1982 European Cup Final
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The 1982 European Cup Final was played on 26th May 1982. English champions Aston Villa defeated West German league winners Bayern Munich 1-0 at De Kuip Stadium in Rotterdam, Netherlands to win the European Cup.
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[edit] Match Summary
On a warm and humid night in Rotterdam, a Bayern Munich team featuring the World Cup winning midfield playmaker Paul Breitner, the European Footballer of the Year Karl-Heinz Rummenigge and experienced German internationals such as Uli Hoeness and Klaus Augenthaler took to the field as strong favourites against an Aston Villa side that boasted only a handful of international appearances and a disappointing league season. On the other hand, Aston Villa were bidding to take the European Cup back to England for the sixth year in a row.
The English team started brightly with both Withe and cental defender Allan Evans going close. But with only eight minutes of the game gone, the odds on Aston Villa achieving an unlikely victory became even higher as their experienced goalkeeper Jimmy Rimmer was forced to leave the field following the recurrence of a neck injury picked up in training a day earlier. He was replaced by 23 year old Nigel Spink who, prior to being unexpectedly called upon to play in a European Cup final, had only one senior game to his name - a 2-1 defeat to Nottingham Forest in 1979.
Bayern Munich needed to put immediate pressure on this new young goalkeeper, but they were unable to trouble Nigel Spink for another twenty minutes and by then, as he demonstrated so ably, he had rid himself of any nerves that may have been affecting him. Thirty minutes were on the clock when, within the space of a minute both Durnberger and Karl-Heinz Rummenigge were thwarted by Spinks acrobatics. Moments later, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge had another goal attempt as he beat Nigel Spink with an overhead kick, but sent it just wide of the goal.
Towards the end of the first half and at the beginning of the second, Bayern Munich threatened to overwhelm Villa as they exerted almost constant pressure on the English defence. Klaus Augenthaler shot narrowly wide, Durnberger forced Nigel Spink to make another save, and Swain had to head an Klaus Augenthaler effort off the line. Uli Hoeness and Udo Horsmann also came close and it seemed only a matter of time before the Germans would make the breakthrough. But in the end it was Aston Villa who struck first. After 66 minutes, Gary Shaw found Tony Morley running down the left wing. Tony Morley twisted and turned as he tried to shake off the attentions of Klaus Augenthaler, before sending a low cross into the area where he found an unmarked Withe who, just six yards out, prodded the ball onto the post and into the goal.
There was still plenty of time left, but Bayern Munich were rarely able to threaten the goal again as they had done before Withe struck. With two minutes left, however, they seemed to have finally made the breakthrough as Hoeness’s shot beat Nigel Spink and hit the back of the net, only for Bayern Munich to be denied by the linesman raising his flag for offside.
That was Bayern’s last chance, and moments later, Aston Villa were crowned European champions. The English domination of the European Cup had been continued by a team that had lost its manager in controversial circumstances at a crucial stage of the season, and had lost 15 league games in a campaign that had seen them finish in a lowly 11th place. Not only that, but their man of the match was a young goalkeeper playing only the second senior game of his career. Bayern Munich had certainly possessed the bigger names and had much more experience of European and international football, but Aston Villa had proved, just as they had in winning the English league championship a year earlier, that as a team they were a match for any collection of big name players. Under the previously unheralded Tony Barton, and before that Ron Saunders, they had been forged into a team that was strong in defence as well as being fast and effective in attack, and now they had carried off Europe’s biggest prize.
It represented a huge success in his first season as manager for Tony Barton. He had only taken over as Villa boss before the quarter-finals after the shock resignation of legendary Villa coach Ron Saunders.
It was to get worse for Bayern players Dremmler, Breitner and Rummenigge. That summer they were part of the West Germany team that lost to Italy in the World Cup final in Spain.
As defending European champions Villa were invited into the European Cup, European Super Cup and World Club Cup for the following season. Their defence of the European Cup ended in a quarter-final defeat to a Michel Platini-inspired Juventus. They beat FC Barcelona 3-1 on aggregate to win the Super Cup, but lost 2-0 to Uruguay club Penarol for the World Club Cup in Tokyo, Japan.
[edit] Match Details
| 25th May, 1982 | |||
 Aston Villa |
1-0 |  Bayern Munich |
Feijenoord Stadion, Rotterdam |
| Withe 67' |
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- Referee
Georges Konrath
Attendance 39,776
Other Villa players who played some part in their European Cup campaign -
Brendan Ormsby, Terry Donovan, Andy Blair, Ivor Linton.
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
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