HAMMARBY IF 3 CITY 3
Friendly
18th July 1972
attendance ???
Scorers
City Lee (?, ? and 82)
Hammarby ?
FROM THE PRESS BOX
PETER GARDNER WRITING IN THE MANCHESTER EVENING NEWS 19TH JULY 1972
As ineffective as England were against West Germany, that was the jibe being thrown at Manchester City by Swedish critics today.
And, after an inept performance against the amateurs of Hammerby, the Blues were warned by Terry Neill, player manager of Hull City, the team they must now beat tomorrow night to qualify for the final of this international club competition.
“If Manchester City are to be recognised as one of the great and professional sides in Europe, they have got to learn to be ruthless killers determined to crush such mediocre opposition as this.”
City scratched and fiddled their way to an embarrassing 3-3 draw against a side who are just three places from bottom of the 12 strong Swedish League.
Certainly the Blues could do no worse than they did in this game where the only real sparkle was provided by Francis Lee’s hat-trick.
He proved all was well again following a summer relaxing after his breakdown at the end of the last season. But, sad to say, the rest of the City galaxy of stars looked pretty sick.
Rodney Marsh, despite all the hard work he has put in reducing his weight during training, was rarely in the game. Little was seen of skipper Colin Bell and only late in the game when he started to make positive runs, did he impress.
Mike Summerbee was too tightly marked to be effective and it was left to Ian Mellor to emerge as City’s most encouraging forward, for two of Lee’s goals were from penalties.
Mellor at times looked extremely useful and with Alan Oakes as consistent as ever. I made them City’s best players in a game where newcomer Colin Barrett impressed in the first half but the spoiled himself by being cautioned for a reckless kick at an opponent.
Mike Doyle was also booked in the first half, when City built what seemed a commanding lead.
That was squandered within six minutes of the second half starting, as Hammerby quickly equalised and then took the lead after an hour. It was not until eight minutes from the end that Lee hit the equaliser.
Altogether a highly unsatisfactory start for City’s pre-season build-up and improvement must be made against confident Hull tomorrow.