Lloyd George knows my father
Posted: Thu Sep 13, 2007 7:03 pm
Why support Bolton Wanderers? Didn't have any choice. No say in the matter. That's just how it is. Get used to it, and enjoy it. If you're Jewish you get circumcised, if you're in my family you support the Trotters. We have a season ticket from 1926 in my family - it belonged to my father's great aunt. It cost half price for 'boys and ladies'... One guinea in the posh seats. And there was a Warburton on the Board even then, I kid you not...
My father took me to Burnden Park when i was nine. Now he's 81, and i take him to the match. And, when she's back home, my daughter's with us - she got the bug when eleven. I like that. That continuity. That sense of identity. That endurance.
And I like that I sit with a bunch of mates who've been going together for a long time - one of them since both of us were fifteen, and making our first trip to London. We saw all the sights we could cram into a long day, and watched us get beaten by Spurs.
First game? a 4-0 defeat by PNE at home in 1958, floodlit, from the top of the Embankment... Fantastic...
Best game - too many. But a lot of them might involve beating a Team from Stretford. Perhaps beating Liverpool away in the FA Cup replay, 1993, was a vey special game, though, that signalled the return of the club from the unspeakable dross of Divisions 3 and (unbelievably!) 4, and gave us all hope.
Worst game. Too many. But one of them might be 0-6 at home against Newton Heath, on a dull, menacing day on the way to relegation, in an atmosphere as sour as lemons.
Most favourite player ever. For sheer joy - J J on song. For captaincy - Paul Jones. For best bargain - Gudni. For intelligence and vision - Youri. But every division has seen a team with heroes, and the lamentable. Oh, Henry Mowbray runs the most lamentable list pretty high. A crap full back, brought to the club by jimmy Armfield, who, you would have thought, might have know a thing or two about full backery...
Hated player? I can't do hatred. Pull on that white shirt, and you're mine, and even if i can't love you, i'll go on hoping that some day you'll do better, even when the evidence to the contary is overwhelming. I can't boo at the end of a bad defeat. I can't get finger waving furious at incompetence.
I used to do glum and red wine pretty well. But a few seasons ago I decided BW were not going to make me unhappy again. And they don't. Though it can take a real act of will.
I do joy unbridled and red wine very well indeed, though... given the chance.
Been enjoying the site. Will probably join in the chat.
My father took me to Burnden Park when i was nine. Now he's 81, and i take him to the match. And, when she's back home, my daughter's with us - she got the bug when eleven. I like that. That continuity. That sense of identity. That endurance.
And I like that I sit with a bunch of mates who've been going together for a long time - one of them since both of us were fifteen, and making our first trip to London. We saw all the sights we could cram into a long day, and watched us get beaten by Spurs.
First game? a 4-0 defeat by PNE at home in 1958, floodlit, from the top of the Embankment... Fantastic...
Best game - too many. But a lot of them might involve beating a Team from Stretford. Perhaps beating Liverpool away in the FA Cup replay, 1993, was a vey special game, though, that signalled the return of the club from the unspeakable dross of Divisions 3 and (unbelievably!) 4, and gave us all hope.
Worst game. Too many. But one of them might be 0-6 at home against Newton Heath, on a dull, menacing day on the way to relegation, in an atmosphere as sour as lemons.
Most favourite player ever. For sheer joy - J J on song. For captaincy - Paul Jones. For best bargain - Gudni. For intelligence and vision - Youri. But every division has seen a team with heroes, and the lamentable. Oh, Henry Mowbray runs the most lamentable list pretty high. A crap full back, brought to the club by jimmy Armfield, who, you would have thought, might have know a thing or two about full backery...
Hated player? I can't do hatred. Pull on that white shirt, and you're mine, and even if i can't love you, i'll go on hoping that some day you'll do better, even when the evidence to the contary is overwhelming. I can't boo at the end of a bad defeat. I can't get finger waving furious at incompetence.
I used to do glum and red wine pretty well. But a few seasons ago I decided BW were not going to make me unhappy again. And they don't. Though it can take a real act of will.
I do joy unbridled and red wine very well indeed, though... given the chance.
Been enjoying the site. Will probably join in the chat.
I'm not, though I do share the one, perhaps most defining characteristic of the Jewish male, but there's no need to elaborate on here thank-you!
