Athletic’s path to Wembley laden with goals

Six Shooter: Frankie Bunn

IN the first of a series of features commemorating the 20-year anniversary of Athletic’s run to the Littlewoods Cup final, the Chronicle looks back at the road to Wembley.

BACK when an appearance at Wembley was reserved for only the biggest of occasions, Athletic’s appearance in the Littlewoods Cup final represented a massive achievement.

The showpiece against Nottingham Forest was, and remains, the biggest game of football the 115-year-old club has ever been involved in.

And it wasn’t as if Joe Royle’s side, who finished the season eighth in the old division two, were forced to scrape and scrap their way through to get there.

The League Cup campaign of 1989-90 was marked out as being very special from the time that Frank Bunn smashed in six goals in a 7-0 win over Scarborough in round three.

In doing so, he set a record individual total for one match in the competition’s history, in all of its various guises.

That game followed on from a 4-2 aggregate win over Leeds United — who went on to finish top of division two — and in round four, Athletic faced George Graham’s Arsenal.

On a famous night at Boundary Park, the league champions and division one leaders were dispatched 3-1. Andy Ritchie got two of the goals and Nick Henry the other, his first for the club, with Niall Quinn’s last-minute effort scant consolation for the North London side.

In the quarter-finals, Athletic came close to going out of the competition.

Playing at the old Dell against Southampton, it took two Andy Ritchie goals — the second of which came in the fourth minute of stoppage time at the end of the 90 minutes — to grab a 2-2 draw and a home replay.

In front of 18,862 supporters at Boundary Park, Athletic fought past the Saints to record a 2-0 win, Ritchie again on the scoresheet along with a rare Mike Milligan strike.

Up against West Ham, Athletic hit the goal trail in astonishing style in the semi-finals.

The stunned Hammers were dispatched 6-0 in the first of a two-leg affair, much to the joy of the majority of 19,268 fans packed into Boundary Park.

Ritchie scored twice and there were also goals for Roger Palmer, Neil Adams, Earl Barrett and Rick Holden as Athletic ran riot.

The second leg was a non-event, West Ham winning 3-0 at Upton Park — a result which confirmed Athletic’s historic, first-ever visit to the spiritual home of English football.