Two Tribes Page 20

  We were on one such coach that left from outside the Liverpool Supporters’ Club on Lower Breck Road, near Anfield. With the exception of my 14-year-old brother, it was a rugged crew – the Yankee on the move. The restrictions on alcohol appeared to have encouraged the widespread use of cannabis.

  There was an empty seat next to my brother and we found out who would fill it when the driver foolishly drove straight on to the M62, bypassing the Rocket pub, a well-known pick-up spot for passing coaches. We had to turn back because an infamous Red named Scrat was waiting for us. He had achieved celebrity in our circles in 1981 before the European Cup semi-final against Bayern Munich. Scrat was part of a group of Liverpool fans rounded up by police in the Bavarian city during an over-exuberant night out. He was at the back of a line being loaded into the German equivalent of a Black Maria when a scuffle ensued further up the queue. Scrat took his opportunity and escaped – still wearing handcuffs. Soon, groups of young Scousers were scouring Munich for hardware stores. Hacksaw blade sales soared. According to the stories, it took all night to cut the escapee out of the restrictive bracelets. The incident was even mentioned on the BBC’s nine o’clock news. Thuggery drew little respect in our circles. Quick wits and comic escapes from the authorities were admired.

  The journey was dogged by police stops and heavy traffic. Once we reached the region that had failed to support Arthur Scargill and the miners’ union, passing pedestrians were abused as scabs. We were hyped up for a massive night.

  At the ground, the queues were huge and growing but we got into the south terracing, where it was difficult to get a good view of the pitch. It felt too full and in the minutes before kick-off there was a swarm of young men climbing the fence to get into the squat East Stand seats. The official attendance was 25,799 but we suspected there were many more inside the stadium. There were constant rumours that the clubs allowed in more paying customers than they declared. For high-demand matches, they could make a tax-free killing and avoid some of the Football League’s shared revenue levy. In the days before computerized turnstiles, it was possible. Perhaps it was just cynicism but we frequently laughed out loud at the attendance announcements. This was another occasion when it seemed the crowd had been underestimated.

  The radios were out again, in much greater numbers. It was not just the anoraks and loners looking for information. Everyone wanted to hear what was happening at Oxford. They had kicked off and were playing at the Manor Ground when the teams came out to warm up in Leicester.

  Everton were on top. Chance after chance came to Gary Lineker. Whether it was his hamstring or the stiff boots, his fluid running style looked stilted and his almost inexplicable anticipation was off beam. Normally, he hit the ball early, so that the opposition goalkeeper could not get his feet set and get balanced for the save. Alan Judge, in the Oxford goal, was able to get into position. On a couple of occasions it looked like the Everton striker was aiming for Judge rather than the net. He was clearly out of sorts. ‘Links missed about five chances,’ Sharp said. ‘It was shocking because he was such a great goalscorer. No one could blame him because he was such a great striker but some of them were chances you’d bet on him taking.’

  As half-time loomed, Kendall’s team were level. That would not be good enough if Liverpool won. It would take the advantage away from Everton and hand it to their neighbours.

  In the East Midlands, another striker was having a better night. Ian Rush, the boyhood Evertonian whose every move in football seemed designed to heap misery on the team he supported as a child, was on the prowl.

  Until Lineker’s emergence, few questioned the Welshman’s pre-eminence in front of goal. By the time he ran on to the pitch at Leicester, Rush had scored nine career goals against Everton. Now he was in a position to break blue hearts again. Not only that, but Liverpool had never lost a game in which Rush had scored.

  With 20 minutes gone, Dalglish picked up the ball in midfield, looked up and saw his strike partner run across the box. The player-manager sent the ball into Rush’s path. With two defenders closing in on him, the Welshman shifted the ball from left to right foot. He showed none of the tentativeness that Lineker was displaying at Oxford and snapped in a shot. He got lucky when the ball took a big deflection off Russell Osman, leaving the goalkeeper Ian Andrews with no chance. Dalglish’s side were one up. While Lineker had dried up as the season hurtled towards a climax, Rush began to show his best form. He would score 11 goals in the league and cup during Liverpool’s unbeaten run.

