Post by Jon on Aug 10, 2009 18:07:55 GMT
I loved the recent post about a trip to Ninian Park as it really evoked the mood of the times. Budleigh’s recollections of that era often strike a cord with me because we are of the same vintage. Like him, I saw 1980 through the eyes of a seventeen year-old. The world looks just a little different if you are five years older or five years younger.
If I recall correctly, it was the first leg of the 1980 Cardiff tie that led directly to the “caging in” of the mini stand. Cardiff fans came streaming across the pitch and over the advertising boards for a punch-up. The cage went up soon after.
It was against Cardiff in the League Cup, but three years earlier, that I had my first “Jasper Carrott moment”. I was in the habit of moving round the pitch at half-time to stand behind whichever goal we were attacking. Terry Lee saved a penalty at the Ellacombe end whilst I was pinned against the fence at the Babbacombe end by a mass of baying Cardiff fans. I was halfway up in the air in celebration before the self-preservation instinct kicked in and I just about managed to keep my feet on the floor and turn my strangled cheer into an almost convincing disappointed cough.
I didn’t venture up to South Wales in 1980, but did the following year for a League Cup tie with Newport. I was just about to head off to Uni, so wanted to enjoy a last away trip with a school mate – whose mum and dad stand next to Dave R on the Pop to this day. Whereas I was facing years of student poverty, he had got a job for life (so it was thought at the time) with Barclays and had lashed out on an old Hillman Imp. Our confidence in its ability to get to Wales and back wasn’t that great so he drove us to Newton Abbot from where we let the train take the strain. I seem to remember collecting tokens off Persil packets that allowed you to buy two tickets for the price of one.
The downside to our cunning plan was that we would have to wait around for hours at Bristol on the way back and get back into NA at about half past three in the morning. But every cloud has a silver lining and we were in no rush to get away from the ground so blagged our way into the players’ bar after the game. We had a lovely chat with Bruce Rioch. He was great to talk to and when we told him of our return travel arrangements he said that if it was up to him he’d let us come home on the team coach, but there was no way Frank would because he was hard as nails. But Bruce had sown a seed in our minds.
Then, as now, Frank O’Farrell had a kind of aura around him. We cocky teenagers had thought nothing off chatting away to a man who had skippered Scotland at the World Cup a few years earlier, but even we felt we were pushing our luck in even daring to approach the Great Man. But approach him we did and asked him direct if there was any chance at all that we could sneak onto the coach for the journey home.
To our surprise, he said we could but if we caused any trouble whatsoever or annoyed the players he’d stop the coach and chuck us out. I didn’t think that Frank, even this slightly mellower than fifteen years earlier version, was the kind of guy to make threats he wouldn’t carry through.
So we sat at the back and kept ourselves to ourselves. Ben Street, the kindly club steward who had recently had a Testimonial match against Wolves, came round with packs of sandwiches for the players and had a couple spare which he offered to us and we gratefully accepted.
We got home relatively early after a day out to remember. I think there may have been ninety minutes of utterly dull football in there somewhere.
If I recall correctly, it was the first leg of the 1980 Cardiff tie that led directly to the “caging in” of the mini stand. Cardiff fans came streaming across the pitch and over the advertising boards for a punch-up. The cage went up soon after.
It was against Cardiff in the League Cup, but three years earlier, that I had my first “Jasper Carrott moment”. I was in the habit of moving round the pitch at half-time to stand behind whichever goal we were attacking. Terry Lee saved a penalty at the Ellacombe end whilst I was pinned against the fence at the Babbacombe end by a mass of baying Cardiff fans. I was halfway up in the air in celebration before the self-preservation instinct kicked in and I just about managed to keep my feet on the floor and turn my strangled cheer into an almost convincing disappointed cough.
I didn’t venture up to South Wales in 1980, but did the following year for a League Cup tie with Newport. I was just about to head off to Uni, so wanted to enjoy a last away trip with a school mate – whose mum and dad stand next to Dave R on the Pop to this day. Whereas I was facing years of student poverty, he had got a job for life (so it was thought at the time) with Barclays and had lashed out on an old Hillman Imp. Our confidence in its ability to get to Wales and back wasn’t that great so he drove us to Newton Abbot from where we let the train take the strain. I seem to remember collecting tokens off Persil packets that allowed you to buy two tickets for the price of one.
The downside to our cunning plan was that we would have to wait around for hours at Bristol on the way back and get back into NA at about half past three in the morning. But every cloud has a silver lining and we were in no rush to get away from the ground so blagged our way into the players’ bar after the game. We had a lovely chat with Bruce Rioch. He was great to talk to and when we told him of our return travel arrangements he said that if it was up to him he’d let us come home on the team coach, but there was no way Frank would because he was hard as nails. But Bruce had sown a seed in our minds.
Then, as now, Frank O’Farrell had a kind of aura around him. We cocky teenagers had thought nothing off chatting away to a man who had skippered Scotland at the World Cup a few years earlier, but even we felt we were pushing our luck in even daring to approach the Great Man. But approach him we did and asked him direct if there was any chance at all that we could sneak onto the coach for the journey home.
To our surprise, he said we could but if we caused any trouble whatsoever or annoyed the players he’d stop the coach and chuck us out. I didn’t think that Frank, even this slightly mellower than fifteen years earlier version, was the kind of guy to make threats he wouldn’t carry through.
So we sat at the back and kept ourselves to ourselves. Ben Street, the kindly club steward who had recently had a Testimonial match against Wolves, came round with packs of sandwiches for the players and had a couple spare which he offered to us and we gratefully accepted.
We got home relatively early after a day out to remember. I think there may have been ninety minutes of utterly dull football in there somewhere.
He wasn't, I once saw him send a player back round to his nearby home to change his "inappropriate" attire before the team coach departed from the ground for an away game and when the poor lad had returned he found to his dismay that they had gone without him.