Portsmouth FC

Flagging Interest in the FIFA World Cup 2026

/ Christopher Perry / Leave a comment

The 2026 FIFA World Cup, is scheduled to be hosted by the Canada, Mexico and the USA.  A second cross-border tournament, first successfully undertaken with the South Korea-Japan tournament of 2002, will present some wonderful memories for those Pompey fans who will travel to support England. Group match tickets, starting at $60, are being allocated through a world-wide lottery.  Final tickets start at $2,030 a piece.  Getting into games may well be an exercise in who you know, or meet on your travels. 

Many of us watching England on the box will also take part in the age-old parlour game of spotting the various St George’s flags from around the country.  It is always cheering to see a Pompey flag in the array of England flags ringing a foreign field.  Spotting Pompey flags at non-England matches during a major tournament gains extra points, by the way. 

Noting names of other clubs and towns on English flags is another side-show, particularly when full backs and centre backs are trading side-passes in the stifling heat of a New World summer. For example, one that caught my eye was Workington, stitched into a flag prominently displayed for the group qualifying match in Tirana, in mid-November.  

Workington AFC, located thirty-five miles south-west of Carlisle, on the Whitehaven coast, would have been a challenging away trip for any lower division team, after the club was elected to the Football League Division Three – North, replacing New Brighton in 1951.  Workington lasted in the Football League until 1976/77, when after winning just four matches that season, it was replaced by Wimbledon FC.  The club made little impression on the Football League, (apart from being a step on the way to Anfield for Bill Shankly and the launch pad for goalkeeper John Burridge’s 798 professional game career), but Workington’s supporters are still proud to support the English national side.

In a club versus country debate, my loyalties have always put Pompey first, then I’ll follow any international side that features Pompey players, past or present.  This permits me some leeway when watching a major tournament, but this year, it will be 60 years since HM Queen Elizabeth II presented Bobby Moore with the Jules Rimet Trophy at Wembley.  That steamy July day in 1966, is one of which I hold some clear memories.  My dad had bought a new black & white television, on which he watched the match with a work friend, while I was left to follow events on the older TV set in the back room.

I distinctly recall Hurst’s header, Peters sweeping the ball home for England’s second and then Geoff Hurst’s thumping third that settled the match beyond all doubt, ensuring that there would be no replay had West Germany equalised again.

Of the controversy about the ball which did not cross the line, or the scrambled 90th minute West German equaliser, I cannot not recall.  I do remember by first brother wandering away bored from the TV, and going up to his room during the match to play with the Lego.  At the time I questioned his commitment to the beautiful game.   If he couldn’t sit through a World Cup Final, how would he ever be a proper football fan, I wondered. He had celebrated his fifth birthday a couple of weeks previously, old enough for school, so old enough to know about football, I reckoned, already being a world-weary six-and-a-half-year-old myself.

Geoff Hurst is still my hero for his three goals in 1966, but it was twenty-one-year-old Alan Ball, who ran the show that day. If you watch a recording of the match, you will see the player, who was to become a famous Pompey manager, run non-stop for the team that World Cup Final day.  He was a vital cog in Alf Ramsey’s ‘Wingless Wonders’ winning formation.  No Pompey fan watching in ’66 could have dreamt that the little guy wearing the No 7 for England would be the man to steer Pompey up to the top Division for the first time in twenty-eight years.

Here’s a game of imagination for you to try, while watching the FIFA tournament whittle forty-eight teams down to the final two, consider who of all the players you see, see if you can spot one who one day may become a member of the Pompey family.

