To celebrate the 50th anniversary of Swindon Town's 1969 League Cup triumph, all week Adver Sport will be publishing a series of stories to mark the momentous occasion.

AS EACH bridge passed when travelling home, John Trollope could not quite envisage the scale of Swindon Town’s achievement from 24 hours earlier.

“The closer you got to Swindon, every bridge would be busier – I’ve never seen so many people,” said Trollope, who missed all but one of Town’s League Cup games leading to Wembley.

The Football Pink would be the only indicator with regards to the volume of supporters that would greet Town’s heroes on their return.

Trollope’s team-mate, and long-time friend, Don Rogers even joked the town’s burglars would have been silly not to cash in on Sunday, March 16 – such was the extent of outdoor celebration and togetherness.

Surprisingly, underwhelmed would be the best word to describe Town legend Trollope’s feelings when first laying his eyes on Wembley – he had never visited the country’s flagship stadium before.

But walking out onto the pitch with 98,189 pairs of eyes looking down – you can figure the rest out.

He said: “All you could see was people as we walked out of the tunnel.

“Danny (Williams) never put any pressure on us, if you want to call it that.

“We turned up on the Friday night at Gerrards Cross and had our evening meal, for most games we would go for a walk the night before to see what the town was like.

“The morning would be the same – myself and Don were up first while the others laid in bed.”

Rogers’ extra-time brace stole the headlines, but the heroic efforts of Peter Downsborough in goal is what sticks out in Trollope’s mind.

That and the echoing Scottish tones of Frank Burrows, who was quick to pick the team up following Bobby Gould’s late equaliser.

Stan Harland and John Smith too – both influential figures in Town’s squad of legends, according to Trollope.

He said said: “Peter saved us in the first 20 minutes, but because of our fitness it didn’t make any difference in extra time.

“We won a lot of games late on because of our fitness – Danny would make sure we were fit.”

The reason behind Town’s extraordinary fitness levels? Thursdays. How the squad detested Thursdays.

Not that running was Trollope’s weak point, but even to this day the Wroughton-born defender remembers his Thursday shift.

“You knew that Thursdays were coming, I tended to ease through that,” joked Trollope.

“Danny Williams had his day of the week where he would get us running. We won the League Cup and won promotion with that system, it was what suited us.

“They didn’t coach in those days, it was just guidance.

“Friday mornings Danny was say ‘please your scent’ – on Friday morning we did what we wanted to.”