The great escapes.

The greatest escape?

  • 94

    Votes: 54 83.1%
  • 98

    Votes: 11 16.9%

  • Total voters
    65
Status
Not open for further replies.
You might've struggled to get in. Huge queue to get in the ground, lots left outside.
Like to think I got that one covered. Started writing Everton about 6 months beforehand, as I didn't want to leave anything by chance and ruin my first Goodison experience. Everton were very helpful and I was promised tickets for the matches I wanted to visit. My mate who I was travelling with, preferred to go a week earlier, as it was more convenient with his work. So, ended up with Coventry City being my first match at Goodison and away to Leeds the week after.
 
Is was in the st end v Wimbledon and when the final whistle went I looked around and to see grown men in tears made me realise what this great club meant to people.
 
You'd have thought the first one would have forced their hand to properly rebuild the team into a not terrible one.
 

Too young to remember 94 but have watched highlights back plenty of times. A couple of things always seem a bit funny to me:

1) our penalty was never a penalty. Don’t get me wrong, I’m very glad we got it, but it’s never a pen. Lot of rumours floating around about match fixing/bribes from that day. Be interesting to see the ref’s bank statement 24 hours after that game. Or if he suddenly purchased a new car with cash in the weeks following. Having said that, maybe the atmosphere of the game got to him and he decided he wanted to get out of the city alive at the end of the day.

2) The Wimbledon keeper properly threw one in at the end. The same keeper who had to answer questions about match fixing the next year. That seems a bit strange to me. Apparently even the Wimbledon manager after the game said “maybe he’s got a few relatives up here”. Crazy stuff. Could you imagine that being said now. there would be hell to pay!

listened to the closing stages of 98 on the radio. I was 11 at the time. looking back, 98 is less satisfying because we didn’t win the game. We did enough though.

1) is it Thomas Myhre in goal? What a howler for Dublin’s equalizer. Can you imagine if Bolton had got a draw? He would be one of our most hated players ever. Absolute shocker. What was he thinking? Just push it out for a corner. I guess that’s why we were down there Though. Poor players making poor decisions.

2) ive also watched the Chelsea v Bolton highlights of that day. Dennis Wise absolutely saved us. At 0-0 Bolton had a goalbound shot with the keeper beaten. Wise cleared it brilliantly. Lebouef (I think) also headed one of the line at 0-0.wise may be a nasty piece of work but he’s alright be me. Fair play to Chelsea that day. They had a european final coming up and nothing to play for in the league. They saved us. Bolton did look a bit awful though.

3) Barmby missing that pen. He also massively got away with it that day. he'd go on to be hated by us for different reasons though.

I was so young for both of these. Be interested to see if anyone who properly remembers it agrees or think I’m talking rubbish. No problems either way.
 
As has been said by many, 94 was far better in that we actually won a dramatic game. Also felt really optimistic that summer as we had a new owner and manager (look how they both turned out!) and had money to spend to rebuilt. We were linked that summer with all sorts of players who had starred at the world cup including Martin Dahlin & Muller.

98 was just a shambles. The team were utterly hopeless, the worst Everton side i've ever seen and couldn't even win that Coventry game. We had penny pinched all season and the fans wanted Johnson out, so there was no optimism at the end of that one.
 
1994 I have almost no memory of, I'd have been 12 at the time and i think I just went and read a book or something so I didn't have to think about it.

1998 I couldn't even bear to listen to Radio 5's Around The Grounds. I think I watched it on Ceefax.


As others have said, 1994 was a better feeling because there was no way that team should have been where it was. It was simply Mike Walker being crap at his job that got us there. 1998 was more depressing by a mile because I don't think anybody could have had any complaints if we were relegated. Dreadful squad, Kendall just didn't have it anymore, the club was a shambles top to bottom and we didn't even win.
 
