35 years of hurt...your top five low points

[cinnamon blue]

The last 6 weeks have been the best six weeks in my 35 years of watching the club. When Tevez lifted the cup at Wembley my football life flashed before me a bit, a bit like a drowning man. There was the glory, albeit limited, the famous victories and the resurgance of a club which seemed dead. But there was also those stomach churning lows. Those awful moments were suddenly all part of a tapestry, a road which lead to that day at Wembley and hopefully continues to the Champions League final. I believe that you need to experience those lows to appreciate the highs as a football fan, and that's why the ecstasy on the faces on all those blues in WEmbley, the tears, the dancing, was so much more intense than fans of most successful clubs will ever know.

So I thought I'd reflect on those lows, and give my top five. I actually mean moments, rather than matches, when I felt sick to the stomach, close to tears and even ready to jack it all in.

1) Gillingham go 2-0 up at WEmbley. I can remember it like it was yesterday. The most tense football match I have ever been to bar none. Big Fat Bobby Taylor put them 2-0 up with a few minutes to go. United had won the treble. We had failed to get out of the third division. I sank down in my seat and put my head in my hands. I questioned my love for Manchester City. I thought "I can't put myself through this any more". I said to my dad "It's never ever going to happen for us, ever, is it dad?". He just looked at me with a tear in his eye.

2) Driving back up the M6 after the 5-2 victory at Stoke. There was no actual moment in this game where the reality of our relegation hit home. It kind of slowly seeped over the crowd like mustard gas. And being undercover in the Stoke end sharpened the senses. But as we drove back up the M6, a car full in total silence, the reality of what had happened kicked in and I just felt sick to the core. How had we sunk so low?

3) Full time whistle at the Luton 83 relegation. The wierd thing about this one is that relegation was a total shock. We'd not been in the bottom three all year. We needed a point to be safe. But it was all irrelevant to me, a 13 year old. City didn't play in division 2. This was just a clamactic end to a poor season. Bang, Antic scored out the blue and the crowd was in total shock. We sang "We'll support you ever more" but there was a sense of total disbelief about this one.

4) United come back from the dead. I think this was about 1994, we were 2-0 up and cruising at home to United. At the time we had as good a team as them and it felt like City were finally back. suddenly we sat on the edge of our own box and they started to murder us. When they got it back to 2-2 with a fe wminutes on the clock it was bad, but when they scored that late winner it was worse than a hard kick in the balls. In fact it was a few minutes after that goal was the low. I seem to remember we'd been singing "2-0 up and you fucked it up" at them all game after a defeat to Galatasary and they were singing it right back at us. Ouch.

5) Driving home after losing 1-0 to Bury. This would have been around 97 or 98 I think, when we were blatently not going back to the premier league, we were actually going backwards. The club was in a mess behind the scenes. We lost to Bury and Maine Road was absolutely furious. The stadium shook with ferocious booing at full time. After the game, David Makin rang GMR to basically say that the club was in tatters and it was all down to Franny Lee. For one of our shareholders to do this was just mindblowing and it seemed at this point that City were doomed forever.

So there you go, there's my low points. The only difficulty was selecting the 5 worst - I could have done another 15 easily! I never dreamed during any of these moments we'd be where we are today - ever. But we are. Enjoy it, Blues, because we fucking deserve it.

Cracking post didsbury dave !!

 

[discopop]

1. The realization that I was never going to see King Colin at his best (too young for his glory years)

2. Walking back through Manchester after the Luton game and bumping into one of my rag mates he asked why I was so pissed off, when I told him we were gone he just pissed his sides that was the moment the hatred of the rags and all things Luton really started for me.

3. 81 replay wagged school we got beat and I got the cane, just fucking brilliant.

4. Trevor Francis doing his Achilles (I think it was that) he was the light in a gloomy team at the time and then boom he was gone for a lot of the season.

5. Owens winner and the wreckage that followed it.

Of course there are a quite a few others but for some reason they are the ones stamped in my mind.

 

[Skashion]

you're not from Rossendale are you?

coz that sounds a lot like my childhood!!!

Accy.

 

[Deleted member 14625]

1. That time where we were flirting with relegation under Pearce when we didn't score at home for 6months. Boring, depressing, hardly ever winning, hardly ever scoring, I missed Maine Road, hated the CoMS, didn't like anyone who was playing for us apart from Dunne.. utter shite! There was no other time I have enjoyed less being a City fan. I enjoyed all our lower division seasons far more than that time. I liked and loved many players who played for us when we were in lower divisions and enjoyed away days where we were taking huge followings, but that time had pretty much nothing I liked! I remember thinking that I hoped we got relegated so we'd have more games to win, more goals to score and differet players playing for us. I was actually disappointed not to go down at the end of that season!

2. That day at Stoke when we won 5-2 and went down to the third division. I thought we'd never come back and that was the end of our club.

3. A couple of games in the third division. I think they were Lincoln away and York away. Awful to see the reaction of the City fans, you could see tears in the eyes of some and pur anger on the faces of others. As it turned out I actually enjoyed that season as a whole. It brought me to a new level of realising what football was all about. It's not about playing at Old Trafford and in the Champions Lg, it's not about star players (I like Andy Morrison more than anyone who plays for us now!), it's not about being the best.. it's about being there for your team through thin and thin, no matter what! We've long gone from that division but there are still clubs getting the same number of fans as they did then, some have big clubs on their doorsteps (think Leyron Orient and Rochdale, best fans in the country for not just going for the easy options of supporting Arsenal/Chelsea; United/City!).

