Gordon the Gaffer
On this day (July 16th) in 1999 the Sky Blues were facing their penultimate season in the top flight after an occupancy of more than thirty years. Under the management of former player Gordon Strachan (now a CCFPA member) for his third full season in charge the Sky Blues had embarked on a four game German pre-season tour to bed the side in for the upcoming Premier League campaign.
Hadji in Action
Youssef in Sky Blue action
WGS had been busy in the transfer market with millions changing hands. Moroccan midfield pair (both now Association members) Youssef Chippo, £1m from FC Porto, and Moustapha Hadji (£4m from Deportivo La La Coruña) arrived to join young Norwegian winger Runnar Normann who cost £1m.
City were also to see the immense talents of George Boateng go to local rivals Aston Villa for £4.5m and CCFPA member Darren Huckerby to Leeds United for £5.5m. This was also the season that the precocious young talent named Robbie Keane joined the Sky Blues from Wolverhampton Wanderers for £6m!
Runar Normann in the Sky Blue
The Sky Blues had begun their tour four days earlier with a comprehensive 5-2 victory over F.V.Speyer and two days ago had faced and beaten former Bundesliga side Karlsruher SC taking the game by the odd goal in three (we reported on both games in detail on their respective anniversaries).
Today’s opponents SC Idar-Oberstein, from the third tier of the national game, proved easy meat as the Sky Blues crushed the German team from the Rhineland-Palatinate by five clear goals! They went even better two days after that this win destroying SC Weinsheim 8-1.
Sadly we do not currently have any further details to hand about the game or scorers for this particular German tour game.
Back in the UK for the remaining pre-season games Strachan’s men lost 3-1 at their fairly recent landlords Birmingham City before beating Aberdeen by the only goal of the game in Scotland. On the last day of this month of July the Sky Blues demolished midland rivals West Bromwich Albion in a testimonial match at Highfield Road for Sky Blue legend Cyrille Regis (who became a CCFPA member well before his untimely death in 2018) before losing their last pre-season game at Hereford United by the only goal.
CCFC 1999-2000
This pattern of results in England pre-season presaged the Sky Blues league season. Although they became dubbed ‘The Entertainers’ for their attractive style of play and winning a fantastic full dozen of their home League games at Highfield Road they were dismal away and failed to win a single game on their travels in the Premier League! On the strength of their home form City finished a reasonable fourteenth, eleven points clear of trouble.
Thanks to CCFPA’s Mike Young for sourcing the images.
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