On This Day – 26th September
It was on this day back in 1960 that the first matches were played in the League Cup.
Alan Hardaker, the former Football League secretary was widely regarded as the man who devised the competition. However, he revealed in his autobiography that the idea came from Sir Stanley Rous, then secretary of the Football Association.
Arsenal, Luton Town, Sheffield Wednesday, Tottenham Hotspur, West Bromwich Albion and Wolverhampton Wanderers all decided against playing in the inaugural competition.
The first games to be played in the First Round fixtures were played on 26th September. Bristol Rovers hosted Fulham and Charlton Athletic travelled to West Ham United. The honour of scoring the first goal in the competition went to Fulham’s Maurice Cook, but Rovers won the game 2-1. West Ham won the other game 3-1.
Aston Villa and Rotherham United played out the first Final in the competition, which consisted of two legs played at each club’s home ground. Rotherham won the first leg 2-0 at Millmoor before Aston Villa won the return leg 3-0 after extra time. The Final wouldn’t be played at Wembley until six years later.
Clubs took the League Cup seriously for the next thirty years as the winners qualified for the UEFA Cup. It was only when Manchester United manager Alex Ferguson began the trend in the mid 90’s to play some of his reserve and youth team players in the competition that the tournament became less important.
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