What Really Happened – Saturday 18 October 1969
Let Police Say : No Play Today – Peter Dealey (Observer 19 Oct 1969 p.5)
Unless football clubs can control hooliganism, grounds may have to be closed and games cancelled, according to the Police Federation, the voice of Britain’s 90,000 policemen.
“There remain too many grounds where the number of police on duty is insufficient to deal with outbreaks of violence. It must be significant that Liverpool and Everton, whose own supporters are notorious for bad behavior on other clubs’ grounds, generally manage to get through a home match without undue trouble. Here there is always a large force on duty.”
Football Round Up – Ronald Atkin (Observer 19 Oct 1969 p. 28)
Life in the First Division is becoming increasingly clear cut. Everton scored six more goals (they’ve now hit 38 in 16 games) and already the faint strains of “we are the champions” can be heard from Goodison’s gleeful terraces. Everton are now six points ahead of Liverpool and beginning to look an even better championship bet than Leeds at the same stage last season. Stoke were Everton’s latest victims.
There was happier news, too, of those famous invalids, Tottenham Hotspurs and Jimmy Greaves. Two goals after half time by Greaves, Tottenham’s first at home since the end of August, were just enough to defeat Newcastle.
And across London Chelsea were back to healthier form. Goals from Peter Osgood and Charlie Cooke against West Bromwich helped to make it a happy occasion for Peter Bonetti, captain for the day on his 362nd League appearance in goal, a club record.
Crystal Palace 1 Leeds 1 – Tony Pawson (Observer 19 Oct 1969 p. 28)
Crystal Palace are one side to be exempt from Don Revie’s remark about the softness of southern teams. Certainly they had the strength and determination to hold the League Champions in a game of punching tackles that was played at a pace that induced countless errors.
[Crystal Palace]…met Leeds head on, taking delight in physical challenges and happy to confine skill to an after thought.
But it was the wingers who so nearly won the game for Leeds. Gray was too quick and too subtle for Hoadley, while Lorimer, less insistent, was the more deadly with his sudden thrusts and his power of shot.
Manchester United 1 Nottingham Forest 1 – Hugh McIlvanney
A reasonably eventful, but essentially moderate football match became exceptional one minute after half time when Best scored the kind of goal that only four or five players in the world would be entitled to attempt. It saved a faltering, anxious Manchester United from defeat by a competent Nottingham team, but much more important ultimately is the memory it left with us, one of those shimmering moments whose specific images are preserved, embalmed in nostalgia, long after their practical meaning in a match is forgotten.
For Wilf McGuiness, of course, there must be the disturbing thought that Best is being asked to perform too many miracles. Without his destructive brilliance and the regular goals it has brought, United surely would never have accumulated the encouraging results of the last few weeks.
Flickin Hell 