8 Years

[RoversAlias]

No, not how long it'll be before we start being good again, but the amount of time that has passed since my favourite day as a Rovers supporter.

27th April 2013. Griffin Park. Marcello Trotta. And the great James Coppinger.

What are everyone's memories of that day?

 

[anton123]

Was a great day for me full of emotions I boarded the train to London with out a match ticket but was told a lad had 20 for the away end standing as his mother had connections to the match sponsors and got told to meet him in the boozer across from kings cross and the excitement started from there , he showed up and some me my dad and brother a ticket and we made it in , the rest is history and I was almost sick with emotion when we broke away after the missed pen and copps scored it will be a memory I take to my grave and the reason we all love the rovers so much , what a day RTID

[Monkcaster_Rover]

Unfortunately I was stuck working weekends but managed to vacate to the canteen at roughly 4.55 to jump about like a crackpot with a fellow colleague & good mate of mine who'd got there just before me & filled me in on the events.

Town after was a good experience!

Not a dot on the lucky buggers who'd got to experience it first hand, mind.

[talksbollox]

The thing that sticks in my memory is the home crowd going wild when the penalty was awarded and then the immediate stunned silence when they hit the bar. It was as though someone had thrown a switch.

At the time my mate said to me “He (Sullivan) won’t save this” to which I replied “No, but he (Trotta) might miss it”.

Well, that’s how I remember it! What a day.

[big fat yorkshire pudding]

Does anyone remember the bit from the ball being cleared to the goal? Until I watched it back I had no idea what had happened?  I do just remember seeing copps getting the ball in front of the net. At first I thought he had missed his touch.  Strangest moment ever.

[CJK]

The thing that sticks in my memory is the home crowd going wild when the penalty was awarded and then the immediate stunned silence when they hit the bar. It was as though someone had thrown a switch.

At the time my mate said to me “He (Sullivan) won’t save this” to which I replied “No, but he (Trotta) might miss it”.

Well, that’s how I remember it! What a day.

The story goes that Sully had a word in Trotta’s ear prior to him taking the kick, so Sully still had a hand in it, allegedly.

[RoversAlias]

BFYP - I almost missed our goal because of the wild celebrations of Trotta missing the penalty. I had my back to goal hugging a total stranger until the crowd realised we were attacking and turned around to see Copps get the ball and score.

CJK - Sully definitely put Trotta off, he was booked for gamesmanship as he was stood chatting at the striker instead of getting to his line. It was his last act as a professional footballer and I'd say was well worth it!

[LincsRover]

8 years ago, wow!!! Great memories - I was there with my mum who was a hit with the Brentford fans! The pub in one of the corners of the ground was full of rovers and Brentford fans - a great bunch I remember. Songs were being sung & one well dressed Brentford fan (in a suit) was chatting up my mum and buying us drinks - then started singing to her! Left the pub with half an hour to go to make sure we got to our seats before kick off - even then mum wasn’t walking too well, esp after a couple of pints!

At the ground, we took our seats in the top tier, 2nd row. The game was as dull a game as I’ve seen until the penalty was given at about the 90th minute. Disaster!!! F*ck*ng referee, never a penalty!! Trotta takes the ball and has a bit of a barney with the Brentford captain (bless him!) & steps up; Sulli has a quiet word in his ear about this penalty being worth a million pounds (or so I’ve heard). Silence..... then a huge groan from the Brentford end and it all kicks off in the rovers end - flares, cheering, strangers hugging each other, dancing, jumping around! Then I turned round to see Copps tapping the ball into the net - bloody hell, surely not! I nearly missed it!!! 

Next thing I remember is just total chaos, I can’t remember the restart, although I know there was one, my memory of it is just all the celebrations, players, fans, John Ryan appeared on the pitch! Just amazing scenes and a day I’ll never ever forget. The journey home was fantastic, singing on the supporters bus and wondering what the hell just happened!

A wonderful memory my mum and I shared right up until she passed away last May - even at her most ill I just had to mention the Brentford game and her whole face would break into a huge beaming smile. She always said she would remember it for the rest of her life, and she did! Similarly, I will remember it to my dying day - the most amazing day I shared with my mum! 

[sheffield exile1]

Nearly missed the whole thing. Thought they had scored so said to my mate I can't take this and was ready for out. No they have a penalty he said, oh well they will surely score says I, but lets watch anyway. Can't imagine how devastating that would have been!

[keyser_soze]

BFYP - I almost missed our goal because of the wild celebrations of Trotta missing the penalty. I had my back to goal hugging a total stranger until the crowd realised we were attacking and turned around to see Copps get the ball and score.

CJK - Sully definitely put Trotta off, he was booked for gamesmanship as he was stood chatting at the striker instead of getting to his line. It was his last act as a professional footballer and I'd say was well worth it!

In Copps recent podcast with Sully they missed the opportunity to ask 'what EXACTLY did you say to Trotta?'

Definitely one of the greatest days to be a Rovers fan.

[PDX_Rover]

I was listening online with my then two year old son, at home in Portland, Oregon. I don’t remember much except going from despair to ecstasy in the space of 30 seconds.

Unbelievable, Jeff.

[VikingRich]

I listened to that podcast and most of the answers he gave were "I can't remember" so even if he was asked I don't think we would have had any more light shed on the incident...

[drfchound]

I listened to that podcast and most of the answers he gave were "I can't remember" so even if he was asked I don't think we would have had any more light shed on the incident...

Saving it for his book maybe ?

