets of manchester or preston or sheffield or anywhere else it was done as most english invented sports were at the english public schools at the um at the posh schools sons of rich folk codifying these rules or the masters of the houses codifying these

rules playing the sports in all their certain way there was loads of different codes of football depending on what school you went to And eventually these were first codified into a single set of laws in 1848. I've not even got this written down. I'm such a nerd. Yeah, you are a nerd. The Cambridge rules, that was. This is the thing, isn't it? The overarching context is the Victorian brothers and sisters who are famed for quite a few poor segments of our history did give us

a couple of rather wonderful things. And one of them, as you say, is sport generally most sports were codified in the in the 19th century uh and england's first love football yeah so they were codified by the public schools but as i'll come to they weren't popularized by them so in 1863 um the football association founded quite a lot of football clubs had already formed uh the oldest and most famous of these being sheffield football club which is the oldest football

club on the planet in in the meantime in order to We get a semblance of structure and, more importantly, a sort of control of the laws of the game. The FA was founded. They put out their first laws of the game. People in Sheffield actually disagreed with those original laws. There was already a bit of a North and South divide going on there. But the important thing in terms of this episode is in 1871, a one Charles W. Alcock proposed the establishment of the FA Challenge

Cup to the Football Association. They accepted. And in November of 1871, the first FA Cup tournament began. 15 teams entered. Only 12 teams ended up playing games. It was a bit shambolic at first. They didn't quite get the sort of giving teams a bye rule until a bit later. So you'd end up with essentially everyone would play a first round game. And then if you had an odd number of teams, a couple of teams would get a bye. Then everyone would play the next round. It was

an odd number of teams. It got to the point teams were getting by through semifinals because there was three teams left in the semifinal stage. Even more shambolic than that. Queen's Park from Scotland entered the first tournament. Sacrilege. Some of the first few tournaments until the Scottish FA said to them, we'd rather you didn't do this.

We'd rather you stayed and played here. But Queen's Park actually got to the semifinals without playing a game because everyone kept getting drawn away to them and no one could afford to get up to Scotland, up to Glasgow to play them. And then they got drawn against, I won't say the Wanderers,

in the semifinals. and they went and played them and it was a draw so then the replay was put on for a few weeks later and queens park then declined to play that because they couldn't afford it so they dropped out without having lost the game or conceded a goal after a nil -nil draw actually i think queens park famously i don't think they conceded a goal in any competitive game for like the first four years of their existence or something and still managed to not win the

fa cup first time around but i digress First FA Cup final was on the 16th of March 1872. It was the Wanderers versus the Royal Engineers at Kennington Oval in London. A very famous cricket ground nowadays. It is indeed. And it was 1 -0 by the Wanderers with the winning goal being scored by one Morton Betts of the Wanderers who was actually playing under the pseudonym A .H. Checker because he was actually a bit of a ringer and he didn't want his real identity given away.

That's so weird. Yeah, it was very limited. It was basically a sense of pride or sort of like courtesy, gentlemanliness, shall we say. Because after all, these were all amateur teams. I was going to say, it's very Sunday League. Yeah. Playing a ringer. These were teams in the early days largely made up of amateurs, largely made up of former public school players who simply put, did not need to be paid to play the game because they were perfectly wealthy already.

either working good, respectable jobs, or more likely, if they've been to the public schools, living off daddy's money. So all was good there for them. So the early FA Cup was dominated, as I say, by amateur upper -class southern clubs, such as the Old Etonians, who won three tournaments in a row in the early days. This changed in the 1880s when... Firstly, Blackburn Rovers became

the first provincial club. I'll get into the professionalism question later, but the first provincial club, shall we say, to reach the FA Cup final in 1882, unsuccessfully. But then Blackburn Olympic reached the FA Cup final in 1883 and played Old Etonians and were the first team from outside of the southern old amateur system to win it, becoming the first northern side to win it in 1883. and was quickly followed up by Blackburn

Rovers winning it in 1884, 1885 and 1886. So as you can imagine, the power had somewhat shifted from the south to the north. That must make Blackburn the only side to have ever won it three times in a row. Other than Old Etonians. Yeah. No one has since. Yeah, I was going to say. Arsenal, I know for a fact, have made three finals in a row, but we haven't won three in a row. No, they were the first team to win three in a row. They are the most recent team to win three in

a row. I do apologize. So they were a side suspected but never proven to contain professionals when they won it for the first time in 1884. And the reason this was controversial is because in 1884, another Northern team, another Northern team who was still playing, just like Blackburn Rovers, Preston North End, were expelled from the FA Cup after admitting to paying players. Basically, they got asked, are you paying players? They said yes, but so is everyone else. And they got

kicked out, obviously. Blackburn Rovers, never got proven. Was that the Preston North End Invincibles? Not quite, but we're nearly there. Around the

same time, yeah, okay. Yeah, so, so yeah, Preston North End got kicked out, Blackburn managed to get away with it, but in 1885 anyway, I mean, things were happening, there was basically shamaturism as it was going on, people getting under the table payments, boot money as they called it, money left behind in their boots or being paid discreetly or given expenses that were far and

above. what was happening and the the fa obviously was made up of largely ex -public school boys who detested this this we're going to get into this a lot with all different sports this is an age -old sort of arguments in english sport between amateurs and professionalism generally speaking professionalism run out one out the exceptions being in the case of rugby where the sport split into entirely and there was a professional version rugby league and an amateur version rugby

union the latter remaining amateur until 1995, which is very impressive. But this is not the case for football. Association football, I should say, because rugby is, of course, rugby football, having originated at rugby school. Neither of which are called soccer. Neither of which are, generally speaking, called soccer. But anyway, so, as I said, Blackburn Rovers winning three in a row, and by the time they won their third, professionalism had been legalised, albeit reluctantly,

by the FA. who could see where the tide was turning. So in 1888, the great Preston North End team reached the final. They were undefeated in 42 matches, having beaten Hyde 26 -0 in one of the rounds. And they had the gall to ask for a photo with the trophy before the final, to which the referee responded, hadn't you better win it first? West Bromwich Albion won that game 2 -1. Yes. Preston lost. I love that. However... The beauty of the Cup, that's exactly what this tournament

is all about, humbling people. Their first loss in 42 games and off their pedestal. However, 1888 -1889 was the first year of the Football League, the first year of what was then Division 1, what you would now call the Premier League, and Preston North End did in fact win that, and they won the FA Cup that season as well, becoming the first team to win the FA Cup double, which is something we might get into again, which is

when you win the League and the FA Cup. in the same season as Arsenal have before, as Liverpool have before. It's a coveted domestic title, isn't it, basically? Yeah, it's relatively rare. I think Man City were obviously the last team to do it, along with the Champions League as well that season, but it doesn't happen too often. Yeah, so from there, generally speaking, the good thing about the FA Cup is, other than...

Small things such as how they do the buys and actually learning how to draw a tournament properly. And replays. Replays have lessened and lessened over the years. In the beginning, if you drew a game, it would always be a replay and it would go on. If you drew again, second replay, third replay. If you drew a final, it would go to a replay and several finals have. I think the first one was 1970 and a couple more since then. I want to say most recently, did Arsenal go to

a replay in 93? 93, we beat Sheffield Wednesday. Yeah, we did the domestic cup double that year, just if anyone cares. Yeah, so the first thing that... Just mention it. Yeah, that's the FA Cup and the League Cup in the same season. Well done, Arsenal. It's a long time ago, so it's not much of a brag. No, I was actually going

to say this. I've had the privilege of watching Arsenal win, I think it's eight, seven or eight of their FA Cups, and I was alive for that one, but I don't actually have a memory of that because I was only... Five. My first memory is 98 Cup Double, League and FA Cup Double. Nicolas Anelka and Marco Marz beat Newcastle 2 -0. Yes, I remember that one too. In fact, I probably watched it with you. Yeah, probably. Yeah, good times. So, as I say, the tournament's largely saved the

same replays. I think immediately after that, they got rid of replays in the finals, so finals went to extra time and penalties. Then they got rid of replays in the semi -finals. I think 1999 was the last semi -final to go to a replay. You probably don't want me to mention it then, but that was Ryan Giggs' wonder goal in the replay to win it. Yes. Stop talking about that. Good goal, though. It was a good goal. A horrible

person, but a good goal. Then it went from the quarter -final shortly after that, and now it's at the point where there simply aren't any replays anymore. extra time and penalties, which is sad, if you ask me. That's only because of the elite end of the game as well. It's just scheduling and the number of games that the best teams have

to play. There's no reason to have got... The irony being that the lower leagues, or at least the lower professional leagues, certainly probably play more domestic league games, but don't play

as many games because of... European tournaments and things like that so yeah and not advancing as far in cups generally yeah yeah and then obviously you have also the international game and so on and so forth it's a real shame because it was a it's one of the romances of the tournament historically isn't it it's like you go away to a to you know a team that you Well, actually, it probably works better the other way around.

