Nearly Reach the Sky (9 page)

I love the idea of playing twice in twenty-four hours, so – with the help of my son – I am trying to revive this tradition using a format in which West Ham never suffers a humiliating defeat to lower-league opposition: tabletop football.

The idea came to me when I was rummaging around in the loft and came across the Pro-Action Football set Williams Jnr was given
as a young lad. It had been many years since Geoff and I had last fought it out over the dining room table – me as Old West Ham versus his New West Ham (he selects any player who has represented the Irons since 1991, the year he was born, while I have the previous ninety-one years to choose from). But we have decided to renew our old rivalry in what I hope will become an annual Christmas showdown.

To be honest, I suggested tabletop football because it is one sporting arena in which I can still compete with him. As a middle-aged man it is only natural that I’m too old and too slow to play football for real. What did depress me, though, was discovering I’m also too old and too slow to play hi-tech versions such as FIFA 2000-and-something. Give me a PlayStation controller and you’d think a diabolical combination of Avram Grant and Gianfranco Zola was running the team, such is the chaos that ensues. But I can still flick a plastic figurine with the best of them.

For anyone of my generation, the top-of-the-table tabletop football game is Subbuteo. And, without wishing to sound unduly immodest here, I was pretty good at it in my younger days.

My first set came with the two-dimensional players that collectors apparently now refer to as ‘flats’. The kits were red and blue shirts with white shorts. For no good reason I generally preferred to use the blue players. The trouble was every game felt as though I was controlling an anorexic Everton taking on an equally undernourished Charlton Athletic.

In the year I first saw West Ham play in the flesh, Subbuteo introduced its so-called heavyweight figures, which were threedimensional and came in different club colours. It was as if a prayer had been answered, and my subsequent letter to Santa couldn’t
have been clearer. Unfortunately for me, it must have got lost in the post, because rather than getting my beloved Hammers I ended up with Juventus. I think that was when I finally lost all faith in Father Christmas and his stunted workforce.

I begged my parents to help me put right this terrible wrong, but they seemed strangely unwilling to get involved. So I nicked my brother’s paints that he used on his pointless plastic Airfix aeroplanes and turned the Old Lady of Turin claret and blue. Well, claret-ish. It was more pillar-box red to be honest, but it was certainly better than black and white stripes.

Encouraged by my success, I tried painting our plastic Homepride flour-grader in West Ham colours too (don’t tell me you’ve never heard of Fred, the little man in a black suit with the bowler hat that unscrewed – what do they teach in schools these days?) but it didn’t turn out as well as I’d hoped. My mum thought I’d done it as some form of protest about not getting the Subbuteo side I’d asked for and my pocket money was withheld for several weeks as a result.

However, it takes more than that to discourage a true West Ham supporter and, once my income was restored, I saved hard to buy the team I loved. (There was no such thing as a leveraged buy-out in those days; you handed over your own money or there was no sale.) For the next five years, during my time at secondary school, I never looked back. If there was a Subbuteo game going, I’d be up for it. And – always playing as WHUFC – I won more than I lost (which is more than can be said for the full-sized WHUFC over the same period).

I had a particularly good home record, which probably had something to do with the fact I played on a top-quality surface.
The original idea, when Subbuteo was first sold in 1947, was for players to chalk out a pitch on an old army blanket – but my old man was having none of that. During the war he had been in the RAF, and he didn’t like the army or their blankets. So he bought a rather nice piece of green baize and persuaded my mum to get busy with her Singer sewing machine. The result was a beautifully embroidered pitch with permanent cotton lines that cried out for a passing game. (We’re West Ham United – we play on the floor.) Few opponents could live with it.

Those of you who recall how quickly the goalmouths at Upton Park became duck ponds in the late ’60s and early ’70s will note that what I was playing on was somewhat different from the real thing. Still, there’s nothing wrong with striving for perfection.

Unlike many West Ham players, I probably retired too early. But you know what it’s like when you’re coming to terms with puberty – there are so many other things a healthy lad wants to do with his index finger.

It was many years before I played again. It was Christmas at my sister-in-law’s and they had bought one of their kids a Subbuteo set. And what a set it was! The only accessories I’d ever managed to acquire were a miniature FA Cup and some plastic hoardings that prevented the players flying off the table and sustaining serious injury when they hit the floor. But this had the lot … floodlights, stands, supporters, officials, everything you could think of except, perhaps, the mounted policemen who – while you make your way to the ground – look down at you as if you are even more unsavoury than the mess their horses leave behind.

