For May 21st I'm going back 33 years to 1988 and the England v Scotland International at Wembley.
I'm afraid it's yet another in the series of "Worst Programme Covers of Our Times". Truly dreadful isn't it?
This was the 107th meeting of the two sides and the first to be played on a Saturday for seven years. Sadly there was trouble beyond the stadium which led to over 200 arrests, a huge total even by the dreadful standards of the era. The match formed part of England's build up for the European Championships being held in West Germany that summer and was part of a three team tournament known as the Rous Cup. The third team involved was Colombia (of course!) but quite why the Colombians were chosen is beyond me since they were unlikely to play like one of England's forthcoming opponents (Ireland, Holland and USSR) in Euro 88.
Andy Roxburgh's Scotland selection was a good side on paper at least and included Leighton, Gough, Nicol, Aitken, Miller, McStay, McCoist and Johnston but was thoroughly outclassed by England on the day. England dominated the majority of the game but scored only once, the early goal coming via Peter Beardsley after just ten minutes. It almost all came unravelled for England right at the death with Shilton needing to save from Kevin Gallagher to preserve the lead and victory in front of 70,480.
In a previous article covering the 1986 England-Scotland programme, I mentioned that I'd been allocated a ticket for the forthcoming Wembley meeting between the sides as part of Euro 2020 but that I had fingers crossed hoping to be successful in the UEFA ballot required due to Covid19 capacity constraints. I'm disappointed to report that of the eight games for which I had got tickets, I had to give up the matches in Munich and Budapest due to the travel and quarantine restrictions and, following UEFA's balloting process, I'm left with just a ticket for the second Semi-Final. Better than nothing I suppose but disappointing nonetheless. Roll on the summer eh?
CRB Match No. 561
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