The Day United Got Gassed Entering Anfield
You think the relationship between Scousers and Mancs is bad now? You should have been there in 1986
THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN Liverpool and Manchester United is often described as “toxic.” On at least one occasion, that description was literal.
The ‘Super Sunday’ propaganda will amp up the atmosphere at Anfield when the teams meet this week but there have been times in the past when the levels of hatred went beyond frenzied.
In February 1986, the United squad and staff were sprayed with a noxious substance as they entered Anfield. They were gassed. And, to be brutally honest, those of us on the Kop thought it was great.
I’ve written quite a lot about the relationship between the cities of Liverpool and Manchester and how economic rivalry manifested itself in football but things seemed to become much more fractious between Scousers and Mancs in the late 1970s. By the start of the next decade, civil disorder was rampant on match days.
United came mob-handed into the Kop in 1981. The police penned them in at the back, behind the strange wall that was situated at the Kemlyn Road side of the end. Most Kopites spent the game looking backwards rather than at the pitch as the fighting continued.
I remember watching a fella we knew being arrested and hauled along the running track behind the goal with four policemen holding his arms and legs as he flailed his limbs in an attempt to escape. We were impressed. The tableau showed off his cutting-edge training shoes beautifully to the packed Kop.
“Nice Forest Hills,” I recall my mate saying. Another joined in the fashion critique. “They work superbly with his duffle coat.” Yes, Wayne was a Scouse hero on so many levels that day.
It’s strange the things you stay with you.
But by 1986 we thought the hatred had passed its crescendo. The FA Cup semi-final at Goodison Park the previous year had reached a level of violence that was beyond what was acceptable even in the Scally world we inhabited.
So we weren’t expecting anything particularly wild on that Sunday in February. There was even some rapprochement between the cities.
The previous night, The Smiths, New Order and The Fall had played the Royal Court in support of Liverpool City Council, who were engaged in a political battle with Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative Government. The event was called From Manchester With Love.
There wasn’t much love in the American Bar, a quarter of a mile away from the gig. The place was bouncing to the tune of “Manchester, wank, wank, wank,” but that was not unusual. It was just another Saturday night in the Yankee.
Sunday erupted, though. Ron Atkinson, the United manager at the time, talked me through the events of the day for Two Tribes, my book on the 1985-86 season.
“Anfield was always difficult,” Atkinson said. “I’d say to the players: ‘Don’t moan about them kicking you. Kick them first!’ It was war in a positive sense.” All positivity disappeared on the approach to the players’ entrance.
There had been some changes to the stadium since United’s most recent visit. “In previous years, the coach used to pull right up to the players’ entrance,” Atkinson said. “You’d be right up against the door, down the steps and into the ground.”
On this day, the bus stopped some way from the stadium. “There was now an overhanging shelter above the players’ entrance,” Atkinson continued. “You couldn't get the coach as close to the door because of it. We were parked about 25 yards away. We had to go through the crowd.”
United expected some verbal abuse and jostling. Instead they got gassed. “I felt something wet on my hand,” Atkinson said. “I thought for some reason it was wet paint. It wasn’t. It was some kind of gas spray.”
Atkinson, who is a Scouser himself, panicked. “I ran inside and don’t remember much about it,” he said. “My eyes were stinging. Mick Brown, one of my assistants, said I was throwing people out of the way. I didn’t see who it was. Mick said I hurled Kenny Dalglish and Alan Hansen aside.”
Bryan Robson, United’s talismanic captain, helped a number of children who had been caught up in the incident. Most of the team went straight out onto the pitch for fresh air – and catcalls from the Kop.
No one was sure what the spray was. It was suggested that it was either ammonia or CS gas. None of the players were harmed. A 12-year-old was taken to hospital but quickly discharged; 22 supporters, many of them children, were affected.
The players put it out of their mind. “We just got on with it,” Atkinson said.
The game ended in a 1-1 draw. It was overshadowed by the assault.
The curious thing is that, although the fans despised each other, players on both sides had a good relationship. Even now, mention Robson to the likes of Dalglish and Graeme Souness and the respect is obvious. “You always had to keep an eye on him,” Souness told me. “He’d hurt you [on the pitch] or hit you [physically].”
“We had a great rapport,” Atkinson said. “After the match it was back to my office for a drink or the Boot Room for a beer. The players got on great, too. It was a battle on the pitch but friendly off it.”
The next time United came to Anfield, Bob Paisley sat at the front of their team bus to discourage any further attacks. When the teams came out before the kick off, they carried special balls. Liverpool kicked theirs into the away section and United punted theirs into the Kop.
Both sets of fans threw them back. They didn’t want a gesture like this. A single song rang around Anfield as Scousers and Mancs expressed the same thought: “You can stick your fucking balls up your arse.”
For once, Reds of both stripes were in agreement. That’s the way it should be.
Gassing is going too far, but let’s not pretend to be mates. Not on match day.
Far Foreign Land, a book about Istanbul and Liverpool’s supporter culture from the 1960s to 2005, is available here £10 UK, £15 Europe, £18 Rest Of World. All including postage. Get it in time for the 20th anniversary in May. Stocks are limited.