What was it like, being a football fan when giants on the pitch included Bobby Moore, Gordon Banks, Johnny Byrne, Bobby Charlton, Bobby Robson and George Best?
It’s easy to Google the records and find out who won and who scored, but was it really like being a fan, standing a few feet from these legends?
If you know someone old enough, it might pay to enjoy a few moments sharing their memories before it’s too late. That’s why I sat down a few nights ago for a vidchat with my dear friend Pudding Pete. Raising a glass for our synchronised Stella’s, I asked him just to tell me what fans saw from the terraces when he was growing up in the 1960s and 1970s.
“Crowds were big“, he told me. “They were all men and boys, almost no girls or women. Most men wore flat caps, most smoked, and football was almost the only place you’d hear anyone swear. Most men worked with their hands in those days, there were no foreign holidays, no weekends away – real life was hard, and football was a big escape.
There were no matchday tickets, the gates opened at 1pm and you just queued up in the street outside the ground to pay cash at the turnstile. Almost everyone stood in the open to watch the game. If you put up an umbrella to protect from the rain, snow or hail, you got a torrent of abuse from the men stood behind. Stands with roofs and seats were mostly for rich men and old men. If you did get a seat, you could maybe buy a cushion for a few extra pennies.
There was no singing, no chanting, but plenty of shouting, cheering and also anger directed at players, managers and of course refs and linesmen. No club shop, no team shirts, just scarves, bobble hats and rosettes you could pin on your chest, all in club colours, so you could show your support.
In the early 1960s, the only football on TV ever was the FA Cup Final, the World Cup Finals and the odd England game. Almost all league games were on a Saturday with a 3pm kick off, half time was just 10 minutes (no pop music, though you might get a marching band if you were lucky) and, with no time ever added on for time wasting or injuries, all games ended by a quarter to 5.
Then, we all had Sports Report on the radio at 5, for what they called the first reading of the classified football results. The man who read them gave you a clue as to who won by his voice – if it was a home win, his voice saying the away team’s name always went lower – like Crystal Palace 5, (then in a funereal voice), Manchester United nil. If the away team won, his voice would go up as he said the away team’s name. The results were followed by on the spot reporters with stories of what happened in the top 6 or 8 matches.
Around 6.30, you’d be down to the newsagent for the football paper, 8 pages, written, edited and printed inside an hour, complete with results, league tables and match reports. And families in homes everywhere were checking their pools coupons, just in case they’d won a fortune by correctly picking 8 draws from their 11 selected games in that day’s fixture list. It’s mega hard to do, just try it!
English football had 4 divisions, First down to Fourth. That was new in the 1960s, as up till then beneath the first 2 divisions, you had Division 3 South and Division 3 North. Which cut travelling distances for less well off clubs and also meant lots of local derbies for the fans. Which all helped build revenue as well as rivalry.” Pete paused for a giant sip of his beer.
“What about the teams?” I asked him.
“Well, the outfield players wore numbers 2 to 11, depending on the position they were playing. Goalies mostly wore green jumpers with no number. In the sun, some keepers would wear a flat cap, like the men in the crowd. In the rain, some keepers would wear ordinary gloves, just like yours or mine.
There were no formations like 4-3-3 or 4-4-2. Until the mid-60s, English teams all played the same with 2 full backs, a centre half, 2 wing halves who operated box to box, and 5 forwards (2 wingers, a centre forward and 2 inside forwards who played inside the wingers and supported the big man up top. One of the inside forwards would sometimes be called a schemer!).
There was precious little play acting and no diving. If a player got injured, an old ex-player called the trainer would sprint from the dugout carrying a bucket of cold water and a sponge. If the magic sponge didn’t fix the pain, that was your lot. There were no substitutes. If anyone got badly injured, you were down to 10 men. If the casualty wasn’t fit to play on, but could be patched up, he’d be put on the wing to hobble around and cause a nuisance to opponents.
When substitutes were first introduced in the 1960s, each team had one (who wore number 12), and he could only be brought on if a player was too badly hurt to continue. Which led to comical scenes where a player would be told to lie down and feign injury so his manager could make a tactical substitution, which was of course illegal.
Pitches were awful, sometimes thick with mud. There was no underground heating and when, on Boxing Day 1962, the snow fell heavily, the Big Freeze began in Britain and it went on for 3 months. Football largely disappeared, giving clubs the headache of catching up 10 or so games in a very short period to get the season ended before summer. Some games were even rescheduled for midweek afternoon kick offs because that was the warmest time of day and there was a bigger chance of the pitch thawing enough that they could get the game played.
Staying warm was a big part of being a football fan in those days. Only very rich people had central heating at home. My parents had just the one fire that was lit each day in the fireplace in the living room and their only other indoor heating came from paraffin heaters, where you lit oil to get warmth from the flame. The fumes were awful, and risk of fire was absurdly high. Bathrooms were very cold, and the bath itself was freezing cold, even when filled with hot water. Indoor toilets were icy on your backside, outdoor toilets (most of us had one) were a nightmare in winter and beds were cold except for where you had a nice warm hot water bottle.”
