2nd MAY AND SOME LATER DAYS

Football On This Day – 2nd May 1953 In one of the most memorable FA Cup Finals Blackpool beat Bolton Wanderers 4-3 at Wembley. It was know as the ‘Matthews Final’ as a 38-year-old Stanley Matthews at last won a club honour after previously being on the losing side in two FA Cup Finals (1948 and 1951) - but it was close with Bolton being 3-1 up with less than 25 minutes remaining. The 'Mortensen Final' would have been a more appropriate title though with Matthews' team-mate Stan Mortensen scoring hat-trick. It was only the third hat-trick in an FA Cup Final - the first at Wembley.

with the other two HAT TRICKS coming in the finals of 1890 by William Townley of Blackburn Rovers in a 6-1 defeat of Sheffield Wednesday, and 1894 when James Logan of Notts County scored 3, helping beat Bolton Wanderers 4-1.

Logan was buried in an unmarked pauper's grave in Loughborough Cemetery, more than 300 miles away from his family home in Ayr. His body would lie there anonymously for another 120 years until some Notts County fans launched a campaign to "put right the wrong".....see below....

AND Stanley Matthews' Route to the final round by round:
Sat Jan 10 Sheffield Wednesday 1-2 Blackpool: Sat Jan 31 Blackpool 1 v 0 Huddersfield: Sat Feb14 Blackpool 1-1 Southampton: Wed Feb 18 Southampton 1-2 Blackpool: Wed Mar 4 Tottenham Hotspur 2-2 Birmingham City: Mon March 9 Tottenham H 1-0 Birmingham City played at Molineux. 

AND in the Semi-Finals 1953 below

Sat	Mar	21		Blackpool		2	-	1		Tottenham Hotspur
					Played at Villa Park, Aston Villa FC
Sat	Mar	21		Bolton Wanderers		4	-	3		Everton
					Played at Maine Road, Manchester City FC

FA Cup Final on May 2nd 1953: Blackpool v Bolton Wanderers 4-3 The Matthews' Final

2nd May 2016: Chelsea 2 Tottenham Hotspur 2 – Spurs let a two-goal lead slip in the Premier League match, with the dropped points seeing Leicester City crowned as Premier Division champions. Yes, unfashionable Leicester, 5000-1 outsiders at the start of the season, are League champions for the first time in their history. They went on to finish the season 10 points clear of second-placed Arsenal although that margin isn’t really a true reflection of the title race. Leicester and Spurs were neck and neck going into the final few matches but while the Foxes were unbeaten in their last 12 matches Spurs didn’t manage a win in their last four, a run which saw them pipped to the runners-up up spot by their great rivals Arsenal. Leicester’s success was widely seen as the most unlikely triumph in the history of team sport but just nine months later the architect of that triumph – manager Claudio Ranieri – had been sacked. Such is life!

In what was described as one of the greatest sporting stories of all time, Leicester confirmed as Premier Champions 2015-16 on May 2nd 2016, finishing top of England's highest league for the first time in the club's history.