1961 Inter-Cities Fairs Cup final

1961 Inter-Cities Fairs Cup Final

AS Roma, champions
Event	1960–61 Inter-Cities Fairs Cup
Birmingham City Roma 2 4
on aggregate
First leg
Birmingham City Roma 2 2
Date	27 September 1961 (1961-09-27)
Venue	St Andrew's, Birmingham
Referee	Bobby Davidson (Scotland)
Attendance	21,000
Second leg
Roma Birmingham City 2 0
Date	11 October 1961 (1961-10-11)
Venue	Stadio Olimpico, Rome
Referee	Pierre Schwinte (France)
Attendance	60,000
← 1960 1962 →

The 1961 Inter-Cities Fairs Cup Final was an association football match played over two legs between Roma of Italy and Birmingham City of England. The first leg was played in Birmingham on 27 September 1961, while the second leg was played on 11 October in Rome. It was the final of the third edition of the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup, an invitational competition open to teams representing host cities of industrial trade fairs. Birmingham had lost to Barcelona in the previous final; Roma were appearing for the first time.

Each club needed to progress through three rounds to reach the final. Matches were contested over two legs, with one leg at each team's home ground. Birmingham won all but one of their six legs. They defeated Inter Milan home and away: no other English team was to defeat Inter in the San Siro stadium for another 40 years.^[1] Roma took a lengthier route to the final: they required a replay in both quarter-final and semi-final, although won each replay by a comfortable margin.

In the first leg of the final, played in front of a crowd of only 21,000 at St Andrew's, Pedro Manfredini scored twice for Roma, and goalkeeper Fabio Cudicini made several high-class saves, before Mike Hellawell and Bryan Orritt scored late in the game to equalise the scores. In the second leg, watched by 60,000 spectators at the Stadio Olimpico, Roma won by two goals to nil to claim their first European trophy – an own goal when an attempted clearance rebounded off Brian Farmer's shin, and a shot from distance by Paolo Pestrin very late in the game while Birmingham's players were all upfield attacking.