Ceefax striker stuns Leicester in FA Cup

Roy Essandoh’s quarter-final winner is the stuff of legend, but how much of it is true?

There’s a reason nobody has heard of Stewart Castledine. With 15 minutes remaining of their FA Cup quarter-final against Premier League side Leicester City and the scores level at 1-1, Wycombe Wanderers manager Lawrie Sanchez threw on two substitutes. One was the former Wimbledon midfielder, the other an unknown striker by the name of Roy Essandoh. The rest? Well, you know the rest. Or do you?

Legend has it that the 25-year-old, who was born in Belfast, raised in Ghana and ‘made’ in Scotland – so far, so far-fetched, but also true – responded to an 11th-hour call on Ceefax from Sanchez, whose team were down to the bare bones.

It was a story that both men were happy to play along with for years, even though it later emerged that the Chairboys had put an advert on their website that was subsequently spotted by a BBC journalist, who published the story on their Teletext service, which alerted Essandoh’s agent.

But in 2012 our hero told a version of the story that was different still: “I’d been playing in Scandinavia before linking up with Rushden & Diamonds when my agent told Lawrie Sanchez that I could do a job for Wycombe. So I went to training and it was decided I would join the club until the end of the season.”

This dispels another myth: that the first time Essandoh met some of his team-mates was during the pile-on that followed his injury-time winner. In fact, he’d already made a couple of league appearances for the Chairboys, against Port Vale and Reading.

Sanchez, meanwhile, wasn’t even there to see his signing re-write history. Three minutes after making his double change, the raging Wycombe boss was sent down the tunnel after his team were denied a penalty for handball.

“The next thing I know, the ball’s right in front of me,” said Essandoh after the game. “I thought: ‘I don’t believe this – it’s awesome.’”

It would be the only goal ‘Ceefax Cyberman’ scored for Wycombe and he left the club at the end of the season, continuing his otherwise unremarkable footballing journey.

As for Stewart Castledine, his career petered out when he left Wycombe a year later, but he is married to Homes Under The Hammer presenter Lucy Alexander. Swings and roundabouts.

Also in this month

1946 Stockport and Doncaster contest the longest ever professional football match, at three hours and 23 minutes. 1996 Aston Villa win the League Cup final – their most recent trophy – with a 3-0 victory over Leeds. 1998 Arsenal attempt to make Wembley their permanent new home.