  Others chipped in. Eight minutes later it was two. Steve Nicol released Ronnie Whelan and the Irishman lobbed the ball over Andrews to double the lead. Liverpool fans behind the goal celebrated wildly and spilt over the fences on to the sidelines of the pitch. Some needed treatment from St John Ambulance personnel but the causes were mainly excitement. Most quickly recovered and returned to the crowd – generally to the East Stand with its much better view. Everyone seemed to accept that the game was over at Filbert Street. Attention was now switched to the Manor Ground.

  The pressure was on Everton and as Liverpool enjoyed their lead at half-time, Kendall’s side were emerging for the second period. They had 45 minutes to save their title challenge.

  The Evertonians were packed into a ramshackle terrace at the Cuckoo Lane End behind 15 feet of fencing with their team attacking the goal directly in front of them. Their radios cackled with bad news: Liverpool were winning. They became more frantic as the game started to open up and Everton hurled everything at the Oxford goal. Lineker twice tested goalkeeper Judge but the more Kendall’s team pressed forward, the more spaces opened up in front of Bobby Mimms. Billy Hamilton, the big Northern Irish striker, skimmed the Everton bar and John Aldridge patrolled the halfway line looking for any chance to break towards goal.

  Aldridge, a Liverpool fan, was desperate to score. Not only would it give Oxford a chance of staying up, it would be his contribution to Anfield’s title challenge.

  Kendall sent on Adrian Heath for Kevin Richardson in the hope that Inchy would replicate his heroics of two years earlier but the switch left Everton a man short in midfield. It was all or nothing for the champions. Their grip on the title was loosening.

  Aldridge got the ball wide in the box and was chased by Mimms. The Scouser chipped back cleverly across goal and Hamilton was in the perfect position. It looked impossible for the striker to miss but Gary Stevens came flying back and swung his left foot at the ball. It appeared the full back had only helped Hamilton’s effort into the back of the net but the ball rapped on to the bar and out of play for a corner. The Cuckoo Lane End swooned with relief as Hamilton sat eight yards from goal shaking his head.

  Oxford were on top. Ray Houghton thought he had scored with a downward header but Mimms produced a miracle save. The young goalkeeper had not conceded in the league since replacing Neville Southall. Most people expected the Welshman’s absence to undermine Everton’s season. Mimms had proved a more than satisfactory replacement.

  Kendall, in his customary suit, barked out orders from the bench. He checked his watch. The seconds were ticking away.

  All ‘School of Science’ pretensions went out the window for Everton. They pumped long balls into the box, causing havoc. Heath finished a bout of head tennis with an effort that Judge collected with relief. They were no longer playing to Lineker’s strengths. The fans behind the goal were twitching with nerves.

  The home side were desperate, too. They were lofting high balls into the Everton area. With two minutes left, one found Hamilton. Uncharacteristically, Kevin Ratcliffe allowed the Northern Irishman to hook away from goal with the ball. It was surprising because Hamilton, one of football’s battering rams, had the turning circle of a truck. The striker rolled the ball back to Les Phillips, who was advancing from midfield. Phillips reached the inside-left channel on the edge of the area, steadied himself and shot.

  At Filbert Street the match was meandering along. There was little of interest happening on the pitc
h. Even the Leicester fans were more concerned with events elsewhere. Ipswich Town, another of their relegation rivals, were losing to West Ham at Upton Park. The home supporters were praying for an Everton goal. Top and bottom of the league were intimately entwined.

  Suddenly, behind Bruce Grobbelaar’s goal, there was a commotion. It started as a hubbub and then erupted into frenzied celebrations. Oxford had scored. At least that was the rumour. Those of us who were not close to a radio fretted about whether the reports were true.

  All along the East Stand, supporters charged to the front and shook triumphant fists towards the pitch and hugged each other. Both sets of players appeared bewildered.

  ‘I lost concentration,’ Steve Nicol said. ‘The cry went up from the crowd. It was one of the few times I stopped thinking about a game during the match. I was thinking, “Let them be right.”’

