Tag Archives: Sport

For Those of You Watching in Black and White…

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Dear old Harry Carpenter. When yesterday I heard of his demise, I immediately thought that he’d died years ago, but that doesn’t mean I wasn’t sad to hear the news. Another part of my childhood snuffs it. Carpenter’s voice was ever-present in our house, commentating as he did on Ali fights (later becoming Frank Bruno‘s straight man), presenting the BBC’s coverage of golf, the tennis (it was only Wimbledon in those days) and the Boat Race. He had one of those friendly, comforting faces who instantly made you feel all warm inside. A bit like Frank Bough without the bondage and coke. Harry also had one on those faces which, like that of Michael Fish and James Burke, never looked how you expected it to look.

So, as I like to honour my boyhood heroes on these pages, I went off to find something suitable to pay tribute to Harry. Where better to start than the bored office-worker’s favourite site, Youtube?

Perhaps someone would have compiled a few minutes of classic Harry quotes? “Oh my god he’s won back the title at the age of 32” stands out in the memory (Ali beats Foreman). “Get in their, Frank!” (Bruno hurts Tyson before being demolished) is another. Indeed those and more were there to watch and enjoy, but I stumbled across this:

Come on, admit it, that felt good, didn’t it? Yes I know it didn’t include much of Harry, but sod that. When was the last time you heard the Sportsnight music? When I played that this afternoon I felt a warm glow all over me. Memories came flooding back: Harry Carpenter, David Coleman, staying up late on a school night, the BBC actually having some sport to show. This was when Sue Barker was half decent at what she was paid to do, Nick Faldo was still on his first wife, most of us in the UK still had black and white televisions and there were just 3 channels on TV. THREE CHANNELS (we pause here for my American friends to stop giggling). Sport on tv in the 70’s and 80’s was something to be treasured cos there wasn’t much of it, and what there was had to share what little bit of airtime there was on offer with other sports, all vying to be seen.

Sportsnight lasted about an hour on a Wednesday night, it’s sister show Grandstand had a 5 hour slot on Saturday afternoons. Fabulous if you loved sport, less so if you didn’t. What we now call narrow band-width meant there was no space for continuous broadcasts. The cricket would share air-time with horse racing and snooker. How did we put up with it? Every half hour we’d have to leave the test match at Lord’s to endure the 3.20 from Haydock, or the final frames of Doug Mountjoy vrs Kirk Stevens. Still at least on the BBC didn’t have adverts, unlike it’s rival over on ITV.

And it had Des Lynham.

ITV’s answer to Grandstand was World of Sport presented by the amiable and skunk-haired Dickie Davies. As I was on my nostalgia quest, I went to look for the theme tune.
I don’t know anyone who admitted to watching it, or at least not regularly, but now wish I had. Just look at this!:

Wow!! All-in wrestling, dog frisbee and log-walking. AND Eric Morecabe !! What a show. What a way to spend your Saturday afternoons. All that plus that haunting middle-eight bars of whistling in the opening music. Maybe I’d misjudged the commercial channel. Had I been too harsh on them ? As the Soviets did to Trotsky, I’d erased all traces of ITV from my childhood memories. So I delved deeper. On to the football highlights.

Everybody quotes tales of trying to watch Match of the Day while your they were supposed to be paying fond attention to the girlfriend, but no-one ever talks about fumblings on the sofa on a Sunday afternoon being interrupted when this came on:

Brian Moore’s The Big Match: ITV’s Sunday highlights show. Nobby Stiles, Ossie Ardiles and Butch Wilkins with hair!! IT WAS THAT LONG AGO !!. And those shorts must have chafed a bit.

I was hooked. GOD, I love Youtube. Where to next?

Now hang on a minute: Get a grip, man, it’s just nostalgia. Worse! It’s nostalgia for ITV shows. Pull yourself together.

Now where were we? Ah yes, football. Now this takes me back, the Beeb’s finest hour. Everybody remembers Italia 90, when we all got behind the English Team’s ultimately futile campaign (apart from the Jocks who got behind the West Germans. They deserve each other). Of all the superb concerts Pavarotti gave, in all the great Opera houses and concert halls of the world, this is what made him a star to millions in the UK.