I didn’t get to use the claret and blue players on this occasion. My nephew supports Aston Villa (no one knows why) and, given
it was his Christmas present, he insisted on his right to the sacred colours. I had no argument with that.

What I did have an argument with was his interpretation of a ‘flick’. The rules of Subbuteo are quite clear about how you propel the figures around the pitch. You can’t push them, you can’t nudge them – and you certainly can’t pick them up and put them down anywhere you damn well like.

I like to think of myself as a patient man and I tried to show him the correct technique. I also explained the rules about what constitutes handball, why it’s a foul if you smash into an opponent’s player without first touching the ball and that you can only score from within a marked zone. But I was obviously wasting my breath.

His first goal clearly shouldn’t have stood as he had ignored at least three of the four points I had just made to him. Short of picking up the ball and throwing it into the back of my net, it couldn’t have been a more blatant case of cheating. But he was adamant he had scored and determinedly set up the pieces for a re-start.

Looking back, perhaps I should have let it go at that, shaken hands and congratulated him on a well-deserved victory. But I’ve always had an inherent sense of fair play and I resolved to show him the true meaning of sportsmanship. I went on to produce a mesmerising performance, if I do say so myself. As I recall, I had a healthy lead and was putting together yet another intricate passing movement when he realised the enormity of his mistake and ran off to find his mother. As I explained to her, I think it should take more than losing a game of tabletop football to make a small boy cry. Apparently, for reasons that were never properly explained to me, he didn’t play Subbuteo again.

When my son was old enough to take his place at the other
end of the table, Subbuteo had rather gone out of fashion. There was a more popular game on the market called Striker, but that was rubbish. The top-of-the-range model was Pro-Action Football, so – like any parent who wants their children to get more out of life than they have themselves – I happily shelled out for that.

Unlike Subbuteo, you could swivel the players so they are pointing in the direction you want them to kick the ball. (As anyone who has ever played association football will testify, there has never been a better coaching tip than ‘play the way you’re facing’.) Magnets in the base of the players meant the metallic ball was drawn to their feet and stuck there until you decided to pass or shoot. (Now I know how Trevor Brooking did it.) And when you did want them to get rid of it, you smacked them on the top of the head. (Be honest – who hasn’t ever wanted to do that when watching West Ham try to defend over the years?)

The first time we renewed our Pro-Action rivalry the game ended 6–6. The old boys, playing 4–4–2, were: Parkes, Stewart, Martin, Moore, Lampard (Snr), Devonshire, Brooking, Bonds, Peters, Hurst, Robson (Pop). The latter-day legends’ starting XI, playing a more modern 3–2–3–2, was: Green, Repka, Collins, Tomkins, Noble, Parker, Tevez, di Canio, Cole (Joe), Cole (Carlton), Zamora. (How that lot got a draw against the greatest players ever to have worn the claret and blue is beyond me.)

That was on Christmas Day. Sadly, the Boxing Day fixture had to be cancelled due to adverse hangover conditions. However, I’m determined to make this a family tradition over the festive period.

After being held at home like that, I think I may have to change my team around a bit, though. Don’t tell Geoff, but I’m seriously thinking about presenting him with a team of nicknames the next
time we meet. And I’m not talking about the Mooro and Pottsy kind of nicknames – I’m going for proper soubriquets.

On current form, as a 4–3–3, I’d pick: Eric, Muffin, Stretch, Reggie, Pancho, Ticker, Hadleigh (aka Boog), Harpo, Sparrow, Psycho and Sarge. By the time he’s worked out who’s who, I’ll be 3–0 up and coasting.

What do you mean you don’t know who Muffin is either? OK, I’ll go through them with you – but only you. No blabbing to my son (not that we’re competitive, you understand). Those nicknames translate as: Phil Parkes (Eric), John Bond (Muffin), Alvin Martin (Stretch), Tony Gale (Reggie), Stuart Pearce (Pancho), Ronnie Boyce (Ticker), Trevor Brooking (Hadleigh aka Boog), Pat Holland (Harpo), Alan Taylor (Sparrow), David Cross (Psycho), and Paul Goddard (Sarge).

And that’s part of the beauty of tabletop football: it gives you a chance to while away time that could otherwise be usefully spent washing the car or mowing the lawn, dreaming up West Ham fantasy teams.

