ROTHERHAM UNITED 0 CITY 1
League Division 2
4th May 1966
Attendance 11,376
Scorer Bell(47)
Ref G Grundy
City Dowd, Kennedy, Horne, Pardoe, Heslop, Oakes, Summerbee, Bell, Young, Crossan, Connor – sub Doyle(unused)
Rotherham Jones, Wilcockson, Clish, Casper, Haselden, Tiler, Lyons, Chappell, Galley, Chambers, Pring
When these sides met in May 1966 City were on the verge of gaining promotion to the First Division. Rotherham weren’t too far behind, although a position in the top ten was clearly going to be the best they could hope for. Manchester born Jack Mansell was Rotherham’s manager, while City were enjoying their first season under Joe Mercer.
City knew a win would bring promotion, and when a Neil Young cross was superbly headed past Ashton born Rotherham `keeper Rod Jones by Colin Bell, all Blues started to celebrate. The match ended 1-0 and City were up.
COLIN BELL HEADS CITY INTO THE 1ST DIVISION
…There had no real pressure on us at Mill Moor that day with four more games remaining, but, nevertheless, we wanted to win. The changing rooms were fairly basic and almost totally constructed from wood. You could shake hands with person opposite you because it was so narrow, unlike the big square rooms in most grounds.
I don’t remember much about the game, although I know that by half-time my ankle was very swollen. They couldn’t take me off because there were no substitutions allowed [I think Colin’s memory was struggling here as Mike Doyle was sub and not used] so they strapped my ankle on the outside of the boot. If I’d taken the boot off, I probably wouldn’t have got it back on again. I played like that throughout the second half. It was during that period, playing down the hill, that I scored the vital goal to give us a 1-0 win and secure our place in the First division. I don’t think I’ve been back to Rotherham since.