I’m sorry, Auntie, I’ll never doubt you again. This was the last era when the BBC and especially the Sports Dept reigned supreme. A golden age. A time when their sports presenters and commentators were household names: Harry, Coleman, Lynham, Eddie Wareing, Richie Benaud, Peter O’Sullivan, Barry Davies (“and where were the Germans? and quite frankly, who cares?”), Ted Lowe, David Vine, Raymond Brooks-Ward (“come on David“) Bill McLaren and Dan Maskell. These are the voices, the sources of all knowledge of my youth, (even Tony Gubba who never actually went to a match but commentated on the highlights from a studio hours later).

Will the bloggers of the future be waxing lyrical over the opening titles to Sky’s Soccer AM or Ford Football Special ? Will they be posting clips from Superleague XIII ? I doubt it. They’ll be seeking out tapes of Booker T and the MGs playing Soul Limbo to herald BBC Cricket, or the theme to Pot Black or Formula 1 motor racing (knowing my luck they’re still be showing it).

So sorry, not much about Mr Carpenter in this one. I just got carried away with the music and the memories. Know what I mean, Harry?


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Going Upstairs for a Decision

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Take a note of the day you read this: I feel sorry for the Australians. I do, honestly. I had two clear LBW decisions turned down by the umpire yesterday, and at the other end, we had their opening batsman stumped by about a yard but their umpire refused to give it. Not even a referral. There is a theory (which I’m formulating) that no cricket match should take place without the setting up of cameras at either end, behind the bowlers arm, and square of both ends of the wicket.

Pub and village sides already have to supply the balls, stumps, umpires coats, even the sandwiches so would it be too hard to get four (six would be even better) of the team to arrive with a camera (with tripod, preferably) to position at strategic points around the boundary ? This would go a long way to banishing dodgy decisions from bent umps on the village greens of England (yes, yes, okay, and Wales).

Everyone has a camera (and therefore all think they’re photographers, especially writers) and most cameras these days come with a video mode. When an iffy call was made and challenged we could all troop to the boundary and study the footage. It wouldn’t take any more than fifteen minutes of argument, I’m sure.

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On the other hand we could just get on with the game, trust the umpires and players to be honest and decent. If we go down the video route and ask for each and every decision to be scrutinised by the fourth, fifth or sixth official we may as well get rid of the officials on the field altogether. We could call it Grid Iron Cricket, or somesuch.

For much of yesterday’s game we stood in light drizzle and strong, gusting wind. It wasn’t ideal, but we played on. We got the game finished and no-one was hurt (apart from a fielder who snagged his goolies on the barbed wire fence surrounding the pitch). Driving home last night listening to a phone-in on the radio one caller suggested to save losing time in Test matches and to make conditions “fair” for both teams the ECB should invest in a roof for Lords (and presumably all the other English (and Welsh) Test venues. I nearly careered of the M25.

Britain Open Golf

Apart from the small matters of cost, practicality, humidity and numerous other atmospherics, IT’S AN OUTDOOR SPORT, FOR FUCK’S SAKE!!!!!!! Did anyone see Tiger throw is five iron out of his pram when a gust of nasty Scottish wind caught his approach shot?? Perhaps we should put a roof over Turnberry, St Andrews and Sandwich? Let’s get video referees to see if a blade of grass got between ball and club, which was why Tiger didn’t get backspin? Stop play when it rains or gets a bit chilly?? Thank Christ for Tom Watson. He showed a few of these powdered ponces how to play the game as it was meant to be played.

Golf, like cricket (and, while we’re at it, rugby and soccer) are outdoor sports. They were invented to be played in the elements. Anyone who’s ever played full-back at rugby on a cold and blustery afternoon in January will attest to how bloody hard and miserable it is. But that’s the game. If you don’t wanna feel the wind gusting around, carrying the ball off in all sorts of directions, and your fingers, frozen to the bone and numb to the tips, fail you as you try to grab hold of this bar-of-soap before the entire back row smash you into the icy mud below then I suggest you either play all your games in Cardiff or buy an X-Box.

