25 Years ago....

Heard on TalkSport that it was 25 years ago today that we got humiliated by Oxford in the Milk Cup Final - the memory of that day still causes me pain and embarrassment as I was bragging to all my pals that we would at last have some silverware to show off at Loftus Road, especially after dumping Liverpool out in the semi - oh how the mighty fall!

Anyone else with memories of that painful day?

 

If my memory serves me correctly, we tonked Leicester 4-1 in the quarter final at Filbert street before putting Liverpool out in the two leg semi.
Then came the final, I don't think our players got off the coach, we were awful!
That was the one & only match I ever took my wife to see, enough said!

 

I have to confess lads, before I learned that Mrs Hoops Eternal was there, I'd always believed that losing to Oxford that day was all my fault. Given the results we'd had getting there, I dropped my all my natural caution and was celebrating weeks before the final!

I should have known better. Whenever I get too optimistic it always goes the other way! No rhyme nor reason, just does.

The outcome was so devastating, I've never spoken about it since (seriously)! Spoken plenty about the 18 points instant relegation from our first venture into the top flight - but never that day. Can now though because I've just found someone else to blame. Mrs HE, you've lifted a great weight off me shoulders!

 

I'm glad that I can be of some use!

Needless to say, we are now separated!

But you have to admit we were crap that day!

 

When we played liverpool away in the second leg of the semi, I was 7. My dad and I travelled up by car and whilst I was growing to love football, I still had some learning to do. Some mate of my dads had given me a Liverpool tracksuit some time earlier and I failed to see the strangeness in me, a QPR fan, wearing a Liverpool tracksuit to this game on this day. Come to think of it, why did my dad let it happen? Added to which we sat in the stand to the left of the kop and when Liverpool twice scored own goals, I was up on my feet shouting and celebrating. No aggro from anyone, just looks of confusion and bewilderment. Understandable.

 

I remember my Dad 'paying' a kid of about 10 to look after our car which was parked about half a mile from Anfield, only to find that someone got in and stole sunglasses and tapes - but not the car!! ... Didn't Gary Gillespie score one of the own goals? Boy wasn't he ugly.

On Cup Final Day, I went with a crowd of about 15 friends and family. All expecting Rangers to give Oxford a good hiding. How very wrong we were, talk about thinking we'd won it before the game started. I was so gutted that it is been virtually erased from my memory.

 

You're stirring up unwanted memories. At least we beat Chelsea on route to the final.

My overriding memory is that smug git in the ITV studios (Jim Rosenthal?) sitting there at the end of the match with his Oxford Utd hat on. Clearly impartial. Where are they now?

 

So, it's ALL ex-Mrs Hoops Eternal's fault?

Thank god for that!

25 years of thinking it was me has just been erased by one sentence!

I'd been at the Liverpool semi-final, and was stood with a Liverpool fan in the Paddock, just behind the dugout.....I remember, clearly, Terry Fenwick scoring a corker, and holding on to a 1-0 win. My mate thought the 2nd leg was a foregone conclusion, and that they'd roll us over.

The bitter irony, of course, is that we DID get rolled over....just not until the Final.

Having not been able to get a ticket to the final....and being away in the RAF, meant I only saw it on the telly.

Mentally scarred, to this day!

 

We beat Notts Forest after a replayed floodlight failure
We beat Chelsea at their place after a replay
We beat Liverpool over 2 legs
But we couldn't live with Oxford
I went to all these games
Does anyone remember Michael Robinsons goal at Chelsea

 

Yep, I remember Robinson's goal, correct me if I'm wrong, but weren't it a lob from the half way line? or am i thinking of another game against Chelsea?
anyway the pain of the Milk Cup Final stuffing by Oxford is now a distant memory, thank God!!

 

Thats the one superhoopseddie. At the halfway line. What a goal that was

 

It's comforting to know that now the blame has been fairly & squarely placed on the shoulders of my wife. Some troubled R's fans have had that 25 year nightmare lifted!

You should all now be able sleep through the night without waking in a cold sweat thinking you were to blame. Consider the demons well & truly banished!

And of course you can cancel those costly counselling sessions!

 

Was it Fillery who was lying on the ground in an offside position at the time?

 

Seem to remember someone on the ground but can't remember who

 

You can see it on YouTube. Then look at the recently posted comments from chelscum fan berating our attendance. What a knob. There were games at Chelsea in the 80s, long before they were rich and famous when they would get 8000 for a home game. Where were they when they were ****?

 

What a day!!

Funnily enough we've got a celebration type thing going on this Satuday at our home match against Chesterfield. I reckon you boys will have something to celebrate Saturday too. I wish they'd remake that old Wang Commputers shirt

 

I was there at Wembley both in '86 and in '67. The experience could not have been more different of course. The latter saw a 10 year old boy watching his 3rd division team come back from 2-0 down against a top side to win their first ever major trophy - Roy of the Rovers or what. The former saw a 30 year old man finally learning that football is not always as the comic books want us to believe - humiliated by a bunch of untalented yokels playing for a corrupt newspaper owner. Contrast and compare.

 

the team were in great form up the final including that superb win at chelsea, day started off great down the pub just past wembley, out numbering oxford fans by the thousands & what a turn up odds on favorites & play like we did dreadful such a let down & never forget it.

 

A great run , away at Chelsea and Liverpool memorable nights,
can't remember the final for some reason! indeed Jeff

 

Amazingly I seem to remember this a lot differently than most of you. We were always the underdogs but we had some terrific players back in the good old days and I seem to remember we were by far the better team on the day, especially in the 2nd half. Not bad for a 'bunch of untalented yokels playing for a corrupt newspaper owner'