An important victory for Liverpool fans in the long-running propaganda war between Liverpool and Manchester United supporters.
The story of how Alan Smith's ambulance was pelted with bottles, beer glasses and stones as he was being carted away from Anfield in 2006 has been rebutted - by the man himself.
During Liverpool's 1-0 victory over Manchester United in the 2006 FA Cup, Smith suffered a broken leg after a challenge with John Arne Riise.
The story had grown that the ambulance got bogged down in traffic and that a phalanx of tanked up Liverpool fans booted it out of the nearby The King Harry pub to send the ambulance on it's way.
In addition to the hail of beer glasses and stones, it was reported that they gave the ambulance the Eamon Dunphy-Italia 90 treatment and rocked it up and down, attempting to overturn it.
Both Liverpool and Manchester United went so far as to condemn the incident.
But now Smith says the whole thing never happened. Speaking to Four Four Two, he now insists that there were no beer glasses rained down on the ambulance and no rocking up and down.
It didn’t happen - fans were still in the ground. I went back to Liverpool a few years later with Newcastle and had a great reception.
I had loads of mail from fans after the injury, including a lot from Liverpool. And Liverpool’s medical staff were great.
They were worried that because there was no blood flowing that I could have had a club foot. Some might say I might as well have in my left foot now!
While Smith's recollection will be seized on by Liverpool fans, it does not exactly tally with the reporting of the incident at the time.
See also: Retro Football Clip: The Three Minutes Which Summed Up The Entire Charlton Era
[Liverpool Echo]
