The curtain comes down on one of English football's most celebrated stages and it will be an emotional time for Everton fans even though they have a fantastic new stadium to look forward to
Everton's men's team will move to the new Hill Dickinson Stadium at Bramley-Moore Dock
Everton's men's team will move to the new Hill Dickinson Stadium at Bramley-Moore Dock
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Image: Getty Images)
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For a good while now, there has been a rumour on Merseyside that Sir Paul McCartney will be part of a Goodison Park encore. It is unlikely but it would be nice. One Merseyside institution saying farewell to another.
For those of you who know your Beatles, perhaps he could play ‘She’s Leaving Home’. Only Everton - well, the men’s first team, at least - is leaving its Grand Old Lady. And the club is not just losing a bit of its soul, football is losing a bit of its soul, the city of Liverpool is losing a bit of its soul.
I have always thought that part of what makes Anfield special is Goodison Park and part of what makes Goodison Park special is Anfield. Two giant pillars of one community within a roar of each other. Neighbours who fight, neighbours who unite.
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The new stadium at Bramley Moore Dock is only a couple of miles away but even though the club is relocating its women’s team to Goodison and the place will remain operational, the area of L4 will never be the same. The move, of course, was inevitable and needed.
Goodison Park has many firsts to its name, not least of which is that it was the country’s first purpose-built football stadium. The only problem is that it hasn’t changed much since … and the first recorded game at Goodison was in 1892.
But joking apart, it is a stadium that has come to represent a dying principle in the elite professional game. That the people who really matter are the common fans.
And by common, I mean the men, women and children of a local community, whether working-class or not. I mean the fans being kicked out of their regular seats behind a dug-out so clubs can sell them to wealthy tourists.
Peter Reid looks at Dieter Hoeness
Peter Reid went toe-to-toe with Bayern Munich hard man Dieter Hoeness on one of the most memorable nights at Goodison Park
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Image:
Bob Thomas/Getty)
For four matches of the World Cup in 1966, those fans reminded a broader audience that Goodison Park was a special place. Watching Eusebio score four goals to help Portugal overcome a 3-0 deficit against North Korea and win 5-3 in the quarter-final remains one of my father’s fondest footballing memories.
But guess what? The fifth Goodison game of the ’66 World Cup was scheduled to be the England-Portugal semi-final but, at the eleventh hour, that was switched to Wembley.
Instead, Goodison hosted West Germany’s win over the Soviet Union and amongst the banners in an incensed crowd was one that read: ‘England Snubs Liverpool’. No wonder the area can sometimes have a siege mentality.
English League Division One match at Goodison Park.
Everton 3 v Bolton Wanderers 0.
Everton forward William "Dixie" Dean scores one of his three goals past the Bolton goalkeeper after a cross from teammate Jimmy Stein.
28th February 1931.
William Ralph 'Dixie' Dean scored sixty league goals in Everton's 1927-28 campaign, completing his total with a hat-trick at Goodison Park on the last day of the season
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Image:
Mirrorpix)
In that ’66 World Cup semi-final, the Germans fought their way to an uninspiring 2-1 victory and the crowd made their feelings known. Goodison Park has always housed a tough audience, make no mistake. But when given something to get behind, few arenas have been as brilliantly febrile as Goodison Park.
The place can shake. I remember Duncan Ferguson scoring a towering header against Manchester United, taking his shirt off and whirring it above his head. Seriously, it felt like the place would vibrate until the end of the game. The fact that it can shake - and that there are still seats with restricted views and there are still turnstiles you have to turn sideways to get through - is probably one of the reasons why it is no longer seen as fit for Premier League purpose.
So, McCartney or no McCartney, it is the end of a long and winding road for Goodison Park as an elite stadium in English football. And English football will be that little bit more soulless without it.
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