GEORGE F. ALLISON : The Way to
Wembley'
LET THERE BE no confusion. G. F. Allison , this evening, is not to tell you how to get to Wembley, but how Manchester City and Portsmouth have got there ; how it is they are to play each other in the Cup Final next Saturday.
The way to Wembley, in that sense, is an arduous one, and, as the Cup Finalists would be the first to admit, one governed by luck as well as by merit. The luck of health, the luck of the draw, the luck of the game. To quote the Spurs' centre-half : ! Luck plays a big part in football '.
Listeners will remember
Arthur Rowe 's broadcast at the beginning of February, when he pointed out that to win the Cup and also to be top of the League in the same season, a team had to play six Cup Ties (without counting replays) and forty-two League games ; at least forty-eight matches in a thirty-six week season. To keep fit, fresh ; never to get stale. It will be seen
what Manchester City and Portsmouth have achieved to reach the Cup Final.
On April 28 they will walk out over the grass to a storm of cheers, fleet of foot and well-muscled as the grey-hounds that race round it at night. And the Cup will be carried back in triumph to Manchester or to Portsmouth, just as luck and skill decide. Then for one more year months of anxiety will be at an end. Not until next autumn need managers and trainers and captains worry about injuries, illness, loss of form, unsettling influences at home. They will be talking of Wembley, 1934, with their eyes fixed all the time on Wembley, 1935, while they think out the way there.