Mansfield Making Cup History

Following their midweek loss to a resurgent Peterborough United, the victors moved up to eighth place with a 2-1 win at the One Call Stadium, Mansfield Town face the tough task next of travelling to Premier League opposition on Saturday afternoon.

It’s FA Cup Fourth Round Day, somewhere the Stags have been on only nine previous occasions in their near 130-year history, having initially been formed as Mansfield Wesleyans in the late 1800s.

The Stags first entered the famous old competition back in the 1909/10 season, losing to Mansfield Mechanics in the second qualifying round; at the time they were participants in the areas’ regional leagues having played in the Mansfield & District League, Notts & District League, Noots & Derbyshire League, and Central Alliance League, up to the outbreak of World War One.

Other Football League names progressing in the qualifying rounds the year the Stags first entered, the likes of Stoke City and Watford, Shrewsbury Town and Accrington Stanley, Coventry City, and New Brompton, now known as Gillingham.

As for Mansfield, they changed from Wesleyans to Town the following season, reaching the First Round Proper for the first times in 1925/26, and the Second Round in 1926/27, before their first major cup run arrived in 1928/29; now in the Midland League, Town, alongside winning the league title (their fourth after successes in 1900, 1924, and 1925), reached the Fourth Round for the first time.

Along the way they defeated Shirebrook (Miners Welfare) 4-2 away on 24 November, then Barrow (Division Three North) 2-1 away early the following month; then of Football League Division Two, the Stags would, in mid-January 1929, cause an upset with a 1-0 win in the Black Country, against Wolverhampton Wanderers, finally succumbing to Arsenal, 2-0 at Highbury, on 26 January.

There was little joy in the FA Cup over the next twenty-or-so years, although they did themselves enter the Football League in the early 1930s; finishing runners-up in Division Three North in 1950/51, seven points behind champions Rotherham United, was a season in which the Stags went to the Fifth Round for the first time in their history.

Then of the Isthmian League, amateur football giants, Walthamstow Avenue, were the Stags’ First Round opponents, Fred Steele netting the only goal of the game, setting up a trip to Chelmsford City a few weeks later in the Second; William Donaldson would bag a brace that day as the Stags eased to a 4-1 win, William Coole and Edwin Barks the others.

Steele was again on target in the Third Round, netting a double in a 2-0 win over visitors Swansea Town (now City), before 180 minutes were needed to see off a stern Sheffield United after a goalless draw at Bramall Lane in front of a crowd of near 48,700.

In the Field Mill replay at the end of January, Steele, en-route to 18 goals that season, and Sidney Ottewell, who finished with 16, found the net in a 2-1 success; unfortunately for Mansfield their cup run ended the following round, losing 2-0 to a Stan Mortensen-inspired Blackpool on 10 February, they going on to lose the final to Jackie Milburn’s Newcastle.

The late 1960s, early 1970s would bring the next successes of the Stags in the FA Cup, progressing to the Fourth Round in 1966/67, the quarter-finals in 1968/69, and the Fifth Round in both 1969/70 and 1974/75.

That run to the quarter-finals, in 1968/69, is the furthest in which any Mansfield Town side has progressed in the FA Cup; back in Division Three, following a brief tenure in the early sixties in Division Four, Tommy Eggleston’s side were quietly dreaming of unexpected glory.

Despite their league form, and having exited the League Cup in the opening round, the FA Cup proved a delightful tonic for the Stags, and, after a 4-1 home win over non-league side, Tow Law Town, in the First Round (Robert Ledger 2, Raymond Keeley and Dominic Sharkey), they travelled to Rotherham in the Second, in early December.

Rotherham and Mansfield battled out a 2-2 draw that day, in front of a crowd of a little over 10,000, Keeley and Sharkey netting for the visitors to earn a replay; that said replay, two days later in Mansfield, was settled by a lone, Ledger goal.

The Third and Fourth rounds were both settled by 2-1 home results as Dudley Roberts scored twice to see off the visiting Sheffield United in the former, and both he and Sharkey were on target as Southend United were beaten in the latter.

West Ham United, led by World Cup winning striker, Geoff Hurst, along with Bobby Moore and Martin Peters, visited the Field Mill for the Fifth Round tie, on 26 February 1969, on what became a famous result in the Stags’ history; even that is now close 60-years-ago.

As well as Hurst, Moore, and Peters, the Hammers side that took to the Field Mill, in front of more than 21,000 spectators, also included the likes of Billy Bonds, Trevor Brooking, and Harry Redknapp; meanwhile, the hosts’ starting line-up was as follows –

Mansfield Town (vs. West Ham United; 1969 FA Cup 5^th Round): Dave Hollins, Sandy Pate, Mick Hopkinson, Johnny Quigley, Stuart Boam, Mickey Walker, Ray Keeley, Nick Sharkey, Bob Ledger, Dudley Roberts, Jimmy Goodfellow

Afterwards, then Hammers boss Ron Greenwood paid tribute to the victors, saying: “We didn’t play badly, so they must have played very well to beat us.

“They are a great team. They thoroughly deserved their victory.”

The victory, by a score of a three goals to nothing, came courtesy of Roberts, Sharkey, and Keeley.

The Stags then crashed out in the next round, the quarter-finals, as they hosted another East Midlands side, Leicester City, losing 1-0 in front of 23,500 spectators.

Since those heady days of the sixties and seventies, the Stags have only gone beyond the famed, Third Round, on three further occasions prior to this weekends clash at Premier League Burnley.

In 1978, 1988, and 2008, the Stags would make the Fourth Round of the famous cup competition, losing to Bolton Wanderers (78), Wimbledon (88), and Middlesbrough (08); the loss in ’88, against Wimbledon, was the year in which ‘The Crazy Gang’ upset all the odds and beating Liverpool in the final (who coincidentally had knocked out Nottingham Forest in the semi-final).

Fast-forward to the present day, and having reached the Third Round five times in the last six seasons, Nigel Clough’s side will be looking to create another slice of club history in Lancashire, having already seen of Harrogate Town, Accrington Stanley, and Sheffield United, with the latter being a side in which the Stags have dismissed several times in past cup runs.

A George Maris brace would help the Stags to a 3-1 win at home to Harrogate Town in this seasons’ First Round, before extra-time and penalties were needed to see off hosts Accrington in the Second; a 2-2 draw would see Will Evans and Kyle McAdam net for the Stags, with Lucas Akins, Deji Oshilaja, and Louis Reed, all netting from the spot to progress.

Then came the seven-goal thriller in the last round, away to Bramall Lane, and a back-an-forth contest which would eventually see the visiting Stags progress with goals from Louis Reed (2), Lucas Akins, and Rhys Oates’ second half winner.

Burnley meanwhile, although struggling at the wrong end of the Premier League following last season’s promotion, comfortably saw off visiting Millwall, 5-1 in the last round, Ashley Barnes scoring twice.

Now it’s time for Burnley, at Turf Moor, on Valentines Day (Saturday 14 February, KO 15:00), as a place not only in the Fifth Round, but also the history books, beckons for Nigel Clough’s Mansfield Town, should they choose to take it…