Through the wind and rain – A sideways look at Rangers vs Marseilles from the Champions League 92/93
I don't know how many times you have set off to watch one game but ended up taking in another. I can only think of once in all my years of going to football. That was in London on Boxing Day many (many) years ago, when me and my dad went to watch West Ham vs Chelsea. It was pretty clear when we got there that getting in was going to be a challenge. The North Bank was full so we tried the South Bank and that was closed too. Resigned to no football we headed back through London and ended up going to watch Fulham vs Oldham. Something must have happened with the Man United game in London the same day as the ground was packed with red and white. Don't remember the score.
But I digress. Back to November 25 1992.
We should have known better at lunch time. Me and Keith would go out and play 1 v 1 at at the green field factory site we worked at. We set up the company 5 a side goals and with a few rules to stop constant long shots away we went. We did this rain or shine and on this occasion it was rain, heavy rain, lots of it, driving rain, but we didn't get the message.
We'd resolved that evening to watch Marlow's away FA Cup 3rd Qualifying Round tie to Salisbury. Marlow featured a lot of players I played with and against on Sundays and they were on a cup run. A run that started in August in the preliminary rounds and culminated in them facing Spurs in the 3rd round, a game shown on Match of the Day.
Salisbury was a hike, with no quick route to get there, requiring nearly 3 hours along narrow roads to the ground. We checked our watches and left work early to head to the game, looking forward to an evening under the lights and the dream of cup glory. But the rain. Still pouring. Pouring so hard I had the wipers on full and was still peering though the murk. We left at 4 for a 7.30 kick off, thinking that given the conditions, the distance and the roads it would give us enough time to get there and have a pie and a cuppa before kick off.
I just looked it up. 71.8 miles and 1 hour 38 minutes is what it should take to make the journey. On this evening with the rain pelting down that was extended to nearly 3 hours. Still the car was warm and we were listening to the radio and talking about football on the way down so all was well with the world. It was about 7:15 when we neared the ground. This was the days before the internet and ready communication, so we saw the floodlights glowing in anticipation but strangely people walking away from the ground. We didn't even get out of the car, asking someone from Marlow, who was walking away what was going on. They had called the game off at about 7:10. Waterlogged pitch. And that was that, we turned round and began the journey back.
And that is how we took in Rangers Marseilles on a cold wet evening in southern England.
The weather wasn't much better in Glasgow but the game was on. Rangers at the time were one of the biggest teams in Britain attracting the best players from down south, their side on the evening featuring Mark Hateley up front, Trevor Steven in midfield along with Mykhaylychenko, surrounded by some of the best Scottish players at the time McCall, Gough, Durrant. But they were up against a Marseilles team with a lot of names recognizable to anyone who watched international football around that time. Future Man U keeper Barthez, who still had hair, Boli, Desailly, current France manager, Deschamps, Abedi Pele, Alen Boksic and world cup spitter Rudi Voller. This was a time when European competition was more egalitarian and the optimism of Rangers was not as misplaced as it appears now.
Though fans feared 6 scuddings in the group, Rangers finished 2nd,winning 2 and drawing 4 of their games, with Marseilles winning the group 1 point ahead, setting up the famed “Battle of Britain” against Leeds with Rangers winning both legs.
There's something about listening to a game in a warm dark car, while the rain pelts down and you can see only intermittently through the windscreen as the wipers make their journey there and back, the view obscured in a second, the atmosphere of an evening far away filling the space.
The commentary took on a glamour and our attention had a focus it wouldn't have had had we been on our way back from our originally intended game. We talked a little about the disappointment of the Marlow game being off and promised we'd go back for the replay. We never did, though I did go to every other game on the run including Tottenham. Marlow were originally drawn at home, but given their ground could hold maybe 4,000 and their average gate was 250, switching the game made sense and set the team up financially for years with 6,000 traveling to White Hart Lane.
The rain. Still the rain. Both here on the road back home and in Glasgow, the drama of the evening unfolding. Davie Dodds had to come out of retirement for a place on the bench, such was Rangers player shortage on the evening.
Expectations were not high. And hindsight would suggest there was a reason for that. Marseilles ended up winning the competition.
I'm not sure where we were on the road at the time, it would have been hard to tell, but Boksic opened the scoring on 31 minutes and that, you would have thought, would have been that. Particularly when Voller doubled the lead on 56 minutes, the commentary excitedly extolling the virtues of what was possibly Marseille's greatest side. On came Gary McSwegan for Steven. He scored in the 76th minute, a great consolation for what had been a determined performance. But rather than settle the crowd were ignited drove the team and in the 82nd minute McSwegan was involved again, feeding Durrant whose cross was met by Hateley. 2-2.
A hectic last 8 minutes ensued with both sides having chances but 2-2 it was and the hopes of the fans had changed to a tentative expectation that the team could achieve more than just “being there” and could indeed make an impact on the group.
Back in the car, we ate our half time sandwiches and continued to peer into the darkness as we headed for home, having spent the evening enjoying a game by accident. Sometimes those are the things that we remember most. The unexpected turn of events that takes us somewhere we didn't expect to be.
We certainly didn't expect to spend a rainy night in Glasgow when we set out to enjoy a rainy night in Salisbury. But that's how it turned out and I still remember it 30 years down the line.
We did make it home unscathed as the rain continuing unabated. And both Marlow and Rangers, united by their blue kits, went on to enjoy cup glory during the 92/93 season.
Here's some details on the Marlow team: Marlow FC, Tottenham Hotspur and some incredible FA Cup consistency (footballinbracknell.co.uk)
You can watch the highlights of the Rangers game here: CL-1992/1993 Glasgow Rangers – Olympique Marseille 2-2 (25.11.1992) – YouTube
by Particular-Ad2675
1 Comment
Cracking story mate