45 years ago today...
American movie director Walter Hill visited The Eyrie to witness the FA Cup first round replay between Bedford Town & Wycombe Wanderers. The evening's experience gave him the inspiration for his 1979 cult movie “Warriors” as groups of Eagles hoolies spent the evening scouring their home patch for vulnerable Blues fans whilst hissing “chairboys, come out to play-i-ay”.
The 75/76 FA Cup run is overshadowed by the previous seasons 3rd round 'Boro exploits but it did feature 3 fantastic ties watched by more than 25,000 over the 6 matches. Away to Croydon in the 4th qualifying round we looked dead and buried until two late goals gave us a replay in which Bodger contributed a hat-trick towards a 5-2 win. Then the 3 game epic against Bedford culminating in a 2-1 win on a Loakes Park quagmire. Finally a trip to Ninian Park and the regular terrace chant that contained the line ”Maskell is better than Yashin” looked like it might actually be based on fact as our custodian repelled everything thrown at him. In the end a solitary Evans goal decided the tie – if only it had been Wycombe's Dylan (who did manage to hit the post) rather than Cardiff's Tony.
45 years on, FA Cup replays shamefully appear to have been consigned to history's dustbin (thanks Big 6) but at least “Warriors” remains a fine film.