You'd be at home against someone, some superpower, and then you would snaffle a draw and get an away day where you get to go and play in a Premier League stadium and you're in a lower league team. Yeah. Big payday as well for the clubs. Yeah, obviously, everyone at the club's happy. Players get to go and play at Old Trafford or the Emirates or Anfield, some giant stadium you've been watching as a kid. The owners are happy because you also get a portion of the gate receipts as well in

the cup. You get 25 % don't you? I think cup games deliberately give you way more allocation. Which for a non -league team or for a lower league team would pay the wages for a whole year. 25 % somewhere like Old Trafford's gate receipts when they've got 76 ,000 people in. That'll keep you going. That will keep you going. Can I quickly add as well, Jack? Because you got us to professionalism.

I think before we go on any further, I think the thing for anyone who's not initiated to the FA Cup, they need to appreciate and understand to grasp its romances. The professional game is only the tip of the iceberg in English football.

So basically, if you're a member club, of the fa there is theoretically a route from whatever league you're in through to the premier league because it's called the footballing pyramid so you only have four professional leagues then you have effectively a semi -professional league which is progressively becoming mostly professional becoming yeah exactly becoming more more professional which is the um national league old school conference but thereafter the league system splits into

effectively north and south and then it pyramids out exponentially to county level yeah it evenly pyramids out now which is something I've been reading into recently it's at level one of non -league so the national league it's one division then it's two divisions then it's four divisions then it's eight divisions so you know theoretically from level ten um you can level 10 of the football league so that's level six of the non -league you can get promoted all the way from there 10

seasons in a row yeah you could theoretically end up in the premier league and you can enter the fa cup as well although level 10 teams don't necessarily get in it level 9 and above are guaranteed a place level 10 only get a place if a level 9 team cannot compete for whatever reason But the point is that... There's a waiting list, basically. Yeah, if you're in the football pyramid, then you can theoretically get to the FA Cup final. You can play anyone in the football league

pyramid. And you can get, in ideal circumstances, from the bottom to the top. And a contemporaneous example of that in sort of semi -terms is Wrexham. who have flown up through the leagues, obviously under the famous ownership of two Hollywood stars. Ryan Reynolds and Rob McElhenney. Yeah, and they've gone from the National League to the Championship in three straight years, which is hard. I mean, it's incredible. I know this is slightly getting off topic. Well, it's not. I mean, Wrexham do

have a very good FA Cup history. despite never having won it, because obviously they've been a lower league team. They have a few giant killings under their belt, a few good cup runs. It is genuinely impressive what those two have done at the club, regardless of how rich they are. You cannot throw money at a football club and get a club free promotions in a row. You simply can't. It must be an incredibly well -run football club. That's all I'm going to say on the matter.

Yeah, agreed. Welcome to Wrexham, if you need any more information. But yeah, I mean, just to round that off, what we're saying, everything we're talking about here is in that context. So it is the most amateurish levels that can

play against the best of the best. you can get a european champion against like a university team and because there are some university teams in the football pyramid yeah there are and and anyone if you go far enough if you get to the the third round is the first round where the premier league teams and the championship teams the league below the premier league uh enter so if you get yourself to the third round and get yourself a lucky draw you can end up as a

and it happens a lot a non -league team playing a premier league team and every so often the non -league team wins and we'll get into that a bit But I think most recently, Lincoln City knocked out Burnley in 2017. And before that, Luton knocked out... Who did they knock out? Norwich. They knocked out when Norwich were a Premier League team in 2013. And there was actually a player who played in both those games. And I forget who it is. But he played for Luton in

the first one and was victorious. Then he played

for Burnley in the second one. Didn't Lincoln make the... quarter finals yeah they made the quarters that's it yeah Andre Gray I think it was Andre Gray yeah so Andre Gray actually played in both those games once on the winning team once on the losing team which does make him the only person I think in history who's ever knocked out a Premier League team as a non -league player and be knocked out by a non -league team as a Premier League player that's fun there you go

But yeah, so sorry, I sidetracked us slightly, but I thought it was important to contextualize why we love this tournament so much and why it captures the imagination so vividly. Well, I should say about this, like we obviously prepared a lot of notes in other episodes. I've not prepared a whole amount for this. I've only really prepared one thing, which I'll go into now because it sort of feeds on to the point we're at in history. It's quite nice just to be able to ad -lib and

talk about something we love, honestly. It is very cool. As much as I love learning about sports, as much as I've loved learning about horse racing and learning about ice hockey, this is, yeah. It's nice. It is nice. Just to say that. So, do you want to, not a story. Yeah, it is a story, actually. Do you want a story? Yeah, I guess so. Because it carries straight on from where we were. So, we're up to, obviously, professionalism's kicked in. I'll take you forward a few years.

We're up to 1914, 1915 season. And as anyone who knows anything about history will know, it was quite a seismic event going on in the world at that time. Some Serbians weren't too enamored by some Austrian guy. Yeah, pretty much. A very good summary. You nailed it there. Be a historian, Ben. So yeah, during the First World War, the landscape of British society obviously underwent huge transformations, but nowhere was this more visible. arguably, than the world of football.

So the 1915 FA Cup final, which was between Sheffield United and Chelsea, which I believe Sheffield United won 3 -0. I've got that written down, just showing off again. You got it right. Became known as the Khaki final, the Khaki final, due to the high number of uniformed soldiers in the stands. It was a poignant and symbolic moment, which neatly captured the end of peacetime football. with the Earl of Derby, who presented the trophy, calling on anyone not yet in uniform to play

a sterner game for England. Although it should be pointed out that was mostly drowned out by the fans cheering, but nevertheless made the papers. As the war intensified, obviously, more and more young men were being conscripted en masse to join the slaughter and the front lines, sadly. So football, men's professional football. was suspended in 1915 at the end of the 1914 -15 season. Football did continue, but it was

very, very heavily enforced amateur. And in fact, there were some teams who came afoul of that after the war. Leeds City ended up being disqualified from the league for paying their players during this amateur period and were reformed as Leeds United, that who are quite famous. Yeah, quite

famous. um so yeah many players obviously left the pitch for the trenches and obviously many many never returned uh over 2 000 professional footballers joined the military and obviously many young men who were filling the terraces and local teams rosters were also lost to the horrors of the western front and the slaughter the mindless pointless slaughter but we'll get let's not get into that right now yeah that's uh We have a tendency to be depressing with some

of our stories. I don't know if it's going to end happily, but let's not go to the trenches. This is good. It's hard to be positive about it. To be fair, you're going to be impressed I find some positivity in the First World War. It's very hard to be positive about that war. Nevertheless, with the male workforce decimated, literally, the people who stepped forward to cover were, of course, women. So women stepped forward to keep the wheels of the nation turning.

