Football’s greatest comebacks
Perhaps the greatest- ever comeback in a competitive football match occurred on December 21, 1957 when Charlton Athletic beat Huddersfield Town 7- 6 in a Second Division League game at the Valley before 12,535 spectators.
Charlton played most of the match with 10 men after losing Derek Ufton as early as the 15th minute. Indeed, Huddersfield capitalised on having an extra man and opened up a seemingly invincible 5- 1 lead with just 27 minutes remaining.
However, at this point Charlton’s star forward Johnny Summers began an extraordinary passage of play in which he scored four goals in just over a quarter- of- an- hour, having already netted his side’s opener early in the second half.
He also assisted with his side’s two other goals as his team staged a remarkable comeback to win 7– 6, John Ryan grabbing the winner with barely seconds remaining. A local reporter at the time described this 13- goal thriller as ‘ amazing, incredible, fantastic’.
As far as I can ascertain, Huddersfield are the only team to score six goals in major European League or Cup game in first- class football and finish up losing!
There have been four 6- 6 draws – Leicester vs Arsenal, 1930 ( Division 1), Charlton vs Middlesbrough, 1960 ( Division 2), Genk vs Westerlo 1999 ( Belgium) and Motherwell vs Hibernian ( SPL) 2010. And for the record over 80 more matches have ended with 5- 5 score- lines, including Sir Alex Ferguson’s 1,500th and last- ever game as manager of Manchester United, away at WBA in April 2018.
Other fightbacks:
In the 2005 Champions League final, Liverpool trailed AC Milan 3- 0 at half- time, but fought back magnificently, took the game into extra- time and then won the resulting penalty shoot- out 3- 2.
■ Blackpool, inspired by Stanley Matthews, came from 3- 1 down to beat Bolton Wanderers 4- 3 in the 1953 FA Cup final.
■ In their 4th round Capital League Cup- tie away at Reading in October 2012, Arsenal found themselves 4- 0 down after 37 minutes but thanks to a hat- trick by Theo Walcott the Gunners recovered brilliantly to win the match 7- 5 after extra- time.
■ In December 1993, in a Champion League game in Germany, Werder Bremen trailed Belgium side Anderlecht three- nil after 33 minutes.
They home side scored five second- half goals in 23 minutes to earn a superb 5- 3 victory.