CITY 3 EVERTON 1
League Division 1
20th April 1981
Attendance 34,434
Scorers
City Bennett(58), Reeves(73), MacKenzie(88)
Everton Varadi(86)
Ref Brian Martin
City Corrigan, Henry, McDonald, Reid, Power, Booth, Bennett, Tueart, MacKenzie, Buckley, Sugrue – sub Reeves(46)
Everton McDonagh, Gidman, Ratcliffe, Wright, Lyons, Lodge, Megson, Eastoe, Varadi, Hartford, McBride – sub Sharp(80)
FROM THE PRESS BOX
PATRICK BARCLAY WRITING IN THE GUARDIAN 21ST APRIL 1981
Four goals in the last half an hour, three of them to Manchester City, helped a sizeable Maine Road crowd to forget the boredom of what had been a dull, and occasionally ugly, afternoon’s play.
There may, however, be lingering after elfects for the City’s left back, McDonald, who sustained possible ligament damage to his left knee and was led from the field. leaving his side with 10 men for the last 23 minutes. McDonald must at this stage be considered doubtful for the FA Cup Finail on May 9.
He had originally injured the knee when receiving a harsh challenge from McBride early on for which the Everton player escaped even a caution.
After Bennett, a sufferer from Lyons on more than one occasion, had opened the scoring with his third goal in two matches over Easter, there was only one likely result. Reeves put. the FA Cup finalists in more emphatic control and although Varadi headed home for Everton late on, it only spurred City to further effort, Mackenzie scoring their third with a minute left.
City, who were without Caton and Ranson because of injury and Gow and Hutchison as a precaution against their exceeding 20 disciplinary points deserved to win if only because they always looked interested in doing so. Everton whose manager Gordon Lee is expected to be dismissed shortly, simply went through the motions of fulfilling the fixture.
In spite of the opposition’s weakness, City took a long time to find any sort of‘pattern, perhaps not surprisingly in view of the changes. John Bond, their manager, made an additional. unforced alteration by relegating Reeves to Substiute and it was not until he
appeared in place of the disapointing Sugrue for the second half that City looked dangerous.
Reeves was not involved, however, in the first goal, which owed much to a superbly-judged pass by Booth, who caught out an advancing defence and gave Buckley the chance to drive powerfully at goal. McDonagh parried the ball, but only to Bennett, who scored. Lyons gave away the
second goal after 73 minutes with a misplaced pass that Tueart helped on to Reeves, who drove powerfully wide of the goalkeeper.