They took up roles in factories, transportation, agriculture, munitions, previously obviously the exclusive domain of men. These munitions workers particularly, colloquially known as munitionettes, brought the same level of energy and camaraderie to their downtime, just as the men did, and chose the sport they most wanted to unwind, and that was particularly football. For the same reasons football is so popular today, because it can be played with anyone with a ball and a couple

of jumpers for goalposts. It is a very accessible sport. So just like with the birth of the men's game, the popularity and organisation of women's football exploded during these years, mainly in industrial centres across the country, mainly built around teams working out of these factories, particularly. I thought you were going to say something then. No, no, I just think this is cool. I'm locked in. I'm just listening. Yeah,

it's great. So one of the most significant examples of this early organisation was the Munitionettes Cup, officially titled the Tyne and Wear and Tease Alfred Wood Munition Girls Cup, which was launched in August 1917 in North East England, as you can imagine by the name. The competition was solely contested by women in factory teams,

obviously composed of female war workers. The final of the inaugural tournament was played on the 18th of May 1918 and saw Blythe Spartans beat Bolcal Vaughan 5 -0 with the legendary Bella Rae, who incidentally scored 133 goals in 30 games that season. She scored a hat -trick in the final. That's alright, isn't it? Yeah, there's a film about her, I think, or a series, was it? Warbella. That's literally like Roy of the Rovers kind of record. It's ludicrous. Absolutely ludicrous.

And she's very, very well respected in her neck of the woods up in Blythe. I think Dan Burns talked about it quite a lot. I think he's from Blythe. Blythe being near Newcastle. Yes, yes. A massive footballing city. But one of the most impressive things about that final was it was played in front of 22 ,000 people in Middlesbrough, which was a pretty impressive turnout. obviously spoke volumes about the enthusiasm for the women's game. The women's game actually managed to reach

international levels before the war ended. On Boxing Day 1917, a representative team from England took on a side from Ireland in front of 20 ,000 spectators, which again is another very good turnout. I don't know what the score of that was though, sorry. I'm sure it was played in really good faith. The Irish and English probably getting on famously at that hit. In 1917? Oh yes. Nothing at all going on in the world then. Which would keep them from a sense of friendship.

There's an irony there for anyone who doesn't understand that it's the same year as the Easter Risings where the Irish revolted against English rule. Not for the first time, not for the last time. So yeah, among the many teams formed during this era, none was more famous or more influential than the Dick Kerr Ladies FC who were based in Preston and founded in 1917. consisting of female workers from Dick Kerr & Co. Munitions Factory, and the comma is in their name, so it's Dick,

Kerr, Ladies FC, which is fun. I don't know why I like that so much. They're from the Dick Kerr & Co. Munitions Factory and quickly rose to prominence as arguably the most successful and well -known women's team of the 20th century. In their very first match, they had a crowd of 10 ,000 and raised £600 for charitable causes, which is the equivalent of £35 ,000 today. That ain't bad.

That isn't bad. They existed for 48 years, and in that time they played 755 games, winning 682 of them, drawing 39 and losing just 34, which frankly is Harlem Globetrotter levels of dominance. I was going to say, that makes the All Blacks look unsuccessful. Yeah. Yeah, good team. Their early matches often drew crowds in the tens of thousands, but famously one match against St. Helen's Ladies in December 1920 was played in front of 53 ,000 spectators at Goodison Park.

which was an attendance figure for a women's club match that wouldn't be exceeded until Atletico Madrid played Barcelona in front of 60 ,000 spectators at the Metropolitano in 2019. Which is ridiculous. That is ridiculous. And wouldn't be matched in England until Arsenal versus Wolfsburg at the Emirates in front of 60 ,000 in 2023. Which is mad. Two years ago. Yeah. So they beat a French 11 2 -0 in 1920 in front of 25 ,000 spectators in Preston, which was actually a record attendance

for Deepdale at the time. The team were known for their fast and skillful play, excellent teamwork. They wore black and white striped jerseys with a Union Jack on the breast, blue shorts, and completed their look with striped hats covering their hair, which they all hated, but was a necessary evil at the time, due to obviously the inherent conservatism. They also contributed most of the players to an England 11 that beat Scotland. Scotland 11, 22 -0 that year as well. Nice. Was

it a 90 -minute game? I think it was 90 minutes. They changed some of the rules. They changed the pitch dimensions, made it slightly smaller, and they made the ball lighter, which actually is legitimate because the balls in those days weighed an absolute ton. I was just trying to gauge how much of a butchering it was. I don't think there's any way that can't be a butchering.

called off early probably should have been. So anyway, they were initially quite well supported by governments and the press due to their fundraising and the backing of the private companies that

formed them as well. They even found support from a very unlikely source when trying to play a pioneering floodlit night match in 1920 with repurposed anti -air spotlights as floodlights and they had to seek permission from the secretary of defence at the time, whose name was Winston Churchill, and they got permission from him to do that. That's weird, yeah, that's kind of cool.

So, here, I'm sure you can imagine where this is going, but despite their popularity and early support, and women's football generally has popularity and early support, it faced enormous and unsurprising institutional resistance. In 1921, at the height of their success, and at the time they were packing Division 1 stadiums to the rafters, The FA, the Football Association, ruled that sport was quote -unquote unsuitable for women and accused them of keeping too much money raised in expenses

and not donating enough to charity. Essentially the same thing they got Leeds City for. Something, of course, keeping too much money in expenses and not donating enough to charity, something that the men at the FA can never be accused of, of course. Yeah, I was going to say the irony in that accusation. Yeah. So by being excluded, by being kicked out, this banned them from using any grounds of any affiliated club and effectively pushed the women's game into the margins for

half a century. Jesus. The Dick Curl ladies carried on playing, as I said. They carried on touring, using smaller venues, but still attracting large crowds. They also toured internationally, which included, this is really cool, a tour to the United States in 1922, where they played nine matches against men's teams composed of former professional players from... the British Isles who had emigrated, and national -level athletes.

Well, they played nine matches against men's teams composed of former professional players and national -level athletes. They faced strong opposition, which included, as I said, former Football League players who had emigrated to the United States, and at least one male player who would go on to appear at the 1930 World Cup for the United States. Despite this, they held their own. Three wins, three draws, three losses.

American newspapers lauded them, with the Fall River Evening Herald calling their visit one of the biggest things in apologies for this word soccer ever to a visitor of the united states yeah we're in england now i can use football uh the praise their stamina their combination play and their speed and peter renzuli who was a goalkeeper for pats and fc remarked years later we were national champions but we had a hell of a job beating them it's impressive that's

very impressive i was going to ask you if that had anything to do with the um the formation of the national women's soccer league in america because that's obviously massive um but A quick Google suggests that's actually more recent than I thought. I think so. So I doubt it. It's 2012 that was set up, but I don't know if it had any predecessors, etc. But anyway, I digress. I just thought it would have been a nice link if it

had been, but it's not. I think women's football in England is slightly behind the curve, but it's not that behind the curve. Unfortunately, the entire world was behind the curve, including the United States. The United States were ahead of the curve, but it's all very much relative. Anyway, so in 1926, following a dispute with the club's ownership, the team was renamed Preston Ladies FC, but continued playing, so it's all

the same team. They continued until 1965, including winning in 1954 against a team from Paris, 4 -0, with future Liverpool manager and 1965 FA Cup winning manager Bill Shankly refereeing the match, representing the winners with a trophy. Bill Shankly. Which is literally the only reason I mentioned that particular fact. I was going to say. Jack, being a Liverpool fan, anyone who's listening, Bill Shankly is a legendary Liverpool manager. He is everything Liverpool. He is the

man who built the club, as it is today. So, the FA's ban on women's football lasted until 1971, and then following sustained pressure from players, campaigners, and fans, it was lifted. The same year saw the formation of the Women's Football Association Cup. That is the Women's Football

