Assault, a ship and Shilts: When Leicester City won at Southampton
When most Leicester City fans think of Southampton away, the number nine comes to mind.
But it was a number one who made his mark at The Dell in 1967, while a Saints striker made more than one mark after Leicester’s first visit back in the 19th century.
Friday 13th October 1967: The RMS Queen Mary ocean liner sets sail from Southampton for the penultimate time, bound for Las Palmas. In just over two weeks, she will leave the south coast again on her 516th and final voyage to Long Beach, California and a long retirement.
The RMS Queen Mary ocean liner in New York
The once living and breathing Queen Mary had passed away 14 years earlier, but it was 34 years before that - in June 1919 - that she arrived at Leicester Midland Station with her husband, King George V, on the Royal Train. Huge crowds lined London Road, Granby Street and Gallowtree Gate to welcome the royal couple.
Shortly after their return to London, a letter arrived announcing the restoration of Leicester’s city status which had been revoked in the 11th century.
King George V and family, including Queen Mary seated on the right
So it was that Leicester Fosse, who had first visited Southampton in 1898 during the reign of George V’s grandmother Queen Victoria, became Leicester City.
Saturday 14th October 1967: It was pouring with rain on the south coast and Leicester City were warming up on a muddy pitch at The Dell. It was the first professional game of a lifelong love for the game for one local ten-year-old boy called Brian. That young boy was terrified by a group of Leicester fans who were wearing motorcycle helmets and giant leather gauntlets and stalking through all four stands at The Dell unsuccessfully seeking a scrap.
Brian would grow up to be two things: the Sports Editor of the Observer, and - with this eye-opening first experience standing on the terraces at Southampton lingering in the memory - a Portsmouth fan.
The Leicester goalkeeper that day was only eight years older than Brian, but he was already drawing comparisons with the man who stood between the sticks when England won the World Cup the previous year.
“This was a performance in the best tradition of his predecessor, Banks, and it must have broken the hearts of the opposition.”
So said the Leicester Mercury about Peter Shilton’s display against Southampton. It wasn’t his goalkeeping exploits that really captured the imagination and stuck in young Brian’s memory though.
The Sunday Sun reported:
“Southampton scored first - then walked into a blitz. In the last minute, Leicester goalkeeper Shilton punted the ball from his own goal area to bounce over Forsyth’s head into the Southampton net.”
Shilton could barely see what had happened. His team-mates pretended to him that Mike Stringfellow had put the ball into the net.
Indeed, when you spend a lot of time researching Leicester’s greatest away wins Stringfellow’s name comes up as a goalscorer time and time again.
He scored away from home on his debut for Leicester, although that came in a 2-1 defeat at Fulham. He scored the only goal at Anfield in 1964, the two goals that won Leicester the game at Old Trafford in 1966 and one of four that did the same at Highbury later that year.
So it would have been a believable lie. The week before the visit to The Dell, Leicester had beaten Bill Shankly’s Liverpool 2-1 at Filbert Street. Stringfellow scored twice in that game - and he would score twice in this one as Leicester thrashed Southampton by five goals to one.
It was only October but Shilton was the second keeper to score in the season. In August, Tottenham’s Pat Jennings had launched a huge kick upfield which bounced once and looped over Alex Stepney in the Manchester United goal, the second Spurs strike in a 3-3 draw in the Charity Shield at Old Trafford.
Six years later, Stepney would score two penalties in league games, the first of which was scored past Shilton in Leicester’s 2-1 win at Old Trafford in September 1973.
Stepney’s career didn’t suffer in the same fashion as the unfortunate Southampton goalkeeper Campbell Forsyth, who had raced back to claim Shilton’s kick but whose momentum from the mudslide took both him and the ball into the net. Forsyth was dropped after the game and retired from the game altogether at the end of the season.
Interestingly, in 1967 the Coventry Evening Telegraph had a “Filbert Street gossip” section:
“Goalkeeper Peter Shilton’s goal for Leicester City last week against Southampton is perhaps more significant than it would appear at first glance. It reflects the changing fortunes of the side, which two weeks ago was struggling at the very bottom of the table.
Now, the ball is bouncing right for them, and, although Peter’s goal may have been a lucky one, who could say that a 5-1 win against Southampton - their first defeat at home this season - was all due to work.
There can be no complaint about the 17-year-old, who, with more experience, should be a worthy successor to his one-time mentor at Filbert Street, Gordon Banks”.
In fact, Shilton had just turned 18 and he was picked for England Youth that week, for a game against Crystal Palace Under 19s at Selhurst Park.
The Dell in 2000 before it was demolished
Leicester’s first journey to Southampton had taken place as Fosse rather than City, back in the Victorian era. And it had not been for a match at The Dell, but at the nearby County Ground, the home of Hampshire County Cricket Club from 1885 to 2000. Southampton only played there for two seasons after their previous, excellently-named Antelope Ground was demolished. Eight months after Leicester Fosse’s visit to the County Ground in January 1898, The Dell was opened - which would, like Hampshire at the County Ground, be home to the club for more than 100 years.
