Almost 40 years after Merthyr Tydfil FC stunned Italian footballing giants Atalanta in the European Cup Winners Cup, the remarkable story is being brought back to life on the theatre stage.

The comedy Just One Cornetto focuses on the weeks leading up to the match at the club's Penydarren Park, when Merthyr defeated the team from Bergamo 2-1, in the first round of the competition.

Disappointment was to follow with the thousands who had travelled from Merthyr to northern Italy having to suffer a 2-0 loss, which meant Atalanta would go through, eventually reaching the semi-finals of the competition.

But the drama of that first match, and the attention on it at a time when English clubs were banned from European football, means it will go down in Welsh footballing folklore.

It was a dramatic game, with Merthyr's winner only coming in the 83rd minute thanks to a Ceri Williams free-kick deflecting off an Italian player, but Bunko believes the play is about much more than that.

"It's a football story. But it's not so much of a football story. The football is right at the end. It's a bit like the Full Monty, where the dance is right at the end. And with this play, the football is right at the end."

The plot follows a boy called Decker, and his efforts to fulfil a promise to take his grandfather's ashes to the game, but it is also about the wider community.

"It's all about the characters and their struggles to overcome. You've got Italians who come over, who are quite apprehensive. You've got the committee, who have got to go from an amateur to professionals. You've got a bit of a love story in it, because the Italians come over and fall in love with a Merthyr girl."

On the night at least 8,000 supporters were crammed into Penydarren Park, but Bunko admits that although he lives in Merthyr, he wasn't one of them.

"I was playing rugby at the time, so it passed me by", he said.

"But the last couple of years, I've been going up to Penydarren Park, and they always end up talking about that game. And I see all the photos on the wall. And I just thought I'd love to do something about it."

"I'm a proud Merthyr boy anyway. And I just wanted to fetch that part. Because the town gets a big kicking off everybody and I just wanted to show the communal side of it and how good it is."

Ben Evans plays the part of Kevin Rogers, the only Merthyr-born player in the team that beat Atalanta, and the man who scored in the 38th minute to go 1-0 up.

With many of those players expected to be at the opening performance on Thursday, Evans says he is excited, despite the added pressure on the cast.

"It's such an honour. I've been very, very lucky to speak to the marvellous Kevin Rogers, who I said to him that I hope I didn't let him down. And he's such a nice guy," said Evans.

"It's very much a Welsh thing that I probably didn't get starstruck meeting Rowan Atkinson or Anthony Hopkins and Michael Sheen. I got more starstruck meeting Gareth Bale and Ryan Giggs and Kevin Rogers and Ceri Williams."

"So, there will be a few extra nerves maybe. And I hope that I do Kevin and all the players justice."

Evans agrees that the significance of sporting events goes far beyond the results on the pitch, emphasising their impact on communities.

He added: "I was only three in '87, but in Wales especially, we hold on to these historical moments. Being from West Wales, we still talk about when Llanelli beat the All Blacks and that was a long time ago," Evans said.

"When we first came into the rehearsal space, we spoke not even about the match, but about Merthyr in 1987 and the problems that were going on economically and how this night gave the town hope. And it's something to make you believe, isn't it?"

Director Neil Maidman attended the famous fixture at Penydarren Park.

"It was absolutely amazing. I was a sixth former at the time. It happened on 16 September. My 18th birthday was on 17 September, so I attended the match the night before," he said.

"Looking back on it, that week was so instrumental in my entire life. I started my first job a few days later and then I actually met my future wife a few days later."

"To be doing and directing this play about that time, it's quite surreal, really."

The independent production looked in jeopardy at one point, as director Neil Maidman and Bunko struggled to secure funding for the project, "which was disappointing", said Bunko.

It's a mirror image of the events of 1987, where club chairman John Reddy led a campaign to raise tens of thousands of pounds, with an army of volunteers working day and night to renovate the stadium, in order to ensure the match could be played in the town.

"We weren't going to put [the play] on, and then the community got together, from business people and volunteers and we got enough money to actually put it on", Bunko said.

"We could then pay the actors good money and we could get the props and the costumes and everything we want."

"But it just showed our little punk rock spirit, and we got money from somewhere else, and on Thursday night we're going to have 500 people in here [The Aberdare Coliseum], which will be a good experience."