Former Blues take trip down memory lane (From Bucks Free Press)

Former Blues take trip down memory lane

8:47am Saturday 24th February 2007 in

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WHILE Wycombe Wanderers achieved wonders in reaching the Carling Cup semi-final this season, plans have just been revealed to honour the team that went one step better half a century ago and reached Wembley.

Fifty years on from the Blues making the FA Amateur Cup Final, surviving members of that squad are being re-united at a special anniversary banquet at Adams Park on Friday, April 13.

The Blues didn't bring back the Cup, as they had in 1931. But they did the town proud against the kings of amateur football in the 1950s - Bishop Auckland.

Returning home in an open-top bus, Blues received the plaudits on the balcony of the Red Lion Hotel. Some 90,000 fans cheered them on at Wembley and it seemed almost as many were in the High Street.

Exactly 50 years on, those headline makers will be remembered, some of the moments from that historic Cup run relived and the men who made it happen will chat about that fantastic era in the club's history.

The Paul Lambert of the day was Sid Cann, coach to the Blues at Wembley. He spent nine successful years at Loakes Park - the club's former ground in the town centre. Under him the team won two Isthmian League titles, were runners-up twice, won the Berks and Bucks Senior Cup three times and took the Blues to the Amateur Cup semi-final in 1955 before reaching Wembley two years later.

"There'll be plenty of chat about him and all the players who made it such a fantastic era for the club," said press officer Alan Hutchinson who is organising the event with another life-long fan, John Taylor.

Taylor, who started his journalistic career covering Wanderers for the Bucks Free Press in 1960, was at Wembley for that final as a schoolboy fan.

He said: "No matter which superstar I've had the privilege to meet since in my newspaper, radio and TV days - and that includes men like Pele and Mohammed Ali - that Blues' squad of the mid-50s holds a special place in my heart."

Thanks to sponsor, John Walters of the Walters Group, the organisers have been able to confirm plans, which includes invitations to members of the winning Bishop Auckland team.

All nine survivors of the 1957 Wembley team - Dennis Syrett, Mike Wicks, the Truett brothers Geoff and Jim, Len Worley, Cliff Trott, Paul Bates, Jackie Tomlin and goalscorer Frank Smith - have received invitations along with other squad members including Jimmy Moring, Ken Brown, Dennis Atkins and Malcolm Hunt.

"It's going to be a lot more that just a dinner," promises Taylor. "We have lots of surprises planned and I'm sure fans old and young will want the chance to mix with and chat to some of the heroes who played such an important part in making that a golden era in the club's history."

l Tickets are on sale for the re-union dinner priced at £30, available from the ground from March 3 or by ringing 01494-455705