Association Cup, as opposed to the Women's. football association cup there was a different organization called the women's football association god forbid the fa take them back onto their wing quite yet yeah so it was a women's football association cup which was the forerunner to the modern women's fa cup and is considered um when looking at stats and history these are considered fa cup games the first fa cup winner for women therefore was southampton women in fc in 1971 nice so throughout

the 80s and 90s the women's game continued to grow but very slowly In 1992, the FA finally took full control of the women's game, taken over from the WFA, though this was merely a step towards full institutional recognition that was still to come. The 90s themselves saw the breakout of the women's game globally for the first time, but as I mentioned, England were behind the curve on that. The first Women's World Cup was held

in 1991. So, as everyone, I'm sure, well, anyone who knows anything about football will be no doubt aware, the 21st century has seen a very... clear renaissance in women's football. The Women's Super League was launched in 2011 which brought professional status and broadcasting deals to the women's game. Attendances have surged as a result and matches now regularly take place in the same major stadiums once closed off to

female players. The Women's FA Cup final is now held annually at Wembley Stadium and after COVID caused the postponement of the 2021 FA Cup final

the match was eventually played. symbolically on december the 5th 2021 which is 100 years to the day since the fa banned women's football uh unfortunately ben close your ears uh chelsea beat arsenal that day in front of 41 000 spectators and chelsea again won in 2023 this time before a record -breaking 77 390 fans which really cemented the cup status as one of the premier events in the global women's football calendar or the global football calendar entirely so yeah there we go

from the factory fields of wartime England to the bright lights of Wembley, women's football. Yeah. That's awesome. Yeah. I do like that story. It is cool. It's a very cool story, particularly the way in which it emerged and then was obviously buried underground again. Um, you know, whilst the men were away and, um, just shows like that without getting too poignant about the whole thing, it does show what opportunity does because

that is all, that is all. world war one was for women's football just an opportunity it's not because it's not because they couldn't do it or they're not good at it just they had a chance to play it seems like the most obvious thing in the world to say but the single way to improve a sport more than anything else to get a lot of people playing it yeah obviously there's an opportunity first world war there was a great demand for it there was a great opportunity for

these women to play it they had downtime between their work in the factories to let off steam and that's what they chose to do because obviously it's a great game and it's an easy game to play it's a very accessible game and for the same reasons now I will say this right now watch out for the England women's team in a few years time because England managed to win the European Championships in 2021 or 2022 when it actually was I think on the back of this relatively slow curve relatively

slow uptake of the game still managed to get a very very strong team together a very very well run team and won those Euros. As a result of that, I, as I mentioned several times, am a coach at a junior football club. Lots of girls have started playing. We've gone from having, I think, about four or five teams when I first joined, and the team may be maybe 40 girls playing at the club, to quadrupling that, at least now. The uptake has been ridiculous. The ability of

those players has gone through the roof. The younger age groups, particularly at our club, are extremely good. They are getting less and less distinguishable from the boys at their age, and a lot of them are playing both in girls football and in mixed football. I should point out to anyone who doesn't know, there is no such thing as boys football in the United Kingdom, or in England, I should say. I don't know what it is

in the other. I presume it's the same, but certainly in England, under the FA, there is no such thing as boys football. It is all mixed football. So boys and girls can play together. Obviously, the mixed teams are mostly boys and then the girls teams have the opportunity to play themselves. But there are a lot of very talented young girls playing in the mixed teams as well. And I've been lucky enough to coach them as well. So,

yeah. So if anyone's come to this podcast thinking they're not going to have to listen to anyone championing women's football, you are horribly mistaken and we won't apologize for it. So, yeah, there we are. But if you're bothered about it, please feel free to go online and complain about it because there's things you can do to benefit

the women's game. If you understand anything about the internet and understand what engagement does, if you don't want anyone to watch that highlight that you're complaining about, I'd recommend you don't complain about it, mate. From my point of view, you go ahead and complain about it. Honestly, if anyone thinks that women's football is going away in England, you are sorely mistaken. It has just begun. It is just getting started. England are going to be very, very good

in about, Six or seven years' time. Just watch out. And if any father out there has a prodigal daughter who is showing immense talent in football, can I recommend Arsenal Women's Football Club as a potential academy steeped in history? And since we're on the FA Cup, can I just point out that we've made 17 finals in the most successful club in women's FA Cup history with 14 wins. So, yeah. 14 wins, eh? Same as the men. Exactly. A nice little symmetry. Our chance to slip in

one of our first stats of the day. Ben has dropped in it. The most successful team in both the men's FA Cup and the women's FA Cup with 14 wins in both is Arsenal. Yeah. Men have made more finals. We made 21 finals. 114. That means they've lost more, Ben. It does, although we have a very, very good win rate in my lifetime. I think we've made... 9 finals. 1 -8. Yeah, I mean, even when Arsenal were struggling in the in -between period between Wenger and now, where you're good again,

even then, you're still winning FA Cups. Arsenal's ability to get to the FA Cup final and win it, I don't know what it is, whether it's just coincidence or whether it's just the attitude of the club. It's a club that takes the competition seriously.

There you are. 14 wins. I'm sure that there is an element of fortune, but it definitely is something that the club associates itself with quite heavily, which is probably part of the reason why I find this tournament so endearing generally, because obviously my team has been successful in it. But yeah, it is. No doubt that there's a dose of luck involved. Because it's all about draws. That's the other thing. It's a random draw. So

why am I being magnanimous about that? It's because the FA Cup draw, there is no seeding system. So the two best teams in the tournament can technically draw each other at the earliest opportunity. And that often opens up a route to the final. I say often. It is not uncommon. It's not obviously. It's not a frequent occurrence that a lower league side makes the final or an underdog makes the final like Crystal Palace this year. But it is also not uncommon. It's not a freak event when

it happens. No. So if you get a favourable draw, you can get to the final or you can get to the latter stages without having to beat too many sides that you would say are conventionally challenging. Yeah. I mean, you still have to beat them. Obviously, Crystal Palace have beaten plenty of good sides to get here. Not least in their semi -final when they knocked out Aston Villa in the Champions League. Not just knocked them out either, just

squatched them. Funnily enough, one thing I mentioned before actually kind of helped contribute to Arsenal's first ever FA Cup win. If you recall, I said Leeds City got kicked out of the league in 1919. The lead city manager was a man called Herbert Chapman. And Herbert Chapman then went on to manage Huddersfield and won the FA Cup with them. And then went on to manage Arsenal. And in 1930, won the FA Cup with Arsenal. Arsenal's first FA Cup. And then promptly, unfortunately,

passed away soon after that. There's a statue of a man built outside the Emirates Stadium. He is a much -loved character. I can go off on it. In terms of doing full episodes about people in football, you've got Johan Cruyff, who I'd definitely do a full episode on. Marcel Bielsa, who I'd definitely do a full episode on. Herbert Chapman, you could definitely do a full episode on. He revolutionised the game of football, his

approach to football. I mean, the team's still effectively using his attacking system to this day, at least structurally, his attacking system. Tactically, the game has changed a lot. He's also the reason that Arsenal Underground Station is named Arsenal Underground Station. Oh, really? Yeah, I think he was the man responsible for that. I say responsible for it. I'm sure he wasn't the decision maker, but he was an influence in

that coming about, I believe. Unless I've misunderstood my history, but I'm fairly sure that's right. Well, fair enough. So where do we go from here?

where do we go from here well okay let's talk about the trophy because i've literally got the no twin in front of me and i'll forget to do it if i don't so there's been five trophies in the history of the competition uh the first one was in 1872 was called the little tin idol it was created by martin hall and co of sheffield for 20 pounds and all the clubs that entered the competition that year had to contribute i think a guinea whatever the heck a guinea is,

towards that. So yeah, that's cool. That is cool. What is a guinea? I'm going to have a look. I want to say it's like a pound and a shilling or something. It's like just over a pound, something like that. But anyway, not used today. No. So that was the trophy until 1895 when Aston Villa came carelessly, had it stolen from them from a shop window display in Birmingham, as you do. The fief was never caught, although in the 1950s, a criminal claimed it was melted down for counterfeit

coins. And Aston Villa were found £25 for its disappearance, presuming it accrued £5 worth of value in the 20 years it was being used. So in 1895, a new trophy, a replacement trophy in the same design, was commissioned and was in use for 15 years. It was retired later and it was later auctioned for £420 ,000 in 2005. There you go. But in 1911, the classic design, the design that's used today was designed and presented

for the first time. Bradford jewellers Fattorini crafted the new, more robust trophy, which is the design which remains the same to today. It was first awarded to the winners of the 1911 tournament, appropriately, Bradford City, with the trophy having been designed in Bradford. It surfed for 81 years and was retired in 1992, where it was very battered and bruised by them.