As a man who carries some excess timber myself, I’d be happy to manage a squad that puts up with a bit of overweight too. (There’s nothing wrong with having a stout manager – just remember to call him ‘Big’, not ‘Fat’, or you’ll upset a lot of loyal fans.) The captain’s armband for my team of tubbies would, of course, have to go to Frank ‘one man and his forklift truck’ Lampard Jnr. Waddling out behind him would be Neil Ruddock, John Hartson, Julian Faubert, Luis Boa Morte, Julian Dicks (gulp – did I really just say that?), Mido, Titi Camara, Brian Dear, Jimmy Greaves and – bringing up the rear by quite some way – Benni McCarthy. You’ll notice I haven’t bothered with a keeper. Quite honestly, you wouldn’t need
one. Just grease ’em all up and lever any of those salad-dodgers between the sticks and no opposition striker is going to be disturbing the onion bag in a hurry.

If you don’t fancy the porkers, how about a team of Alans? Sealey, Devonshire, Dickens, Curbishley etc. Of course, you’d have to play a few out of position – the only defender I can think of is Alan Stephenson. And I’d cheat by including Paul, Martin and Clive Allen (crafty, eh?). But the good news is you don’t have to go with Allen McNightmare in goal: there’s a guy called Alan Dickie who turned out in the green jersey for us a dozen times in the early ’60s and, although I never saw him play, I just know he’s better than McNit.

But the biggest challenge when picking fantasy sides is to put together the ultimate team of the most useless players we’ve ever had. Let’s face it, choosing a dream team of West Ham all-time greats is relatively easy. Picking Worst Ham United is far, far harder.

For what it’s worth, this is my starting XI from hell: Allen McKnight, Rigobert Song, Steve Walford, Gary Breen, Mitchell Thomas, Freddie Ljungberg, Nigel Quashie, Ilie Dumitrescu, Peter Eustace, David Kelly, Ted MacDougall.

You may well disagree with a number of those selections, and I can understand why. I don’t think anyone can put up a serious argument against McKnight – he truly was in a class of his own. But at the back there is a bunch of other players making a strong claim for inclusion: Gary Charles, Ragnvald Soma, Paul Hilton, Calum Davenport and John Cushley all made the shortlist. Some might even suggest George Parris, but I’m not having that. Not George!

And what about midfield? ‘No Franz Carr, Andy Impey, Dudley
Tyler or Dale Gordon?!’ I hear you cry. ‘No Nigel Rio-Coker?’ Then there’s Matthew Rush, Luis Boa Morte and Florin ‘two bob’ Raducioiu. As I say, this isn’t easy – although Joey Beauchamp did make the task a little less tricky by ensuring he never actually turned out for West Ham during his fifty-eight days at the club, thus ruling himself out of contention in this particular exercise.

Dutchman Marco Boogers, on the other hand, did play for us – making four appearances as a substitute, which included a sending-off for a chest-high tackle on Gary Neville at Old Trafford that did not go down well with a red-faced man drinking expensive French wine. Before the hapless Boogers was finally sent back to the land of his birth permanently, there was an oft-repeated story in
The Sun
claiming he had returned to Holland feeling sorry for himself and was holed up in a caravan. However, it turns out this was not entirely true and the reporter had actually been told that, rather than residing in a
caravan
, he’d gone on holiday by
car again
. An easy mistake to make – it could have happened to any of us.

That aside, what little anyone saw of him convinced us all he was utterly useless, which is why he made the shortlist for one of the two places up front in my Worst Ham side. But, like Mike Small, John Radford, Jimmy Greaves, Sandy Clark and Lee Chapman, he didn’t quite get the nod for the first team. Sometimes, as a manager, you just have to go with your gut feeling.

Try it yourself. It’s tougher than you think – but you may well come up with something better (or do I mean worse?). Still, I’m standing by my selection. All things considered, I reckon this lot would be certain to go down before the Christmas decorations even went up.

I
UNDERSTAND THAT NOT
everybody feels the same way as I do about West Ham. Had I been in any doubt there were one or two clues in the year the hopeless Avram Grant masterminded our relegation. Some of the folk from south of the river, who do not much care for claret and blue, hired a light aircraft to fly over Wigan as our fate was sealed at the DW Stadium trailing a banner that read: ‘Avram Grant, Millwall legend.’

At Tottenham – another club not renowned for its love of the Irons – one fan made a banner along the lines of ‘Come home, Robbie – mission completed’ after loan signing Robbie Keane contributed to our demise by missing a whole host of very scoreable chances.

All very amusing, I’m sure.

