Heroes & Villains – Blackpool
Hero – Stanley Matthews
There can only be one hero for The Tangerines and that is Sir Stanley Matthews.
‘The Wizard of the Dribble’ played for Blackpool for 14 years, between 1947 and 1961.
Matthews won the FA Cup for Blackpool in 1953, helping to turn things around after Bolton went 3-1 ahead with 35 minutes to go.
Matthews put in a fantastic performance and Blackpool won the game 4-3. Stan Mortensen netted a hat-trick that day for Blackpool but the Final will forever be remembered as ‘The Matthews Final’.
In his time at Bloomfield Road, Matthews played in 379 league matches, scoring 17 times but set-up countless more goals.
Fans from all over the country would flock to watch a match involving the great man. His name alone would add several thousand on the gate.
An article in the ‘On This Day’ on 23rd February marked the date that Matthews passed away. The article can be found here.
Villain – The Oyston’s
Karl Oyston was the owner of the Bloomfield Road club from 1987 having bought the club for the nominal sum of £1.
In recent years there have been many protests and fan boycotts to try and oust the Oyston family from the club. It is hard to find anyone hated by a set of fans in the world of football!
The Oyston’s reign was finally over in February 2019 when the club was put into receivership. A court ruling was also made that Owen Oyston had to pay fellow director Valerie Belokon £25 million.
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