1997: It’s the Late Late Show at Filbert Street

We here at Fosse Posse love to bring you the latest news and opinions on our great football club, which we all love, Leicester City. But we also like to reminisce and look through blue tinted glasses at how our team have come through the last 133 years.

We’ll delve way back and highlight the likes of Arthur Chandler, Frankie Wortho and others, as well as Cup Finals, landmark achievements and moments that have just filled us with joy (and sometimes despair)!

Welcome to another look back at all things Leicester City, and this time to a barmy summers evening 20 years ago and a fantastic midweek Premiership game........

August 27th 1997

Leicester City 3 Arsenal 3

Midweek games always seemed a bit special at Filbert Street over the years, from European Cup ties, FA and League Cup replays to league games that changed a season.

This was the 2nd Wednesday night fixture Leicester had to play in the opening few weeks of the season, having already beaten Liverpool at Anfield 2 weeks earlier.

The current Coca Cola cup holders had started the season well and we’re unbeaten with the visit of second-placed Arsenal travelling to fourth-placed Leicester.

Martin O’Neill’s team consisted of some of the best players to have pulled on the blue shirt during modern times, with the likes of Guppy, Heskey, Elliott, Walsh and Lennon among others.

However the game didn’t start as hoped for the City faithful, as Arsenal pressured Kasey Keller’s goal and took the lead in the first half through Bergkamp. He received the ball from a corner on the edge of the area and curled brilliantly into the top far corner to open his account for the night.

Just past the hour mark, Bergkamp made it two and look to set Arsenal on their way to all 3 points, after he burst from midfield, slip past Pontus Kaamark and hit the ball off Keller as he rushed out, looping it into the empty net.

The clock ticked away and many City fans were heading for the exit, as it looked unlikely of any comeback from the foxes.

However, with 6 minutes to go, Heskey steered a loose ball in the box past Seaman, halving the deficit.

The remaining City fans cheered on their heroes and they began to pepper the Arsenal box in search an equaliser.

Heskey won a corner with 90 minutes on the clock, and all the big men from the back filled the box. The ball was cleared but was soon put back out onto the left side where Matt Elliott picked it up and from the edge of the box fired a low shot with deflected into the far corner of the net, sending everyone into raptures. 2-2!

But it wasn’t quite all over yet, as Bergkamp showed his superb quality to complete his hat-trick by receiving the ball in the City box, juggling it over Elliott’s head and side footing perfectly past the Keller.

The joy turned to despair again for City and we were now deep into injury time, with little time to recover.

The foxes forced one last corner, which Garry Parker floated into the packed Arsenal area. Steve Walsh rose above everyone and headed back across goal, which Spencer Prior then headed to the back post and Walsh leaped again to power a thunderous header past a helpless David Seaman. 3-3!

What a match, City recovered from 2-0 down with 6 minutes to go before seeing 3 goals in stoppage time and a pretty decent hat-trick from that Dennis bloke.

Garry Parker summed up the match on the Independent website:-

"We were a team that never gave up under Martin. Teams hated coming to play us Filbert Street."

Still to come, we have the story of how Peter Taylor somehow got us to the top of the Premiership in 2000 and the game which saw 2 hat-tricks for City legends Lineker and Lynex.

If you want us to highlight anything in this series, feel free to leave a comment below and we’ll be more than happy to oblige.