~

The Seven Stages of An International Career
All the world cup’s a pitch And all the men and women merely players

They have their appearances and their substitutions

And one man in his career plays many parts

His games being in several parts.  At first the debutant

In awe of his team-mates, who know the score

And then the unused substitute skipping and stretching

Shining with enthusiasm, trying to catch the coach’s eye To get on the pitch,

And then the player, Growling like a lion, during the national anthem

Sung with patriotic passion.  Then a hardened pro

Full of feints and moves, making the killer pass

United in loyalty, sudden and quick in a challenge

Seeking the winner’s reputation

Even in time added on for stoppages. And then the coach

In fair round belly with peaked cap on With eyes severe and beard of formal cut

Full of wise tactics and modern formations

And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts

Into the sad and slipper’d panel pundit

With spectacles on nose and on the couch, side on;

His too young clothes, well sav’d, the screen too wide

For his shrunk name and his big manly voice

Turning again toward petty gripes 

Complaints of VAR and referees’ 

Unfair whistles.  Last game of all 

That ends this strange, eventful career

Is with child-like enthusiasm and mere oblivion

Sans shirt, sans club, avec memories et medals.

 ~

(with apologies to W Shakespeare)

~

n.b. This article was first published in a Portsmouth match day programme, details tba.

Chris Perry

02/05/2026

Lights Out

/ Christopher Perry / Leave a comment

Do you travel to Pompey matches by train?  Are you old enough to remember walking over the footbridge at Fratton station, turning to your left and looking for Fratton Park, marked for nearly 60 years by four classic floodlight pylons?

For many fans using the footbridge, looking for the floodlights was a ritual, even on non-match days.  The floodlight pylons marked our spiritual home, our Mecca.  The removal of the pylons had huge symbolic significance for many.  Not least, reminding us that nothing stays the same, but also that our new owners were not going to let our ground fester.

Despite the best efforts of fan ownership, Fratton Park was fast becoming a liability, with crumbling staircases, rusting beams and shaky foundations, if there were any foundations at all at the Milton End.  Removing the floodlight pylons also eliminated a major workplace hazard.

I had often looked up the ladder of the pylon that stood at the western end of the North Terrace in awe of the height of the structure.  Who would be the person charged with climbing all the way up there to change a light bulb, I wondered.

With Portsmouth being a nautical city, there once would have been plenty of capable deck hands, experienced at clambering up the rigging and out over a spar to reef the sails in a storm, but not recently.  It would take some nerve climbing up the floodlight towers, above the concrete terrace, whatever the weather.  Before the Millennium Tower was completed, only a few, those living in the tallest tower blocks on the island, would have the privilege of enjoying such a dramatic perspective of Portsmouth, as the person charged with lightbulb replacement.

The floodlight pylons were installed during 1962 to replace lights situated on the roof of each stand. The new lights were funded by members of the Portsmouth Central Supporters Club and as such, the new structures were a dramatic symbol of Pompey fans’ commitment to their team, a commitment that was put to the ultimate test during the later financial collapse of the club.

Mark Caitlin, when CEO here, was taken aback by the many expressions of dismay that the pylons were going to be taken down.  Those pylons marked our home and in this topographically challenged city, they were something for us all to look up to.  As a result, at significant expense, a lone pylon was removed by PMC Construction and set up in a corner of the club carpark.  It still stands there, naked of any lights, a bare steel frame, looking a little forlorn, with nothing yet to acknowledge the emotional attachment that it, with its three siblings, held for so many Pompey fans. 

Originally floodlights had run along the top of Pompey’s two Leitch Stands. They would have not looked much dissimilar to the current pitch lighting arrangements.  Apparently, the original lights had a dramatic power failure during a match with Sparta of Rotterdam, that was being played to test whether professional football was practical under lights, before Fratton Park hosted the first ever Football League floodlit game against Newcastle United in 1956.

As we gathered with Millwall fans last season in excited anticipation of a keenly-awaited contest, we too suffered a power failure that meant everyone had to be sent home. This provided visiting Millwall fans the chance to sing how poor Pompey must be because, “…Southampton’s got lights!”

It was an embarrassing evening for the club, but one not of its making.  A sub-station feeding into Fratton Park, operated by the local electricity company blew up and all the frantic work of the stadium management staff to overcome the power outage was to no avail. With the return of our fierce rivals from Bermondsey, (their fourth trip here since 13th August 2024), please pay a thought for the stadium maintenance team whose work at Fratton Park is dedicated to ensuring we have a safe, well-lit and comfortable ground this afternoon, where we can watch the whole illuminated match uninterrupted.

