All good things come to an end

Sunday August 23 should have been a very strange day for me. It was the first West Ham home match since March 1986 that I hadn’t even considered attending.

I missed most Saturday matches between my first game, on Easter Monday 1986, and August 1988 because I was still at school (I went to a public school and had lessons on a Saturday). But I always thought about going. I bought my first a season ticket in 1989-90 – the year I went to university (I even chose my university, Southampton, because of its proximity to London). During my three years away, I missed only two home matches – the first weekend I was down there (a 3-2 victory over West Brom) and an evening Zenith Data Systems Cup tie (a 5-2 victory over Plymouth). Bearing in mind that West Ham were a very strong cup side at the time (we reached a semi-final in each of my three years at university) and were playing many extra matches, my record was impressive (I also went to 60% of our away games).

In the subsequent 16 seasons, I probably missed 12 home matches. On every occasion I was out of the country, with the exception of one match when I had the flu (a 4-3 win over Sheffield Wednesday, which was on TV) and a couple of games on Boxing Day (my mum frowned upon football taking priority over a family Christmas). Things changed slightly last season, when I missed two of our final five home matches – once to watch the Grand National on TV and the other time because a friend had invited me on an all-expenses-paid trip to Ascot.

My passion for West Ham (and football in general) has waned considerably over the past few seasons, for a variety of reasons: the lack of atmosphere at the stadium; the obscene amount of money in the game; cheating, money-grabbing players who move on as soon as they get a better offer; ridiculous ticket prices; and the offensive thugs who populate the Boleyn Ground (see 9/12/08).

It was a combination of these factors, plus the luxury of being able to do what I want on a Saturday, rather than turning down the chance of a weekend away because ‘we’re playing Bolton at home’, that ultimately led to my decision not to renew my season ticket. I must admit that on my way to Heathrow airport on June 20, I wrote to the stadium manager asking for a free season ticket (see 19/06), to make up for the stress caused by my row with the foul-mouthed racist sitting behind me. But he never replied.

So on August 21, I took the opportunity afforded by my new-found freedom to join my family for the final few days of their caravan holiday in Norfolk. The extent of my indifference was summed up by the fact that although the game – one of the highlights of our season, against Spurs – was being shown on TV, rather than find a pub in which to watch it, I spent the afternoon in a Great Yarmouth amusement arcade and taking my nephew and niece swimming. I clearly wasn’t the only one who has had enough, as the game didn't attract a capacity crowd; our first match of the season and against one of our biggest rivals would usually have sold out weeks in advance.

The next day, the message boards were dominated by posts about sections of West Ham fans (and large sections, from what I gather) singing ‘you should have died with your brother’ to ex-West Ham player Jermain Defoe, whose half-brother died in April after being assaulted in the street. As I pictured the West Ham fans, their faces contorted with rage, and I thought about the enjoyment of my niece and nephew as they splashed around the swimming pool, I knew that I had made the right decision to move on.

Fantasy football

Despite having relinquished my season ticket, I was tempted out of retirement for the cup-tie against Millwall a couple of weeks ago. I have been to half a dozen matches against our biggest rivals over the past 20 years and almost without exception, they have been experiences that I will never forget. On my first visit to the Old Den, in December 1988, I turned off the Old Kent Road up towards the ground, only to find police on horseback charging fans. I just started running, along with everyone else. Even though I never wore colours, I decided not to hang around outside. Inside the ground, the atmosphere was pure hatred. I have never experienced intimidation like it since. Perhaps it was the impetuosity of youth, but I still headed back there twice in the next four years (all the matches kicked off at Sunday lunchtimes).

Like most Irons fans who had experienced a West Ham v Millwall derby, I was really looking forward to this match. I attended with a close female friend, who has also just given up her season ticket. We arrived at Upton Park station at about 18.25 and walked down Green Street. According to the papers, we should have found ourselves in the middle of a riot. Instead, all we saw were 100 or so Burberry-clad, teenage West Ham fans drinking in a caged area next to the Queens pub, while singing (falsetto mainly) how much they hated Millwall. We actually shared a joke about their average age and how Millwall fans would be quaking in their boots.

After a quick visit to the ticket office, we headed to the Central pub on the Barking Road. Again, there were many boisterous Irons fans about. It was evident that a lot of them had been drinking all afternoon. Like the lads outside the Queens, these were the all mouth and no trousers brigade, who could probably recite every line from the Green Street movies, but who would run a mile if a single member of the Bushwhackers of F-Troop appeared.

