Nottingham Forest Cult Heroes

David McVay

Description

Nottingham Forest Cult Heroes is devoted to those players who, over the years, have won a special place in the hearts of the City Ground faithful - not necessarily the greatest footballers, but a unique brotherhood of mavericks and stalwarts, local lads and big signings. The cast list alone is enough to stir up the memories and tug at the heartstrings of any Forest fan - Anderson, Ardron and Burns, Baker, Collymore and Newton - recalling how these charismatic personalities used to ignite passion on the terraces. Find out which red-and-white icon drunkenly smashed through the window of a C&A department store. Whose war was spent fighting hand to hand in the Burmese jungle. Who used to leapfrog Mini cars in the car park, and who "lived out of a chip pan"! Discover and delight in the magical qualities of these 20 mere mortals elevated to cult status on Trentside.

Sujets

• Nottinghamshire

Informations

• Publié par: Pitch Publishing Ltd
• Date de parution: 01 octobre 2012
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781909178298
• Langue: English

Extrait

This edition first published by Pitch Publishing 2012
Pitch Publishing A2 Yeoman Gate Yeoman Way Durrington BN13 3QZ www.pitchpublishing.co.uk
© David McVay 2012
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the Publisher.
ISBN 978-1-909178-29-8
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Contents
Acknowledgements
Introduction
1. Arthur Dexter
2. Billy Walker
3. Wally Ardron
4. Tommy Capel
5. Jeff Whitefoot
6. Henry Newton
7. Ian Storey-Moore
8. Joe Baker
9. Jim Baxter
10. Duncan McKenzie
11. Brian Clough
12. Peter Taylor
13. John Robertson
14. Tony Woodcock
15. Viv Anderson
16. Garry Birtles
17. Kenny Burns
18. Stuart Pearce
19. Stan Collymore
20. Jason Lee
Acknowledgements
With grateful thanks from the author to:
Frank Clark
Alan Hill
David Stapleton
Bob Fairhall
Carolyn Maginnis
Fraser Nicholson
Joe Fish
Neil Footitt
Danny Kirkman
Danny Taylor
Danny Mouncer
For Paul. During his formative years, Henry Newton was always his big hero. You were always mine, bro.
To my gorgeous Debby and the gruesome twosome, Tom and Jess. Love always.
In memory of John Brindley – we were the egg men, koo koo katchoo … and great balls of fire Billy.
Introduction
IT WAS NOT THE usual suspects that attracted us to the City Ground. Not the prospect of fluent football being played at the highest pinnacle of the domestic game. Not the twinkle-toed inside-forward Colin Addison, the effortless pass master John Barnwell or the supremely athletic and reliable centre-half Bobby McKinlay. Nor was it the imposing pipe-smoking centre-forward Frank Wignall or his partner in crime on the left wing Alan Hinton, possibly one of the finest crossers of a football of his generation. Not even Henry Newton. No, a perverse personification of muscle and grace was the man we went to see in that Forest side of 1964 vintage.
Joe Wilson inspired our first visit to see Nottingham Forest: me and my grandad that is. Joe Who? to a new generation of Forest fans perhaps and even some of those who were regulars at the time might echo that sentiment. But in August 1964 Joe Wilson was the reason that Bill McVay took me on the 61a bus from Clifton Estate to climb the steps that led to the splintered, weather-worn benches of the old wooden East Stand at the City Ground. It was sunny, I think, but then all opening Saturdays of any football season since time began have been noted for being unseasonably scorching. The view then behind the East Stand embraced meadow land, Lady Bay and the meandering course of the River Trent as it made its way downstream towards the sluice gates at Holme Pierrepoint and beyond to Hazelford Lock, Gunthorpe Bridge and Newark.
Not that Birmingham City had a chance to survey the panorama that Saturday afternoon, although defending a 3-1 lead with less than 20 minutes remaining, it appeared that some of their players found their thoughts drifting further afield to a win bonus and a night on the town. In flighty, flirty and fun-filled Small Heath perchance? Hinton – whose stock would plummet dramatically in later years with Forest fans before rising, deliciously enough, with Derby County – Addison and Barnwell were all instrumental in retrieving the deficit and overturning it to secure a 4-3 victory out of the jaws of almost certain defeat.
So exhilarating and so euphoric was the experience that my granddad felt it incumbent to return. With me.
There was another reason. Joe Wilson.
So exhilarating and so euphoric was the experience that my grandad had forgotten the object of his enterprise in originally purchasing the two bus and football tickets: to let Joe Wilson know he was there.
Joe, like me and my grandad, was Workington-born and migrated south from the depressed and largely redundancy-blighted county of Cumberland in the same year, 1961. It was not only the home calling and a chance to reacquaint himself with a native of the Lakes that appealed to grandad. Apparently, Joe Wilson had lived several roads away from our own home in Salterbeck and communities being somewhat more welcoming and less fragmented in those days, it was inevitable that he would instantly recognise a friendly accent whose dialect still baffled local Nottingham traders, but had sheepdogs running obediently to heel from miles around the neighbourhood.
