Perfect pitch for a bumper snowfight
ALtHOUGH I had been a polio victim as a baby and could only walk with callipers, my dad had been a good footballer and I was footballmad after watching him play. He was an everton fan, but he also took me to anfield and I became hooked on Liverpool. One of my favourite memories was in 1965 — the evening we were going to play Cologne in the european Cup quarterfinal at home. It was the second leg following a 00 draw in Cologne, and a big crowd was expected. the ground was full an hour before kickoff, but it began to snow, which became a blizzard. at 8pm, the the game was abandoned and an instruction was issued that a voucher would be provided at the exits to allow entrance to the rearranged game. But they had to print the vouchers so they kept the exits locked, because you had to go out of the turnstiles to get a voucher. so 40,000plus fans were stuck in the ground for three hours waiting — what would they do? It had stopped snowing, so someone produced a ball and approximately 200300 a side played up and down the pitch. then those that couldn’t get a kick started throwing snowballs, and it became the biggest snowball battle I’d ever seen. It was great fun! eventually, everyone reluctantly left and the match was played a week late. I got in, having been given a ticket by a German fan who told me in amazing english that he would not be able to come back for another game. I had an excellent seat. Unfortunately it finished 00 again — no penalty shootouts then. after a third game (can’t remember where) finished in yet another draw, the tie was decided by the toss of a coin, which famously landed upright on rough turf, but came down tails the second time, giving Liverpool the chance to move forward to the semifinal against Inter Milan. after one of the greatest nights at anfield at which they beat the Italian giants 31, they sadly lost 30 in the second leg, following a couple of dubious refereeing decisions. It was rumoured the referee never refereed again, or indeed never needed to.
malcolm Catesby, garndolbenmaen, gwynedd.