“If you talk to any Evertonian who was there that night, who actually got in this ground that night, and you said, ‘You can take one game to the grave with you’. Say there was 55,000, I’m betting you 50,000 would take this game with them.” Andy Gray’s words about the second leg of Everton’s semi-final against Bayern Munich in the Cup Winners’ Cup are not hyperbole. Admittedly the official crowd figure was 49,476 but, that apart, Gray is right about how Everton fans feel about the match of 24 April 1985. It was the ultimate night in the history of Goodison Park.
It was an evening that flooded the senses: two superb teams packed with great players were both chasing trebles. Neither of them took a backward step as the line between success and failure shifted throughout 90 minutes of intense football. And it was all played out in the kind of atmosphere that has to be heard to be believed.
Everton, who qualified for the competition as FA Cup winners, started slowly, only squeezing past University College Dublin 1-0 on aggregate. They soon picked up the pace, beating Inter Bratislava home and away to set up a quarter-final against Fortuna Sittard, which they won 5-0 on aggregate. After an unpromising start, they were suddenly facing Bayern in the semi-finals having not yet conceded a goal.
Writing in the Guardian, David Lacey spelled out the challenge for Howard Kendall’s team. “Bayern are now clear favourites,” he noted after the draw, adding that Everton “have been presented with a major obstacle to their hopes of appearing in a European final for the first time.”
A 4-1 win in the quarter-finals against Roma – who had reached the European Cup final the year before – demonstrated Bayern’s abilities, and players such as Jean-Marie Pfaff, Klaus Augenthaler, Søren Lerby and Lothar Matthäus indicated the quality among their ranks. But Everton were far from daunted; an unbeaten run from Boxing Day onwards had propelled the club towards the brink of glory.
Without the injured Kevin Sheedy and Gray for the first leg in Munich, Kendall tweaked his formation, using midfielder Trevor Steven just behind lone forward Graeme Sharp. Kevin Richardson and Alan Harper came into the team and performed admirably in midfield, as Everton earned a fine 0-0 draw in the Olympiastadion.
“I am not pessimistic,” Bayern coach Udo Lattek said after the stalemate. “We can do what Liverpool did to us in the European Cup four years ago when we had a goalless game at Anfield.” But recent history was not on their side. Bayern had been thwarted by British clubs in the previous four seasons: Liverpool, Aston Villa, Aberdeen and Tottenham
All four of these British clubs lifted a European trophy after defeating Bayern, and Everton would go on to do the same. However, at half-time of the second leg, hopes of reaching the final in Rotterdam seemed to be disappearing over the horizon.
Everton had started brightly and as first half progressed the tension cranked up. Neither team was afraid of a confrontation or two, as the tackles flew in. “If you look at the game now it should be X-rated,” says Kevin Ratcliffe on the brilliant documentary Howard’s Way. “Anybody under 12 shouldn’t be watching it”. Looking back at the coverage, Everton’s skipper is not exaggerating.
The challenges were fierce. Lerby on Peter Reid; Reid on Eder; Hans Pflügler and Gray in an altercation that saw them both booked; Eder forced from the pitch due to an aerial challenge with Gray; Ratcliffe wiping out Ludwig Kögl. It was not a night for the faint-hearted.
Through all of this, the atmosphere from the terraces bubbled. But the volume dropped from 11 to 0 when Dieter Hoeness gave Bayern the lead against the run of play in the 38th minute. It was the first goal Everton had conceded in the tournament. At half-time, Everton’s players could have been excused if doubts had crept into their minds. But not these players. Not this manager.
Kendall remained calm, convinced that Everton were playing well enough. Reid recalls his manager’s very simple instructions. “Get the ball in the box. The Gwladys Street end will suck it in.” Kendall was wise before the event. Within three minutes Everton were back in it.
A long throw from Gary Stevens was flicked on by Gray, and when Sharp headed past Pfaff the ground erupted. With 17 minutes remaining, another Stevens throw resulted in Everton’s second, Gray taking advantage of a Pfaff fumble before wheeling away in delight. Somehow the volume increased. “A cacophony of noise,” said commentator Martin Tyler.
The crowning moment came in the 86th minute from a player who by his own admission had endured a terrible evening. “I put my hand up,” Steven says on Howard’s Way. “I had a poor, poor match. I couldn’t contribute, I couldn’t get into it.” With Reid constantly complaining to him that he needed to turn up, Steven did manage to produce one moment of glory.
As Bayern pushed for a second away goal, the grace and serenity of Sheedy became evident, as he took possession on the left flank in his own half. “There wasn’t too long left,” Sheedy recalls. “People were panicking by this stage. So I’m waiting for Andy Gray to make a run. I’ve weaved past a couple of players. I’m still waiting for him to make a run. I’ve got 55,000 people shouting ‘man on’.”
If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs, then you are a special player, to ever so slightly misquote Rudyard Kipling. Sheedy refused to be flustered, releasing his pass when Gray finally made his run. Almost in slow motion you could see the opportunity opening up, all Everton fans hoping that Gray has spotted Steven inside him, deep into Bayern’s half.
Steven describes the goal on Howard’s Way. “Kevin’s patience on the ball. Andy, first touch, swivels. I don’t know if he’s recovered from that swivel yet. And then I’ve got the Gwladys Street looking at me. The keeper just started to go down and I hit it.” As the ball hit the back of the net, Sheedy described the noise in his autobiography: “It was like a volcano going off.”
“It’s settled now,” Tyler screamed, as he struggled to be heard above the din inside Goodison. “Rotterdam, here they come.” As the television pictures cut to the ‘Welcome to Everton’ sign in the tunnel, Tyler added, “Bayern saw that sign as they went out and the welcome they were given was not just warm, in the end it was red hot.”
“Howard Kendall’s side gave a performance of verve and passion that the Germans found irresistible,” Patrick Barclay wrote in the Guardian. Describing the comeback in the second half, Barclay noted: “This produced the most ear-bashing roar of all from a crowd of nearly 50,000, whose raucous support Everton had stirred throughout a night when skill was allied to raw endeavour.”
Just listening to the sounds of Goodison Park that night induces goosebumps. “The noise was unbelievable,” remembers defender Pat Van Den Hauwe. “I’ve never forgotten it.” Neville Southall, not noted for extravagant statements, emphasises the magnitude of the win over Bayern. “I would swap everything I ever achieved in football for that one night.”
Read any Everton player’s account of the Bayern match and they all agree it was a night like no other. Sharp dedicates a whole section to the match in the preface Sharpy: My Story. Reid recalls his senses being scrambled in Cheer Up Peter Reid. Sheedy says of the atmosphere. “It just hit you as if it was something physical.”
“I have not known many nights like this,” said Kendall after the comeback. Not many clubs have. Everton fans will come to love their new stadium in time, but it will never be with the same as Goodison Park. Time moves on and the fans will undoubtedly create memories at their new home. But it will have to be something remarkable to surpass that night at the famous old ground on 24 April 1985.
This article is by Steven Pye for That 1980s Sports Blog