  Jan Mølby got the message right away. ‘You knew something big had happened,’ the midfielder said. ‘People say, “Did you know Everton had got beat?” You could tell by the commotion in the stands.’

  Les Phillips’s shot had beaten Mimms at the Manor Ground. Everton were 1–0 down and had barely any time to rescue themselves. Dalglish and his men had their fate in their own hands for the first time since August.

  At the final whistle, Liverpool fans poured on to the pitch. The celebrations lasted all night.

  On the way home, with less harassment from the police, Freddie, the coach organizer, arranged for us to stop at a pub in Stoke-on-Trent. Just after midnight, the landlord opened the back door and fifty or so thirsty Scousers filed in and drank until gone 4 a.m. The publican’s wife provided us with free sandwiches and a healthy whip-round was the reward for the couple’s troubles. It was a far cry from the previous summer and the appalled stares of travellers on the platform at Preston. We were not quite the outcasts we had been in the weeks after Heysel. It was good to be welcomed.

  We got home late. The shift workers were travelling to work. It would not be a pleasant day for Evertonians. We were happy, even though my brother had to go to school and I was due in work in three hours. There had never been a moment during this epic campaign that realistic Liverpool supporters believed that Dalglish would lead this team to the title. First Manchester United and then Everton looked like they had run away with the league. Even when Liverpool were chipping at Everton’s lead, few thought Kendall’s team would slip up. They seemed too good to surrender their advantage.

  In the course of two hours, with one game left for Liverpool, an entire season had been turned on its head. Who wanted to sleep? Nights like this did not come along very often.

  It was a much tougher few hours for Everton and their fans. Their defeat was a shocker. Oxford had not won at the Manor Ground since Boxing Day. The first league goal that Mimms conceded – although it was not the goalkeeper’s fault – was catastrophic. Neville Southall hated being on the sidelines but he had every sympathy with his understudy. ‘It was difficult to watch but Bob came in and did really well. No one could blame him for anything.’

  Lineker gave an uncharacteristically whingy interview to ITV’s The Midweek Match where he talked about the problem with his boots. Some of his teammates thought he was throwing the blame at the backroom staff. Pat Van Den Hauwe articulated this in his autobiography. ‘If a certain pair of boots are so precious, you should pack them yourself. Gary was obviously disappointed with the defeat and the chances he missed, but sometimes you have to hold your hands up and admit defeat.’

  Kendall hid his emotions and remained upbeat. ‘I have suddenly become a Chelsea fan,’ he said. Later, in his autobiography, he took a sideswipe at Lineker, saying, ‘We lacked killer instinct.’

  There was nothing for it but to have a drink. The team got back to the city and immediately headed for Chinatown and the nightspots. They were soon joined by the Liverpool players.

  ‘After the Leicester and Oxford games, me and Rushie went on the ale with Ratcliffe and some of the others,’ Mølby said. ‘We were out until after 2 a.m. We had a great time.’

  Little of the competition and aggression on the pitch was carried over to the pubs and nightclubs. ‘They were great lads,’ Peter Reid said. ‘We’d try to kill each other on the pitch and then have a pint. We’d drink in the same places, so we were always bumping into each other.’

  It was still in the back of both sets of players’ minds that the next time they would bump into each other on the pitch would be at Wembley.

  21

  Bridge of sighs

  Chelsea’s season had petered out but winning at Stamford Bridge was no foregone conclusion for Kenny Dalglish’s team. Everton were not the only ones wanting the Reds to slip up.

  ‘The romantics among us would love to see Liverpool falter and open the door for West Ham to clinch the title for the first time in their history by winning at Everton on Monday,’ wrote the Daily Express’s Steve Curry on the morning of the final Saturday of the league season. It was wishful thinking and it would not have gone down well in the Shed, either.

  The pressure was on but Liverpool were well used to dealing with this sort of situation. ‘It sounds trite,’ Lawrenson said, ‘but every game was massive. I was more worried because I’d been injured. I was thinking I may not start.’

