One Moment in Time – Triple hat-trick against Huddersfield…not that I was there! | OneFootball

Imagine wanting to watch City only to be told by your Dad that you’re not going to the match because he thinks it’ll be a bore draw and then finding out you’ve missed one of the most entertaining games in the club’s history!

Well, that’s exactly what happened to Alex Livesey, a true Blue and now one of the UK’s most highly respected sports photographers.

Livesey has travelled the world covering major sporting events including the Summer and Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games, FIFA World Cups, UEFA European Championships, UEFA Champions League Finals, Rugby World Cups, the Tour de France and numerous Grand Slam tennis events.

He has also found himself in some weird and wonderful places covering events as diverse as ice golf on a course 590km north of the Arctic Circle in Greenland and horse racing on the frozen lake of St Moritz.

But that afternoon in 1987 with City v Huddersfield on the horizon, the only place he wanted to be was Maine Road.

It was a November day and City were languishing in Division Two after being relegated from the top-flight the previous campaign.

It’s fair to say that Alex wasn’t too impressed when he checked the scores later that evening.

“My Dad had season tickets in the Main Stand for years so we used to go every week until we got relegated in 1986/87.

“My Dad was fed up of going and said ‘I’m not having season tickets this season, we’re just going to go when we feel like going’.

“This was the first season where we didn’t have season tickets and I asked my Dad if we could go to that Huddersfield match.

“His words were: ‘We’re not going to bother going to that, it’s got 0-0 written all over it’.

“I put the results on the TV on the old VidiPrinter after the match.

“We were waiting for the score to come up and it said ‘Manchester City 10’ but it also wrote the word ‘TEN’ just to confirm it wasn’t a mistake. Then Huddersfield 1.

“I said ‘I can’t believe you didn’t take us!’ I laugh about it now. That’s one match I wish I’d gone to.”

As for the details of this memorable Maine Road match, Neil McNab opened the scoring with a powerful left-footed drive, before Paul Stewart, David White and Tony Adcock completed the rout with a hat-trick apiece.

Former City man Andy May grabbed the visitors a consolation at 9-0, but it would do nothing to dampen the spirits of the crowd, who witnessed a truly memorable performance from Mel Machin’s men.

After the game, the famous photograph above was taken by Bob Thomas showing our hat-trick heroes with the match ball.

Although we put 11 past Lincoln City in 1895, this result remains our largest winning margin in a league fixture.

Sorry about that, Alex!