Too young to remember 94 but have watched highlights back plenty of times. A couple of things always seem a bit funny to me:

1) our penalty was never a penalty. Don’t get me wrong, I’m very glad we got it, but it’s never a pen. Lot of rumours floating around about match fixing/bribes from that day. Be interesting to see the ref’s bank statement 24 hours after that game. Or if he suddenly purchased a new car with cash in the weeks following. Having said that, maybe the atmosphere of the game got to him and he decided he wanted to get out of the city alive at the end of the day.

2) The Wimbledon keeper properly threw one in at the end. The same keeper who had to answer questions about match fixing the next year. That seems a bit strange to me. Apparently even the Wimbledon manager after the game said “maybe he’s got a few relatives up here”. Crazy stuff. Could you imagine that being said now. there would be hell to pay!

listened to the closing stages of 98 on the radio. I was 11 at the time. looking back, 98 is less satisfying because we didn’t win the game. We did enough though.

1) is it Thomas Myhre in goal? What a howler for Dublin’s equalizer. Can you imagine if Bolton had got a draw? He would be one of our most hated players ever. Absolute shocker. What was he thinking? Just push it out for a corner. I guess that’s why we were down there Though. Poor players making poor decisions.

2) ive also watched the Chelsea v Bolton highlights of that day. Dennis Wise absolutely saved us. At 0-0 Bolton had a goalbound shot with the keeper beaten. Wise cleared it brilliantly. Lebouef (I think) also headed one of the line at 0-0.wise may be a nasty piece of work but he’s alright be me. Fair play to Chelsea that day. They had a european final coming up and nothing to play for in the league. They saved us. Bolton did look a bit awful though.

3) Barmby missing that pen. He also massively got away with it that day. he'd go on to be hated by us for different reasons though.

I was so young for both of these. Be interested to see if anyone who properly remembers it agrees or think I’m talking rubbish. No problems either way.
Think your views on the Wimbledon game are a pile of garbage tbf.
 
Last edited:

As has been said by many, 94 was far better in that we actually won a dramatic game. Also felt really optimistic that summer as we had a new owner and manager (look how they both turned out!) and had money to spend to rebuilt. We were linked that summer with all sorts of players who had starred at the world cup including Martin Dahlin & Muller.

98 was just a shambles. The team were utterly hopeless, the worst Everton side i've ever seen and couldn't even win that Coventry game. We had penny pinched all season and the fans wanted Johnson out, so there was no optimism at the end of that one.

It's funny really, as Myhre was fantastic that season, and probably kept us up in all honesty. But on that day, it was a really week piece of goalkeeping. It was strange as we were really comfortable, suddenly that slipped in and it was chaos for 2 or 3 minutes.
 
1998 was almost the end of the club. Blue Bill allegedly wanted Howard back as the sentimental fool would. Johnson was back over in his warehouse looking for his money back. Sadly little Everton started that day, it certainly didn’t start in 1994 that felt like a blip or near miss a bit like the end of the Catt era. I know this may sound petty but the rebuild of the Park End summed up where we were heading, I always felt it was a Tranmere stand when we could have had the equivalent of the Holt End following the survival with revised plans to make a statement of a 44 thousand capacity Stadium.
 
1998 was almost the end of the club. Blue Bill allegedly wanted Howard back as the sentimental fool would. Johnson was back over in his warehouse looking for his money back. Sadly little Everton started that day, it certainly didn’t start in 1994 that felt like a blip or near miss a bit like the end of the Catt era. I know this may sound petty but the rebuild of the Park End summed up where we were heading, I always felt it was a Tranmere stand when we could have had the equivalent of the Holt End following the survival with revised plans to make a statement of a 44 thousand capacity Stadium.

The original plans for the Park End were a 2 tier stand, I remember them publishing it in the programme shortly before the old stand was demolished. They then cut costs and went for the cheap option, a single tiered mecanno stand not in keeping with the rest of the stadium.
 

Status
Not open for further replies.
Top