70th ANNIVERSARY!! CAN WE FORGET IT?

June 8th 1953 saw England play against The USA for the first time, at the New York Yankee Stadium, under floodlights. This ended unsurprisingly, as a 6-3 win, with goals from Tom Finney 2, Nat Lofthouse 2, Ivor Broadis 1 and the interestingly named Redfern Froggatt 1. Only 7,271 came to witness "soccer" in a baseball stadium, but hey ho, it took time for the Yanks "to turn up" in more than "battle"....don't we know!

The England tour started in Buenos Aries, on May 17th and was the first official FA tour outside Europe. 

The team England fielded against the USA, that day, at the end of a long tour was: Ted Ditchburn, Alf Ramsey, Bill Eckersley, Billy Wright (c), Harry Johnston, Jimmy Dickinson, Tom Finney, Ivor Broadis, Nat Lofthouse, Jack Froggatt, Redfern Froggatt (below). Some well known names there then!

Redfern Froggatt featured on the original, 28-man, longlist for the 1950 World Cup, however he was excluded from the final squad. He made his England debut against Wales on 12 November 1952 and his fourth and last England cap came on 8 June 1953 against the USA, in which he scored three of England Lions' six.

Redfern played over 430 games for Sheffield Wednesday, scoring 140 goals. Jack Froggatt (see badge) was Redfern's cousin, and he played for Portsmouth, Leicester and Kettering Town also winning 13 caps for England, scoring 2 goals.

Retiring from football, Froggatt returned to Portsmouth to become a publican. For 22 years, he kept the Manor House in Cosham, The Milton Arms near Fratton Park (Portsmouth's ground) and a hotel in Partridge Green, West Sussex....both a "stone's throw" from my back yard.

This tour included Argentina (0-0: match abandoned after 25 minutes due to torrential rain, with 80,000 in crowd), then Chile 2-1 (goals from Lofthouse and Tommy Taylor. 57,000) and Uruguay 1-2 (goal from Taylor 66,000) and included a bout of food poisoning (there might have been some espionage?). The tour ended in New York on the 8th June, lasting 38 days and 4 games, England used only 14 players!!

England have since this, played the USA several times, winning 8, losing once and drawing 1. The infamous defeat came during the two nation's first meeting, on June 29th 1950, when the star studded English lost 0-1 to the USA in a World Cup match.

This result is noted as one of the biggest shocks in the tournament's history.

Before the game, England were heavy favourites against a hastily assembled U.S. team, which was composed of part-time players. The game's only goal was scored by the U.S.'s Haitian-born centre forward Joe Gaetjens. This game and the U.S. team (shirt below) were profiled by author Geoffrey Douglas in his book The Game of Their Lives, which was made into a film of the same name (later renamed The Miracle Match).

England has won 6-3, 8-1, 10-0, 5-0, 2-0, 2-1, 2-0, 3-0, drawn 1-1 (World Cup 2010).

The 1-1 draw in the 2010 World Cup held in South Africa, came with a "depleted side". Fabio Capello, was the hapless England manager and after going ahead through Gerrard, Rob Green let a Clint Dempsey shot slide under his body; final score 1-1. The England campaign ended with an embarrassing 1-4 defeat by our old foes Germany, in the Round of 16.