Home Bargains goalkeeper Germano Mendez was the hero after saving two penalties during their shootout win over Hartlepool AFC Supporters. The Bargain immortalised themselves by finally getting their hands on the FA Sunday Cup and joined the pantheon of Merseyside football clubs to win the National Cup as the Guinea-Bissau shot-stopper etched his name into Liverpool Sunday football folklore.
It is a historic feat in a historic season that has brought an historic treble, after adding the Liverpool County FA Premier Cup to their Liverpool Business Houses Premier Division title win. More history was made when Joey Gibiliru Jr, part of the Bargain coaching staff, joined his father Joe Gibiliru Sr in winning the illustrious Sunday football competition as both a player and manager.
The Gibiliru name was already in the National Cup history books after Joe Gibiliru Snr won the competition with Nicosia in 1991 previously. He then won it as a manager, with his son, when Nicosia became two-time winners in 2003-04 after beating UK Flooring 3-1 at Anfield.
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Gibiliru Jr had the chance to follow in his father’s footsteps two years ago when Home Bargains took on Trooper FC in the final at Stoke City’s Bet365 Stadium. They saw their dreams end after the Birmingham team came from behind to win 2-1 but at Bramall Lane, home of Sheffield United, they got their redemption.
He said: “I knew we had a good enough team (to bounce back). These opportunities don’t come often, they’re once in a lifetime, but I knew we had a good enough team to come back – I just didn’t know how far away it’ll be. I’m just so happy that with the same group of lads, we’ve come here and won it. It wasn’t easy.”
Gibilru father and son stood on the Bramall Lane turf with two contrasting emotions. Senior remained composed and proud to see his son play a part in guiding a Liverpool team to Sunday Cup glory again – the first team to do so since the Campfield in 2021.
He said: “It’s fantastic, me and my lad have played in the same team before, many, many years ago and won the National Cup at Liverpool, he (Joe Gibilru Jr) scored one of the goals. I was always giving him stick of what he should be doing but he’s gone and done it now.”
Across the pitch, in front of a jubiliant travelling contingent, Jimmy Vaughan, a retired builder and one of the founding fathers, was held aloft holding the famous National Cup trophy. It was an accolade that had evaded the Bargain for 40 years since its foundation in 1988.
Vaughan had described the FA Sunday Cup as the pinnacle of amateur football as the Bargain pushed to get past the semi-final in 2022, which they did beating Highgate Albion before losing to Trooper.
It was the veteran amateur football icon who introduced his son, James, now secretary of the football club, to Sunday football and in tandem, the pair have been chasing the national silverware for decades. The pair were both there in Staffordshire two years ago when their hopes, and best chance in their then-38-year history, were dashed, forcing them to watch the trophy presentation as the second-best team in the nation.
The pair shared an embrace as the celebrations truly began, and no doubt a tear or two will have been shed. James couldn’t find the words to speak but Vaughan Sr said: “Finally. It means the world to me, look what it means to all these smiling faces to the rest of them.
“We did it the hard way but today’s the day, we’ve won the treble, County FA Premier Cup, the league and the big one, the Nash.”
In 90 minutes, they were marginally the better side in a cagey affair. Declan Daniels broke the deadlock with a deft header and they looked like they were heading to FA Sunday Cup glory over 10-man Hartlepool AFC Supporters.
That was until substitute Elliot Wilson thrashed home the equaliser in the fourth-minute of six added on at the end of the second-half.
There were Bargain bodies strewn on the pitch and in the dugout as Hartlepool fans streamed onto the field, fuelled by the late leveller and anger that spilt into the stands when a select number of supporters made their way across the main stand to where the Liverpool contingent were based – sparking ugly scenes, a 10-minute delay in proceedings and the threat of abandonment if tensions boiled over again.
It looked like history was about to repeat itself and they were about to see Sunday Cup supremacy snatched from the jaws of victory again. For the Guinea-Bissau goalkeeper, who had been largely untroubled, aside from a routine save or two and sweeping off his line, found himself picking the ball out of his net in the final minute of second-half stoppage time.
With the belt theoretically around their waist, the Bargain were hit with a sucker punch and stunned going into the penalty shootout. However, two saves from Mendez during the penalty shootout were crucial to the triumph at Bramall Lane.
Manager Brian Moogan said: “I said before the penalties (to Mendez), ‘you’re going to win us it’ and he has mate. Brilliant.”
The penalty shootout hero was left crestfallen after the defeat to Trooper two years ago and said: “I’ve been trying to win this competition for a long time, I have to thank god for giving me the power to come back to win this tournament, I’m so happy, I’m with all my mates, working together, buzzing.
“I’m delighted. When I was 16 or 17, I started learning how to save pens. Today, I’m so happy. Every single time, we’ve been fighting to win this cup and it’s happened today, thank god. I’m so happy.”
