Fulham 10 Ipswich 1

[knockin on heavens door 0]

Happy days, from The Guardian yesterday

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/blog/2011/dec/23/joy-of-six-christmas-football-matches

Fulham 10-1 Ipswich Town (December 26, 1963)

It''s extremely difficult not to spring to the conclusion that, back in the day, players used to stagger through the Christmas fixtures absolutely paggered on egg nog. What other explanation is there for the high scores and crazy swings synonymous with holidays past?

The most famous example of festive fluctuations came, of course, on Boxing Day 1963. It would be churlish not to run through that day''s classifieds, though we should probably all know them off by heart now: Blackpool 1-5 Chelsea, Burnley 6-1 Manchester United, Fulham 10-1 Ipswich Town, Leicester City 2-0 Everton, Liverpool 6-1 Stoke City, Nottingham Forest 3-3 Sheffield United, West Bromwich Albion 4-4 Tottenham Hotspur, Sheffield Wednesday 3-0 Bolton Wanderers, Wolverhampton Wanderers 3-3 Aston Villa, West Ham United 2-8 Blackburn Rovers. (According to the Times, the 66 goals were attributable to "a mixture of icy conditions in some places" and "rain and slush in others". No mention of egg nog. We''re not buying it.)

The most noteworthy result of the day had been at Craven Cottage: a club record win that stands to this day for Fulham, a club record thrashing that is still the blackest mark on Ipswich Town''s book. Even so, the score wasn''t the biggest surprise in the world: Jackie Milburn''s piss-poor Ipswich side had already shipped 58 goals in 23 games, and were already shoo-ins for relegation, a mere 18 months after becoming league champions under Alf Ramsey. Ipswich were steadily useless: they were 5-1 down at half time, and Fulham just kept on trucking. Graham Leggatt was the main man for the Cottagers, scoring a hat-trick in four minutes. Bobby Howfield – who later became a place kicker in the NFL for the Denver Broncos and the New York Jets – wasn''t far behind Leggatt, with a hat-trick of his own.

The other big score of the day – OK, the other really big score – came at Upton Park, where West Ham were skelped all over the shop, eight goals to two, by Blackburn. Again, though, it wasn''t totally a surprise: Rovers were the league leaders, Fred Pickering and Andy McEvoy both helping themselves to a hat-trick. ("Everything West Ham did was tinged with misfortune," wrote Albert Barham in the Guardian, "while everything Blackburn did was coldly calculated and correct.")

Notable events were everywhere. At Burnley, Manchester United were annihilated 6-1, Andy Lochhead scoring four times. It could have been much worse for United, too: according to Eric Todd of this paper, "United''s goal had several astonishing escapes". A surprise, seeing United were chasing the title? Sort of, but not really: they''d gone down 4-0 at Everton on the previous Saturday. (Down in the Second Division, incidentally, Manchester City were trouncing Scunthorpe 8-1 at Maine Road, Jimmy Murray and Matt Gray with hat-tricks, Derek Kevan with two.) At Anfield, Roger Hunt scored four times for Liverpool against Stoke. Jimmy Greaves scored two at the Hawthorns, helping Spurs to a 4-2 lead over West Brom, but the Baggies boinged back, Don Howe scoring a late equaliser (having earlier missed a penalty).

But it was the advocaat-fuelled set of return fixtures two days later that really cemented the results into legend: Aston Villa 4-2 Wolverhampton Wanderers; Blackburn Rovers 1-3 West Ham United; Bolton Wanderers 3-0 Sheffield Wednesday; Chelsea 1-0 Blackpool; Everton 0-3 Leicester City; Ipswich Town 4-2 Fulham; Manchester United 5-1 Burnley; Sheffield United 1-2 Nottingham Forest; Tottenham Hotspur 0-2 West Bromwich Albion. West Ham, Manchester United and – most impressively – Ipswich Town had all avenged their Boxing Day humiliations. Though Ipswich wouldn''t receive much of a fillip from their face-saving win: they ended the season in last place, having let in 121 goals.

[Mister Chops 7]

I think the Man U 9 Binners 0 was also around that time of year.  I was working over the Uni holiday and staying in a Binner''s house so bought all the papers the next day and made him a special collage.

[Mister Chops 7]

http://www.trulyreds.com/20100824/a-premier-league-record-man-united-9-v-ipswich-0/Oh dear, how memory plays tricks.  4 March 1995.  Apologies.  Still, never a bad thing when the scum are routed at any time of year.