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If your idea of golf is a windless day, with perfect greens and nice, flat, soft, fluffy fairways which allow one to float a wedge into within 6 foot of every pin then you can go into Tiger Woods 09 on the Wii and select “turn off elements”. It’s a pastime but it’s not sport. A bit like tennis. I blame Wimbledon for a lot of things, particularly endless Tiger Tim and Morbid Murray headlines, and the rise of the middle class woman into the assumed status of ‘sports fan’. Listen, darling, two weeks of stealing the best armchair in the house, painting your face with a union flag and understanding Hawkeye doesn’t suddenly turn you into Desmond Lynham or even Kirsty Gallagher (bless her). But now that you have your bleedin roof over centre court all the other part-time sofa-jocks think it’ll work for every other sport.

Watch Brian Glover in Kes playing the PE master pretending to be Bobby Charlton and you lot will realise how football AND ALL REAL SPORT should be played. NOT in manicured sports halls, NOT under the supervision of fifty tv cameras but outside, on grass under the clouds and officiated by proper humans, complete with all the frailties, weaknesses and mistakes that humans bring with them.

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For the record, I hit 28 runs (16 of them off a 17 yr old girl’s bowling. It was her first ever game) and took 3 wickets (one of which was that of the girl’s even younger girlfriend). I feel it’s only a matter of time til I get a call-up for England. Move over Freddie.

Age will not weary them

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I had followed the same training schedule as the previous 20 years—I’d done nothing, and I’d been out for a curry and a few pints the night before. I’d packed as many surgical supports as I could fit in my kit-bag, I’d shunned a sandwich for lunch and opted for just-the-one pint (pre-hydration) before the game. But still, as I arrived at the ground for our first cricket match of the season it was clear it was going to be a long, hard day.

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My first worry was that our influential skipper was not, as is usual, inspecting the wicket or warming-up on the boundary, but was in fact on assignment in the Hindu Kush. Bugger. But good news came when someone mentioned a young-ish, fast-ish, swing bowler had been selected and was on his way. Excellent! someone to do most of the donkey-work. Then more bad news: another one of our member was stuck in traffic somewhere somewhere between the South Circular and the Guilford bypass and was gonna be late. If at all. Christ.
When we gathered in the visitors’ changing room the full horror struck me: I was 44 years old, overweight and overhung, short on muscle and hair, but long on girth and ralgex, and I calculated that at least six of my team-mates were older than me!. Admittedly a couple of them looked a good deal fitter than I did, but it was clear that I was part of the youth policy. Someone had blundered. My mood didn’t improve when the young fast bowler showed up with his leg in plaster, having gotten injured playing soccer last weekend. Oh poo.

Pic: Freefoto.com

Pic: Freefoto.com

We took the field having dragged a mate out of the pub to make up the XI. Ten of us were resplendent in albeit rather snug-fitting cricket whites, the eleventh (he who was enjoying a quiet half-gallon in the boozer til press-ganged into playing) in my spare cricket shirt, a pair of cargo pants and brown hiking boots. Less WG Grace, more WC Fields.

We bowled. I bowled. It hurt. The batsmen tucked into our bowling like Ranulph Fiennes in a Katmandu Curry House. The opening attack (myself and an Aussie called Jeff) had a combined age of 94. My eyes bled, my calves seized up, my lungs screamed and my head thumped. Between overs I stood in the outfield gasping for breath, my big fat red head sweating audibly. I looked like a fat Swan Vesta.

Catches were taken, many more were dropped. Play was occasionally punctuated by a clatter of stumps, but more often the ‘ping’ of a lump of leather coming of a plank of wood and hurtling over the boundary. One of their young guns scored a hundred as the runs flowed, lbw appeals were turned down and the fielders’ good-humoured chat, banter and yelps of HOWZAT ?? turned into coughs, moans, and yelps of pain.

At the end of their innings it was clear they’d scored approximately 100 more runs than we were happy with. But no matter. TEA! Sandwiches, pork pies (like we needed more) doughnuts (ditto) and lashings of hot tea had been provided in the pavilion. We devoured. A condemned XI’s last meal.