We walked back to the Boleyn Ground at about 19.15. If anything, the atmosphere was less charged than for comparable derby games. When we play Spurs or Chelsea, there are always large groups of men hanging around Green Street, seemingly looking for trouble. But on this occasion, there was nobody. According to reports, there was plenty of action taking place outside Upton Park station, although there was no buzz that a riot was going on 300 yards up the street.

So we headed to our seats at the northern end of the Dr Martens Stand. It was only when we got into the ground that we saw our first Millwall fans. Now it's not for me to comment on what happened outside the ground because I didn't see anything. But there was clearly plenty of trouble. In my opinion, the worst trouble of the night occurred outside the stadium during the game, when the police had moved inside the stadium. The hardcore hooligans (and there are still many 'supporting' both sides) are too savvy to cause trouble in the ground, where their every move is recorded on CCTV.

Inside the stadium, the atmosphere was electric. It was a combination of hatred for the opposition and a more passionate support for the team than had been witnessed for years. The first incident happened in the Millwall end, when there was a scuffle with stewards down the front. When Millwall took the lead, their fans started goading the West Ham fans below us in the lower tier of the Dr Martens Stand.

News started to spread concerning the stabbing of a West Ham fan in Priory Road. This acted as a catalyst for more hatred to rain down on the away supporters. My friend received a call from her brother, advising us to get out of the ground as soon as possible, because Sky Sports was reporting that a riot was going on outside.

As the second half progressed, the atmosphere died down considerably. The people inside the stadium ultimately wanted West Ham to win a football match, and the team's insipid performance against lower-league opposition was embarrassing. However, with 15 minutes to go, a penalty appeal was turned down in front of our stand. With passions running high, there was a surge from the back of the stand, which caused a domino effect and people to spill over the advertising hoardings. The police immediately steamed over and started flailing their truncheons about. This exacerbated the problem, with every wannabe hooligan rushing over for a piece of the action. I saw only one man throw a punch, yet the police waded in as if a full-scale riot was taking place. It was an incredible case of over-reaction.

Of course, this cranked up the atmosphere. A man jumped out of the end of the Chicken Run nearest the away fans and ran in to attack them. He was soon pulled away by the police. Then with three minutes to go, Junior Stanislas ghosted in at the far post to score the equaliser. It had to be in front of the area where the earlier incident had taken place - and right in front of the Millwall fans. There was delirium all round the ground and a couple of hundred fans ran on to the pitch. But these weren't hooligans seeking to confront the Millwall fans. They were overexuberant drunks who had reacted to a match-defining moment during the most highly charged atmosphere the Boleyn Ground has witnessed for 20 years. Their motives were exemplified by their actions: posing for pictures, congratulating the players and dancing silly jigs. To a man, they were too scared to even venture into Millwall's half of the pitch, let alone goad their supporters.

The two subsequent pitch invasions, after the second and third goals were more pre-meditated, but involved fewer people. It was more a case of teenagers wanting to see themselves on TV or in the papers. The Millwall fans, meanwhile, began to rip up seats and throw them on to the pitch.

After the match, we made our way swiftly to the Green Gate pub. But as there was no evidence of the reported riot, and there were no buses about, we walked two miles through Plaistow to Stratford station. Again, we saw nothing that wouldn't have been unusual at a West Ham v Wigan fixture.

With the media's thirst for football hooliganism stories so infrequently sated these days, it was obvious that what had happened was going to make front-page news. And I can't deny that it was the worst trouble I had seen inside a stadium in my 23 years as a regular at the Boleyn Ground (with the possible exception of the ICF steaming into the Chelsea end in April 1986 – my fifth-ever game). But it was only the worst trouble because I had never seen truncheons wielded inside the ground, nor had I ever witnessed seats thrown on to the pitch. Yet the police hadn't needed to behave in such a heavy-handed way. And the seats were thrown on by Millwall fans.

As a journalist, the media coverage fascinated me. I bought all of the nationals the next day and the misreporting in all of them was shocking. I am not going to comment on what went on outside the ground. But most of what I read bore no relation to what I had seen. It was simply sensationalist reporting. According to The Sun: 'About 15 minutes from time, a large number of West Ham fans sitting close to the visiting contingent attempted to break the security cordon to get to their rival supporters.' This is a description of the penalty incident, when a surge from the back of the stand resulted in fans at the front being pushed into the stewards and police, only to be indiscriminately battered. Then after West Ham equalised, our best-selling paper reported: 'Stewards and riot police used shields and batons and battled heroically to keep rival fans apart as the game stopped for five minutes.'None of the beer-bellied West Ham fans had any desire to go near the Millwall end, no shield were in evidence, and the only time that batons were deployed had been 10 minutes earlier.

