Chelsea vs Real Madrid - we go again. The two giants of European football will do battle in the Champions League quarter-finals on Wednesday night, with the first leg at Stamford Bridge.
It is a rerun of last season's semi-final, which ended with the Blues coming out on top and eventually going on to lift the Champions League trophy under Thomas Tuchel. But that occasion in 2021 and tonight's first leg clash, as well as the second leg in a week's time, will be a far cry from the first ever meeting between the two sides.
Chelsea and Real Madrid went head to head in the Cup Winners' Cup in 1971. Not once, but twice. In the space of two days. It was a farcical situation all told.
On Thursday lunchtime at the Hilton in Athens, some Chelsea players were poolside in the one day between their drawn Cup Winners’ Cup final and the replay against Los Blancos. Peter Osgood, whose goal in the replay would be decisive, was leading the charge on the beers and cocktails. The sun was out, the surroundings were beautiful and by the time dusk arrived those partaking in the party were, in the words of maverick midfielder Alan Hudson, “off their heads”.
Manager Dave Sexton had earlier told his team, following a light training session, to rest up. Some were carrying knocks, others were mentally exhausted after Ignacio Zoco had made it 1-1 in the 90th minute and extra-time failed to produce a winner the night before. In a time before penalty shootouts, UEFA had hastily decided to hold a replay 48 hours later and the teams were only informed after returning to their hotels.
So, for at least three players, Sexton’s instruction and the governing body’s lack of foresight was the green light to, well, get on it. Half a century on Paddy Mulligan, who was a substitute in both games, is still laughing at the “miracle” that unfolded the following night. “Real Madrid must have been up to something even worse than we were if we could beat them the night after,” he says.
Hudson, meanwhile, can recall telling Osgood to manage his intake as the striker, Charlie Cooke and Tommy Baldwin began to drink the bar dry. “There were more bottles of booze there than any other table in Athens,” Hudson says.
“I went to a flea market to try and walk off a dead leg and when I got a taxi back they were by the pool already celebrating. I said to Osgood: ‘We’ll celebrate tomorrow when we’ve won it, not now.’ And all he said to me was: “Go home, get some rest because you’re going to have to do all of my running tomorrow.” Then he scored again. So much for preparation.” Quite.
Chelsea went into the initial game without too much knowledge of Real. “Even now I don’t have a clue who they beat in the semi-final,” Hudson, who was 19 at the time, says. “They talk about preparation for players now and it makes a mockery of what we did.” Mulligan agrees. “I laugh now at the analysis and the videos of this and that,” he says. “We had no videos of Real but we quickly learnt where they could be got at. It’s far too analytical now. We’re playing a game of imperfections and looking for perfections. It’s an impossibility.”
Before kick off the players had to line up behind members of the Greek military and march around the Karaiskakis Stadium, which had initially been the velodrome for the 1896 Olympic Games. The country was under the rule of a far-right junta between 1967 and ‘74 and UEFA seemingly made no effort to stop the influence seeping into their final.
There was little forewarning for Chelsea, and presumably Real, who were simply told the day of the game that they had to participate in a political act they knew little about. “It was daft,” Mulligan says. “None of the players wanted to do that but UEFA in their simple minds decided it was OK to go along with it. It didn’t distract us come the game. We knew we were there to play one of the top clubs in the world.”
When the game got underway Chelsea started brightly, fashioning the best chances of a goalless opening period. But then Osgood, who had a troubled campaign featuring an FA ban for gambling activity, scored around the hour mark with a left-footed finish from near the penalty spot. Real were awakened by falling behind and moved up a gear, with midfielder Pirri a level above the rest. He won 10 La Liga titles in addition to a European Cup between 1964 and ‘80 and left Cooke and Hudson with their heads spinning in the Athens heat.
“He’s one of the greatest players they ever had,” the latter says. But Pirri injured an arm in the second half and was not as influential in the replay. “He had a cast on his arm in the second game and if he hadn’t got that injury the result might have been different.”