4. I absolutely hated hated hated one particular game. Stockport at home. We were 1-0 up (I think Weikens scored) but lost 2-1, I think to a penalty about five minutes from the end! Felt as bad, if not worse than I did, when we lost all these recent derbies to late or stuffy goals to United! I was absurdly fuming! Don't know why really, just hated losing that one game!


That's pretty much it. I never felt disappointed to be in a lower division when we had players playing for us who I loved to watch and have playing for us. Nicky Weaver, Gerard Weikens, Andy Morrison, Kevin Horlock, Shaun Goater, Paul Dickov, SWP, Benarbia, Huckerby, Wanchope, even going back to Brightwell, Lake, White, Redmond, Morley, Stewart, Moulden.... I would rather have watched them players in a lower division than watch Sibierski, Samaras and Corradi in the Prem!

 

[jimharri]

Can't be bothered to trawl through the whole thread (too lazy to be arsed!), but I'd imagine my 5 would have been listed countless times already. In no particular order (chronological, level of low-ness etc etc);

1. Kerb crawler Pleat dancing across Maine Road. Heartbreaking, and so much worse than all the subsequent relegations since then (bar one; see number 4).
2. Ricky Villa and THAT goal. Replayed endless times since; any fool could have waltzed through a back four imitating statues.
3. The 5-0 mauling at the swamp, with the legendary Simon Tracey in goal that dark night. Didn't Kanchelskis grab 4, IIRC? Jesus H.
4. Stoke in '98. Only we could win our last game of the season away 5-2 and get relegated to the REAL third division. I relaise JR was manager that day, but Clark and, particularly, Ball have a lot to answer for. Utter humiliation.
5. The 3-2 hoisting of the white flag at Maine Road against the vermin after being 2 up at HT. No comment necessary.

To be honest, it was hard to list only 5. The 8-1, Spurs in the cup at Maine Road (the invasion game; '93?), the whole season in the third tier of English football, Forest at home in the cup a couple of years back, THAT Michael Owen goal, That Stuart Pearce season (january to may without a single home league goal; how the fuck did we stay up?), Halifax and Shrewsbury in the cup back in the prehistoric ages, Colin Bell's injury, etc etc. The list is endless. No wonder what little hair I have left is greying rapidly!

 

[Mr Partridge]

1. The Liverpool relegation in 96, the first one I'd ever experienced.

2. The Stoke relegation in 98, even though I was only 11 it was the lowest I'd ever felt, I never wanted to leave the house ever again

3. Being 2-0 down to Gillingham, it literally felt like the end of the world.

4. Having to sell SWP, realising that we just couldn't compete with the likes of Chelsea and our financial troubles meant our ambitions were now severely limited

5. The Cup quarter final defeat to West Ham. We had a pretty shit team but a very winnable home tie and I was convinced it could be our year. We ended up with about 10 injured players from two games. Pearce may have been a poor manager but he certainly didn't have much luck while he was here.

 

[liamctid]

You could have a Top 5 of the Stuart Pearce era alone.

1) The SWP sale.
2) The Blackburn FA Cup game.
3) No goals at home after New Year.
4) Sitting at one game, cold, bored and completely disinterested then falling asleep.
5) The last home game against the rags when we were safe but still kept all eleven behind the ball and refused to attack them.

What about a top ten for Pearce with these additional five...

Naming an injured Samaras vs Wigan a couple of days before we really needed him in the Cup quarter final and bringing him on, only for him to suffer a re occurrence of the injury, thus missing the quarter final
Getting beat in the quarter final and Sun Jihai getting sent off
Corradi
Dabo
Beanie

and another to make it a top eleven

Playing piped fan songs and cheering through the PA

Stephen Jordan giving up the chase and Blackburn making it 3-0 at home. After that waiting at Piccadilly for 3 hours in the freezing February rain in only a tshirt before I got my bus railreplacement service back over to Sheffield.

Being 2-0 down to Wigan within 2 minutes, eventually losing 4-0. (FOUR)

Taking a mate from Uni down to Chesterfield away on a Tuesday night "should be a good laugh" - lost 2-1 after coasting at 1-0.

(Blackburn again) Losing at Ewood on the last game of the season and Richards getting hacked down and not one of the players seemed to give a fuck about one of our (youngest) players getting assulted.

Having the same post match interview no matter what the outcome (unlike Mancini?!) 'This football club deserves better' etc.

 

[WEMBLEY76]

Hearing a rag twat neighbour saying conference in two years(CITY) after Stoke relegation in 1998

 

[OnlyOneUweRosler]

1) Getting beat 0-5 in the derby at Old Trafford: nuff said
2) Getting knocked out of the FA Cup by Cardiff in 1994: Nathan Blake scored, then Keith Curle missed a penalty
3) Getting beat at home by Bury 0-1 in 97/98. Really was seen by a lot of us as a sign things were VERY seriously wrong
4) Getting relegated in 2000 from the Premiership at Ipswich. Had just had back-to-back promotions out of Division 2 and 1, so to go down in our first season back in the Prem was annoying
5) Losing the League Cup quarter final 0-4 at Crystal Palace in 1995. Was my first full season as a City fan, and I thought this could be our year. 0-0 at half time, only to get humped in the second half.

 

[Midlothian Blue]

Losing 2 - 1 York City away and that putting in our lowest ever position of 16th in the 3rd tier of English Football. Coming home from that I was thinking it was all over for us........................maybe not now!