OTD: SAFC 2-0 LUTON
- BY SOBS
- 2 days ago
- 4 min read
On this day in 1973, we played Luton Town in the quarter final of the FA Cup. Sorry to mention the words “quarter final” so soon after the nonsense at Port Vale but to get rainbows you need a bit of rain. We’d already knocked out Notts County (after a replay), Reading (after a replay), and the Manchester City of the day, Man City (also after a replay) to be drawn at home to Luton Town; an all second division tie. We’d lost 2-0 at home the previous October and, as fate would have it, had to play the reverse fixture at Kenilworth Road on 10th March.
Tickets for the cup game were in such high demand that the club announced the collection of vouchers at the home game against Oxford United would guarantee satisfaction. Good move from a financial point of view, as 39,222, 13,000 more than the recent Boro game, turned up and there was mayhem at the turnstiles. Dave Watson scored the only goal, Ray Ellison, another ex-Newcastle United reserve, made his debut and we went home happy with our vouchers clutched to our chests. Our next game was at Luton and, presumably in an attempt to confuse our opponents for the cup, Bob Stokoe included Ellison again, along with John Lathan, Jacky Ashurst, Brian Chambers and Jimmy Hamilton. We lost 1-0 to put us in 16th place but, as far as the league was concerned, we were in the quarter final of the FA Cup and we could live with mid-table mediocrity. Promotion was almost certainly beyond our reach but the big one was at home a week later, even if they had done the league double over us. Oh and they’d beaten Newcastle on their cup journey.
In front of 53,151, Jim Montgomery was presented with a gold watch by chairman Keith Collins, as it was his 453rd game for us, overtaking Len Ashurst as our record appearance maker. On the field, Stokoe reverted to the big guns, and we lined up:
Jim Montgomery
Dick Malone, Richie Pitt, Dave Watson, Ron Guthrie
Bobby Kerr ©, Ian Porterfield, Micky Horswill
Billy Hughes, Vic Halom, Dennis Tueart
...and Dave Young on the bench, the single, lonely substitute.
Luton frustrated us for long periods of the first half as we attacked the Fulwell End, in what had become our established style under Stokoe. Several of our team (Kerr, Hughes, Tueart, Pitt and Horswill) had played together for our junior teams and therefore knew each other’s game inside out. We played a flat back four, which was virtually compulsory in 1973 but, with Big Dick Malone carrying on the style of his predecessor Cec Irwin, quite probably the English game’s first overlapping fullback, by frequently swapping passes with Bobby Kerr and bombing down the right. In the middle, Micky Horswill snapped at his opponents then game the ball to Porterfield who sprayed it forward or wide to Hughes and Tueart. Our formation was flexible, switching from lone centre forward Vic Halom to two up front when Billy Hughes joined him. At other times Billy would be wide right with Dennis Tueart on the left and that fluidity did much to turn the game after the goalless first half.
Something else that helped was Ron Guthrie’s desire to score. He only ever got two for us and both came when he became a goal-hungry fox in the box, as well as a solid left back. Ten minutes into the second half, we sent up Dave Watson for a corner. At that time, the penalty area bore no resemblance to the American Football stuff you see today, there was a fullback inside each post and one big defender added to the attack. Simple stuff. Anyhow, Bobby Kerr sent in a corner from our left and Dave Watson was there just beyond the back post to thump in a trademark header. He didn’t head the ball, he volleyed it with his head did Dave.
That might have relieved the pressure a bit but a one goal lead is never that safe, even if we did look the better side. John Aston and Jim Ryan were a constant threat on the Luton wings and our fullbacks had their work cut out to keep them at bay. They did that so well that Ryan was replaced with twenty to go by the aggressive centre forward Derek Hales, who joined future Sunderland coach, under Denis Smith, Viv Busby up front. That shifted the focus of their attacks to the centre but Watson and Pitt did their jobs well. There were eight minutes left when we won another corner on the left and this time Richie Pitt jogged forward instead of Watson. Same corner from Kerr, header from the same place but this time by Pitt and, as the ball dropped on the edge of the six yard box and virtually in the middle, there was Guthrie to swivel and hook it over his right shoulder and in. Game over, us in the semi final of the FA Cup for the first time in my lifetime? What was all that about? Sunday teatime’s draw told us it was Arsenal, the Arsenal of the day, or Chelsea (because they’d drawn 2-2 and needed a replay), at Hillsborough, and the league went firmly to the back of our minds. It was no longer just a cup run, the twin towers of Wembley and the FA Cup final, were but a single game away.