It was valued at £1 million on the Antiques Roadshow, and some speculate it might originally have been a champagne cooler, given it's got decorative grapes on it. But it doesn't really matter. 1992, because it was so battered and bruised, they made a new one, which Liverpool captain Mark Wright was the first man to lift when they beat Sunderland in 1992. 2 -0. Ian Rush and Michael Thomas haven't scored the goals. The famous Michael Thomas. Oh yeah, shouldn't have mentioned him.

That was an error. Yeah, he famously once scored against Liverpool to win the league title for Arsenal. With the last kick of the season. We do digress. Fever pitch. Yeah, neither of us remember that. We were alive for it, but we were very young. And then in 2014, exactly the same trophy, but a bit more material, a bit heavier, 6 .3 kilograms, designed to withstand public

appearances. So yeah, the one trophy lasted like 80 years and the second trophy only lasted about 30 years because it was touring so much and so many fans touched it and dropped it, I imagine. And the new trophy is built a bit heavier to desire to be able to be dropped by, you know. children and the like. Yeah, Arsenal captain. That's true. Obama Yang dropped it. But yeah, so it's only everyone loaned to the teams that win it and it has to be returned to the FA by

March the 1st of the following year. So they get it for quite a fair bit of time. Ten months. That's quite cool. Nine months. I'm just going to throw a bone to our random enthusiasts out there. This time they're numismatists, I think. They're the people who collect coins. I found out what a guinea is. A guinea was worth £1 .01 and equates to £1 .05 in modern money. And so, yeah, the clubs didn't have to contribute very

much. And it also shows just how far it's come when you were telling us about how much the cups were auctioned off or valued at later on in the tournament's history. Yeah. Yeah, there you go. Entrenched. I will never... I will never remember that word you just said, but shout out to you coin collectors. And numismatist, if I'm pronouncing it correctly. I can't imagine the Venn diagram of people who collect coins and like this podcast. It's very far apart. Probably a complete circle,

I imagine. Yes. Yeah, shout out to you, our core supporters, probably. Yeah, so. The trophy though, yeah. The trophy's an iconic trophy. It's the way it looks. Yeah, the way it's in parts as well. The way you've got the base, you've got the trophy, you've got the lid. It all separates out and confuses Arsenal captains in that one occurrence. They try to lift the whole thing up. I mean, I guess it's true for most modern sports these days, but the silhouette of the

FA Cup is unmistakable. Yes, as all good trophies should be. Champions League trophy as a Premier League is. Silly crown on top. But the FA Cup's logo is just a silhouette of its trophy. Or it is just the trophy, a picture of it, depending on your preferred broadcaster. With a sponsorship slapped over the top? Naturally. Is it Emirates still? I think it is, yeah. They also sponsor Arsenal. They do. Oh, conspiracy theory. There we go. I also keep winning it. Weird that. I

love a conspiracy theory. I'm just having a look at the sponsors for us. The Emirates, yeah, it is. So, I mean, I'll charge for a bit of the rest of the history. I think it would be a good idea now. So, first final at Wembley Stadium was in 1923. Bolton beat West Ham 2 -0. One of the goals was very controversial. Officially, 126 ,000 attended. Mate, the White Horse final. The White Horse final. Actually, it was definitely over 200 ,000. It might even be as high as 300

,000. Can I add some flavour to that? The White Horse final. I don't know why I went down rabbit holes with this because I think I love it for a couple of reasons. It's horses again, yeah. It's horses. It's post -World War I. It's indicative of the love that the English public have for this tournament and this event generally. And so, yeah, as you were just saying, Jack, like official capacity was, I think, 125 ,000 back in the day at Wembley. Obviously, it was terraces.

make allowances for that um but the london underground that day sold more than 241 000 tickets from stations within london to wembley says it all doesn't it and that figure doesn't cover the people that traveled without a ticket because obviously it would have been people bunking trains it doesn't cover people who reach the stadium on by road or on foot and it doesn't include london buses which were described as overwhelmed On the day of the match, the gates opened at

11 .30 a .m. Kickoff was obviously traditionally at 3 p .m. And by 1 .45, they had to be shut because the stadium was already full. And then people started gathering outside of it. So the fans rushed the gates at 2 .15. One of the spectators, Terry Hickey, who was interviewed, said later, to put it mildly, the whole thing was a bloody shambles. which I think is a very English articulation

of the situation. The roads around the stadium were so blocked that the Bolton players had to abandon their coach a mile from the stadium and walk through the crowds to the game. And the stadium authorities were considering calling it off, but they feared the consequences of cancelling the FA Cup final and the angry response that that might provoke. And as you said, they think up to 300 ,000 people actually managed to gain

entry. Terraces are overflowing to the point that the fans were on the pitch and the mounted police had to be brought in to clear the crowds. And this is where our protagonist, our hero, enters the fray. So, yeah, mounted police, as I say. And one of those police officers was a chap called P .C. George Scorori. I think I'm pronouncing his name right. Scorori. Scorori. Which is quite an appropriate name, actually.

It is, yeah. He wasn't supposed to be on duty that day, but he answered the call for emergency assistance. And he was on a horse named Billy. Now, Billy was a grey horse, not a white horse. I was going to say this. The only fact I know about Billy is that he wasn't white, even though it's called the White Horse Final. Yeah, he was grey. The TV cameras couldn't pick him up properly. He came across as white on the TV screens, exactly,

and all the photos that were taken of him. And so, basically, PC Scorry didn't think, he literally is on record as saying he didn't think it was possible. He thought it was impossible to clear the crowds. But he describes the horse as easing them back with his nose and tail until he got the goal line cleared. And essentially, he thinks that the horse was, he gives the horse all the credit. He says it had nothing really to do with

him. The horse was just, commanding attention and the crowds were good natured and seemed to understand what was required of them and what the horse was asking them to do and he pushed them back and whilst the pitch was being cleared the event choir of St. Luke's sang Abide with me Abide with me I didn't know if you were going to mention that or not I had that charged up and ready to go So yeah, that's why it's called the White Horse Final. But I just think it's

so cool. It prompted discussion in the House of Commons, and I think this is your fact, Jack, not mine, so I'm going to plagiarise off you, but I think it led to it being a ticketed -only event. Is that right? Yeah, I was going to say, in the least surprising news ever, all -ticket

final from there. Yeah, I love this story, and I love how that's the first use of... history of abide with me being sung at the fa cup final apparently it was also sung by the west ham fans as they sadly walked home after losing but um uh abide with me became a permanent staple from 1927 and i have a theory why it became a permanent staple from 19 or why it was sung so why to remember that it was sung in 1927 because the 1927 final had a a lot of people in the stadium from a certain

part of the united kingdom which is who are very well known for their singing, very well known for their male choirs. Cardiff City got to the FA Cup final that year. And if anyone knows anything about Wales, they love a sing song and they're very good at it. And Cardiff City played, and again, close your ears, Ben, they played Arsenal that day and Cardiff City actually won the FA Cup, which is the last non -English team to win

the FA Cup. There are still, basically anyone playing in the English football system enters the FA Cup, so Cardiff still do, Wrexham do, Swansea do, so on and so forth. Although it's been, Cardiff reached the final, I think 2008, they reached the final, lost to Portsmouth, I believe. Yes. But yeah, Cardiff were the last

non -English team to win it. They took the FA Cup back home with them to Wales and left behind a legacy of Abide With Me being sung then on and then for, therefore, for the rest of the time. It's a wonderful song. That is, yeah. That's a cool, that's a cool origin story. It is. It is very cool. But yeah, sorry, I just really like the White Horse final just because I think it illustrates, left to our own devices, what the English public will do to make an FA Cup

final. Yeah, absolutely. And any other sporting event. Anyway, 1927 was also famous because it was the first FA Cup final broadcast by the British Broadcasting Corporation, the BBC, obviously via the radio. And the Radio Times also gave a grid. which allowed you to follow the ball around the pitch. So the commentator would say, the ball is now in A1 or whatever, and you'd be able to follow it on the pitch. So completely pointless, but that was interesting. Innovative,

at least. Yeah. So yeah, I'll fast forward ahead now. I'll spin through some of the key finals, the key things that happened, all the key things that happened during the tournaments. 1946 was the first post -World War II FA Cup. Most notable for some ties being played over two legs, which has never happened before. Derby County won the final, but it was most notable for a disaster which happened in Bolton in the sixth round, which is the Burnden Park disaster, in which

