Whilst the younger ones amongst us may regard Man City’s last gasp victory in 2012 as the most dramatic Premier League finish, back in 1989 there was an equally dramatic finish to the season between Arsenal and Liverpool, and now all those years later it has been relived in a new docu-film.
The Premier League has undoubtedly turned the most popular sport in the UK into perhaps the biggest in the world. The Premier League is carried by 80 broadcasters to 156 countries, and last weekend for example was viewed by some 4.4 billion people……just get your head around that for a minute.
So naturally when Manchester City snatched the Title from rivals Manchester United in the most dramatic fashion with 2 injury time goals to beat QPR 3-2 at the end of 2011/12 season it hit the headlines in all 4 corners of the globe.
However, fans of slightly more years, would point to when a pretty much UK only audience tuned in to ITV (Yes top flight football on terrestrial tv) and witnessed the climax of the 88/89 season.
In what was the Football League’s 100th Anniversary it produced an absolute classic!
Anfield was the setting for the Friday night match. Arsenal hadn’t won the League Title in 19 years, and Liverpool were coming off an FA Cup Final victory less than a week earlier, although still with a heavy heart with the Hillsborough Disaster still fresh in everyone’s mind – in fact it was the postponement of the original match that was due to be played only a few days after the disaster that created this final game shootout.
After Arsenal had topped the table most of the season and end of season slump allowed Liverpool to overtake them and top the table by 3 points, so the objective for the Gunners was simple – they had to win by a two-goal margin or the title went to the Merseyside club.
We’re sure you know what played out in the 90 minutes so we’ll let the docu-film tell you that, but it does feature interviews with many of the participants of that night – a night that it is claimed rejuvenated the sport, as it showed the potential of just how lucrative tv packages could be.
TV rights were bought by ITV back then for £44 million over 4 seasons – last year the TV rights package for 3 seasons sold for a combined price of £5.1 billion!
The sport has evolved immeasurably since the 26th May 1989, and the vast majority would say for the better, but sometimes it’s good to reminisce.
Take a look at the trailer below.