CITY 3 NOTTINGHAM FOREST 3
League Division 1
26th October 1968
Attendance 32,937
Scorers
City Bell(11), Young(32), Hindley(40 og)
Notts Forest Storey-Moore(56), Baker(69), Chapman(74)
Ref J G Lewis
City Dowd, Connor , Pardoe, Doyle, Booth, Oakes, Lee, Bell, Summerbee, Young, Coleman – Sub Owen(unused)
Notts Forest Marshall, Hindley, Winfield, Taylor, McKinley, Newton, Lyons, Barnwell, Hall, Chapman, Storey-Moore – sub Baker(64)
… Forest were in bottom spot with eight points from 13 games.
Theirs had been an unhappy season, starting with a fire which burned down their almost-new main stand the previous August and consigned them to playing all their home games at Notts County. And three goalkeepers had been lost through injury to give Johnny Carey a severe problem.
It was a “typical” Manchester City performance, as older supporters say; one that they had witnessed down the years from time to time… the Blues cruising along three goals up and then fighting in the end to claim a point from a game where the opposition should never have been allowed to recover.
“That’s the sort of thing I was talking about,” says Mike Summerbee. “We’d put a few useful results together and then blow it by losing concentration and allowing opponents to get back into the game.”
The Blues opened the scoring with a fine goal from Colin Bell. Francis Lee made it with a pinpointed centre from the right and Summerbee headed it backwards to the lurking Bell, whose finishing shot was deadly. Neil Young was next on the scoresheet, and a scrambled affair it was.
The first shot was blocked effectively by the Forest goalkeeper, Gordon Marshall. But he couldn’t keep hold of the ball and it ran back out to Young, who by now was sitting firmly on his backside. Luckily the City player put his second chance wide of the ‘keeper It was a goal to celebrate Neil’s 250th League game for the club.
Young was also involved in a third goal before half-time, cracking in a shot which struck England Under-23 international Peter Hindley on the chest as he ran towards his own net to ricochet past Marshall.
Three goals down and apparently dead and buried … could Forest stage any vestige of recovery?
They could – and did! ]an Storey-Moore was the player who began it for the Midlanders. With just under half-an-hour remaining, the Forest leading scorer played a swift one-two with Barry Lyons, waltzed round Tommy Booth and Mike Doyle, and planted the ball out of Harry Dowd’s reach.
Then the Forest substitute, Joe Baker – brother of former City striker Gerry – entered the fray in place of Colin Hall. It took him precisely five minutes to get into the rhythm of the game and then he struck to make the score 3-2.
Surely the Blues wouldn’t let this one slip? They seemed to realise that Forest meant business and tried in vain to raise their game to prevent the visitors from equalising.
It was too late. Back swept the red shirts and in 74 minutes they were level. They were awarded a corner on the right and Baker tried a shot. The ball ran to Bob Chapman and he made no mistake.
“Malcolm (Allison) gave us a right rollicking afterwards;’ recalled Summerbee. “It was the start of a poor run as we lost the next three League matches as well. But it wasn’t all bad; both Dave Connor and Glyn Pardoe had great games.”
The Forest comeback performance had been achieved without two of their most influential players as both Jim Baxter and Terry Hennessey were out injured.
ADAPTED FROM AN ARTICLE IN THE CITY PROGRAMME 18TH DECEMBER 1995