“EVERYTHING on wheels is on the road tonight,” a Glasgow driver observed.
From late afternoon onwards on Wednesday, May 18, 1960, an endless procession of cars, taxis and buses drove in bright sunlight, guided by shirt-sleeved policemen at every corner, to Hampden Park, where Real Madrid were aiming to beat Eintracht Frankfurt that evening to lift the European Cup for the fifth successive year. By 6.30pm, touts outside the ground were selling tickets at their original prices; just before kick-off, reported the Glasgow Herald, they were giving them away. The official attendance inside was 127, 621.
Real won 7-3, and for our sportswriter Cyril Horne, it was the finest game he had seen in his 35-plus years of watching football. Never in Scotland, or even Britain, had there been a spectacle such as this, he wrote. Long before the final whistle, “Scots in their entirety were glorying in the Real display.” The Germans had been bewildered for long periods by great feats of ball control, from Alfredo Di Stéfano and Ferenc Puskás in particular. Puskás scored four goals; Di Stéfano the other three (including the one pictured here, Real’s second goal of the match). “We may not see another European Cup final until we are much older,” said Horne, “but we shall remember this one as long as we live.” On behalf of Scotland he thanked the Spaniards “for showing us a new, glorious game.”
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