Our Turn To Bat

Cricket - SS Box

Cargo-pant guy (50-odd), now having borrowed the bottom half to his kit, took to the crease with his batting partner (who just might be under 30) and our innings began. Whack, ping, wheeze, clunk. The pair got off to a flier. If the elder of the two hadn’t pulled a muscle in his arse who knows how many more runs they could have run? But it was a great start. All the way up until it wasn’t. The young lad was bowled out when we’d scored 89.

But that was ok. Happy with that. A much better start than usual. In walked our no.3 batsman (more than 50-odd) who really did look the part. He looked comfortable at the crease (both his arse muscles were still working) and started to knock a few balls around to all parts of the field. Very much the man in form. But no sooner had we in the Pavilion got comfortable and ordered more tea when he was hit smack-bang in the face by the ball. Lots of blood. Lots. Quite put me off my fifth sarnie. Our number 11 batsman took him to hospital and we were down to 9 men again.

Our batsmen nudged and nurdled and smacked and smote the ball into gaps in the field as we crept towards the total required. Our ill-clad, aged opener scored 93— ON HIS OWN!. Gradually, two things dawned on me: a) we could win this; b) I might have to bat. Oh fuck. Oh fuck fuck fuck! Then it happened: the bloke in front of me was, disaterously, given out LBW (by the then-umpiring Cargo Man) and I was in. I protected my stumps, head and goolies and we sneaked a sharp single. My partner at the other end was caught out. Then I ran-out my next partner. Bugger. The last man in (he’d returned from delivering our man to hospital) joined me in the middle and we needed 14 to win with 2 overs left. Then 13 needed. Then 11. It was tortuous. It was pathetic. Two men who hated batting (combined age 99), swishing and swatting and limping up and down the wicket. One ball left. One run to win. SWISH, PING. The ball shot between two fielders and we ran like buggery (if buggery is very, very, slow and painful, which I suspect it is.) and we’d won. Stone me!

2 Pints

I left the field very gingerly, very sweatily and very happily. Every bone and organ ached like hell. We went to the pub. I had to sit down. Our hospitalized mate was having an x-ray and I was having a pint. Every cloud. This report was typed with the two digits I possess that can actually still move. Silly old sod.

Short Square Legs

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I once had a row (no, honestly) with the bloke who taught me history. He stated that nothing was inevitable. Nothing. I took issue with this and, as is my wont, argued the toss. As I recall it was in a lesson that had supposed to be dealing with the outbreak of WWI—you know the stuff: The Serbs, The Austro-Hungary Empire, Rio Ferdinand, etc etc and after we’d gone through all the build up, I had noted that war was, therefore, inevitable. A debate/row ensued as Mr Lepine (for that was his name) listed the many different ways and points in time when war could have been avoided. Nothing, he repeated again and again, is inevitable.

I only mention this as I’ve just watched our glorious leader, Mr Brown (with my mind he runs), look the camera in the eye and state that no MP who has defied the rules on their Commons expenses will be allowed to stand for election as a Labour Party candidate. Defied the Rules. Hmmmm. Has anyone out there read anything by any MP who has actually admitted to breaking or “defying” the rules? No, of course not— they’ve all made “mistakes” or “errors of judgement” but all of them, of course, were working “within the rules”. I put it to you, Mr Lepine, that it is INEVITABLE that these shitbags (or is that manurebags?) will get away with the fraud and the skulbuggery because they were acting “within the rules”. Also, just look of the smugness as one-by-one, MP after MP queue up for the BBC and Sky News as they celebrate the demise of Speaker Martin— as if we’re supposed to believe the HOC is a good clean-living honest house again. One of them (faceless tory/labour backbencher) actually said “I’m relieved that we’ve put all this behind us”.

A wee dram afore ye go ?

A wee dram afore ye go ?

