I’ve had 37 years in the game but nobody forgets this blooper
GREAT SURVIVOR DIBBLE PLOTTING DOWNFALL OF FORMER CLUB CITY
ANDY DIBBLE is common ground between the wildly different worlds of Cardiff City and Manchester City. He also knows why the club he works for now has a chance tomorrow against the one he played for way back when.
It was in 1994 that Dibble and Manchester City of the Premier League rocked up at Ninian Park for an FA Cup fourth-round tie against a struggling side in the third tier.
‘Well that wasn’t a nice one, was it?’ Dibble said yesterday. ‘I came on in goal after something like 70 minutes for Tony Coton at 1-0 down. We missed a penalty, all sorts, and out we went. You’re just thinking, “That wasn’t meant to happen”. But you know what, it shows you what can happen. It’s the FA Cup.’
These days, Dibble is Cardiff’s goalkeeping coach. More than that he is one of football’s great survivors, having spent only two weeks out of work in 37 years.
It is a career that started as a Cardiff apprentice in 1981, took in a League Cup win at Luton and included nine years at Manchester City from 1988 to 1997.
He has saved a penalty in a Wembley final, won ‘something like nine or 10 promotions’ as a player and coach with 21 different clubs, and saw Gazza drive a car into a lake. But he knows he will also be remembered by many for March 1990 and a goal with almost one million YouTube views.
The footage shows the Manchester City goalkeeper waiting to launch upfield when Nottingham Forest’s Gary Crosby appears from behind him and nods the ball out of his hand before passing it into the net.
‘We had a holiday home in Spain and it would always be on the blooper video on the plane on the way over,’ he said. ‘It still crops up somewhere or other.
‘The horrendous thing is the next season it became ungentlemanly conduct and you would be sent off for it.
‘But I do see the funny side. I have come across Gary on the touchline (Crosby has coached with Burton, Derby and Sheffield United) and we have a laugh and a joke about it.
‘It made me look a mug and probably cost me my place in the Manchester City team, actually. The next season Howard Kendall bought my mate Tony Coton.’ It is a somewhat different Manchester City these days. On Dibble’s arrival they were in the second tier and in his last season they were back there, separated by top-flight seasons spent largely in the lower half of the table, barring a couple of fifth-places under Peter Reid. ‘I cost about £250,000 from Luton,’ he said. ‘I had a brilliant time at City. Under Reid, he would let us all have a couple of glasses of wine before a game to relax. He knew how to manage people.
‘It’s funny, though, when you think of the differences from then to now. The training ground used to be at Platt Lane and was very open. I remember if I had a bad game some guy would just walk up behind the goal in training and be like, “Oi you, pull your finger out.” Now City can buy whatever player they want and you won’t even see a corner of the training pitches without an appointment.
‘What they have built there is great — one of the best teams in the world. I love watching them.
‘Look at Ederson. £47million was he? The only keeper I’ve seen as good with his feet is Fabien Barthez. You see him standing so far out of his box — he has taken that kind of keeping to a different level. You see the tattoos and you’d think he might be aggressive, but on the pitch he is just so calm.’
The subject of tattoos takes Dibble into his wider career. He played seven games for Rangers as they won their ninth straight SPL title in 1997 and lost a bet with his team-mates on their subsequent tour to Toronto.
‘I end up having to get this “nine in a row” tattoo because of a bet,’ he said. ‘I don’t even like tattoos.’
It was at Rangers that he met Paul Gascoigne. ‘I remember one day he turned up with Chris Evans, the radio DJ. They were driving up to the team hotel and had pulled up in a layby and bought some car off a guy for £500.
‘They proceeded to drive past the rest of us and straight into a lake. Well, not much you can say about that! Great player.’
His team will face a few more of those tomorrow.
‘Sometimes the big club loses,’ said Dibble. ‘Bring them on.’