A BRIDGE TOO FAR

⓭ years ago to the day, Manchester United captain Rooney was lifting the League Cup, after a close-fought win over Aston Villa at Wembley, and City were juggling with a media profile that was threatening to unwind under the sagging pressure of a negative press. At Wembley and at Stamford Bridge, it was the pain of Wayne that was the sentiment of the day.

Plus ça change, as the Belgians say.

Two months into Roberto Mancini's tenure as City manager, there were image issues at stake for the club. The Italian had supposedly been in the stands at the Etihad during Mark Hughes' final game in charge versus Sunderland, a fact that some newspapers had jumped upon as an affront to the Welshman. More pressing on this occasion, however, was the match due to take place at Stamford Bridge, where City would be displaying their new-found structural stability under their Italian coach against a Chelsea side topping the table and packed with Premier League winning experience that would carry them to a 4th title that May under their own Italian tactician Carlo Ancelotti.

City, lying just outside the Champions League places, had other things on their minds, however. A solid start under Mancini had brought them up towards the contenders and the match at Stamford Bridge represented an opportunity to get a statistical monkey off their backs while also representing for two of the game's participants the chance to make amends for a personal feud that had run its course in the public spotlight of the national newspapers.

That, by the end of an exhilarating fixture, there was as much focus on what happened during the team presentation as what ensued during 90 minutes when City laid to rest a terrible record in West London speaks volumes for the media interest in the romcom entitled Terry and Wayne.

City had not managed a win at Stamford Bridge since 1993, making the 4-2 triumph on this occasion a pleasant and rare surprise. Cajoled into an effervescent attacking display by the electric front pairing of Carlos Tevez and Craig Bellamy, City won 4-2 to the general astonishment of everyone present.

For John Terry, however, the humiliation of being captain of the league leaders dumped on their backsides by precocious visitors was only half of the public embarrassment. Ex-team mate and City left back Wayne saw to the remainder of the cringe factor at the Bridge. Captain Leader Legend was the banner fluttering from the stands at the Bridge, but one would have been tempted to add "Philanderer" after news escaped that Terry had been employed (or employed himself in fact) in a bold attacking formation against Bridge's girlfriend (or former girlfriend as she was by this time).

Mick Dennis in the Express has his say

Terry's display, having been sounded out for a move to City the previous summer, was uncharacteristically hesitant, bringing many to the conclusion that the England captain had various other things on his mind at the time. Certainly the pre-match hand shake would have lingered on Terry's mind during the first half, as most of City's players looked the other way as they took his hand and Bridge ducked the shake altogether, giving the massed ranks of photographers the picture they wanted for the morning editions.

Bellamy's incisive attacking on the field matched his attack on Terry off it, as he was widely quoted in the papers as saying "Everyone knows what Terry is like off the field". 

"People in glass houses shouldn't throw stones", came the swift reply from the Chelsea man, as clouds of green smoke issued from his flared nostrils. Bellamy had himself been accused of inappropriate behaviour towards his girlfriend involving a golf club.  

It later became apparent that a change in Premier League protocol had been okeyed to avoid further embarrassment to the Chelsea captain. Refereee Mike Dean asked City skipper Shay Given to lead his team mates down the line for the handshakes, when it was usual for the home captain to "welcome" the visiting team by making the move himself. This carefully thought out change allowed Bridge to keep moving and avoid shaking hands with the man who had run off with his girlfriend.

Given the current climate of alleged rule-breaking, City fans can look back at the vaudeville of Stamford Bridge as a storm in a tea cup during a period when the media were largely onside with the idea of a new challenger to the elite cartel of United, Arsenal, Chelsea and Liverpool. 13 years on, it is City that many would like to see removed from their perch at the top of the Premier League tree so that the poor success-starved upstarts of Arsenal and United can have their turn in the limelight.

       

| Saturday 27th February 2010 .. Season 2009-10 |

| Premier League, Stamford Bridge |

| Chelsea 2-4 City (Tevez 2, Bellamy 2)  Att: 41,814 |  

Tevez scores one of his two goals

"DOWN THE FLANKS AGAIN CITY HAVE PROSPERED..."

🎤John Motson, who died today, carried many of us from childhood through adolescence and on into cynical adulthood like a football mothership swaddled in a sheepskin overcoat. His voice will survive him, echoing around in our minds for all time, a soundtrack to our lives in sway to the great but simple sport he made his name describing.

Thrown in at the deep end to commentate on an FA Cup tie at Edgar Street between non-league Hereford and Newcastle United on 5th February 1972, his luck was to have his first game suddenly explode into the spectacle of what would become one of the competition's most talked about matches and containing, certainly, one of its most replayed goals. Ronnie Radford's strike for Hereford that brought the kids down from the trees and caused a full scale, parka-clad invasion of the muddy playing surface, has become one of the moments of Britain's sporting history. It was Motson's first day at work.

What an introduction. 

Ronnie Radford wheels away at Edgar Street: :"Radford again, oh what a goal, what a goal!!! Radford the scorer. The crowd are invading the pitch and it will take some time to clear the field...."

The 70s and 80s saw almost uninterrupted BBC coverage for Motson and his erudite colleague Barry Davies, as David Coleman graduated to the warmth of the studio and others picked up the pieces of the highlights games that followed Match of the Day's two main matches. Motson it was, with his earthy delivery and geeky penchant for stats before stats were a thing, that took control of every Cup Final, much to Davies' chagrin. 

His voice carried us through World Cups and European Championships, a steady flow of reassuringly mispronounced foreign names in the phase immediately before the opening of the money channels to the Premier League.

It was in the early years of the Premier League that he probably sealed his City-commentating history with a piece of work to accompany the exhilarating 5-2 home win over Tottenham in 1994 that was replete with bubbling enthusiasm and gurgling joy. For Motson, this was the type of football he loved to be present at. Just like the rest of us, he could hardly contain himself, but, and this was his consummate skill, his boyish simplicity shone through in his commentary, as he pasted words and phrases to the delightful spectacle he was being paid to witness. 

He leaves us the poorer for his absence and leaves the world of football commentary in an altogether different era of flat platitudes and cosy chit-chat. One of the quintessential sounds of football has fallen silent.