It was not a day I had ever planned, or expected to have attended when I first took to the terraces of Ninian Park almost fifteen years ago. Our team at the time were enjoying a pretty exciting cup run, and had our team been about 5-6 years younger, then we would have posed a massive threat to Portsmouth on that day in May, 2008. Especially with a front pairing of Jimmy Floyd-Hasseilbank and Robbie Fowler, a dream pairing in their prime!
Our manager that day was Dave Jones, he had a good attacking ethos, and had built a strong team that carried us to that final. The opposing manager, was the current QPR boss, Harry Redknapp.
I have been watching football for as long as I remember, you can excuse me for the cliché, but that is the truth. It has always been there, through the good times and the bad times. It has been a source of happiness, and as any other Cardiff fan will tell you, frustration and anger. Never in my wildest dreams did I envisage watching my team, Cardiff City walking out onto the hallowed turf at Wembley stadium. It was May 17th, 2008 when that dream became a reality.
As a football fan, I was always hearing of people’s memoirs of their FA Cup experiences, and how legends were made, and dreams broken in the hope of winning the world’s oldest cup competition. The FA Cup is a tournament, which of late has been rumoured to have lost its spark, with teams in the higher leagues instead focusing on competitions with greater financial benefits. This in itself is a tragic thought, because the cup bears so much history, and is the foundation to the success of many of the teams across England and Wales. At Cardiff, the captain of our 1927 cup winning side has been honoured with a statue outside the stadium, and despite the 87 year gap, we still talk about it, when City were in heaven.
So with tomorrow's two teams lining up at the historic Wembley stadium, managers in their boxes with their floral buttonholes attached to their tailored suit lapels, abide with me being sang from the choir, and both teams 90 minutes away from etching their names into British football history, remember to treasure the moment you witnessed an FA Cup final. Remember how fortunate we are to witness this historic trophy, the trophy our Great Granddads, Granddads, fathers and uncles all tell us about, all the names that caught fame from the FA Cup, all the legends who have lifted the trophy, and all the memories that will stay with us for life. The FA Cup is about special moments, and the magic with the Cup cannot be equalled, purchased or created, it is a legend developed over time, through heartache, jubilation and memory. It’s more than a cup, it’s more than a game.
The Footballer Magazine
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This article first appeared at: http://thefootballermagazine.wordpress.com/2014/05/17/the-fa-cup-magic-legend-and-history
Memory added on January 20, 2021
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