Our rivalry with The Hated Millwall, in particular, has prompted a good deal of speculation over the years. Again I am delighted to be able to call on the expertise of historian John Simkin to explain how it all started: ‘It has to be remembered that Millwall was established in 1885, ten years before Thames Ironworks and fifteen years before West Ham United. In fact, Millwall were champions of the Southern League when Thames Ironworks was established.’

At that time, the two clubs occupied the same side of the Thames – with The Hated Millwall nestled in the kink of the river that is rather misleadingly known as the Isle of Dogs. Their name comes from the windmills that used to line the western embankment. Sorry, John. Didn’t mean to interrupt there. Please, carry on.

Many thanks for that, John – good to know that history proves we really are the bigger club.

They say that if you sit in St Mark’s Square in Venice sipping a cup of coffee long enough you will get to see everyone you’ve ever met in your life. Personally, I think they’re wrong (and I’m certain your cappuccino wouldn’t be worth drinking by the time every last one of them turned up). More likely, I reckon, is that if you spend long enough supporting a football team you are going to fall out with just about every other club you come into contact with.

I’m not talking about the long-established enmity that West Ham supporters reserve for traditional foes such as The Hated Millwall and Tottenham. This isn’t even about that natural human instinct to revel in the failures of the glamorous and successful like Manchester United, Liverpool and Leyton Orient. What intrigues me is how you can grow to dislike so many teams that you once thought would never give you cause to complain.

Take Southampton. There was a time I had no problem
whatsoever with the Saints. The whirling arm of Mick Channon when he celebrated a goal; the one-club loyalty of Le Tiss; the 1976 Cup final underdog win against Man U – what was there not to like? Then, in the season we both came up from the Championship, we had a date with Southampton on Valentine’s Day and they behaved so badly that I won’t talk to them again until they call to apologise (with chocs and flowers too, I should add).

Yes, our man Matt Taylor was stupid to get involved after we were awarded a penalty. And he shouldn’t have raised his hands to an opponent. But Southampton’s Billy Sharp went down like he’d been decked by a heavyweight boxer in what looked to me to be a cynical and deliberate attempt to get a fellow professional sent off. The football they played afterwards was no great shakes either and – like the bottle of over-priced Irish cider I had at half time – the whole evening left a very nasty taste in the mouth. So now the south coast side are on the long list of clubs with which I have issues.

Oh, and while I’m at it, on the way to the Southampton game I saw a Saints fan smoking on the platform as he waited for a Tube train – which these days is about as socially acceptable as picking clinkers out of your crack at a family wedding. No one lights up on the Underground any more. Have some people still not heard of the King’s Cross fire?

Southampton are not the only team in red and white stripes to have upset me over the years. I never forgave Stoke for ‘stealing’ Geoff Hurst and I’ve no intention of ever forgiving Sheffield United for the fuss they kicked up over Carlos Tevez. Yes, we broke the rules and were fined accordingly. I’ve no problem with that. What does still rankle is the way they sought compensation for
being relegated. They went down because they weren’t good enough over the course of the season and then lost to Wigan on the last day, not because we had Tevez – who had actually been in the side when we were beaten heavily at Bramall Lane some weeks earlier. Still, no one wants to rake up all that again.

The Argentine will of course be for ever considered a West Ham hero after he gave us the crossed Irons salute upon returning with Man Utd. But I fell in love with him the day he tackled a Watford player with his head. He didn’t challenge him in the air – the ball was on the floor when a prostrate Tevez lunged in with his cranium. That, my friends, is how you get to achieve legendary status at Upton Park.

Incidentally, a few days before the Blades played their Sheffield rivals, in the so-called ‘steel city semi-final’ at Wembley,
The Guardian
ran a story previewing the match. My colleague who was given the copy to edit was no expert on the beautiful game. She felt that, as we were running the piece on a Thursday and the game was on Saturday, it would read better if, rather than mention the days of the week repeatedly, she changed it slightly. Which is how Sheffield Wednesday became ‘Sheffield yesterday’ in a great national daily newspaper.

While we’re in Yorkshire this might be a good time to explain why Leeds is still one of the teams that vexes me greatly. The explanation is simple: Don Revie – the man who set out to win at all costs and convinced talented players they would be better off kicking their opponents instead of the ball in such a way as to be considered entertainment.