The Mirror's reports were almost identical, while The Independent even talked about the pitch invasions after 'each of Millwall's subsequent two goals' (obviously a night off for the subs). And for some reason, not one paper mentioned the ripped-up seats. It may not have been on the scale of the Luton riot of 1985, but such incidents still merited coverage.

But pride of place must go to Sky. Phil Thompson was watching the match on a monitor and castigated Stanislas for goading the Millwall fans and running to the area where the police had earlier been wielding their batons, after he had scored. The truth was that a 19-year-old lad scored a crucial equaliser in the biggest game of his career. He ran past the Millwall fans without looking at them, to reach the nearest set of West Ham fans – who happened to be in the aforementioned area.

Even Thompson's idiocy was surpassed, though, by a live report from outside the Boleyn Ground at 08.00 the following morning. The reporter must have been disappointed that the riot had finally died down (it was only 14 hours since it had apparently started). As there were no bodies lying prostrate on the ground nor any burning buildings, he obviously had to fill his airtime with something else. So as the camera panned in on him, he produced two bricks, ‘from a wall that the hooligans had knocked down to use as weapons’. He then bent down to pick up an iron bar – another weapon. But the best was yet to come, when he produced an uprooted tree. I couldn't help but laugh as I imagined some of east and south London's hardest men battering each other with two-foot saplings.

What went on outside the stadium that night was horrific and has no place in society, let alone football. As for what went on inside the stadium, like the majority of people at the match, I enjoyed myself more than I had at any football match for almost 20 years. It was intimidating and passionate and reminded me of why I fell in love with the game in the mid-1980s. As I thought about Sky's sanitised version of this once-great sport that I had been consuming for the past 10 years, I realised that giving up my season ticket had been one of the best decisions I had ever made. Let's hope we get Leeds or Chelsea in the next round.

The end of an era?

I seem to have caused quite a stir in the Boleyn Ground’s corridors of power. The anger that had been welling up inside me since my confrontation with the vile racist IBM in December (see 9/12/08) needed an escape valve, so as well as blogging on the subject, I sent a letter to the club’s chief executive, Scott Duxbury, and pitched an article at When Saturday Comes.

The magazine jumped at the idea and asked me to write a piece for its website the same day. But as I had other commitments, they commissioned me to write a one-page feature for the magazine.

Whether it was the fact that I had warned the powers that be at West Ham that one of only two national football magazines would be publishing an article based on my damning letter, but I received a call from someone at the club.

As I didn’t really have anything else to say on the subject, I never rang him back. A few days later, after When Saturday Comes had hit the streets (see July issue, p35), he called again and left another message.

I rang the man – stadium manager Ron Pearce – back the following day. I was impressed by his determination to talk to me, until he admitted that he had lost my original letter and only remembered my name when a friend asked whether he read the article in When Saturday Comes.

I warmed to Ron, who was determined to address the problem. He had obviously done his research into the fan in question and my background, and was adamant that he didn’t want me to relinquish my season ticket. He asked whether I wanted the racist banned, but as the idiot clearly has nothing else in his life, I thought that this wasn’t a good idea. He would know straight away that I was behind it, and in the unlikely event that any of his friends can read, he could easily track me down. We settled on placing a couple of plain-clothes police offers around IBM next season to 'observe'.

Ron and I reminisced about the ‘good old days’. He was clearly a passionate and long-standing fan, and although not as jaded as me, he could clearly understand where I was coming from. He offered to move me to a better seat, but I rejected this suggestion. Part of the reason I still go to games is because I have been standing or sitting on the same piece of concrete for more than 20 years – far longer than the ignoramus behind me (far longer, in fact, than Nick Hornby ever did). The view may not be as good as it used to be, but for sentimental reasons, I am not sure that I can move. Plus, it would be admitting defeat.

I was told that if I changed my mind, I should post my application direct to Ron, who would sort me out with the best possible seat.

But with 12 hours to go until I head to Asia for eight weeks (ironically, I have timed my return to coincide with the first game of the season), I’m still ambivalent about forking out £800 for nine months of average football and foul-mouthed abuse from yobs with IQs lower than their shoe size.
 

The best of a bad lot?

Now the dust has settled on what can only be described as a better-than-expected season, I have to admit that I found it all a little boring. Yes, the quality of football has improved (although that’s not saying much after the past couple of seasons), but there were so few memorable matches – or even exciting moments.

