5th January 1963: I can remember skating on the frozen floodplain of the River Arun at Pulborough, in the post-Christmas school holiday...I was nearly a teenager. We set up two goals on the ice and played a sort of sliding football game with a lump of ice as the ball. Children, please don't do this at home unless you have adults nearby to test the safety factors, such as the thickness of the ice and have a first aid kit nearby just in case. Do not skate near an apparently frozen river; use your geographical knowledge to assess dangers of the river bank etc!! Check near emergency stuff. Below the Arun dicing with the A29 at the aptly named Swan Pub
The 1963 big freeze meant that only 3 of the scheduled 32 FA Cup 3rd Round ties were played, with the last tie, in that round, not being decided until March 11th. The Lincoln v Coventry tie was postponed a total of 15 times and 14 of the other ties suffered 10 or more postponements. Between December 8th and 16th February, Bolton did not play a single competitive match.
The 44 First and Second Division clubs entered the competition at this 3rd Round stage. The matches were scheduled for Saturday, 5 January 1963, but due to the Big Freeze only three games were completed at this date. The bulk of matches were not completed until February and March, with the final non-replay tie being played on the 7 March. There were nine replays in total, of which the earliest possible playing date was 30 January, and the latest the 11 March.
The Fourth Round matches were originally scheduled for Saturday, 26 January 1963, but due to the earlier, problems with the weather, most of the third-round games had still not been played and only one tie, the Burnley v Liverpool match, was able to be played on that day. This and three other games went to a replay, with the Portsmouth v Coventry City match requiring a second replay, which was the last match of the round.
The 5th Round matches were originally scheduled for Saturday, 16 February 1963, but the delays of the matches in the third and fourth rounds prevented the ties from being played until much later. On 28 January, the FA announced that the draw for the fifth round would be put back a week, and that the league season would be extended until 19 May. Faced with the problem of wishing all the ties to take place on the same date, the FA decided on 4 February 1963 that the fifth and sixth rounds would each be postponed by a week to 23 February and 16 March respectively. The following week, on 12 February, the FA again decided, due to the lack of completion of many games, that the fifth and sixth rounds should be postponed. The agreed dates, Saturday 16 March and Saturday 30 March respectively, were the final postponements of these two rounds. There were no replays, but the Nottingham Forest and Leeds United match did not take place until the following Tuesday, while the Coventry City – Sunderland game was played on the 25th.
The four quarter-final ties (6th Round) were scheduled to be played on Saturday, 9 March 1963, but were postponed until the 30 March. The Nottingham Forest–Southampton match went to two replays before the tie was settled, in Southampton's favour.
The semi-final matches were originally scheduled to be played on Saturday, 30 March 1963. However, on 18 February 1963, the FA Challenge Cup committee announced that the semi finals would be put back by four weeks to 27 April, and that the final would not be played until three weeks after its original date, on 25th May.
Leicester City who beat Liverpool 1-0 and Manchester United with a 1-0 win over Southampton, came through the semi final round to meet at Wembley. 99,604 in the stadium were thrilled to see the two clubs meet and some to see United win 3-1. (Denis Law scored after 30 minutes and David Herd 2 scored in 57th and 85th mins). Ken Keyworth scored after 80 mins to make the final period interesting. Here's an oil painting of Denis in his club and nation's kit, buyable for around £750.
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