Yet it was Zoco who produced the equaliser, despite offside appeals, less than a minute before the end of normal time. Real were ascendant at that stage and the additional 30 minutes saw Peter Bonetti make a couple of good saves as Chelsea clung on. After Swiss referee Rudolf Scheurer blew his whistle the players walked off unsure of what would happen. They bathed and departed unaware that UEFA bigwigs were deciding the teams should reconvene on the Friday evening.
The squad had tickets to fly home on Thursday morning, leaving board members in a panic as they sought an extension at their hotel and different travel arrangements. John Hollins faced an even bigger problem: he was due to be the best man at a wedding on the Friday and faced a rather angry call from his wife, Linda, when she learnt that the squad would have to stay put. Adding a shake of salt, Hollins picked up a knock and was not in Sexton’s XI for the replay.
Then there were the supporters. Between four and five thousand had travelled for the initial meeting, predominantly on chartered packages, meaning only a minority could stay for the replay. Some slept on beaches and the players, sharing a far closer bond to those who paid their wages than the modern star, even had a whip round to partially fund rebooked flights home for the hardy few that remained.
“We had a collection to help lads out,” Mulligan says. “They didn’t have the money to go back and we wanted to look after them. That’s what it is all about.”
Come Friday evening, the Blues supporters outnumbered their Madrid rivals but the overall attendance was halved. Osgood, Cooke and Baldwin may have been carrying sore heads but, as Hudson says, they were seasoned pros who knew what was needed when it came to gametime. “I always thought if the Real Madrid coach saw three Chelsea players off their heads, they might have gotten the wrong answer.”
The replay was nip and tuck but Chelsea again went in front thanks to a stunning effort from John Dempsey after 33 minutes.
“It was a wonder goal,” Mulligan says. “We had practised it from corner kicks. Dave would have Charlie or Peter [Houseman] taking the kicks in training like that with Demps waiting for the ball to come out on the rebound. It was cleared out to him and he hit a half-volley into the roof of the net.”
Osgood proved there were no ill effects from the day before by making it 2-0 six minutes before the interval when receiving a pass from Baldwin, turning near the ‘D’ and sending a grasscutter into the bottom right corner. Real stepped it up again in the second period and Sebastian Fleitas made it 2-1 following a delightful dribble down the inside left channel with 15 minutes remaining but Chelsea held firm against a barrage of white shirts.
At the end a handful of supporters invaded the pitch with Union flags before the trophy was presented to Ron Harris, kickstarting raucous celebrations. Many of the fans who had stuck around were invited back to the hotel afterwards where the party hit another level. This time the entire squad was involved.
Unsurprisingly little sleep was had and memories of the Saturday morning flight back are hazy but the players were surprised by the reaction upon arrival back in London. They boarded an open top bus and, driving down the M4 on route to a reception at Fulham Town Hall, the players noticed more flags hanging off every bridge as they came closer.
At the Town Hall, Osgood, continuing to enjoy himself, told those present that Chelsea were going to become the best team in Europe. Except Chelsea went only one way in the years that followed: down.
They were seventh in the league in 1971-72 and Mulligan remembers excited talk about Stamford Bridge being redeveloped only for it kickstart a spiral of decline. “I remember Dave Sexton bringing us into a room and showing us a prototype of the new Stamford Bridge. I said to Dave, ‘I hope we have the team to see that stadium’ He wasn’t too impressed but I was being serious.”
The following season Chelsea slipped to 12th. Then, with funding issues around the new east stand being built, Hudson and Osgood were sold for club record fees in January 1974 after falling out with Sexton over their off-field lifestyles. And the demise was rubber-stamped by relegation in 1974-75, leading into more than a decade of yo-yoing between divisions.
Hudson was hurt by being sold to Stoke. Sexton did not want players out drinking but, as the now 69-year-old recalled in a previous interview: “We were on the King’s Road, spending time with rock stars who wanted to be us while we wanted to be like rock stars.”
Mulligan believes a failure to plan beyond the short-term was the primary reason for the downfall. “It was the cart before the horse,” he adds. “Instead of making sure the team was in really good shape for five years, it was done on an annual basis. They left an awful lot to chance.”
It all seems a world away from the circus of this week’s Champions League quarter-final first leg between the teams, whose only other meeting before last year's matches was the 1998 Super Cup.
