Giant killing, what giant killing? Albion hit the Shots for six
They were all there for the upset. 5,300 Aldershot fans, the Match of the Day cameras, journalists from every national newspaper. All of them had descended on the Recreation Ground on Saturday November 18th 2000 expecting to see a piece of FA Cup giant killing.
Sorry to have disappointed you, guys. For once, Brighton gave a thoroughly professional performance against non-league opponents as Micky Adams’ Division Three promotion chasers hammered their Ryman League hosts 6-2.
At 2.50pm, the ingredients were all there for a cup upset. A raucous atmosphere in a fantastic, ramshackle stadium that was something straight out of the 1980s. A sloping pitch, driving rain and wannabe giant killers who topped their league table with only one defeat to their name all season.
Not to mention Brighton’s appalling record against non-league opposition. In the six previous seasons, the Albion had failed to beat part timers four times.
Kingstonian (1994), Sudbury Town (1996) and Hereford United (1997) had all eliminated the Seagulls from the competition and it required a brilliant Nicky Rust save in the final seconds away at Canvey Island to scrape a 2-2 draw and earn a replay from the 1995 trip to Essex.
Then there was also the interest in Aldershot themselves as a phoenix club. In March 1992, the Shots folded under crippling bankruptcy with two months of the Division Four season still left to play.
They reformed in the Isthmian League and had worked their way up with three promotions in the intervening nine years. The Albion’s visit was a chance for them to mix it with the professionals again and continue their remarkable rise.
Former Albion winger Clive Walker wrote in The Non League Paper in the week preceding the game that Aldershot were the best bet for an upset in the first round. Even a bloke who played 130 times for Brighton – including in a Wembley play off final – was writing us off.
That’s what attracted the BBC to Hampshire. Only once in the previous 15 years had Brighton been on Match of the Day and that was for their elimination at Hereford, a match whose appeal was largely based on the grudge element given that just six months had passed since the drama of the final day of the 1996-97 season at Edgar Street.
The BBC got their wish of an upset that day, but there was no repeat on this occasion. The away end at the Rec was accessed via a winding path through a forest, which was apt as all the media who had arrived mob handed expecting a giant killing couldn’t see the wood for the trees. This Brighton side were different.
As Micky Adams told the press mob afterwards, “That’s why you were here and the Match of the Day cameras, hoping there would be an upset. My team talk was quite easy after that. We kept a low profile all week, kept our mouths shut and came and did the job.”
It took just three minutes for the Albion to get that job underway. Charlie Oatway was brought down 25 yards out from goal and his midfielder partner Richard Carpenter duly stepped up to score a trademark free kick to give the visitors the perfect start.
Brighton were completely dominant for the first 20 minutes and should have been out of sight, Gary Hart and Bobby Zamora both missing good chances.
They paid for that profligacy when Aldershot equalised against the run of play on the half hour mark. Future Crystal Palace striker Wayne Andrews was fouled in the box by Danny Cullip and Gary Abbott smashed home the resulting penalty.
For all of 15 minutes, the hopes of a cupset were back on. Andrews was giving Kerry Mayo a torrid time and the Shots supporters were roaring their approval.
That’s where Adams’ squad began to show their sizeable character. Those Brighton sides from years gone by who so regularly fell to non league opposition might have crumbled at that point, but a team with the likes of Cullip, Oatway and Carpenter had fight in them – and not the sort that saw three Aldershot pubs get smashed up by Albion fans before the game.
Two minutes before half time and the visitors retook the lead through a penalty of their own when Shots goalkeeper Andy Pape sent Zamora sprawling and Paul Watson converted the spot kick.
Brighton had the Rec’s significant slope in their favour in the second half and they took full advantage of it to run riot and add four more goals.
Oatway, a man hardly known for his goal scoring ability, netted an absolute screamer when he curled one into Pape’s top corner from distance after a scampering run from Nathan Jones.
Jones earned Brighton their second penalty of the afternoon when Pape somehow ended up grabbing the Albion winger around the neck rather than catching the ball when attempting to gather a cross, allowing Watson to complete his brace with another successful conversion.
Zamora then finally got in on the act with Brighton’s fourth, heading home from close range after Hart deflected a cross his way. Remarkably, that was Zamora’s first away goal of the season – give he’d end the campaign with 31, the fact it took him three months to net away from Withdean was astonishing.
Matt Wicks (likes a drink) got the sixth when Hart helped Oatway’s corner onto the back post. Aldershot fans did get something to cheer with two minutes remaining when Abbott headed home, but the chance of the giant killing that the media frenzy had suggested was going to happen was long since gone.
As a result, some Brighton fans thought that the BBC might move the highlights down the order from their feature tie given the demolition job.
They didn’t. In fact, once we’d all got home and taken several hours to dry out, the game got a full 10 minutes. Mark Lawrenson even went so far as to say, “It’s always nice to see one of your old clubs doing well.”
Shame the rest of the country who wanted the upset to take place didn’t think so.