quite a lot of fans lost their lives. Not, unfortunately, the last disaster to hit the FA Cup. We'll come to later. It's also a pretty eerie precursor, because it's similar in nature. Yeah. So, playing in that game was one Stanley Matthews. I think it was Bolton against Stoke, I want to say. at that point. Correct. I don't think Matthews had joined Blackpool yet, but anyway. Stanley Matthews, in 1953, was the most famous English footballer ever, at that point. He's still one of the most

famous English footballers to this day. His incredible longevity is most notable. He was the first ever winner of the Ballon d 'Or trophy, and he won it in 1956. I think that's boss. He won it in 1956 at the age of 41 years old. Whoa. Which

was nine years before he retired. carried on playing until 1965 played for England until 1957 but in 1953 he'd never won any trophy he played for Stoke his boyhood club he'd won division two with them I should say he never won a division one trophy or an FA Cup trophy or anything like that he won division two with them in 1933 he would later win division two with them again in 1963 which is fairly incredible but in 1953 Blackpool, his team at the time. He was at Blackpool

in between a couple of spells at Stoke. They were playing Bolton in the final and they found themselves 3 -1 down with not too long left on the clock. He was playing with a man named Stan Mortensen who was possibly the most unfortunate man in FA Cup final history because this final became known as the Matthews final after Blackpool came back from 3 -1 down, pulled the goal back through Mortensen, got an equaliser through Mortensen. which was his hat -trick goal, because he scored

the first goal as well. That's a Stan Mortensen hat -trick. And then in the 92nd minute of the game, having equalised in the 89th, Stanley Matthews beat a couple of players, got to the byline, pulled the ball back across to where he thought Stan Mortensen would be. And apparently Matthews later said, for the first time all bloody season, he wasn't stood there. Obviously, Stanley Matthews would never have said bloody because he was a lovely man. But Stan Mortensen wasn't there,

but a man named Bill Perry was. And Bill Perry... swept it in for a 4 -3 victory in what is generally regarded as the greatest FA Cup final of all time, and definitely the greatest FA Cup final comeback of all time. So it's called the Matthews final, basically because of the reverence the British public have for Stanley Matthews. It really should be called, if not the Mortensen final, then the two Stans final, something like that, because Stan Mortensen and Stanley Matthews

were both instrumental to winning that. So yes, Stan Mortensen is obviously very well remembered. He's the only man ever to have scored a hat -trick in an FA Cup final, and everyone remembers Stanley Matthews. I think you can probably begrudge that, because Stanley Matthews was an absolute legend. Yeah, and he's still got his FA Cup medal, Stan Mortensen. Yes, a legend of the game himself. So the 1950s were notable for pretty much one other thing. We both like this story a lot. I

know where you're going with this. So, well, in general terms, it's notable for one other thing, which was injuries. Injuries. There were no substitutes at this point. There was no substitutes until 1967. But let's go through this. 1952, Arsenal's Wally Barnes got split cartilage. 1953, Eric Bell was injured during that final I just mentioned. 1955, Jimmy Meadows broke his leg. 1957, Ray Wood of Man United. got clattered and ended up finishing out limping on the wing. 1959,

Roy Dwight broke his leg playing for Luton. Roy Dwight, funnily enough, is actually Elton John's cousin, what he's most famous for. 1960s, he carried on. Dave Whelan broke his leg playing for Blackburn. Do you recognise the name Dave Whelan? Yeah, I do, but I don't know why. He was the chairman of Wigan when they won the FA Cup in 2013. That's it. That was a brilliant fight. Now his nephew owns it or something. Is that right? Yeah, 1961, Len Chalmers as well.

And then finally, in the mid -60s, they finally allowed substitutes in football. You might have noticed there was one year and one name I left off there, Ben, because a man that deserves a mention, 1956. Well, he's going to make all of these other guys look like they basically should have played on. For various reasons. So Bert Routman was born in Bremen in 1923. He joined the Luftwaffe earlier in the Second War. They

later became a paratrooper. He was initially serving in Poland and fought on the Eastern Front. He earned five medals, including an Iron Cross, which is a very high award for valour in the German army. Later in the war, he ended up on the Western Front, where he was captured by the British as the war grew to a close. One of only 90 of his original 1 ,000 -man regiment to survive the war. He was transferred to a prison of war

camp in Ashton in Makefield, Lancashire. After the war, he refused an offer of repatriation, instead deciding to start his life in Lancashire, to continue his life living in Lancashire, where he got married and started playing in golf for a local football team who were St. Helens Town. He was so good that in 1949, a much bigger team, Manchester City, back when they were still loved

and respected by all, as opposed to today. yeah basically probably should say pre -2006 seven -ish before they got bought out by a thai billionaire then were sold to their current owners um they were very much like loved as a working class team of the people and there's a long -going joke about everyone in Manchester supporting Manchester City and not Manchester United despite Manchester United's success. Obviously, I don't want to criticise Manchester City wholeheartedly.

A lot of their fans have been there and they've been through some ups and downs. Some major downs. What was the second division? Seeing themselves win a playoff game to get themselves back up. The second division is what is now League One, the third tier of English football. You can, 12 years later, winning the title. I bet the high tasted sweeter for the low that preceded

it. Anyway, Bert Troutman played in his first FA Cup final in 1955 against Newcastle United and came out on the losing side, the wrong side of a 3 -1 deficit. But Manchester City got back there in 1956 and they were playing Birmingham City in that game. So the game started well for Manchester City. They took the lead in the third minute before Birmingham equalised in the 15th

minute. Manchester City restored their lead so with 17 minutes remaining Bert Troutman dived at the feet of a Birmingham striker to win the ball but the striker's knee hit him in the back of the neck with a forceful blow Troutman was immediately knocked unconscious and the referee understandably stopped there immediately the trainer came out to the pitch but Yeah, even in the 1950s. I'm laughing because, like, stopping play is as far as this story goes for, like,

medical attention and care for this guy. Oh, there was no substitutes. There was no substitutes and ordinarily... I get that, but, like, he got sparked and they were just like... Yeah, sorry. If it was an outfield player who got injured, they'd stick him on the wing. You can't do that with a goalkeeper. There were no substitutes permitted at this point. They'd either have to see out the game with 10 men and an outfield

player in goal. In fact, their captain advised, their captain Roy Paul advised Troutman to go off and wanted to put a player called Roy Little in goal instead. But Troutman, being hard as nails, as he obviously was, insisted on carry on playing. So he played out the remaining minutes in great pain, with Manchester City defending a lead at this point as well. Basically, the City defenders should try to hoof it as far as

they can. whenever it was possible, but even so, Troutman was still called upon to make a couple of further saves, the second of which caused him to recoil in agony due to another collision. Why was this so impressive, Jack? Because everyone's probably wondering, why are you banging on about this? Because this guy only got knocked out, and I've heard about people breaking their legs. So, it turned out after the game, Bert Troutman did in fact go to the

doctors, which is good. And after the game, it turned out... that he had broken a bone in his neck. And that had it been a little bit worse, there's nothing the trainer could have done in that situation, shall we say. It was close. It was a close run thing to, well, you know, something bad or something very bad happening, shall we say. But nevertheless, he got through the game. Manchester City won the FA Cup. And when he went

up to career electors, win his medal. The Duke of Edinburgh commented that his neck looked quite crooked. So there you go. If even Phil notices, you know it must be bad. Broken his neck and still played on. Ridiculous. Absolutely. I love that story. Wild. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, cool for a number of reasons. Because A, he won. B, it was a different time. And C, his backstory.

And it's just astonishing, obviously. and also despite that run of injuries and despite this specific injury obviously making very big headlines it still took the FA over 10 years to allow substitutes in the FA Cup it shows how archaic it was it's not hard to so conservative yeah it's not hard to see why the women weren't allowed to play for like another 30 years or something just like traditions man traditions trump everything yeah to use some common sense I mean you can obviously

people will argue and say you can now get For those who don't know, you now get to name, I think you get to name 12 substitutes and you can make five during the game. And, you know, even when it became allowed to have substitutes in the mid to late 60s, it was still only one substitute. You just had one spare player on the bench. It's very different now, but, you know, you can make arguments both ways with that.