  The centre back’s experience helped. He’d been in big games throughout his Liverpool career. The newer players like Mølby had not been in this position before and were less certain. ‘I was nervous,’ the Dane said. ‘We weren’t quite convinced. It was a difficult place to play.’

  It was forbidding for supporters, too. There was always a hostile atmosphere at the Bridge. It was an ugly, open stadium with a greyhound track between the crowd and the pitch. Behind each goal there were semicircular terraces. The away section was at the north end of the ground. It was vast, roofless, open to the elements and could accommodate 11,000 people. It would need all that space for the Liverpool fans arriving in anticipation of winning the title. The match was pay-at-the-gate and there were concerns that the away support would exceed that number.

  Opposite was the Shed, which was named for its strange roof that covered only a small part of the sprawling terrace. The East Stand was an incongruous three-tiered 1970s construction that looked like it had been transplanted from a different century on to the rest of the stadium. Between the East Stand and the Shed were strange kiosks that faced out on to the playing area.

  Across the pitch the West Stand had wooden tip-up seats at the back but trackside the seating was on concrete in a section known as ‘the benches’. This part of the ground was occupied by a particularly nasty set of Londoners.

  The strangest thing about Stamford Bridge? There were always cars parked on the greyhound track behind the goals. It was not advertising, just a group of motors sitting idle for the duration of the game.

  The potential for trouble was always high at the Bridge. Because the away end backed on to railway lines, opposition supporters had to enter on the Fulham Road, close to the home fans’ turnstiles. At most stadiums, the groups looking for aggravation could be directed towards opposite ends of the ground. Here they all converged on a couple of hundred yards of west London street.

  Scousers and Chelsea fans had some history together. In August 1977, after a League Cup game at Anfield, a paltry number of travelling supporters were being bused back to Lime Street for the football special. They were attacked on Scotland Road with a barrage of bricks. The windows of the Londoners’ transport were smashed in the ambush.

  Chelsea’s mob wanted revenge and anyone from Merseyside would do. The next year, a west London crew jumped Everton supporters in the Tube station at Kensington High Street. It became a famous incident in both cities. London Underground were in the process of installing strip fluorescent lighting on the platforms. Combatants on both sides claimed to have picked up the long, tubular bulbs and squared up to each other like Jedi knights with lightsabers. The Scousers came out worse on this occasion and soon g
raffiti appeared at Lime Street Station with a simple rallying cry: ‘Ordinary to Chelsea’. A new chant was born to let the London boys know that Liverpool fans were a different proposition. ‘We won’t be like Ever-ton,’ we sang, ‘we won’t die at High Street Ken.’ In Scouse, it sort of rhymes.

  When Liverpool drew Chelsea in the FA Cup in 1982, there were plenty who took up the graffiti challenge and passed up the special trains to get to the capital early on the ordinaries. There was skirmishing all day but the worst violence took place in the ground in front of the cameras. The no man’s land divide of terrace isolating the away fans was breached and vicious fighting took place over the railings separating the two sets of supporters.

  By the mid 1980s, Combat 18 and other right-wing groups had a solid toehold in Chelsea’s Headhunters hooligan mob. Merseyside’s reputation for left-wing politics added an extra dimension to encounters between the two sets of fans. Violence was never ideological but there is no doubt that the political differences played a small part in the contempt in which both sides held each other.

  The authorities had been nervous enough to move Chelsea’s game at Anfield earlier in the season to a noon kick-off to reduce the possibility of trouble. With Liverpool needing three points to win the league at the Bridge, a huge number of Liverpudlians travelled south for the game. It was another security nightmare for the capital’s police – for more than one reason.

  Liverpool’s ‘worst’ fans rarely tried to seek out trouble. They were thieves. They would shoplift and opportunistically dismantle cigarette and fruit machines. Their speciality, though, was jewellery shops. ‘Big crowds were used as a front for professional criminals,’ Peter Hooton said. ‘It wasn’t unusual for shops to get done at away games.’ These career thieves had found a way to combine their business with their favourite form of recreation: football.