One of the tensest matches I have ever been to was the Quarter final of the FA Cup on the 8th March 1980 against Aston Villa at Upton Park. Unfortunately, the video clip attached below does not, and realistically can not, fully transmit the rising tension inside the ground to what became a white hot fever pitch. It was of course our Cup winning year despite still being a second division outfit. We had already beaten West Brom, Orient and Swansea in the previous rounds and the visit of Villa had everybody full of anticipation of the possibility of a Cup semi final or more?
Villa came to Upton Park in 5th place in the old first division and the Hammers were in 7th spot in the second division. The Hammers were without their inspirational skipper Billy Bonds and lined up as follows; Parkes, Stewart, Martin, Brush, Lampard, Pike, Brooking, Devonshire, Allen, Pearson and Cross. Billy would be back two months later with this same line up, albeit replacing Paul Brush, to win the Cup at Wembley against Arsenal.
The Hammers had a great mix of players in this fantastic team. They had bought Phil Parkes for what was then a World record fee paid for a goalkeeper. Alvin Martin, who had been awarded an apprenticeship six years earlier, a day after QPR had rejected him, was a mere 21 and was to go on to earn two testimonials with West Ham. Ray Stewart at 20, had joined earlier that season from Dundee United and was the most expensive teenage signing in British football at the time. Paul Allen was a mere seventeen and was to go on that year to break Howard Kendall’s record of being the youngest player ever to play in a Cup Final. Frank Lampard (snr), Stuart Pearson and David Cross added experience to the side and of course the best midfield pairing the club has ever seen (IMO), in Brooking and Devonshire, added the guile and silky touches to a balanced team.
The feeling around the ground prior to the game was that we needed to finish the job today. We had a chance at home but if we went to a replay we had little hope. This was a fact born out that with ten minutes to go in the game, Villa fans started singing songs on how easily they would beat us in Birmingham. A heavy shower ten minutes before the game made for a greasy surface but some great football. Early on Devonshire slid a ball into the six yard box for it only to be scrambled away when it seemed easier for Pike to nudge home. A short while later Devonshire himself brought a great save from Villa keeper Jimmy Rimmer as did Alvin Martin with a free header on goal, but basically the first half produced a lot of huff and puff. The final 25 minutes of the second half saw enormous pressure on the Villa goal and it was a constant bombardment from West Ham that eventually took the fans to a delirious frenzy. With each missed chance, goalkeeper save and frenetic clearance the atmosphere in the ground grew from passionate to electric. The countless goalmouth scrambles merely compounded the tension as the feeling mounted that this was not to be our day. Then the pressure valve was finally released in the last two minutes when Villa defender Ken McNaught inexplicably handled the ball in his own area to give away a penalty.
There have only been two penalties where I just had to close my eyes and this was the first. The other was the equalising penalty from the same man, Ray Stewart, a year later in the League Cup final at Wembley. Well, history tells that Ray belted home both those penalties and the one against Villa had many people at Upton Park crying with relief, including me! Both these penalties were in the final moments of matches with so much riding on them. We don’t see Upton Park “rocking” too many times nowadays, but it certainly rocked towards the end of this game. There is some conjecture to Ray Stewart’s penalty record. Unofficially he had 86 attempts and missed ten although he actually scored twice from the ensuing rebounds. I was not there for all of Ray’s penalties but I know I definitely missed two of them!