Obviously, the quality of the game is improved as a result because players can run harder and faster knowing that they're only going to be on the pitch for 65 minutes. So, yeah, make of that what you will. Yeah, it's pretty remarkable. I mean, with the FA Cup's fellow remarkable stories, that's why it's so damn cool. Yeah, I don't want to get into certain things too much because we're going to do so many FA Cup episodes in the future and we're going to be able to dive in depth.

I should point out to everyone as well, obviously when we redo events, we're not going to go back through the history as well. We'll be straight on to the stories. Yeah, we'll just signpost people back to the history if they want to. Yeah, so I would say the heyday of the FA Cup is the 1970s and the 1980s where some legendary finals, amazing things happened. First finals go to a replay. It was 1970 where Chelsea beat Leeds 2 -1 after extra time after a 2 -2 draw at Wembley,

which my dad was at, I think. I think my dad said he was at that one. But he wasn't at the replay, which is probably for the best because he's a Leeds fan. So is your brother. So is my brother, yeah. I'm the dark sheep. I was born in Liverpool, just to defend myself. 1970 was also the first year with a very short -lived, until 1974, third -place playoff in the FA Cup,

which I did not know until today. 1972 was the Centennial FA Cup final, and just to throw my dad and brother a bone, Leeds won that one, beating Arsenal. 1 -0 with an Alan Clarke diving header, I think I mentioned before. Some of the best FA Cup final winning goals of all time have been headers. If you think about Wimbledon in 1988, Laurie Sanchez's header, obviously Wigan in 2013. Is that 88 or 89? 88, that was. 89, Liverpool won it after Hillsborough. Yeah, in 2013, it

was, what's the ginger lad called? He scored the winner for Wigan. Ben Watson. Ben Watson, yeah. That's the one. Leaping like a salmon. I remember. Yeah. wanting Wigan to win that final so much. I was so ill that day. I had a really bad stomach bug and I basically couldn't stand up without having to run to the toilet to throw up, which I'm sure everyone appreciated that imagery. Until you saw Ben Watson's header, is

that what you were going to say? I literally, I got to the point where I was like, how has this game got to the 80th minute? But I have now just come out of it. I feel great now. And then Ben Watson scored that. It was fantastic. I was like punching the scene, like cheering and celebrating. And then five minutes after full -time, I was back in the toilet again. Yeah, just since we've mentioned that Wigan one, they won that cup the same year that they were relegated.

And then the following year, they actually made the semifinals again and en route to the semifinals where yours truly knocked them out on pens before being hull in the final, for what it's worth. They played City again en route in the quarters and pulled their pants at the Etihad. So they beat them two years in a row. You'll have to see it. Yeah. That's what this trope is all about. City fans must hate us. Yeah, we're just trooping City. Yeah, yeah. Although, who knows? But anyway,

the 1970s. The year later, just to bite back at my dad and brother, was one of the greatest FA Cup final shocks of all time, where Lowly Sunderland of Division 2 played all -conquering leads at this time, one of the best teams in the world, and beat them 1 -0 in one of the...

Greatest final shocks. Ian Porterfield scoring the winner and Jimmy Montgomery, the real hero in Sunderland's goal, keeping out the legendary Peter Lorimer with one of the greatest double saves of all time, which if you haven't seen it, watch it. It's incredible. Yeah. More shocks. Again, I just want to add a little bit of context for you. Leeds were as dominant in the 70s as Liverpool were in the 80s or Man United were in the 90s. Well, maybe not as dominant. But

they won a lot of league titles. I think all Leeds fans would accept that Leeds should have won more than they did. Leeds were better than the titles they ended up winning. And they still won. What I mean is they were the team of that decade. Maybe two UEFA Cups. Yeah, they were the team of the decade. They were the team of the decade. The way Liverpool were the 80s, United were the 90s, and City are now. Maybe not as

successful, but they were the best team. And also a deeply unpleasant team to play as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And if anybody's not... You know you played them. Yeah, if anybody wants a sort of comedic spin on it, just watch the damned United and Brian Classview of Leeds United and his experience where he temporarily took

over there. yes that went down well so yeah it was the first there was actually three division two teams who won the FA Cup in the 70s and won in 1980 two in the 70s won in 1980 because 1976 Southampton beat Manchester United 1 -0 and then 1980 West Ham beat Arsenal one, Bill. They did. You're hell -bent on just talking about the seven

cup finals we lost, not the 14 that we won. Arsenal, of course, being the holders of the competition at the time, having won another one of the greatest FA Cup finals of all time, having been 2 -0 up late in the game. Arsenal were 2 -0 up late in the game, as you can see, two late goals. And just as Manchester United thought they had the game in the bag and were going to score a third and win it, Arsenal went to drop at the other end and Alan Sunderland, of course, scored the

winner. Back post. Big perm as well on Alan Sunderland. The 1981 was a great final too. Spurs winning it with Ricky Vila's wonder goal, which I'm sure you won't want me to talk about that much. Great finals in the 70s and 80s. Liverpool beating Everton a couple of times. The second of which, 1989, won 3 -2 against Everton in that final. That came a few weeks after the singular darkest day in Liverpool Football Club's history and in Definitely the FA Cup's history as well. And

in English football's history. And in maybe, well, I wouldn't want to say all the football's history. There's been quite a lot of dark days around the world. But the Hillsborough disaster, which I'm not going to talk about too much today because I want to do it in depth sometime. The introductory episode to the FA Cup is not the time to do it. But obviously as a Liverpool fan... It would be remiss not to mention it though.

It is... Yeah. 97 Liverpool fans lost their life 95 on the day a 96 a little while later and then a 97 died of injuries caused by the accident not too long ago now so yeah massive tragedy the cover up and the attitude of the newspapers the press the government at the time I'll save it for another day but yeah Strong views on that one. A lot went wrong accidentally and then a

lot went wrong deliberately afterwards. Yes. So a lot went wrong because of incompetence and then a lot went wrong because of malice after the fact. A lot of things were said that shouldn't have been said and a lot of things were done that shouldn't have been done. A lot of time and a lot of money was wasted. A lot of opportunity to, well, to be honest, even to get to the point where it happened, there was just bad political decisions made. But as I said, I'll come to that

in the future. Yeah, that's definitely something that we can drill into. Demonisation of an entire group of people, essentially, was a factor in it. Football fans, generally. Yeah. Anyway, so, yeah, from there, obviously, again, more recent, the last final replay, as you said, Arsenal beat Sheffield Wednesday, the first club to win the FA Cup and the League Cup in the same season. So, the year 2000 saw the singular worst thing.

that I can say a club has done in FA Cup history when Manchester United withdrew from the competition to instead play in the FIFA Club World Championship in Brazil. Fortunately, they got it handed to them when they were there. They didn't even get out of the group. But as a result of that, one of the teams that lost in round two was redrawn back into the competition as a lucky loser. And the lucky loser on that day was Darlington. That's a fun fact. They once tried to sign Tino Esprit.

