On the trail of Mantova v Cambridge City

Our esteemed Historian, Neil Harvey, shares his experience of a recent trip to Mantova in Italy:

"During a recent holiday in Italy, I spent a few days in the historic city of Mantova, having travelled there with the knowledge that Cambridge City had played against AC Mantova in April 1980 in the Anglo-Italian Tournament. That game was played at Mantova’s current stadium, the Stadio Danilo Martelli.

There was very little coverage of this match in the Cambridge Evening News as many journalists were on strike at the time. I sent an email to the Gazetta di Mantova a few weeks before I went to Italy, more in hope than expectation that they would be able to find a match report in their archive. Within a couple of hours, I had received a reply from the Gazetta, asking me to collect the match report from their office when I was in Mantova.

"The Gazetta di Mantova was first published in 1664, making it the world’s oldest newspaper still in existence and published with the same name. On arrival at their offices, I used my limited Italian to introduce myself and was soon speaking with Tomasso (written press) and Andrea (TV). Fortunately for me, both men had much better English than my Italian. After an informal chat and interview in their reception area, I went to the studio with Andrea so that he could film a short piece for their TV TV channel.

"City's game in Mantova was played in the evening on Wednesday 2nd April 1980. There was extensive coverage of the game in the local press in the days leading up to the match. The headline in the Thursday edition of the Gazetta read “Mantova all’inglese”. This means that Mantova won ‘in the English style’. This is a traditionally used phrase in Italian football parlance to describe how a team has a clean and efficient victory. For the record, after a

goalless first half Vittorio Muiesan gave the hosts the lead after an hour and Guiseppe Manarin scored in the 80th minute to secure the victory ‘all’inglese’.

"The report revealed the previously unknown City XI as follows: Kevin Murray, Peter Lindsay, Neil King, Andy Parker, Chris Hutton, Gordon Petrie, Keith Pointer, Peter Martin, Dave Lill, Mark Watson, Steve Haylock. Dave Simmons came on after 79 minutes to replace Haylock. Unused subs were Mick Every, Steve Kearns and Mick Wilson.

"Back in 1980 AC Mantova were in the third tier of Italian football (Serie C). The club had a spell in Serie A from the early 1960s to the early 1970s, with Dino Zoff their keeper from 1963 to 1967. The original club folded in 1994 and the currently named Mantova 1911 are about to embark on the third successive season in Serie B.

"After about 30 minutes in the company of the lovely staff in the office of Gazetta di Mantova I crossed the road to have a look inside the stadium, and then we headed back into the old part of the city for a meal in the lovely Piazza delle Erbe."

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With thanks to Andrea Gabbi, Tomasso Bellini and Andrea Giangiulio at Gazetta di Mantova.