The Hillsborough disaster

The events of one sunny April afternoon would change the face of the sport forever after families were left broken and bitter by shocking deaths which could have been easily averted.

The seeds of tragedy were sown soon after the FA Cup semi-final between Nottingham Forest and Liverpool was allocated to Hillsborough - Sheffield Wednesday's home ground and then a regular venue for semis.

Police gave Forest fans the Spion End of the ground which held 21,000 while Liverpool had the Leppings Lane End, which held only 14,600 - an odd decision considering the relative size of each club's support,

Half an hour before kick-off a bottleneck began to form outside the Leppings Lane. The turnstiles couldn't let enough supporters in quickly enough to ease the pressure building up outside the ground and by 3pm more than 5,000 Liverpool fans were still outside the stadium.

Police ordered a gate to the stand to be opened because they believed the pressure of fans outside the ground was "a danger to life". Gate C was intended as an exit and did not have turnstiles, so a rush of supporters entered the stadium.

As they sped in, they joined two already very overcrowded central pens, causing a huge crush at the front of the terrace. Men, women and children were pressed up against the security fencing with no means of escape.

However, more than five minutes of the match passed before the unfolding tragedy became apparent to those not in the Leppings Lane. Referee Ray Lewis, after being advised by the police, stopped the match after fans started climbing the fence to escape the crush.

Some fans were heroically pulled to safety by supporters in the upper tier of the West Stand while a precious few managed to escape through portions of fence broken by the sheer weight of people.

With the players in the safety of the dressing room, the pitch quickly started to fill with supporters - some unharmed, many injured, some dead. Advertising hoardings were torn down to form makeshift stretchers while the emergency services struggled to come to terms with the scale of the disaster.

At least 700 people were injured, about 20 seriously, while the death toll on the day reached 94. Fourteen-year-old Lee Nicol died in hospital soon after and four years later Tony Bland finally succumbed to his injuries and passed away.

The city of Liverpool spent the following weeks and months in mourning and the funerals - always attended by members of Kenny Dalglish's team - came horribly thick and fast. Players went to hospitals to see the injured and families, still in a state of shock, demanded answers as a cruel tabloid witchhunt by The Sun newspaper blamed supporters rather than the blundering South Yorkshire Police.

However the resultant inquest returned a verdict of accidental death, with little or no allocation of blame apportioned to the police services. The coroner ruled that all victims had sustained their fatal injuries by 3.15pm, based on advice from pathologists, and as a result, he did not hear any evidence of what happened after that point.

Many of the bereaved families believe their loved ones were still alive by 3.15pm and perhaps, given proper medical assistance, could have survived. To this day they campaign for the inquest to be reopened.

Lord Taylor's inquiry into the disaster found that police shortcomings contributed to the tragedy and subsequently recommended ground improvements including the tearing down of security fencing and the introduction of all-seater stadia.

Key Figures

Did You Know...?

A previous crush had occurred in the same stand during the 1981 semi-final between Tottenham and Wolves, causing a total of 38 injuries.

Four days later, AC Milan and Real Madrid met in the European Cup semi-final. The referee blew his whistle six minutes into play in order to hold a minute's silence as a mark of respect to those who lost their lives in Sheffield. Half way through the minute's silence, AC Milan fans sang Liverpool's "You'll Never Walk Alone".

Large swathes of Liverpool refused to buy The Sun newspaper after editor Kelvin McKenzie ran a front-page exclusive headlined 'The Truth' making vile and untrue allegations about the behaviour of Liverpool fans. McKenzie later retracted the story, issuing an unreserved apology, but in 2006 said: "I wasn't sorry then and I'm not sorry now."