Joe Mercer's farewell match got off to a cracking start when Mike Channon forced the ball into the net in the sixth minute after the goalkeeper had failed to hold a Trevor Brooking shot following a Kevin Keegan corner-kick. The Yugoslavians fought back to equalise and then take the lead after misunderstandings in the England defence. Keegan, who had been arrested at Belgrade airport and beaten up by security guards two days earlier, had the satisfaction of heading the equaliser in the seventy-fifth minute to give a happy ending to the Joe Mercer interlude. They had arrested Keegan when completely over-reacting to him clowning around while collecting his baggage. More Pythonesque farce followed when Bernard Joy, one of the few journalists who witnessed the incident, raced to a telephone to give his newspaper, the London Evening Standard, the hot exclusive. When he finally got through to the newspaper switchboard, after the frustrating delays that were common in those pre-direct dialing days, the operator started with pleasantries:  'Nice to hear from you, Mr. Joy. What's the weather like out there?' Bernard, the last amateur to play for England, was in urgent deadline-beating mode. 'I've got no time for small talk,' he snapped. 'Put me through to the copytakers immediately. I've got an exclusive story here.'  'Uh, but Mr. Joy,' the operator said,  'It's Sunday. There's no paper today.'

Source Notes

TheFA.com
Original newspaper reports
Rothman's Yearbooks
Mike Payne's England: The Complete Post-War Record (Breedon Books Publishing Company, Derby, U.K., 1993)
Norman Giller, Football Author
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CG