Bad weather has caused the third round of the FA Cup of 1962/1963 to be delayed … 261 times.
3 of 29 matches took place
The weather has worsened since December. Frost fog has forced 18 Football League matches to be canceled, including eight on December 22, 1962. Four days later, most of England was covered in 35.5cm thick snow.
The snow kept falling, the frost never thinned, and the ice in the River Thames was so thick that one could organize a race on it. January 1963 goes down to history as the coldest month of 20th century England.
Because much of England is flooded with snow, fresh food prices are up 30% and in many areas, the main water supply has been frozen. Naturally, English football is not prepared for such a sudden, impactful crisis.
At this time, some teams still don’t have headlights, so the FA called on teams to play in the afternoon to avoid having their power cut. However, only a few yards (Goodison Park among them) have underground heating.
So on January 5, only three matches of the third round of the FA Cup took place: In the Northwest, Preston lost 1-4 at home to Sunderland and Tranmere drew 2-2 with Chelsea. In the southwest, Plymouth football team was beaten 5-1 by West Brom.
Many football matches were postponed
29 other matches were postponed. With only Sunderland and West Brom winning tickets for the fourth round, 62 teams entered what The Times described dryly as “one of the most extraordinary rounds in tournament history …”
Of course, realizing that the icy will not soon melt and know that, if the fans do not come to the field will affect their finances, the team owners are trying to think of a solution as long as is a playable field. They took them to Danish snow moving tractors, fire generators, hot air machines, and also tried de-ice pellets.
In fact, even when the snow is cleared, the ground is usually frozen to almost 1 meter. Wrexham has dirtied their Racecourse Ground with more than 80 tons of sand and the reward for being able to play after 4 days is delayed. The thing is, they lost 0-3 on the beach court before Liverpool of legend Bill Shankly later.