FGR in the FA Cup 3rd round after nearly 120 years!
It was 3 Jan 2009 at The New Lawn, home of Forest Green Rovers since 2006, when a first-time capacity crowd of 4836 turned up for the FA Cup 3rd Round tie against Derby County FC.
As a fairly new fan of FGR of but a few years this epic match lives on in my memory as one of the most exciting football games I have ever seen.
Within 20 minutes we were leading 2-0, thanks to a stunning strike by Jonathan Smith from outside the box, and then Alex Lawless slotted home a second. 2-0 up at 20 minutes! Surely this was to be one those great giant-killing games of all time?
Not quite – Rob Hulse prodded home Derby's first goal on 40 minutes, and then Albrechtsen's header levelled the score at 2-2 on the stroke of half-time.
Derby County were taking control of the game after the break with the influential man-of-the match Kris Commons (now of Celtic) playing well, but with 18 minutes of the game to go an excellent pass from FGR's Simon Clist allowed full-back Paul Stonehouse to shoot low into the corner of the goal - WOW! 3-2 to FGR. C'mon Rovers!
But just 4 minutes later Paul Green slotted home for Derby and the scores were level again. The visitor's fitness was beginning to tell and in the final minutes this was repaid when Commons, clear with only the FGR keeper to beat, was tackled and felled from behind in the penalty area by defender Darren Jones. Poor Darren gets a red card, and Davies scores from the spot for Derby County on 87 minutes.
Phew! Final score: Derby County 4 FGR 3.
Mega sighs of relief for Derby, but anguish and heart-ache for little Forest Green Rovers.
A hugely entertaining game though and one of my great FGR memories!
As the Derby caretaker manager, Chris Hutchings, said afterwards - “That was one heck of a cup-tie”.
John Harrop
Memory added on October 11, 2013
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