Saturday November 26th 1966! I remember playing football at Collyer's School in Horsham on the Saturday morning and then the excitement of going to Horsham Town's ground, Queen Street to watch this First Round FA Cup tie.
“We shall do our best to come out of it with honour. We are leaving nothing to chance in our determination to show that we are fully capable of organising a function like this.” These were the words of Horsham chairman Leslie Hale ahead of his side’s FA Cup first round tie with Third Division Swindon Town and, although the Football League side emerged fairly comfortable 3-0 winners, he could be happy that Horsham Football Club had put on a good show.Earlier in the FA Cup Fourth Qualifying Round match Horsham FC played against Sussex rivals, Hastings United, complete with ex-Spurs and England centre forward Bobby Smith, in their forward line. Smith's team had been beaten by Horsham 2-1. Smth was not in good shape.
In Round One, on November 26th, Swindon Town FC, The Robins, made the journey from Wiltshire to take on Horsham manager, Pat Tobin’s Athenian League part-timers. Cup fever had the sleepy Sussex, market town well and truly in its grip. More than three thousand fans had filed through the Queen Street turnstiles to watch, as this second-ever appearance in the first round generated much excitement.
The club had been there before, in Round 1, of course, in 1947 when they took on a Tommy Lawton-inspired Notts County, away. County won that one 9-1. “My father, Joe, was on the HFC committee at the time and I can remember going down to the ground most evenings that week to help with preparations in main stand” ~ Paul Dixon
In the five weeks leading up to the tie, he had barely a moment’s peace. Many hours were spent answering queries and leading his committee and helpers in making the complicated arrangements for dealing with this unique event. In addition to the fact that he had to return in the evenings to catch up with his job as managing director of his local engineering firm, he had several sleepless nights as his mind continued to churn over his day’s problems. For the committee, the priority was to ensure that as many of the local townsfolk as possible could watch the match and temporary stands were brought in to raise the ground capacity to eight thousand. Seats were installed along the perimeter of the pitch and behind the goal at the old car park end of the ground, where 2,500 would be seated in ten-tier stands. Seated tickets were priced at 6 shillings, with those wishing to watch from in front of the main stand paying 5s and 4s for general ground admission, with a thousand half-price tickets made available to pensioners and under 16s (me for example). A total of fifteen hundred were allocated to Swindon Town and a further five hundred to Horsham’s committee members, supporters association members, and those most closely connected to the club.
“I was one of a couple of program sellers for Horsham and sold them on that day. l was only thirteen and remember it being a great day and seeing those temporary stands up was quite something” ~ Andrew Lawson
To alleviate matchday congestion, the railway goods' yard, commuters’ car park, the YMCA and Horsham UDC were turned over for supporters’ cars and coaches and, as a result, the town centre was kept relatively clear, to the obvious delight of Saturday afternoon shoppers.
There was some surprise, and frustration, when Swindon officials demanded that Queen Street’s newly-installed floodlights be strengthened in order to facilitate a 3pm kick-off. The lights had been introduced just over twelve months earlier, at a cost of £5,000, and were initially claimed to have been of ‘Football League standard’ but, at the behest of the visitors, eight additional lights were added to the four corner pylons and the bulbs upgraded. But, still unhappy with the work that had been done, Swindon refused to accept the mid-afternoon start and the match was brought forward to 2.15 pm!
After this match, in Round Two, Swindon beat non-league, Ashford Town at home 5-0, Swindon then drew with West Ham away 3-3 and beat them 3-1 in the replay. In Round 4, The Robins beat Bury 2-1, then in Rd 5, lost to Nottingham Forest 5-0, after a 0-0 draw at Forest, a 1-1 draw on a neutral ground. Forest lost to Spurs in the Semi-final 2-1 and as we all know Spurs beat Chelsea 2-1 in the Final.
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