~

Lighting Up
 
All the clocks have been changed
Winter gales are rolling in
By ten past four the Sun will be gone
Time to switch the floodlights on
 
Visible from Bognor Regis and from Ryde
Those floodlights call us back home again
Engine driver, ferry captain
Please make sure we're there on time
 
Cross the footbridge at Fratton station
Look left and see the bright white glow
Pompey and Millwall are at it again
Fingers crossed these lights won’t blow
 
There’s something special about floodlit games
The pitch is greener, the faces shine
The players shirts are much more vibrant
Our club songs shake this proud island
 
It’s a Saturday, close to three o’clock
The Fratton crowd is ready now
Soon the whistle will be blown
Time to get the football on

~

n.b. This article was first published in the Portsmouth FC v Millwall FC match programme on 22nd November, 2025.

Chris Perry

30th May 2026

The Non-Attenders

/ Christopher Perry / Leave a comment

“There is nothing like football is there?  Nothing can make you feel every emotion like a football match.”  Kevin Maybe.

Portsmouth is the most densely populated city in the United Kingdom.  The latest data calculated the population to be 208,100.   As a seated stadium, the largest crowd here was in 2009 versus Spurs when 20,821 pitched up.  That equates to about 10% of the total island city population, although many Pompey fans don’t live in the city.  When Pompey played Derby in the FA Cup in 1951, the crowd was more than 20%, one-in-five of the city’s residents.  Imagine!  Every fifth person in the city going to Fratton Park. It is hard to believe that possible.

I knew a man who proudly told me he was there in 1951, although I am more impressed now if someone boasts of being in the crowd of 1,200 versus Bristol Rovers in the 2016 EFL Trophy match, which was Pompey’s smallest crowd since 1946.

Have you ever wondered about the 90% of the city’s people who don’t go to Pompey matches?  What are they doing?  Up at the QA on Portsdown Hill, there are some wards that overlook the city from which the lights of Fratton Park are clearly visible.  Up there, patients are able to listen to Pompey’s home matches on the QA Hospital Radio via the Pompey Audio Description commentary service.

This service was initially set up in the 2015/16 season in partnership with the Portsmouth Disabled Supporters Association to bring match commentary to partially sighted Pompey fans at Fratton Park, but has now been wired into the QA Hospital Radio service.  Why not just listen to the BBC Radio Solent service, you might ask?  Well many patients may do, but the Audio Description service commentators are specifically trained to describe the action non-stop, with the asides and chat saved for pre-match and half-time, so that listeners know exactly what is happening, as it happens.  It is detailed commentary, focusing precisely on where the ball is and what the players are doing.

A couple of the original Pompey AD commentators are now working for national radio and other TV stations, as the current dedicated team certainly could be, given the great service they provide to their listeners.

Besides Pompey fans too unwell to attend, there are a large number of people in Portsmouth who are freed up to enjoy a bit of personal space, while one, or more of their household is down at ‘The Park.’  My grandmother would settle into an armchair with a cuppa and watch the wrestling on ITV during Saturday afternoons, while my grandfather was at football.  Some people go down to Gunwharf Quays, (or Gunwharf Queues as I call it), for some shopping, meaning many people have to be there working too, to take their money.  

Some people of nervous disposition cannot go to games due to the anxiety a Pompey game can bring on.  My grandfather’s doctor told him to stop going to games because his heart was no longer up to the strain, which sadly turned out to be true, although he was spared watching Pompey ever playing in Division 4, which was a blessing of sorts.

In Nick Hornby’s first book Fever Pitch, he writes of his dream of buying a house next to Highbury, which came true due to the sales success of his book. As a result he could just pop out the door to watch his beloved Arsenal, but then they moved to a new stadium down the road, but not too far.  I wonder how many of Pompey’s neighbours have achieved the local equivalent, fulfilling a lifetime’s ambition by living next door to Fratton Park?