“For many fans, a hot pre-match meal was a must.” That’s where Pudding Pete got his nickname. He still always has a hot pudding before a game – apple pie and custard is his favourite.
“Football in those times was a man’s game. As I say, pitches were horrid, and fixture lists at Christmas and Easter didn’t care about the players – it was all about entertainment while fans had a couple of days off from the labour of working. Most work in those days was manual.
Over Easter, there would be 3 games in 4 days (Friday, Saturday and Monday). Games played on Easter Monday were the reverse of the Good Friday match ups. At Christmas, teams would play each other on Boxing Day with the reverse fixture the day after. To keep travelling down, these were mostly local derbies so there was nearly always an overdose of added grudge and needle mixed in with the revenge from injustices and bad decisions the day before. And there were some silly scores. I remember the year when Fulham beat Ipswich 10-1 on Boxing Day. I was staying with family in Essex, so we went to the return match in Ipswich the next day – and the home team reversed the 9-goal defeat with a 4-2 win!
Sliding tackles in those days were 2 a penny, and the tackle from behind was alive and well – and legal! Refs in those days didn’t have cards, so a caution came with the ref producing little black book and writing down the player’s name. The ref always asked a player for his name, so – when the player being “booked” was famous – the crowd would howl abuse at the ref for apparently not knowing the player’s name!
If you were sent off, you knew because the ref was pointing dramatically (Hitler salute style) towards the dressing room. There was no radio communication between match officials, no 4th official, and when the ref got injured, the PA system would ask for a person from the crowd with experience to volunteer to be a linesman. Famously, one time, Jimmy Hill (ex-Fulham player and ex-Coventry manager who became a TV pundit) put down his microphone and picked up the flag so the game could be completed. Needless to say, he got right barracked.
Other changes in the 1960s and 1970s included the arrival of ‘hooligans’ who wore bovver boots, stood behind the goal and sang, led rhythmic clapping and chants, carried big banners with sometimes witty messages and threw toilet rolls at the opposing keeper – especially when the teams came out or when their team scored. This was the period of history when fans fighting became a feature of football, and parking your car near the ground might result in a dent in a door or your radio aerial being snapped off.
The presence of police ballooned at the same time and, to prevent end of match pitch invasions, the bobbies would all come out 10 minutes before the end to stand between fans and pitch. Their untidy marching was often greeted by fans singing the Laurel and Hardy theme music, and – when policemen took up their positions – they often blocked fans’ view of the action, which just resulted in more abuse.
Players all wore black boots, and shorts were always white or black until Chelsea played in all blue shirts and shorts, and Liverpool played in all red. Shirts never had long sleeves till the mid 1960s, and shorts never had numbers till Chelsea introduced them with their blue shorts. Apart from position numbers, the only thing on a shirt was the club badge – no sponsor names.
Match of the Day came along on TV in the mid 1960s, but only ever showed one game in black and white. There were no pundits or co-commentator ‘experts’, there was only one camera and you only ever saw a goal once – there was no instant replay. Homes only ever had one TV, so watching the footy often required negotiations and deals with other family members who didn’t want to watch football. Colour TV didn’t reach most homes till the 1970s.
Transfers of players could happen any time all season up to the deadline, which was always 16 March. From that point on, no transfers would take place until the season was over. There was no issue with registrations and, with only one or two foreign players in the whole league, no problems with paperwork so, if the club could sign a player by Saturday lunchtime, he’d be in the team and play that afternoon.”
When Pudding Pete finally stopped talking to draw breath, I thanked him for his memories and the mental pictures he gave me of footy back in those days.
And then Pudding Pete said, “Isn’t it strange? Life has changed in so many ways. At home, we now have fitted kitchens with a fridge, a dishwasher, washing machine, a dryer, and we consume frozen food, sliced bread, tea bags, lager and crisps with flavours. We wear trainers and whatever they mean by leisurewear. We go shopping at supermarkets and shopping centres. We travel on motorways in cars with seatbelts, deciding where we go using sat-nav, listening to the car radio or our personal playlist, and CDs, DVDs and cassettes have all come and gone. We have computers, tablets and smartphones, all with apps and social media. We eat food from Indian, Chinese and Korean restaurants, we have McDonalds, Burger King and Starbucks. These changes have all happened since the 1960s started – just like the changes we’ve talked about in football.
But there’s one thing in football that hasn’t changed at all. Goalies are taller now, they’re fitter too, and they can use TV or video to do homework on their opponents to give themselves more chance of stopping goals. Yet the size of the goal remains exactly the same. Isn’t it time that goals were made bigger?“