[Chris the Rover]

The most memorable 18 seconds of my Rovers supporting lifetime. An unbelievable swing in emotions. I remember shouting to my son that we were going to score. He was jumping up and down and hugging a complete stranger. Needless to say he missed seeing it. Drove home afterwards, singing all the way and couldn’t speak next morning.

[Lincoln Rover]

With Mrs D in the top tier of the away end. I was physically sick as they took the penalty I started to regain some composure as Billy passed the ball to Copps. Remember thinking he’d lost control just before he tapped it on. Cue buckets of tears, hugs with family & fans I’d never met. Straight after got a call from BBC 5L asking me to talk live to Mark Chapman & Robbie Savage... loved it. We stayed down in little London and never slept a wink that night just grinning and looking at my Rovers shirt hung on the back of the bedroom door. Fair play to sets of other fans in the bar that night coming over & offering us congratulations. They say loyalty isn’t rewarded. I beg to differ and the goal couldn’t have been scored by a nicer bloke.

[Draytonian III]

I ran a bus for Paul that day and I couldn’t wait to get rid of the £1000 in bus fares I collected for him ,also there was a bloke down at the services who’s wife was feeling a bit poorly, he went to the match she went back home from maybe Watford Gap in a taxi

[Superspy]

I was going to write out my memories of that day, but I wanted to share it a little differently with you all. Since my children were born they've both had their own email address and I email them a few times a year to tell them about key points in their life, send them pictures, that kind of stuff, so that when they're older they'll have a record of how things played out in their lives as they happened, rather than me trying to tell them the story through 20 or 30 years of hazy memory.

Anyway, in 2017 I sent an email to my little girl after taking her to her first game, the following is an extract from that email. Thanks for reading if you get to the bottom of it. Getting emotional just thinking about it so I'm just going to paste and hit 'post'.


Regardless of the date, your birthday isn’t the event I’m referencing this time. I’ve been incredibly lazy…again…as I meant to send you this message 3 months ago (oops), but I swore to myself I’d get this sent before your birthday so I can send you another one, and they’re all in the right order. I’m not really sure why I’ve put this one off, as the story I’m going to tell you is about a moment I’d been waiting for, for a very long time. On the 8th of April you went to your first Donny Rover’s match, but to understand the significance we have to go back a little further…

In the April of 2013,  a few weeks before we moved into our first house,  your mum and I had just found out she was pregnant. The feeling was incredible. I burst into tears as soon as the test showed positive, and we were both overwhelmingly happy. A week later (on the 27th) we both made the VERY long trip south to watch Donny against Brentford in the last game of the season. There was a lot riding on it, both teams could get promotion to the Championship, but we were in the better position – all we needed was a draw, and Brentford needed to beat us. The game was tense, and at 0-0, in the 4th minute of injury time, we gave away a penalty. What happened next was the most incredible thing I’ve ever witnessed at a game of football. We all watched, expecting the worst, only to see Marcelo Trotta step up and MISS the penalty, the ball was cleared, and 19 seconds after he hit the bar, we scored at the other end, winning the game, and going up as champions! It was unbelievable. The atmosphere was insane. And after screaming my lungs out, I stood at the back of the stand trying my hardest not to cry. All I could think about was that my unborn child’s first Rovers experience was something as bonkers as this, and that I’d be able to tell him or her that they were there…kind of. I was so happy.

A couple of months later we went for the 12 week scan, only to find out that there was nothing there. It was a blighted ovum. Which effectively means your mum got pregnant, but the baby never actually developed. Sat looking at that screen was the most horrible experience of my life. The woman doing the ultrasound was trying her best to not tell us the painfully obvious truth, but it was written all over her face. Our world was torn apart and the 2 of us were miserable for a long time. It’s incredibly difficult to know how to feel in a situation where you’re mourning the loss of an unborn child….but one that was never there in the first place, and there’s not a damned thing anybody can say to make you feel better. On a personal level I was devastated, obviously because of losing a child and having that torn away, but also that the football story, that special moment, went up in smoke along with it. The baby would have been due on Christmas Eve.

If I could go back and change it I absolutely would NOT, because if all of that hadn’t happened, we wouldn’t have had you. And you are the single most amazing thing that has happened to me.

So, fast forward 4 years, and here we are in April 2017. There have been a few Rovers games I’ve gone too where as I’ve left you’ve gotten upset that you couldn’t come with me, and we’ve been talking about taking you to a game for a while. The circumstances were similar, in that we were once again playing to get promoted, only this time to League 1, and it wasn’t the last day of the season. So we kitted you up (you’ve had a strip since you were born) and took you to watch us play Mansfield at home. We won 1-0 and got the promotion we were hoping for. And on that day I replaced the horrifying ghost of an amazing football experience with an unborn baby that never was, with a new amazing football experience with my beautiful little girl. It’s awesome that your first game was a win and a promotion party. Grandad Steve found it particularly ironic as he’s had several season tickets over the last few years and only seen relegations, up until the point where you saw a promotion at your first game. I’ve bought a match programme and written in it to commemorate the occasion, exactly like your grandad did when I was a kid. The difference was I was 10 (I think). We played Hull and drew 1-1.

[Bailey Vickerage]

Me and my dad were in the top tier the whole game up until we gave the penalty away, by the time we had scored we were right at the front on the bottom tier my dad had 1 leg over the advertising hoarding and I was hugging and celebrating with a stranger who I’d never seen before until the 93rd minute of that game. I remember my dad trying to get me onto the pitch but the stewards were having none of it.