Match Abandoned - Insufficient Players !!!

[60YearsAPie]

Belenenses were forced to start their Portuguese top-flight game against Benfica yesterday with only nine men! An outbreak of Covid had left them with 17 players unavailable. They were 7-0 down at half-time and started the second-half with only seven players, due to two injuries. A further player went down injured soon after the re-start, leaving them with six players on the pitch and the game was then abandoned.

When Notts beat Burslem Port Vale 10-0 in a league game at Trent Bridge in 1895, the visitors turned up with only 8 players. Makes you wonder why the Magpies only scored 10!

[upthemaggies]

Belenenses were forced to start their Portuguese top-flight game against Benfica yesterday with only nine men! An outbreak of Covid had left them with 17 players unavailable. They were 7-0 down at half-time and started the second-half with only seven players, due to two injuries. A further player went down injured soon after the re-start, leaving them with six players on the pitch and the game was then abandoned.

When Notts beat Burslem Port Vale 10-0 in a league game at Trent Bridge in 1895, the visitors turned up with only 8 players. Makes you wonder why the Magpies only scored 10!

There was a league game we played at Preston in 1891 in heavy snow and extreme cold. The conditions were so bad that five Notts players refused to play on at 0-4 down and walked off. Notts had already lost another player following a scuffle with a Preston player. The five-man Notts conceded two further goals. Preston protested about the behaviour of the Notts players and the League ordered that Notts and Preston should play a friendly, with Preston receiving half of the gate money and the rest being split between Notts and the Football League.

[60YearsAPie]

Good stuff utm, I'd not heard of that before. The records say that the crowd was 300, which must be a reflection of the weather conditions.

[60YearsAPie]

There was a league game we played at Preston in 1891 in heavy snow and extreme cold. The conditions were so bad that five Notts players refused to play on at 0-4 down and walked off. Notts had already lost another player following a scuffle with a Preston player. The five-man Notts conceded two further goals. Preston protested about the behaviour of the Notts players and the League ordered that Notts and Preston should play a friendly, with Preston receiving half of the gate money and the rest being split between Notts and the Football League.

I was intrigued by this and managed to find a couple of reports on the game. What amused me, was that for the last twenty minutes even though Preston had eleven against Notts' five, they were only able to score two further goals, as they were continually caught offside!

[upthemaggies]

I was intrigued by this and managed to find a couple of reports on the game. What amused me, was that for the last twenty minutes even though Preston had eleven against Notts' five, they were only able to score two further goals, as they were continually caught offside!

The most extraordinary match around that period might be our 2nd ever home league game in 1888, the game v Everton. That sounds like something that anybody who was there would never forget. I've only got access to OCR's of the reports so I have some trouble piecing the bits and pieces together (especially if they are in two columns side by side), but it looks as though one of the Everton players (who had a bit of a reputation and had got into trouble in an earlier game that season with Villa) has hit one of our supporters behind the Gamston end goal and then got attacked and punched twice, possibly with a stick the 2nd time and suffered a head wound. This all started after he'd got into a fist fight with one of our players. The funny thing is, at the FA hearing, our then secretary had to deny that bad language had been used in the members area with ladies present.

The following season 1889/90 v Wolves sounds pretty bad too with the ref blowing for time 5 minutes early and then being mobbed by pitch invaders. The Wolves goalkeeper tried to shield him from the mob and got badly hurt, the ref escaped with a few kicks to the legs. This was all sparked off by the ref disallowing a Notts equaliser and then giving Wolves a 2nd goal which should have been ruled out.

[60YearsAPie]

There was a league game we played at Preston in 1891 in heavy snow and extreme cold. The conditions were so bad that five Notts players refused to play on at 0-4 down and walked off. Notts had already lost another player following a scuffle with a Preston player. The five-man Notts conceded two further goals. Preston protested about the behaviour of the Notts players and the League ordered that Notts and Preston should play a friendly, with Preston receiving half of the gate money and the rest being split between Notts and the Football League.

Below is a hybrid of the accounts of the 1891 game against Preston, from the Sporting Life and the Middlesbrough Daily Gazette;

PRESTON NORTH END v NOTTS COUNTY
Saturday, 12th December 1891

The return League engagement between these two teams was played on the Deepdale Ground on Saturday, and proved, without exception, the most regrettable incident ever seen at the ground. It was soon painfully apparent that there was considerable feeling between the teams.

The Notts County players behaved in anything but a sportsmanlike manner. That the players were chilled to the bone there can be no doubt, but that is no excuse for five of the team to leave the field as they did. The game was by no means pleasant at any stage, and after half an hour Drummond (Preston) and Oswald (Notts) came to blows in consequence of the latter alleging that the former wilfully kicked him. They were ordered off the field, but Mr Lockett, the referee, afterwards told them to return. Drummond did go back and scored two goals, but Oswald had received a severe kick in a most dangerous part of the body and could not continue.

At the end of twenty-five minutes play in the second half, on account of the weather, which was fearfully bad, a biting south-easterly wind, with sleet and rain, six of the Notts team left the field, but Daft returned, and he, with Calderhead, Mclean, Hendry and Toone, opposed the North End eleven. The five stuck to their work splendidly, and as the Preston men were continually caught offside, only two more goals were scored. The League will, no doubt, have something to say about the matter of the players leaving the field, which they did at the instigation of their captain. The referee would, no doubt, have prevented the whole occurrence had he at the first made a firm stand.

[SwalePie]

Belenenses were forced to start their Portuguese top-flight game against Benfica yesterday with only nine men! An outbreak of Covid had left them with 17 players unavailable. They were 7-0 down at half-time and started the second-half with only seven players, due to two injuries. A further player went down injured soon after the re-start, leaving them with six players on the pitch and the game was then abandoned.

When Notts beat Burslem Port Vale 10-0 in a league game at Trent Bridge in 1895, the visitors turned up with only 8 players. Makes you wonder why the Magpies only scored 10!

Turns out they all tested positive for the Omicron variant. The 13 cases at Belenenses account for every detected Omicron case in Portugal apparently.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/59465983

[nw6pie]

Turns out they all tested positive for the Omicron variant. The 13 cases at Belenenses account for every detected Omicron case in Portugal apparently.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/59465983

Crazy story.

I’ve always had a soft spot for Belenenses as Belem is the home of the nata (Portuguese custard tart) and the ground’s close to the place where you can have a nata and a pint - a very dangerous combination.

On a football note, it makes you wonder where some of our keepers might have played if we needed them as outfield players. I’d have stuck Bob Catlin up front as nuisance value. Patterson might fancy his chances as a tricky winger.