The next opportunity to offer Joe Wilson some Cumberland pearls of wisdom arrived on 5 September. Forest at home to West Bromwich Albion; as they say, another 90 minutes of your life you’ll never get back. After the drama of the previous match it was destined to be a 0-0 draw and no matter what rose-tinted spectacles through which you observed, this First Division game was as dire as anything the Premiership could conjure up today.
Even Addison eased into the spirit of things. Awarded a dubious penalty with time running out, he shanked his spot-kick so wide and high into the Bridgford End that I’m sure the clock at the back of the terracing stopped momentarily for fear of its second hand being dismembered by the errant Addison’s aim. Yet, while the clock was ticking normally, the seconds turning into minutes and the minutes dissolving, well into another minute of desperate tedium, there was one incident that made that September afternoon remarkable and worthwhile to this nine-year-old fledgling football fan.
Shortly after kick-off, the ritual passing of youngsters down to the front of the terracing had taken place, over heads, round the side or underneath legs depending on age and size.
My grandad’s tactics had been shrewder, more calculated this time. The elevated reaches of the East Stand had been far too isolated to make meaningful contact with anyone except supporters or passing bargees on the Trent. This time, we headed for the main stand, the one that would be incinerated within a few more years, and stood close to the players’ tunnel. As the half-time whistle went, in a novel role reversal of sorts, Bill McVay launched himself towards the front barriers as the teams trooped off for a cuppa.
"Joe lad, owsit ga’rn." The Cumberland accent is lost in translation and years, but grandad, with his regulation tweed hat and St Julien tobacco roll-up hanging from one side of his mouth, seemed to get his message across.
Did Joe Wilson look up? Well yes. Was there a flicker of recognition? Who knows? But maybe he heard the dulcet tones of a familiar lilt among the boos from disaffected home fans among the 28,334 crowd (not sporting an anorak in those days or inclined to train spotting, I didn’t count them, it was Ken Smales’ marvellous reference and history book about Forest that filled in the gaps).
It was sufficient for Bill McVay. His mission had been accomplished. Joe Wilson suffered a groin injury several weeks later and never played for Forest again, moving on to Wolverhampton Wanderers. Being an astute and philanthropic man, environmentally conscious ahead of his time, my grandad probably realised that the volatile cocktail of a Cumberland accent and the lament of a Black Country dialect, colliding head-to-head at Molineux in similarly loquacious fashion, could tip the planet off its axis and obliterate the natural order. To save mankind, a selfless gesture to humanity I suppose, Bill McVay did not pursue Joe Wilson to the edge of darkness at Wolverhampton.
Strangely enough, my path with Joe Wilson would entwine one more time, far less threateningly to civilisation, by which time Man’s first footprints on the moon were imminent. In between, I had returned to the City Ground regularly. Tottenham Hotspur would register their usual win on Boxing Day, but I missed Jimmy Greaves, absent with what was euphemistically called a tummy bug or bad cold. Hot dogs from the Trent End as Joe Baker weaved his magic against Burnley in March 1967; a 1-0 home defeat by Liverpool on a balmy September evening the following season. Jumping on and off the back of moving buses and their open platform entrances, enough to induce nervous twitches in the modern health and safety zealots. My brother Paul seeing a declining Best, Law and Charlton still get the better of the Garibaldi Reds; March, 1969. You could set your life and formative years by it sometimes.
And then came Notts County, just over a fortnight later. Nerdy ahead of their time like my grandad was green ahead of his (apart from his drinking Home Ales best bitter, fuelling smokey corners of political debate in his local pub and allowing our boxer dog to fart and crap indiscriminately on the Farnborough Road playing fields), Notts County offered refuge from the sexy, glitzy Forest that had emerged on the south bank of the river during the 1960s. Fronted on the Trent by three buildings that masqueraded as rowing clubs, but were in fact women-magnets and pulling dens of iniquity for teenagers ridden with angst and Led Zeppelin, Forest represented everything that was young, vibrant and psychedelic that befitted the so-called swinging decade. Notts County, on the other hand, represented your parents. Black and white, drab, impervious to change and immovable in opinion. In short, Forest were as cool as Woodstock. Notts County as naff as the Black and White Minstrels.
Which is why, shamefully, I admit to heading for Meadow Lane to see Workington on 16 April 1969 for a meaningless Fourth Division fixture. But why?
The freedom to wander around the County Road stand without hindrance perhaps was one attraction. To list