Ask a fan to name their highlight of the season and they will be scratching their head. Securing a lucky point at Anfield? Thumping Portsmouth at Fratton Park? A draw at Stamford Bridge? Ask a fan who doesn’t attend away matches and the choice is even more limited. Hammering Blackburn 4-1? Dominating Hull? Coming back from a goal down to beat Macclesfield – after extra time? For me, the highlight was Carlton Cole winning Goal of the Month in March – something I watched on Match of the Day.

As a West Ham fan, I don’t expect to be challenging for the title. Realistically, with the big four’s resources and the money being spent by Spurs and Man City, seventh place is about the best we can do. So to come ninth is pretty respectable. But I do expect to have given one of our main rivals a ‘bloody nose’ or at the very least attended a couple of end-to-end matches, full of goals and excitement, with the result in doubt till the final whistle – and with an atmosphere to match.

If we take our biggest games of the season – the ones the fans most want to win – as those against Man United, Arsenal, Chelsea Spurs and Liverpool, 2008-09 must go down as one of the worst season in our history. In those 10 matches, we managed no wins and three draws – scoring only a single goal in the process. The results of the five home games make particularly sorry reading: 0-1, 0-1, 0-2, 0-2 and 0-3. Even more depressingly, it wasn’t as if were unlucky in any of them. We hardly created a chance and were easily beaten, which did nothing for the atmosphere.

Extending our results sequence to the matches against the fifth- and six-placed teams, Aston Villa and Everton, provides one draw and another three defeats – and only two goals. We scored at home against only one side that finished above us – Fulham. And taunting John Paintsil and Paul Konchesky hardly ranks alongside baiting Jermain Defoe or Frank Lampard.

Where was a match to rival the thrilling 3-2 win against Arsenal in January 2006, when we became the last side to win at Highbury? Or the 4-3 home win against Spurs in February 1997? What about the ‘obscene’ effort an already relegated side put in against Man Utd in April 1992, when Kenny Brown’s volley denied the Reds the title? Or the 4-1 victory at White Hart Lane in April 1994 (Steve Jones’ finest moment), Paolo di Canio beating the arm-waving Barthez in an FA Cup tie at Old Trafford in January 2001 or Leroy Rosenior’s late header to secure an FA Cup victory in Highbury in January 1989?

To put such a mundane season into perspective, I have had to look up most of our early-season results. And there it all was, in black and white. Six defeats in seven home games before Christmas. Going out of the cups after insipid performances at Championship strugglers Watford and soon-to-be-relegated Middlesbrough. Only scoring more than once twice in our last 17 games.

I know that I am in the minority – and perhaps I’ve got masochistic tendencies – but give me a relegation dogfight any day. Even an unsuccessful one.

Lout of order

It has taken me a couple of weeks to write this post because I am struggling to come to terms with how I am feeling. But there is no point in denying it any longer: I am embarrassed to be a West Ham fan.

This realisation was brought home to me in the aftermath of our home defeat by Chelsea a couple of weeks ago. The following day, the back-page headlines in most of the papers were dominated by Hammers fans’ abuse of Frank Lampard and John Terry. Variously described as ‘spiteful’, the reports focused on our ‘unacceptable’ taunting of the England pair, accompanied by pictures of fans’ faces contorted with rage. The Mail on Sunday asserted: ‘West Ham fans have developed a reputation for being among the most vile in the country.' In The Sun, the on-field action took up only the final fifth of the match report, with the article featuring such opinions as ‘even by the vile and hateful standards set by West Ham “fans”, the abuse meted out to Terry and Lampard was a disgrace’. The following day, PFA chief executive Gordon Taylor asserted that West Ham fans had ‘overstepped the mark’.

For those of you living on the moon, the fans were vilified for continually chanting ‘John Terry, your mum’s a thief’ and, at Lampard, ‘you let your children down’, in reference to a heated on-air debate the player had partaken in the previous morning with a radio DJ who had called him ‘scum’ for leaving his fiancé and children. According to The Sun, there were also chants about Lampard’s mother – although if it’s a subject below even the retard who sits behind me (see ‘Show Racists the Red Card’, 9/12/08), I am sceptical about such claims.

Personally, I don’t have a huge problem with the taunts about Terry’s mum. They are true. She made a conscious decision not to pay for the goods and was caught red-handed. It could be argued that it is irrelevant, but I still think it qualifies as terrace banter. The Lampard situation was obviously seized upon because of the fans’ antipathy towards him, as he has taken every opportunity to slate the club since he left. But do you think he wanted to walk out on his daughters? To bring the subject up, in a week that also marked the first anniversary of his mother’s death, was unacceptable.

