THE sympathies of the whole footballing world were with Manchester United but a group of men who cost £110 combined were determined to bring the cup back home to Bolton.

Only 86 days before the final, British European Airways charter flight 609 from Belgrade to Manchester had crashed in the snow at Munich, killing eight of the United side affectionately known as the Busby Babes.

It had been a minor miracle a hastily-reassembled team had made it all the way to Wembley but suffice it to say they rode into the game on a tidal wave of public emotion and goodwill. Bolton, by no fault of their own, began as the villains of the piece.

Matt Busby had been on life support after the crash and it had been his assistant Jimmy Murphy who cobbled together a team less than a fortnight later to beat Sheffield Wednesday in the fifth round. The Reds were given special dispensation to play cup-tied players brought in from other clubs but largely promoted from within, which included the young Ian Greaves, who would later go on to manage his opponents.

Wanderers had been thrashed 7-2 by United a fortnight before the crash, Roy Hartle recalling a decade ago: “They were on another waveband.

“They were so talented. Most sides have three or four talented players, they had many more.”

Emotion had got to the Bolton players too, and Hartle recalls tears on the team coach as it made its way towards Wembley, filing past the massed ranks of United supporters.

Busby even rose from his hospital bed to come to the game, taking his position in the dugout and still visibly weak from his ordeal.

Yet Bolton had their own reason to seek success. Five years earlier they had been beaten by Blackpool, a result which had cut deep. The 1957/58 season had not been particularly successful – Wanderers had finished 11th in the First Division – and an ageing team was coming to the end of its natural course.

Bill Ridding had built his team for just £110, the cost of a £10 signing-on fee.

The frugal approach had been a necessity as the club had hit on hard times in the years between the two finals. Harold Hassall, recruited for a club-record £27,000 from Huddersfield Town, had seen his career ended by injury on New Year’s Day 1955, which put a severe strain on finances.

The men who had been so important in the run to the 1953 final – Willie Moir, Bobby Langton and Johnny Wheeler – had now moved on and so it became a case of Ridding and his scouts trying to do things on the cheap.

The game itself was not a memorable affair and Hartle recalled how celebrating the victory on the pitch had been difficult, such was the mixed emotions around the stadium.

“We were doing the lap of honour,” he said in 2008, “And Tommy Banks turned to me and said ‘Shall we go?’ I replied ‘We might as well. This is not a happy thing to be doing’. We were in the course of going off the pitch when Bert Sproston, our trainer said, ‘C’mon lads, this is a trip of a lifetime’. He convinced us to complete the lap of honour.”

The Bolton Evening News’ correspondent Haydn Berry was more cutting with his verdict.

“It is not easy to decide where to begin these reflections on a famous victory which has written an exciting new chapter in the history of Bolton Wanderers. If you have not already read, or heard, enough about the match, it was won by the best of all cup formulas – solid, unshakable defence, and scoring opportunism allied to the will to win.

“Manchester United were not as good in any of these respects. In fact, they were not as good opposition as expected, even allowing for their hastily-built force.

“The Wanderers win was their easiest of the series, apart from the York replay. This may be one reason why the match was not one of the Wembley epics.”

Nat Lofthouse summed it up after the game.

“We went into the final as the Other Team,” he said. “And that only gave us greater determination. We are sorry United could not crown their season with a win, football is a game where there can be only one winner, and I am proud to say that was Bolton Wanderers.”