Forest and Me!

My first Forest game was 24/2/68, a 1-0 home win over Burnley. I cannot remember much about it, given I had only turned 7 on 25th Jan.

My earliest memory is the noise that used to be generated from the Trent End; you could always hear it from where we parked the car, even if it was a mile away. That was impressionable to a young lad.

The first really great game I remember was the 4-1 hammering of Man City in the 4th round of the FACup in 1974, which in legend became known as the 'Duncan Mckenzie show' although the whole team were fantastic on the day. Played on a Sunday, with an early kick off due to the floodlight ban & the ongoing power workers & miners strike, for me that afternoon we lit up the world.

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I've seen some fantastic highs and some awful lows, the greatest length I've gone to to watch the Reds, probably has to be a 35 hour coach journey to Madrid & then some 37/38 hours back on a Wright's 50 seater! But it was worth every minute to see us RETAIN the European Cup. Not even Man Utd have done that.

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My favourite game ever, I think was Tottenham (a) 1/3/92, League Cup Semi-Final, 2nd leg, for reasons I have highlighted on a separate section on this site.

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There are many other games that ran it close, far too many to list them all but if I had to state my best 5 of all time (in no particular order, outside of my favourite), they would be as follows, although I suppose these can vary slightly from time to time:

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1) Tottenham (a) League Cup Semi-Final 2nd leg

(won 2-1 AET to reach Wembley) - 1/3/92

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2) Man City (h) - FACup 4th Round - 27/1/74 - Won 4-1

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3) Liverpool (h) - European Cup 1st Round 1st leg - 13/9/78 - Won 2-0 ... drew 0-0 in the 2nd leg to knock them out ... also a wonderful night

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4) Liverpool (at Old Trafford) - League Cup Final Replay - 22/3/78 - Won 1-0 ... this was the first major trophy I had ever seen us win. 4 days earlier, 18/3/78 I had made my first trip to Wembley where the game had ended 0-0 but a fantastic day out none the less.

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5) Hamburg (at the Bernabeu) - European Cup Final - Won 1-0 ... I regard this as our greatest ever achievement, even above winning it the first time in Munich or indeed our one and only top flight title in1978 ...  

It is a measure of how many fantastic memories I have given some of the games not listed above! ... Including the Incredible 1st Leg of the 1979 European Cup Semi-Final - Forest 3-3 Cologne ... We all know what happened in the 2nd leg of course to take us through to that unforgettable night in Munich, where we won the European Cup for the 1st time defeating Malmo 1-0 ... Not a great final perhaps, but a wonderful night with over 25,000 Forest fans in the stadium ... a record for a British Club at that time.  

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In detailing these, there are so many I have left out that could have been included - I am well aware of that! ... In all honesty, It's an almost impossible task.

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Worst or Most upsetting 5 ever, although again there can be a bit of variation ...

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1) Newcastle  - FACup Quarter-Final - the original game and both replays ... March 1974

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2) Tottenham - FACup Final - 18/5/91 - growing up in the era I did, I always wanted to see us win the FACup & we all know what happened. Lost 2-1 AET

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3)  Anderlecht (a) - UEFA Cup Semi Final 2nd leg - 25/4/84 - having won the home leg 2-0, we lost the away leg 3-0, something was not right on the night & everyone knew it - In 1997, it finally came to light that they had bribed the referee, who awarded a penalty to them when their player took a dive with no Forest player anywhere near him.

He then disallowed a Forest goal (Paul Hart) in injury time for no reason, which would still have taken us through on the away goal rule.

I will always hate Anderlecht, but we may never play them again. If we did a return to Belgium for revenge would be a very interesting trip!

4) Sheff Utd - Play Off semi-final 2nd leg - lost 4-3 away & 5-4 on aggregate.

5) Yeovil - Play off semi-final 2nd leg - having won the 1st leg away 2-0, how on earth did we manage to lose 5-2 at home on that fateful night 18/5/07 & 5-4 on aggregate?

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Obviously, Hillsborough 15/4/89 is something way more significant than any football match and a day I will never forget. We were just the Forest fans at the other end & there was litle we could do to help. I hope and pray the families get their justice, which they so deserve.

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Cloughie's last home league game,Sheff Utd & then Ipswich (a) were also very emotional days but for very different reasons.

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