The Joy of Six

[kushiro]

A simple idea. We've now scored six in the FA Cup on six occasions. Want to know the details? Of course you do.

 

 

1) Leicester Fosse 6 Hucknall Portland 1.  FA Cup 5th Qualifying Round, December 9th 1899.

 

We used to play some real minnows back then. There were a huge number of clubs in Nottinghamshire that used to enter the competition, and we always seemed to be drawn to face one of them in the Qualifying Rounds.  A couple of years before this we'd been drawn away at a club called Kimberley, where:

 

'50 or 60 Leicester supporters had to stand on an exposed field, with not a vestige of a stand or even a shelter from the cutting north-east blast, and did their best to make believe that they liked it'.

 

We won that 3-1. I wish I'd been there.

 

We also faced a club called Notts Olympic. They played in the Nottingham League, and that season they finished 13th - out of 13. And the result at Filbert Street? Leicester Fosse 13 Notts Olympic 0 (still our record score).

 

So this year we were given a home tie against Hucknall Portland. It was a similar day to yesterday - the game was in doubt because of fog. But it got underway, and we strolled to a 6-1 victory, the game's dominant figure being our wonderfully-named centre half Bert Dainty. 

 

That win took us into the First Round proper, where things got a bit more difficult. We were drawn away to Sheffield United, who were still unbeaten and sat five points clear at the top of Division One. We put on a fine show at Bramall Lane but United won 1-0.

 

 

2)  Leicester Fosse 6 Croydon Common 1.   FA Cup Round One Replay, January 22nd  1912

 

There are so many stories attached to this tie that you'd need a seperate Joy of Six to do it justice. I'll try and cover it in simplified form here.

 

A week before this game we were shaken by the resignation of George Johnson, our secretary / manager. Who could possibly replace the man who'd steered us so ably through the last 14 years?  Our trip to South London for this Cup tie gave us an idea.

 

Our opponents were in the Southern League. The first game was played at their ground The Nest, from where the you could catch a glimpse of the nearby Crystal Palace on top of Sydenham Hill and dream of being there for the final three months later.

 

It was a busy time for Moss Everitt, secretary of the Croydon supporters' club. Perhaps that's why he tried to take a short cut across the railway line on his way home the day before the game. He was hit by a train and died. 

 

The following day players of both sides wore black arm bands and the game finished 2-2.

 

The replay at Filbert Street was initially postponed because of heavy snowfall and was rescheduled for the following Monday. Our 6-1 win included the last ever Fosse goals for Percy Humphreys. He was the man whose prolific scoring took us to our first ever promotion four years earlier.

 

In the next round we lost at Barnsley, which meant we could concentrate on the battle to stay out of the bottom two (and avoid a re-election vote). We were OK in the end because our season was turned round by a man we signed from Croydon Common just after the Cup tie - a forward called Harry Sparrow. 

 

He wasn't the only person quitting The Nest and heading for Filbert Street. Shortly after we signed Sparrow, we set our sights on their secretary Jack Bartlett, and he arrived in March to fill the seat George Johnson had vacated.

 

 

3)  Millwall 3 Leicester City 6. FA Cup Fourth Round,  January 27th 1934. 

 

Here's Channy hammering in one of our goals at The Den that afternoon:

 

 

Amazing day that one, on our way to our first semi-final. I've written a lot about this game before. See this if you missed it a year ago:

 

https://www.foxestalk.co.uk/topic/133561-the-worlds-oldest-and-greatest-cup-competition/

 

 

 

4)  Leicester City 6 Watford 3. FA Cup Round Four, January 26th 1936

 

Another solemn occasion, but this time it wasn't a supporters' club secretary who had just died - it was the King of England, George V. Here's the Popular Side during the minute's silence, all caps off:

 

 

Danny Liddle got a hat-trick for us that day, but Sep Smith was the star of this show (in the season he won his only England cap).

 

 

5)   Burton Albion 1 Leicester City 6.  FA Cup Round Three. January 5th 1985.

 

Gary Lineker got three in this one, but thanks to Burton's keeper being felled by an object thrown from behind the goal, the FA ordered a replay.

 

It was restaged at Highfield Road - behind closed doors, which was probably a good thing, as earlier that season at the same venue Leicester fans had invaded the pitch in such numbers that Coventry decided to reintroduce perimeter fencing, which had been removed when they made the ground all seater in 1981. 

 

We beat Burton 1-0 with Paul Ramsey's early goal. Here though is the first match:

 

 

 

 

 

6)  Leicester City 6 QPR 2.

 

28,000 crowd! This competition has still got some life in it.

 

 

 

Edited 12 January by kushiro

[kushiro]

We've scored more than six a few times too. All of these were against non-League sides in the Qualifying Rounds, apart from the Crook Town match - they were a non-League side too but made it through to the Third Round.

 

 

Crook Town were originally drawn at home, but accepted Leicester's offer to switch it to Filbert Street, a move that so infuriated their fans that gates at their home matches were down by several hundred for the rest of the season.

Edited 12 January by kushiro

[kushiro]

Great piece on that Burton game here:

 

https://www.theguardian.com/football/that-1980s-sports-blog/2017/jan/06/fa-cup-third-round-leicester-city-burton-albion-block-wood

[Craig]

Enjoyed that thanks