My brothers came over and the Danish squad were watching back home before we all went off

My brothers came over and the Danish squad were watching back home before we all went off to the Mexico World Cup So it was a great day.”Not to mention a memorable night. Sammy told him: “It’s only big because I’ve got these two medals in my back pockets.”Two years later, when Liverpool returned as “certainties” against Wimbledon, Molby was on the bench. “Stringfellows was just up the road from our hotel and we all turned up carrying the Cup. “When I was seven I saw Charlie George lying on the Wembley turf after his winner against Liverpool in 1971. I became an Arsenal fan,” he said, as if confessing a guilty secret.

“Had Liverpool won, it would have been them.”Molby atoned amply 15 years later in the first Merseyside final, creating two goals as Liverpool won 3-1 “It was the greatest moment of my career Some fine players never reach the final Others get there but don’t perform But it wasn’t just the game. “We didn’t understand the magic of Hereford beating Newcastle or Sutton beating Coventry because we had nothing comparable in our football culture.”The competition had its hooks in him at a tender age. “When we watched the FA Cup on television, we wanted to see big games, like Manchester United v Liverpool,” recalled Molby, 40, who will be at the Leeds-Arsenal tie tomorrow as a summariser for Danish TV. In the 20 years since he arrived at Anfield from Ajax, he has avoided even one such outcome (unless you count Wimbledon’s Wembley win over Liverpool, which he does not on the grounds that the Dons were “a good top-division team”).In a curious way, this discrepancy reflects his formative years in Denmark. No matter: should Molby’s Kidderminster Harriers defeat Wolverhampton Wanderers in a third-round derby between the sides lying 16th in the Third Division and 20th in the Premiership respectively, the Harriers Arms will be swinging like the wildest West End watering hole.Wolves, who have only 17 miles to travel and probably have more fans in the Worcestershire carpet-making town than the Harriers, should be warned that Molby is due a giant-killing. They were neither the first nor the last footballers to quaff champagne in the notorious nightspot, although the Dane, widely acclaimed as man of the match, established a “first” for the venue by swigging it from the trophy.The old, silver object of desire (the Cup, that is, rather than Peter Stringfellow) will be absent at Aggborough Stadium today.

Yet it was the FA Cup that provided the highlight of his playing days – and now the supposedly unfashionable competition may be about to do the same for his managerial career. Jan Molby won championships in England and the Netherlands, represented Denmark on the global stage and shone in the company of Gullit, Van Basten, Rush, Dalglish and the Laudrups. The former Scotland international has steered the Pilgrims to four successive wins during the month which have put them top of the division.. In the last fortnight we have brought in three new players of great quality, which is necessary if the club wants to get even better and progress.”Plymouth Argyle’s manager, Paul Sturrock, won the Second Division award for the second time in three months.

“I can understand that.”We will hopefully tie up a new deal, but the old one runs out next Thursday. I thought it was done and dusted but apparently there is a problem.”I don’t want to lose him, it would give me an extra problem to find a replacement. He might be better off going somewhere else from a financial viewpoint, but I think he is better staying here for football reasons.”Nigel Worthington has been named as the Nationwide League manager of the month for December after leading Norwich City to the top of the First Division for the first time in five and a half years.Worthington, who also won the accolade for September, said: “The first half of the season has been exceptional and we have given ourselves a wonderful platform. But, of course, he made his statement before the Premiership became quite such a hopelessly difficult challenge for most of its participants. It was, anyway, a declaration predicated entirely on the belief that the most important thing in football is money.We will see yet again this weekend that this is not so. We will see it in the relish of the fans for English football’s last link with a more romantic past.