FIFTY YEARS AGO: SPURS & CHELSEA MEET IN LEAGUE CUP SEMIS AND IT WAS A CLASSIC
TOTTENHAM legend Steve Perryman and former Chelsea star Alan Hudson know all about thrilling League Cup semi-finals between the two sides.
Sitting down to discuss the 1971-72 meeting (above) in the final four, Perryman recalls Hudson’s “special goal” that sank Spurs in the final minute of the second leg at White Hart Lane, the Blues winning 5-4 on aggregate.
And Hudson reveals how teammate Peter Osgood landed himself in hot water with the law while celebrating getting to Wembley, where Chelsea went on to lose against Stoke.
Steve Perryman (below, left): What a good test this is going to be for Spurs, for both teams in fact because Chelsea have had all this Romelu Lukaku nonsense and they’ve also had a bit of a wobble lately. The two sides play each other three times in the space of 18 days and it’ll be an undoubted test.
Alan Hudson (below, right): The big problem for me these days is all this passing around at the back. The back fours have the ball more than the midfield players and front players and, as an opposition defender, you’ve got to love that.
SP: I agree but I’ve got faith that my club can do it over the two games in the Carabao Cup. I saw the Spurs players under the two previous managers before Antonio Conte and it looked like they didn’t want to run for them. But it looks like the players are running for Conte. You’re selling your profession short, your supporters short and above all else, you’re selling the club short. The supporters are now in love with Conte – but if Daniel Levy doesn’t deliver what he wants, I think Conte is the type who could walk out.
AH: I was a little concerned when Conte said
Eric Dier could be the best centre-half in the world. Frank
Lampard said
Jose Mourinho told him in the showers one day, ‘You can be the best midfield player in the world’. Had Jose said that in the media, it would have been a no-no, it might have put him off his game, embarrassed him even.
SP: Sir Alf Ramsey said about Martin Peters that he was 10 years ahead of his time. That was a heavy weight to bear on his shoulders.
AH: I know the first leg is at Stamford Bridge but the old White Hart Lane was always my favourite ground. I don’t care if they could get 150,000 people into the new stadium, it would still not hold a candle to White Hart Lane.
SP: Yes, I called it a working-class palace. It wasn’t glitzy, it wasn’t shiny, it wasn’t luxurious but you were always thinking about what had gone on in that stadium in the past – that was the most important thing. When our Spurs team played Chelsea in the 1971-72 League Cup semi-finals, it took a special goal from you in the second leg at the Lane to take you to Wembley.
AH: I wouldn’t call it special! It was a free-kick out by the corner flag, it went through a sea of legs and through Cyril Knowles’ legs on the line. You could say I nutmegged Cyril from 35 yards.
SP: I don’t remember it being rubbed in that we lost but it would be today, that’s for sure.
AH: After the game, at about two o’clock in the morning, Peter Osgood and one of my mates were taken away in a police van for causing trouble in the King’s Road. We were singing ‘We’re going to Wembley’. They ended up fighting with police, we went to court the next day and they were let off with a slapped wrist.
SP: I hope football is the winner after these games, Alan. Sometimes there is a nastiness between the supporters now and there shouldn’t be. Don’t worry about other clubs, just worry about
your own club.
■ CHECK out the full conversation on the Steve Perryman Podcast and the Alan Hudson Podcast