20 Years Ago Today

20 years ago to this very day, I was stood on the Holte End at Villa Park watching West Ham lose 0-4 to Nottingham Forest in the FA Cup Semi-Final.

Two decades on, Tony Gale's unjust sending off still hurts. It changed the game for sure. Gale was at his career peak at that time.

It came to define the career of referee Keith Hackett, who told the Daily Mail this year:

My decision dramatically affected the game and ruined a lot of people's day out. It was a tight one, tighter still today.

The thing that nobody knew was that, the Thursday prior to the match, referees were told at a meeting the law had not been applied properly. We were told a simple foul was all that was necessary for a sending-off.

Gale was sent off for a foul that would not have got a yellow card a week before.

It's all people ever talk to Gale about. That goes for me, too.

image: BBC

Despite the result, the game remains a highlight of my West Ham supporting life.

An atmosphere never experienced before or since. Non-stop singing and the longest rendition of 'Billy Bonds' Claret and Blue army' in history. Every time Forest scored, we just sang louder. Solidarity, defiance, nonsensical celebration. Whatever it was it felt great. 

This video captures a part of it. Motson and Charlton are wittering on about a 19 year old Roy Keane, but the real story, the only story anyone was talking about afterwards, as evidenced by the BBC director's choice of camera shots, was the West Ham fans at 4-0 down. Years on, non-West Ham fans still remind me of it.  

I've never felt so elated coming out of a game. Or hoarse.

The 2006 Cup Final showed that although football has changed, some of that spirit remains.  It makes me wonder what would happen if West Ham ever actually win anything.

Loose Lips

West Ham's Jack Collison, last night on Twitter:

If only Jack's employers had come to the same conclusion.

Triesman, the FA, and the Mail on Sunday’s misjudgment

I’m not really bothered England’s bid for the 2018 World Cup.  It would be nice to host the tournament but I couldn’t really care less about it. 

However I know many are and that a lot of work has gone into presenting the bid. Much of that work has been undone in the last few days by a combination of a previously anonymous civil servant, Max Clifford and the Mail on Sunday.  A lovely trio.

Bravo then for Gary Lineker’s decision today to resign writing his Mail on Sunday column in protest at the nature of the story and its effect on the bid.

We learnt nothing of value from the Mail on Sunday’s ‘expose’ and it benefitted no-one (with the exception of England’s rivals in the 2018 bid).  The ‘shocks’ in this utter non-story, amplified by unearthed and previously anonymous blog posts:

• Newspapers love honey traps, especially if they are organised on their behalf.
• Newspapers like to see failure and have the power to force resignations from public office.
• Newspapers like to create and distort the news agenda, rather than report it.
• People talk bollocks in private conversations.
• People have neuroses and often speak of paranoid conspiracy theories, regardless of factual evidence or rumour.
• Boys like to show off to impress the girls.
• People like to flirt.
• Some married people are unfaithful.
• Some people are spiteful.
• Some people will abuse friendship, trust and work ethics for money / five minutes of fame / personal revenge.
• Max Clifford’s clients like to pose for photos in gardens.

Mr Sullivan, Think Before You Speak

I'm still open minded about the Sullivan / Gold takeover of West Ham. Clearly anything is better than being owned by an Icelandic Bank creditor.

Much of what they've said is a breath of fresh air to me.  I love the (apparent) openness.  For once, the fans are being told straight what we've suspected these last few years - West Ham are in a financial mess.  

They might just be taking it too far though.  Hardly a day goes by without one of them announcing something negative about the club.  No-one likes being drip-fed bad news.  

That's bad enough but today's suggestion that the staff will need to have pay cuts in the summer , could not have been more badly timed (or inconsistent), coming on the eve of the biggest game of the season so far.

Enter Gianfranco Zola:

"I think the article should have been done at another time, not just before a match like tomorrow," said Zola.

"It would have been better to say that at another time and maybe talk to us before talking to a newspaper. That is my feeling."

This might be Zola's first step in a perhaps unwitting exit strategy.  It's never a good idea to publicly criticise your employers, but that he said it only heightens my respect for him.  Sullivan's use of the word 'Armageddon' might prove to be self-inflicted wound on a desperate situation.

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ITV - Football (and Violence) United

Two months ago, I wrote about football trouble which had occurred at the West Ham versus Millwall Carling Cup tie. Amongst my reactionary ranting I highlighted that there was a romanticism attached to hooliganism that a whole new generation who had only just been born in the 1980s were now inheriting from their parents. 

I felt strongly that this romanticism is clearly enhanced if not justified by relentless films and documentaries which portray violence, antisocial behaviour, and disrespect as a way of life - something to be embraced.

Social problems run a lot deeper than I can outline in a few sentences and I'm not blaming ITV for this but boy they don't help.  They currently have a campaign promoting their football coverage in the UK under the banner "We Are Football United."

Now take a look at the schedule for ITV4 tonight: 

Yes that's right. Two games of football from the Europa League followed by the movie Green Street, and if that wasn't enough a documentary on fan rivalry in Croatia and Austria.

A point of disclosure - I haven't seen Green Street and in some ways my comments can be seen as ridiculous as the Christians who complained about Jerry Springer The Opera without seeing it and those who were furious with Jonathan Ross and Russell Brand without hearing their radio show.

I accept that there may be some very valid artistic merit in Green Street with social commentary on emotional ties / personal identities that develop in all male groups bonded together by violence.   

When the promotion of this art becomes intertwined with the promotion of football as sporting rivalry the lines between social commentary / art and glorification of violence become blurred. 

My point, and what I was trying to say two months ago, is that this film was directly marketed at those who see football hooliganism as a romantic aspiration. The very people who looked forward to the West Ham v Millwall match for reasons other than football.  The target audience and the commercial (not artistic) ambition of the movie sickens me, as does ITV's scheduling tonight.