Manchester City Revive Banana Tradition for League Cup Semi-Final, Fans React

If you were confused by the emergence of inflatable bananas at the Etihad Stadium on Wednesday night, you most certainly were not alone.

Manchester City revived the 1980s tradition for their League Cup semi-final victory over Everton, which booked their spot in February's showpiece at Wembley.

Fernandinho, Kevin De Bruyne and Sergio Aguero cancelled out Ross Barkley's opener to send City through with a 4-3 aggregate score.

Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images

The club gave away thousands of inflatable bananas to supporters as they entered the ground, a tradition (partly) explained on City's official website:

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The yellow peril has become part of the Club’s folklore and have been a staple part of matchdays for City fans for more almost 30 years and occasionally make a welcome comeback for special occasions.

Their initial arrival centered mainly around the 1988–89 season and proved to be a colourful affair, especially on the Kippax at Maine Road or at away grounds and the Blues’ faithful were rightly praised by the media for bringing some much-needed humour back to a dull period for the club and football in general.

Why bananas? Well, one theory is the club have been known to slip-up on a few banana skins in the past, so that’s in with a shout and another is Imre Varadi, a crowd favourite of the day, had a surname that sounded a bit like a banana.

However the most creditable tale is that Frank Newton, a City fan and computer analyst, was the man who started the tradition.

The legend goes that Frank brought his inflatable banana to Maine Road after borrowing it from a mate in Leeds back in 1987.

It was around that time that popular striker Imre Varadi was on City’s books and away to West Brom, the chant for Varadi went up and with the banana among the away fans at The Hawthorns, the chant became Imre Banana.

From there, the craze of bringing various blow-up bits of fruit, toys, monsters and suchlike caught on and supporters at other clubs had their own varied themes, though City always led the way.

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Still confused? You're not the only one:

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What's going on with these inflatable bananas at City? There must be a history behind it?

— Busby MUFC (@BusbyMUFC) January 27, 2016"

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The state of Manchester City with their inflatable bananas. What a joke.

— leanne (@leanne3654) January 27, 2016"

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