One particular moment still gives me the shudders all these years on. Leeds were pressing in front of the South Bank and a
speculative cross came into our box. Keeper Bobby Ferguson went for the ball – and, after colliding with defender John McDowell, came crashing down like an Olympic diver performing a double twist with pike. Only Ferguson wasn’t throwing himself into a diving pool – he landed head first on hard, unyielding ground. He had clearly lost consciousness – yet the hard, unyielding style that Revie demanded of his teams meant they played on, and would have happily celebrated a goal with a fellow human being lying motionless nearby if a Mick Jones shot hadn’t been blocked by the horizontal, but alert, McDowell.

Newspaper reports from the time say Ferguson was out cold for four or five minutes. A witness remembers our bonny Bobby lying there for ten. It seemed much longer. I don’t believe there was a single person in the ground who didn’t fear he had broken his neck. Back then they didn’t quiz managers after a game in quite the same way as they do now, so we never got to hear Revie’s thoughts on the matter. It’s my guess he wouldn’t have batted an eyelid if Ferguson had left Upton Park in a wooden box. (The world record fee we paid for Ferguson certainly didn’t prevent him getting battered from time to time. More famously than the Leeds game, he had been carried off the previous season in the League Cup semi-final replay against Stoke at Old Trafford … but that’s another story.)

I realise it’s a fair old leap from the art of gamesmanship to artificial pitches, but join me by the long jump pit as I begin my run-up. As I recall, four clubs had the drastic plastic: QPR, Preston, Oldham and Luton. I suppose I should despise them all equally but, hey, no one said life is fair. It’s you, Hatters, that really gave me the ache – somehow the beach ball effect at Kenilworth Road seemed even more laughable than at any of the other
grounds. I’m not putting you in the same league as loathsome Leeds, you understand – but I won’t be buying one of your Luton Lotto tickets any time soon.

And where do you think you’re going, Bristol City? I still haven’t forgiven you for that 10.30 a.m. kickoff.

Then there’s Oxford United. How can anyone fall out with them? Well, I managed it after a rather unpleasant disagreement with one of their supporters following a game at their place. I won’t bore you with the details, but I think it’s a reasonable guess that the young man with whom I debated the various merits of our respective teams was not an undergraduate at the university that fields the dark blue crew in the boat race.

I never thought I’d have a problem with Coventry – not after they beat Tottenham in a Wembley final. Then, in the Championship at the Ricoh, we had a whole load of tomfoolery about who broke the minute’s silence for the city’s wartime bombing victims – and now they’re on my list too.

I could go on – and I will because I haven’t got to Notts County yet. My lack of goodwill towards them goes back to what used to be known as the second division. The only consolation on missing out on the Cup final, courtesy of our old friend Keith Hackett, would have been to have gone up as champions. Only Notts Co spoiled that particular party with one of the most negative displays seen at Upton Park in years. The fact they later appointed Paul Ince as manager only serves to prove that my initial judgement about them was spot on.

Swansea could well have found themselves on this list as well, but their supporters did have the good grace to be genuinely embarrassed by the disgraceful play-acting from Chico Flores that earned
Andy Carroll a straight red and a three-game ban in the 2014 relegation battle. Their manager, the high-class Michael Laudrup, did what so few do and criticised his own player publicly for his actions. (Laudrup’s reward? He was sacked three days later.)

There is, I know, a slight chance that I am beginning to sound like a cantankerous old curmudgeon who bears a grudge. As my wife and children will testify, nothing could be further from the truth. Rather it is that I have a strong sense of justice – which is hugely satisfied by seeing the likes of Luton, Leeds and Sheffield United flounder in the lower leagues.

The Italians may have got it wrong about St Mark’s Square, but they are right about revenge. Unlike frothy coffee, it is definitely best served cold.

There was a time when, if you wanted a biscuit to dunk in your cappuccino, you’d look to Reading to provide it. But not any more – which explains the reason I don’t really care for them either.

Let me be clear about this. I have no problem whatsoever with the good people of Reading – or indeed the town itself. It gave me my big break in journalism. It’s just the football club I dislike, even though I used to watch them occasionally as a youngster and have some ancient programmes from 1968 to prove it (Mansfield, Oldham and Gillingham – they’re yours if have any use for them).

The thing is, I have no time for anyone who makes up their own nickname (Paul ‘The Guv’nor’ Ince? Of course this includes you!). Once, Reading were the Biscuit Men; now they like to call themselves the Royals. Talk about social mobility!

Remember Huntley and Palmers? No, they weren’t the England full backs in the good old days of two-three-five. They made biscuits. Lots and lots of biscuits. In fact, they made so many biscuits
that Reading became known as Biscuit Town. And, without wishing to labour the point, the local football team became known as the Biscuit Men.