Octobers Past

Apologies that once again I have resorted to a picture of some objects from the archives, but it was either that or a picture of the TV screen during Strictly this evening, and I'm generally not a fan of TV screen blips!
So it's a selection of old football programmes from Octobers past.
A couple from my days at Durham when I made trips up to Newcastle to watch the Toon on Saturdays when the college team I played for didn't have a game, or had played in the morning. The first is from October 1982 when a Fulham team managed by ex-Newcastle favourite Malcolm Macdonald humbled the home team 1-4. Even with Kevin Keegan in the team. A year later, S and I went to see Newcastle play Man City. On what is still one of my favourite memories of watching sport, Newcastle won 5-0. A hat-trick from Beardsley and goals from Keegan and Waddle on an afternoon when fantastic football meant that nothing else mattered.
A year on I was still a student but now in London. I stayed in halls on Rosebery Avenue, within walking distance of Highbury. Which is where QPR played Partizan Belgrade in Europe, because of the plastic pitch at Loftus Road. As you might be able to tell from the state of the programme cover it was a very wet night. Standing on the North Bank I saw QPR win 6-2. They lost the away leg 0-4 and went out on away goals.
The following year I was living and working in Edinburgh, having started work in the IT department at Scottish & Newcastle Breweries. I won a couple of tickets in a competition run to that year's Skol Cup Final, and went to Hampden with M, my girlfriend at the time. We saw Hibs lose 0-3 to Aberdeen, and as we were nominally supporting the Edinburgh team, it was the start of a series of unsuccessful visits to the national stadium to watch football.
The programme from 1986 is from another game in a grand stadium, but the match was low-key - Meadowbank v East Stirling in the Scottish Second Division. Meadowbank won 1-0.
The next two years are both mementos of Dundee United's Euro campaigns. In 1987 they were in the UEFA Cup and as finalists the previous year expected to beat Czech side Vitkovice. Instead they lost 1-2 at home and 2-3 on aggregate. A year later they were in the Cupwinners Cup against Dynamo Bucharest. Again a home defeat (0-1) and 1-2 defeat on aggregate.
Two Edinburgh programmes to complete this little set. Hearts in Europe against Dniepr in 1990 - I met D and M there and saw Hearts win 3-1 on the night, 4-2 on aggregate on another wet night standing on the terraces. And Hibs against Partick from 1994. Hibs won 3-0.

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