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The 1980 European Cup Final was a football match held at the Santiago Bernabéu Stadium, Madrid, on May 28, 1980, that saw Nottingham Forest F.C. of England defeat Hamburger SV of Germany 1 - 0. In the 21st minute, John Robertson squeezed a right foot shot wide of Hamburg keeper Rudolf Kargus into the corner of the net, to give Nottingham Forest back-to-back European Cup final victories. The victory also meant that Forest became the first club to date that has won the European Cup more times than their domestic first division.
[edit] Match Summary
The 25th anniversary of the European Cup Final, was to be held at the home of the most successful team in the competitions history, the Santiago Bernabéu Stadium in Madrid. Sadly, the presence of two of Europe’s lesser known clubs in the final meant that the ground was barely half full for such a prestigious occasion, but that did not mean that the match mattered any less to the two teams involved. Both, however, were hampered by injury to their star centre-forwards. Forest were without Trevor Francis who had torn an Achilles tendon, while Hamburg’s Horst Hrubesch had an ankle injury which meant that he was relegated to the substitutes bench.
With Kevin Keegan taking his position at the head of the Hamburg attack, the Germans made a bright start as Forest took up the defensive positions that they would keep for most of the game. During the opening twenty minutes, the English team rarely ventured outside their own half while Hamburg piled on the pressure. During that time, the nearest anyone came to a goal was when Shilton tipped a Felix Magath free-kick round the post with an outstanding fingertip save. But despite all their possession, Hamburg could not find the net, while Forest on almost their first venture up field found themselves in the lead. Having exchanged passes with Garry Birtles on the left hand side, John Robertson, Forest’s Scottish winger moved inside and as he approached the penalty area, struck a low right footed shot that beat Kargus in the Hamburg goal, hit the inside of his left hand post and into the net.
Hamburg looked to have made an immediate recovery when Reiman slotted home after Peter Shilton had parried a Felix Magath shot, but the linesmans flag was up for offside and the celebrations were stopped. And that was as close as they came to equalising. From then on Forest performed a classic rearguard action. It was nothing that had not been seen many times before over the previous two years with Burns and Lloyd stopping nearly every attack that the opposition could throw at them and Peter Shilton behind them brilliantly keeping out the few chances carved out from the few occasions that his defenders were beaten. The Forest players ran and harried the opposition until some of them could barely stand, but in the end hard work and determination triumphed over greater skill and technique as Nottingham Forest ran out 1-0 winners to retain the trophy that they had won in Munich a year earlier.
It had not been a great game and with it coming on such a significant anniversary for the competition was compared unfavourably with previous finals by many commentators. But for the romance of a small club triumphing over the biggest names in Europe for the second time, and for the triumph of pride and hard work, it was a story to rank with the best finals of all. Shorn of their most exciting player, Brian Clough’s Nottingham Forest had taken the European Cup back to England once again. Nottingham Forest would never touch such heights again in Europe, but they will go down in history as the small town club who showed just what was possible as they won and retained Europe’s biggest prize.
[edit] Match details
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
Nottingham Forest F.C.
Antonio Garrido