For other neighbours, matchdays might be the worst day of the fortnight.  What with the crowds roaring, parking restrictions, police horse dung in the street, match days might be days to go off the island and walk on the Downs, or the beach at The Witterings, although from both you can still see the glow of the lights (as you can from the Bognor Regis prom).  In the 1940s and 50s, some of the neighbours used to charge 6d to look after the bicycles of fans, so making a bit of pocket money from the gathering throng.

A poem by Rebecca Loveday, captures the excitement and anxiety of watching Pompey hang onto a one-nil lead against Leeds United, as the final minutes are played out.  Early leavers may just be following doctor’s orders, but for many, this is when the drama and sheer joy of attending is most keenly felt, which is exactly why they are here in the first place.

~

n.b. This article, with Rebecca Loveday’s poem, was first published in the Portsmouth FC v Wrexham FC match programme on 5th November, 2026.

Chris Perry

29/05/2026

 

Raise the Colours

/ Christopher Perry / Leave a comment

Here we are again, playing Leeds United, an original phoenix clubs, who rose from the ashes of the infamously financially dodgy Leeds City FC. 

Known as The Peacocks for decades after formation in 1919, Leeds United either took their nickname from The Peacock Inn across the street to Elland Road, or because of the garish combinations of old gold and blue shirts worn by the team from formation until 1962.  Now the white of Real Madrid is the club colour after Don Revie imposed it, with little whisper of fan protest, while yellow and blue (the city’s official colours) have become a staple part of United’s away kits.

Pompey fans know how important club colours are to our identity.  Witness the row about the short-lived red Emirates sponsorship of the Millennium Tower. We are vehement defenders of the royal blue shirts, white shorts kit, with our red socks (suggested by long-time Club President, Field Marshall Montgomery) a vital, un-substitutable element. Home kits are pretty much standard these days, but Away kits and Third kits are the marketing team’s dream.

Nostalgic and historic colour schemes often prove popular, not least last season’s salmon pink of Pompey’s 125th Anniversary tribute to our first ever team kit.  Club kit designers consider whether any prospective design will be worn by supporters as leisure wear, which explains why black is often used, ignoring the fact that, from a football perspective, that a team-mate in a dark shirt will be less easy to spot than one in bright blue, white or red.

Incidentally, red has been identified by some social scientists to be the shirt colour of teams that win the most sports trophies, but this theory is clearly nonsense given the history of football in Hampshire.

The worst away kit I have ever seen was Cardiff City’s 1972/73 away kit of lilac and primrose, first worn at Fratton Park in August 1972.  On a blistering afternoon, Cardiff’s players were squinting into the Sun as it began setting between the South Stand and Fratton End.  They had taken a first-half lead from a Derek Showers goal, but as the game and heat wore on, after a Pompey equaliser from Brian Lewis, Pompey were handed the lead in bizarre circumstances.  It was the 80th minute when Cardiff won a throw-in on the South Stand touchline, in their own half.  One of their players ran over insisting he take it, so caught the ball that had been thrown toward him by his team-mate.  Referee Harold Davey (a FIFA list referee of the time) immediately ruled that the catch was handball because the throw had been made in accordance with the laws of the game.  You can imagine the complaints from the men in lilac and primrose shirts at that decision.  From the free-kick Norman Piper put Pompey ahead, to the home crowd’s cheers and laughter.  A third Pompey goal via Richie Reynolds in the 89th minute made it a 3-1 win. 

Derek Showers remembers the awful kit and the game well.  Born in 1953, Derek had grown up knowing that Pompey were one of the great teams of English football in the post-war years.  He was absolutely thrilled to have scored at Fratton Park.  He remembers floating home on a high. “After getting off the team coach at Ninian Park, I caught the train up The Rhondda to Merthyr, but because the last bus had gone, I had to walk the last mile or so to my village.  I had just scored against mighty Pompey at Fratton Park and there I was, past midnight, walking up the valley with my football boots hung over my shoulder.  ‘So much for the glamour of being a professional footballer’ I thought.” 

After joining Pompey from Bournemouth & Boscombe, when Pompey were struggling in Division 4, Showers learned how tough life as a footballer could be.