Inevitably (see!) Martin will be blamed for everything from trouser presses to to ghost mortgages. Between them, the election of a new speaker and Gordon turning a blind eye (oops) to the robbers in his own party AND the imminent parliamentary recess will go a long way to the disgraceful behaviour of MP’s becoming a faint memory sooner rather than later. Yes, GB will get a kick up the arse at next month’s elections, but he was gonna get that anyway. Knacker of the Yard is having meetings about having meetings about whether to meet about investigating the scandal. Sir Christopher Kelly’s Committee who are looking into the scam doesn’t report back to the house until November— that’s six months away. So we’ll be left with the corpse of Michael Martin, who seems to be carrying the can for the lot of em. Sure, Douglas Hogg is stepping down to spend more time with his moat and a couple of instantly-forgettable Labour MPs will be shown the door over their houses-that-never-were. (Why didn’t Nick Brown eat the evidence?—he seems to have eaten everything else), but the real news is that they’ve hounded out the fat wee mon, to pay for the sins of others. Dodgy little sod? Yes. The most dishonourable man in the chamber? Not even close.
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In other news, this weekend sees the start of the cricket season for yours truly— time to oil my bat, apply the liniment, strap-up the knees and squeeze into the flannels. Think of me this weekend as I wobble about a corner of a English field that is forever foreign to me, while younger types run around chasing, throwing and hitting balls. I always greet the start of a season with a mixture of glee (I get to see all my mates again in lots of nice pubs) and dread (it fvcking hurts). Thank god for the upcoming bank holiday monday—it gives me one more day to recover the power of walking after I will inevitably be asked by the skipper to bowl several overs (I reckon he’ll get two out of me). As I plummet inevitably towards my 45th birthday Captain David still believes I can bowl quick(ish) out-swingers for over-after-over. I was sure that my puny performance last season would finally prove to him that I’m fat, flatulent and fragile. My little legs no longer have the strength to carry me around at anything faster than glacial pace. I should be making the sandwiches and opening the biscuits, not opening the bowling. Season after season he cocks a deaf’un to my entreaties. Surely he’s found a 20 year-old quickie to take over the duties? Or is he really just trying to kill me? If it happens again this season I am thinking of tabling a motion of no confidence in him. I fear it’s inevitable.

Right arm over(weight)

Right arm over(weight)

كيف-كان-ذلك؟ *

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What a week we’ve had? The shenannegans of F1 continue on the track and in the courts, climaxing with Ron Dennis jumping overboard to save the McLaren team from further punishment over Liargate. The Diffusergate inquiry found in favour of Eva Brawn’s mob and a bloke called Jenson (a fine old English name) still leads the championship. Any day soon the back pages will be full of something called Racegate or even Interestinggate when a Grand Prix is actually more enjoyable AFTER the race starts. What a farce it all is? I’ve actually seen grown men leave a pub to go home on a Sunday afternoon to watch the latest parade from the Nurburgring or Monza. LEAVE A PUB. Honest.

Hands up who's bored with F1?

Hands up who's bored with F1?

Meanwhile, in the world of sport, David Dunne was sent off for the third time this season as Man City bid a fond adieu to Europe. Dunne, desribed to me this morning as a “Sunday Morning Lummox”, has the turning speed of your average oil tanker. It’d be no surprise to this reporter if at City’s next home match Somali Pirates were spotted sitting behind the goal, waiting to board him.
Terrific news from Seth Efrica that Andrew Flintoff ISNT playing in the IPL for the money. No, no. He’s playing to hone his 20-20 skills for the upcoming World Cup. Thank heavens for that, then. I guess there’s the added attraction of the probability of him getting injured so he can sit out the poorly-paid Ashes series. On the other hand if Freddie can get hold of the Aussies that are down there and take them out for “just the one” of an evening, maybe we still stand a chance against them, as they won’t have sobered up by July. Our reader with Setanta has promised to keep me up-to-date with the scores from the IPL, not that I give a monkeys.

 

Gonna be good n hot down there, under the lights. Having played a lot of cricket abroad (albeit to a rather lower standard) I can vouch for the complete shock of playing in a very hot climate and what it does to your system. My military-medium-pacers have been spanked over boundaries from Adelaide to Antigua and I’ve always been able to blame the heat or the altitude for my complete lack of competence with ball-in-hand. On one occasion in Nairobi (5889 ft above sea level) I wobbled and waddled to my mark at the end of my run up before delivering the fourth ball of my spell, when with sweat-filled eyes and a thumping head, I turned and started charging (sic) towards the square leg umpire before collapsing in a heap. “Take a blow, Bealers” came the exasperated voice of the skipper. At least they didn’t score a boundary of that delivery. In Mombassa I didn’t even manage to bowl a single ball as an excruciating pain shot up my left leg after I’d taken but three strides towards the wicket. The doctor said it was cramp, but I’m pretty sure it was cobra-bite.