For Leicester Fosse and City, it was the first of 14 trips to Southampton without a victory - right up until 1967. In fact, it took Leicester until the 13th visit in 1952 to reach double figures in goals - a feat nearly repeated in one evening 67 years later.
In 1898, Leicester Fosse were kind of a big deal. Lying seventh in the Second Division of the Football League, Fosse were viewed with relish as a potential giant-killing by the Southern League champions Southampton. The Saints had been sent to Shawford, halfway between Eastleigh and Winchester, for a week of additional training.
The Leicester Fosse team stayed at the Bedford Hotel. The building is still there, still called the Bedford, serving burgers and beers on Bedford Place in the city centre, not far from the railway station and a 20-minute walk from Southampton’s current home of St Mary’s.
The Bedford in Southampton
Leicester, meanwhile, were not coming into the game in good form despite their Football League status. They had lost their previous three games in January, all away from home, and conceding ten goals in the process to Blackpool, Burnley and Newcastle.
The Southampton Observer and Hampshire News was confident:
“If the players will rise to the occasion we account for the Fosse to-day, but let it be understood that they are meeting a determined side. It is reported from Leicester that about half of the Midland team are playing for their places to-day.”
Perhaps that extra week’s work paid off for Southampton’s players. The Southern Echo’s reporter was impressed by the hosts:
“For the first half hour of the game the Fossils were immeasurably the superior team, but they made the pace too hot to last, and suffered defeat by two goals to one. Superior stamina carried the Saints through.
As a matter of fact, they were almost as fresh at the end as at the beginning of the game, whereas the visitors were plainly distressed.”
Distress was the order of the day, because the drama surrounding Southampton FC on 29th January 1898 didn’t end with a famous victory over the Football League Fosse.
The Southern Echo’s report of what happened later that evening had three separate headlines, one underneath the other. The first: “After the battle was over”. The second: “Southampton’s centre-forward in trouble”. The third: “A footballer’s Saturday night adventures”.
In the court proceedings that follow, the prisoner’s name was Jack Farrell. His occupation was centre-forward for Southampton FC.
“Mary Ann Wareham, of Wellington Road, Freemantle, said that on Saturday night she was returning from town with her husband, and when near Blechynden Station, prisoner called out to her, and made use of an indecent expression. Her husband remonstrated with prisoner, who knocked her down, and also assaulted her husband.
Joseph Wareham, husband of the last witness, corroborated as to the language used and said he followed prisoner, and told him he should not leave him till he found a constable.
Prisoner them struck him in the eye, blacking it. Mrs Wareham then stepped in between them, and prisoner then knocked her down. There were three of prisoner’s “mates” with him, one of whom pushed his wife and kicked her hat, so witness took off his overcoat, and undid his belt to defend himself and wife.
Witness and his wife called for the police, and Sergeant Drew came up. Witness asked the sergeant to take prisoner’s name and address, but prisoner ran away. In reply to Mr Chipperfield, witness said prisoner was “quarrelsome drunk.”
Mr Lamport addressed the Court for the defence, and said how deeply the prisoner realised the terrible position he was placed in. Farrell had only that day led his team, the Southampton Football Club, to victory in the English Cup tie with Leicester Fosse, for the preparation for which he had undergone severe training.
After the match which had been so gloriously won, Farrell did a very unwise thing, and took two or three glasses of drink, which, coming after his training, undoubtedly was too much for him.”
Farrell was fined £5 and 12 shillings, which was paid straight away after which he left the Court with his friends.
Southampton Pier at the end of the Victorian era
A free man, Farrell helped Southampton continue their unlikely progress in the FA Cup. In the quarter-finals, he scored in a 4-0 win over First Division team Bolton Wanderers. His cup run ended in the semi-final, a 1-1 draw with Nottingham Forest, when he suffered an injury that ruled him out of the replay.
The replay was held at Crystal Palace on 23rd March 1898 and controversy reigned. Referee John Lewis halted the scoreless game with ten minutes left due to blizzard conditions. When play restarted, the blizzard got worse - but Lewis didn’t call a second stop to proceedings.
As the snow piled up, Forest scored two late goals to reach the final against Derby County. The 62,000 attendance at that game, also held at Crystal Palace, remains a record for a meeting between Derby County and Nottingham Forest.
Jack Farrell, meanwhile, left Southampton that summer to join his hometown club Stoke City, where - after short spells back at Southampton, at New Brighton Tower, at Northampton Town and West Ham United - he eventually returned and became, of course, a pub landlord.
A tale that takes in Leicester City, Stoke City, Nottingham Forest, Southampton and Derby County - the five clubs that would take up the vast majority of that 18-year-old Leicester goalkeeper’s long and illustrious career.