There were numerous other ill-informed chants. So ‘Chelsea ain’t got no history’? Well, what about winning the first division title in 1955? At that point in West Ham’s history, our sole ‘achievement’ had been appearing in the first FA Cup final at Wembley – we lost, of course. Then, apparently, Joe Cole is ‘queer’? Does his stunning fiancé Carly Zucker know? And, according to the boss-eyed, overweight, pasty-faced, knuckle-dragging retard behind me, Frank Lampard is ‘fat and ugly’? Well, I train five days a week in the gym, but would still do anything for a physique like his.

Things have changed so much since I started attending matches in 1986. In those days – and it is worth bearing in mind that this was a time when football was it its lowest ebb, with hooliganism at its peak and the tragedies of Heysel and Bradford still fresh in the mind – West Ham fans were renowned for their humour. Many a dull game was livened up by a wisecrack from the crowd. Swearing was reserved for match-changing incidents or horrific tackles – not simply a misplaced pass, as is the case these days. Energies used to be channelled towards supporting the team, rather than abusing the opposition. But now, it is as if spending £45 on a ticket gives 'fans' the right to indulge in the kind of intimidatory behaviour that would get them arrested if carried out away from the confines of a football stadium. Do the idiots in the stand think that winding players up puts them off their game? On the contrary, it inspires them to play better.

At least I’m not the only one who is becoming fed up with the way Irons fans are being – deservedly – portrayed in the national media. A couple of days later, the Express featured a letter from a West Ham supporter expressing exactly the same sentiments, who after attending matches at the Boleyn Ground for 30 years, now wondered whether he wanted to be part of such a hate-filled environment. I know where he is coming from. After having missed only about 25 home games since March 1986, I very much doubt that I will be renewing my season ticket.

Loyalty slouchers

The only loyalty displayed by footballers these days is when it suits themselves. The astronomical wages and signing-on fees that they earn mean players no longer have to depend on a testimonial match to see them though the first few years of their retirement. They can kiss the badge on their shirt as often as they like, but as soon as they get a better offer, they’ll be out of E13 as quickly as their Porsches will carry them.

The fact that we will never again see a Billy Bonds, Trevor Brooking or Steve Potts at the Boleyn Ground was brought starkly into focus by two players during last month’s transfer window.

Craig Bellamy reportedly stormed out of the training ground, insisting that was going in strike until he was allowed to join either Spurs or Manchester City. With Scott Duxbury refusing to do business with Spurs, the Welshman was soon on his way to Manchester for £14m.

Paid handsomely for missing most of his first season with injury, you might think that he feels that he owes West Ham something, after starting only 22 games and scoring nine goals. He might have been of the opinion that Spurs or Man City offered him a greater chance of honours, but would he even get into their sides? His transfer may be big news at the City of Manchester Stadium right now, but if the richest club in the world starts splashing out on the likes of Kaka, the petulant striker will find it difficult to secure a place on the subs’ bench.

Bellamy claimed that he was never going to strike. But he has been a troublemaker throughout his career and is hated at almost every club at which he has ever played (and he has had eight by the age of 29). Apart from several bust-ups in pubs and clubs (which, to be fair, are par for the course for many footballers), Bellamy’s crime sheet is long and varied: he threw a chair at Newcastle’s first-team coach; called his manager Graeme Souness a liar; sent abusive text messages to Alan Shearer; publicly criticised his manager at Liverpool, Rafa Benitez; and attacked team-mate John Arne Riise with a golf club during a ‘team bonding’ session in Portugal. To make a profit of £6.5m in 18 months on an injury-prone player who has clearly got ‘issues’ looks like good business to me.

On the other hand, Luis Boa Morte turned down a move to Hull after the clubs had agreed terms, insisting that he hadn’t asked for a transfer and wanted to see out the remaining 18 months of his contract. Perhaps there is some loyalty still in the game?

Or could it be that a player who has never been first-choice at the Boleyn Ground and who is derided every time he takes the field, simply wasn’t prepared to accept the huge pay cut that Hull were asking him to take? In my opinion, taking into account his wages, reputation (26 caps for Portugal) and £5m transfer fee, is the worst player I have seen in the claret and blue. A fresh start at a club with lower expectations (he excelled as a big fish in a small pond at Fulham) would have been in both parties’ interests.

The great irony is that Bellamy was abused for wanting to quit West Ham, while Boa Morte was jeered for refusing to leave. When it comes to loyalty, nowadays it is only the fans who are even on nodding terms with the concept.