Yes, they did. And, yeah, a series of unfortunate events that eventually led to them going bust, I believe. Yeah, they went bust, yeah. But, yeah, United, like... You just don't do that. You don't do that, yeah, exactly. You don't do that. And if you do do that, make sure you go and win the bloody competition you've, you know, dropped out of. At least have the decency to go bring home the tin... pot, two -bit rubbish trophy that you decided to... That you decided wasn't

important enough for your efforts. Even to send your youth team to. Yeah, yeah. I think, like, nah. I'm not having that. I'm not having that at all. Neither should you. No excuse whatsoever. No one's done it before or since, which probably tells you the backlash that it generated. Yeah. It should have been banned. As much as I hate Manchester City now, God, my hatred of Manchester United at that time. Runs deeper. My dad never quite got me to be a Leeds fan, although I do

love Leeds United. He never quite got me to a Leeds fan, but my God, did he get me to hate Manchester United. That man did a sterling job at that. Yeah, you can see our biases coming to the fore here. It's very difficult to remain objective when it comes to football. But yeah. regardless of your affiliations, I think withdrawing from the FA Cup is sacrilege, basically, when it comes to English footballing. Tradition, culture, heritage, morality. I don't know what else to

say about it, really. You just don't do it. It's despicable. Despicable behavior. Anyway. And I would say the same about my own club. But thankfully, my club are decent and have never done something so abhorrent. No, they haven't. Neither has mine. And speaking of mine, 2001 till 2006, Wembley was redeveloped and the FA Cup final was played outside of England at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff, which is a lovely stadium, to be fair. The last of those finals was 2006, which

is known as the Gerrard final. after Steven Jarosz scored twice, including a 35 -yard screamer to equalise in the last minute and send me into quite large raptures. What a goal. And then Liverpool ended up winning on penalties there. So 2007 was the first final at the new Wembley, which Chelsea won. And from 2008, in order to pay for the new Wembley, all semi -finals have been played at Wembley, which I hate, and you probably hate

too. Yes. Cool. So previous to that, Semifinals were always played at a neutral venue, but it was always somewhere in between the two grounds. So if it was, I don't know, Aston Villa versus Newcastle, they played at Old Trafford. If it was Arsenal versus Manchester United, they played at Villa Park, something like that. It would be Stamford Bridge, Villa Park, or Old Trafford, generally speaking. Hillsborough. Hillsborough as well, of course. I think the city ground in

Nottingham a few times. I hate that. It's a money thing, isn't it? Yes. Like all these things in modern day sport, the money talks. It's a shame because the showpiece event is supposed to be at Wembley. But now you get to go because there's more tickets to sell, more corporate hospitality to sell. But yeah, it's a shame. It is. And anyway, that's pretty much up to the modern day, obviously. As we said, Manchester City versus Crystal Palace this weekend. And the neutrals like us will probably

be supporting Palace. We will definitely be supporting Palace. Just before, because I suspect we're wrapping up shortly. I think so, yeah. But before we go, do you have a favourite FA Cup final, Jack? Do I have a favourite? A personal favourite. I do, but it's going to make me sound like a nerd. We used to have an old videotape. Of the 1953 FA Cup final. And I used to watch it. Which was the Matthews final. I used to watch it. And

it's wonderful. I can't go past this. Stanley Matthews is my favourite footballer of all time. He's just. If you're going to learn about one footballer. And be completely. Have your opinions of footballers turned on his head. As to how a man can be so humble. So beloved. And so lovely. And play for so long. And be so fit at a time when. This was. Men who had steak and eggs for breakfast and a half -time cigarette. That wasn't him. He was fit as a fiddle. But yeah, 1953 would

probably be my show. I wasn't expecting that. I wasn't expecting that. I thought you were going to pick a Liverpool one, which shows you, or shows anyone who's listened and stuck with us to the end of this episode, just quite how much you actually love this game and this sport above your allegiances. The best Liverpool one is the Gerrard final, which is obviously, I love that goal and it was a great moment for me. Liverpool should have won that game. Liverpool were the

better team in that game. West Ham, I mean, if I was in neutral, I'd be gutted about that because West Ham were the plucky underdogs at the time and Paul Koncheski, you know, scoring for his hometown club to give them the lead and everything like that. But yeah, it's not as romantic. It was 1953 years. It's it. It's everything. I've got, I reckon I could, all three of mine are Arsenal wins, naturally. I think I could probably, I could give you three though, like for different

reasons. I think I know what one of them is going to be. Go ahead. It's only Ray Parler. Of course it is. It's only Ray Parler signing. 2002. Epic

up front. I'll beat Chelsea 2 -0. Freddie Lundberg scored a... wonderful goal wonderful solo goal and then Rave Harler who is a bit of a cult hero at Arsenal and a stalwart in midfield guy from Romford basically they used to have a thing called like fan fan zone yeah and for the final they had yeah for the final they had celebrities special guests or whatever and Tim Lovejoy was as a Chelsea fan was commentating and as Ray Parler picked up the ball, he said, oh, it's only Ray Parler

before Ray Parler curled in a 30 -yard beauty into the top corner. You might be over -exaggerating on the yardage, but that was a beauty. I think it was 50, maybe 60 yards. A real kick, yeah. Yeah, a bicycle kick from the halfway line. No, it was, yeah, that was unreal. But I think that my favourite one is probably the victory over... Hull in 2014 just because we hadn't won for quite a while. Nearly 10 years we hadn't had a trophy. We came from 2 -0 down. Aaron Ramsey with the

winner. And then the most comfortable FA Cup final I've ever enjoyed was when Arsenal beat Villa 4 -0 because that was nice and easy. It was before Villa were good though. It was before Villa were good but I've never watched a game

of such magnitude in such a relaxed state. um although you probably don't recall it like that because i'm sure even in like the 90th minute i was like if we can see it now even though it sounds like you but yeah anyway there we are um the romance of the cup it'll never die uh and those people that say that it's lost its magic don't know what the hell they're talking about yeah and i'm just i think we should end just by talking about the greatest thing about

the fa cup just because i don't think we've given it enough emphasis is giant killings so so anyone who's not heard that phrase before this is when a lower league team knocks out a higher team. Even better when it's a non -league team knocking out a Premier League team like we mentioned. Lincoln City did and Luton Town did within the last 12 years or so. But just to give a shout out to the great ones in the past. Hereford United knocking out Newcastle in the 70s. Ronnie Radford?

That was a 30 -yarder. Flew in to win that game. Sutton United knocked out Coventry City as a non -league team in 1989 on a horrible pitch with a header and then I think Coventry hit the bar and withdrew Sutton's goal lived a charmed life and pitch invasion at the end you love to see it so yeah and then Chesterfield 1997 reaching the semi -finals going all the way playing Middlesbrough in the semi -finals getting the last minute equaliser to force a replay in the semi -final but unfortunately

lost in that replay. Good times. Cool. So where can people watch it? If you're in England, the BBC. Always the BBC. And ITV. It's on both three to air now. Who cares? It's always the BBC. It's always the BBC. If you're in America, I think you will find it on ESPN. I think in some jurisdictions it's on Satanta, which I didn't even know still existed. Oh, really? Yeah. Neither did I. That's right. New Zealand, you will find it on Sky.

Australia apparently is Optus. Cool. Just trying to see if I can find Ireland for anybody that's interested in Ireland. Do they know about BBC Signal? I'm not sure. I can't find Ireland, which is annoying. But I'm sure the people in Ireland who like football, who may or may not listen to this, will be able to find the FA Cup final if they want to watch it. I'm pretty sure, yes. Anyway. But yeah, so there we are. And so that only leaves us to preview where we're going next

week. Yes, which I'm superbly excited about because I recorded the intro to this about six weeks

ago. I'm so excited about it. So next week. it's the well primarily the crown in the jewel of the formula one calendar to finally give us a chance to talk about formula one it's the monaco grand prix uh but also because uh i love overstretching us and doing more sports than we can possibly handle in one episode we will also be uh passing you know passing a bit of comment on the other events in the triple crown of motorsport which are the indy 500 and the 24 hours of le mans

talking about the drivers who've attempted all three, the one who succeeded, and the ones who have got oh so close, as well as focusing mainly on Monaco, which, say what you want about the race, it's still a hell of an event. Yeah, and to end on a deliberate and sickly pun, you'll be driving that episode, I think. Wee. I can't wait. I'm very excited. So yeah, if you're interested

in that, join us then. but until next week goodbye Jack goodbye Ben see you later see you later Yet again, thank you for listening to the Sporting Almanac podcast. Your support really means the world to us. If you enjoyed it, give us a like, a subscriber, a rating, wherever you get your podcasts from. But most importantly, as ever, please tell your friends. There's no better advertising than word of mouth. It costs nothing and it really does make a difference. Our theme tune is Oh

Yeah by Hermione Productions. You can find us on Bluesky at the Sporting Almanac or drop us an email at sportingalmanacpodcast .gmail .com. We'll see you next week on the streets of Monte Carlo. But until then, stay curious. Sport is nothing without the stories that make it. Goodbye.