"I am confident we will stay up, because we have prepared well and we are ready." That was Alan Ball, the day before his Manchester City side went into battle at Maine Road against Liverpool, desperate to retain their Premier League status. Even a win would not guarantee their survival. Wins for their fellow strugglers Southampton and Coventry City, on equal points but with better goal difference, and a draw for Sheffield Wednesday, two points ahead and also with a healthier balance in the goals column, would have done for City, even if Bally's boys spanked Roy Evans's FA Cup finalists. But in all statistical likelihood, a win would have been enough.
And a win would indeed have been enough. Saints drew 0-0 with Wimbledon, while Coventry held Leeds in another goalless encounter. But City were fed some bogus information – Wimbledon, they had been told, had scored a late goal at the Dell – and so a most Cityesque denouement to the season unfolded.
City looked to have been down and out, Steve Lomas clumsily deflecting Steve McManaman's cross into his own net after six minutes. Just before half-time, Ian Rush marked his last game for Liverpool with a deflected drive to make it 2-0. But with 19 minutes to go, Neil Ruddock clattered Georgi Kinkladze like some sort of lumbering oaf, Uwe Rösler slotting home the penalty. Seven minutes later, Kit Symons equalised. And so as the sands of time ran out, with Southampton "losing", the diktat was delivered: keep the ball in the corner, to secure the draw that would keep City in the big league.
Oh dear. Poor Lomas, whose day had began so badly, held the ball by the flag. As the clock ticked down on the pitch, the sorry truth was beginning to be realised off it. City might have prepared professionally, but their in-game information management wasn't quite up to speed. Wimbledon hadn't scored at all. As things stood, Saints were safe. Niall Quinn, long substituted and now demobbed in his shirt and breeks, sprinted from the stands to the touchline, screaming to Lomas to get moving. The midfielder went in search of the goal City were suddenly so desperate for, but it was too late. "This is the greatest disappointment of my career," sobbed Ball after the match.
Another would be coming a few months later, as he was sacked, his "three-year plan" to get City back to the top of English football in sorry tatters.