A rabbit by his hutch

A rabbit by his hutch

Anyway, never ever again will I throw beer cans at the TV as I watch the English tourists falter and collapse against the Indians/Pakistanis/Sri Lankans as I fully understand how harsh foreign conditions can be on us Poms (playing in Colombo was like playing in a wok). I would, however have donated my left testicle to watch last night’s World Cup Qualifying match between Scotland and Afghanistan, where the Afghans romped home by 42 runs. Played in Benoni, Sef Efrica (presumably the Kabul Oval is undergoing a refurb?), the Scotch were chasing 280 to win but lost their last 8 wickets for 50 runs. Now I know a lot of you will be surprised that Scotland play cricket (it’s staggering popular in the gorbals), but how much fun do you reckon you’d have playing a match in-between US bombing raids in Helmand Province?? I reckon your opening bat may lose concentration every-so-often, deep backward square regularly gets kidnapped before tea, and there’s a land-mine just on a length outside off-stump. I suspect there’s a few short legs around, but that’s another story.

 

*Arabic for “How was that?”

Saturday Titfers

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Unknown Football ground photographed somewhere or other, circa dunno. Probably not the Valley.

Unknown Football ground photographed somewhere or other, circa dunno. Probably not the Valley.

In a quiet side street of the charming hamlet of Charlton, (as in ‘Charlton Athletic Nil’), South East London once stood a little pub called The Valley, named after the local football team’s home ground. A pretty unremarkable little boozer, which my brother and I used to go in for “just the one” at lunchtime on match days (we were supporters, you understand, not players. The players were in the boozer across the road).  It was suitably scruffy, unknown to traveling opposition supporters, and mercifully free of the formica and stainless steel decor favoured by the Slug and Pianos, the All Bar Funs and the Trout n Tillbox pub chains so popular with the roof of today.

But the feature of this pub which will stay with me forever was an old photograph on the wall. Or to be precise, a photo so large it stretched across two walls, floor-to-ceiling, in the main bar. It showed life as it was 60 years ago, a life sadly no longer with us. The photo at the top of this page , similar to the one in the pub,  will give you an idea of what I mean.

Pictured was the old, massive, main terrace at Charlton’s ground, presumably photographed just post-war. Several things struck you when you looked at the picture: That they used to sell-out home games; Some of the supporters were smiling; No-one was kicking seven shades out of anyone else; and everyone in the photo was male. But there was something else: of the nigh-on 20,000 people in the photo everyone, and I mean EVERYONE was wearing a hat. Be it a trilby, a flat cap, or whatever, EVERYONE wore a hat. Question: when the time came to throw your hat in the air in celebration of Charlton scoring a goal (quiet at the back!) how did you get your own hat back? It must have been carnage.

Charlton beating Liverpool 3-0 (yes, honestly). Not a dry hat in the house.

Charlton beating Liverpool 3-0 (yes, honestly) December 1959. The home goalie, Willie Duff, dives to clear some smudges from the photograph. Not a dry hat in the house.

I have a particularly big swede and I suspect I would have often walked home with someone else’s cap, 3 sizes too small perched, at a jaunty angle, on the top of my head, while some other poor little sod wore my one, having to walk four yards before the hat moved.

In 1953 Charlton beat Middlesbrough 8-1 which presumably meant that some of those present changed hats 8 times during the match. I wonder if after twenty minutes you ended up with a real corker of a titfer you just buggered off home and sod the result? Were you refused entry to the ground if you were hatless? What if your chapeau was a birthday present but the bloke standing 7 yards away caught it during the melee after a late equalizer? My mum would have gone Garrity if I returned home without it.

Sad I know, but it’s something that’s always bothered me.
The pub’s not there now. Demolished for yuppie flats, A Costa Coffee bar or somesuch. Gone the same way as epidemic hat-wearing, a thousand proper boozers around the country, and home goals at The Valley.