The Magic of the Cup – 1973/1974 Season

The 1973/74 F.A. Cup season was one of the most remarkable on record, not simply on the pitch, but off it too.

It brought us a first taste of competitive Sunday football in this country as the nation grappled with the oil crisis and the three-day week and clubs battled to find electrical generators to fuel floodlit football.

Bideford played more F.A. Cup games in a single season that any other club ever has, before or since, and still only made it to Round One. Newcastle United looked as though they might equal the record as they went through replay after replay before a riot threatened their very place in the competition.

But it all ended with Liverpool's Bill Shankly winning the competition for the second time as a manager and concluding that that was fulfilment enough for any man, leaving the stage to the shock of a nation.

With a revealing director's commentary on the season as a whole from Newcastle United's Alan Kennedy – later a Liverpool legend – and full coverage across the season using contemporary and newly researched sources, "The Magic of the Cup 1973/74" is the comprehensive story of a classic season in the story of the world's greatest cup competition. Published in 2020.

Size: 148mm x 210mm – 194 pages.