He suffered an injury that nearly cost him a leg.  As he was not a prolific goal-scorer, he suffered some vitriolic criticism from the terraces.  Despite this, the centre-forward nicknamed Nookie Bear by Pompey fans, still has brightness in his eyes when talking about playing at Fratton Park.  He had been discovered by Leeds, Juventus and Wales giant, John Charles and signed for Cardiff at 15 years of age.  Today, Derek looks fit and strong enough to still play the game for a living.  As for team kits, Showers would pull on a shirt for whoever was going to pay his wages and help keep a roof over the heads of his beloved family.

Leeds Sonnet 2024/25


Hot August day, hope stitched on our sleeves
We travelled north to take on mighty Leeds
Never thinking we might draw three – three
 
Graffiti, fan stickers and gable-end murals
Walking side by side with the local people
To Elland Road, their football cathedral
 
So good to be back in the second tier
In the bigger towns with bigger grounds
We’ll give it a fair crack, play without fear
 
After that heady first day, we all thought OK
We were a bit lucky, but so were they
No way will it be easy playing away
 
Now they’re here pushing for promotion
While we’re back home battling relegation

n.b. This article was initially published in the Portsmouth FC v Leeds United match day programme, 9th March 2025

~

Chris Perry

26/05/2026

 

South Stand Tea Hut

/ Christopher Perry / Leave a comment

Football on Boxing Day is one of the nation’s favourite fixtures.  To have a home match is particularly satisfying, but frankly, any Boxing Day match is to be savoured. 

I was once a regular on the South Terrace, Milton Enclosure, before it was re-fashioned into the seating it is today. The South Terrace was a cold, draughty, but dry place.  Close enough to the pitch to be able to smell the cut grass, the turf and players’ embrocation.  The ball would frequently end up cannoning around this patch of terrace and it would sometimes be followed by a player who had slid off the pitch, across the orange tartan track and over the retaining wall onto the concrete.  Players on the field could also clearly hear the expert tactical advice on offer from the enclosure and would sometimes respond directly verbally or more often using hand signals.

At the back of the enclosure, wedged underneath the Leitch commissioned steelwork, was a tea hut. It looked like a garden shed from B&Q and was staffed by a lady called Joyce Tynan. She worked alone, which meant that a massive queue for beverages would develop at half-time. This queue then merged with the queue for the toilets beside her hut. On more than one occasion, I found myself following the wrong painfully slow procession, when I actually wanted a tea not a pee.

Eventually, my friend, Dave and I agreed to take turns from match to match to nip along just before half-time to get our drinks order in early.  Neither of us minded taking on the task, because it was possible to still see some of the pitch from the tea hut counter. As well as being able to keep alert to the action, it meant having a chance to have a brief chat with Joyce, who was always good natured, however poorly Pompey might be playing.  Joyce had served teas at Fratton Park for many seasons and along with the senior turnstile operator, who definitely remembered Pompey’s glory years, they were two people who would always brighten any visit to PO4.

I also remember a limited option of chocolate bars at extraordinary prices being available from Joyce’s tea hut, so not many of those were bought.  I used to always check the date of these slow selling products to make sure they were at least fresh that season.

Besides the steaming urn and plastic cups of coffee, Bovril, or tea options, there was a glass cabinet for keeping pies warm.  After the match, with the hut locked up, unsold pies were left on the counter to take away for free to stop them going to waste. 

Having beaten the half-time queue, Dave or I would be back on the terrace in double-quick time, where we could gingerly sip the boiling hot drink, sometimes having a brief chat with Touchline Tony, as he took a break from stadium announcements, to dissect with us what had gone right or wrong in the first 45 minutes.

Joyce at the tea hut was a lovely woman with an impossible job.  Towards the end of her time at Fratton Park, Joyce did get an assistant, a student, who I think was simply bemused by what was expected, as waiting times did not get any shorter. Thankfully, things around Fratton Park have changed for the better.

Unlike professional rugby and non-league football, it is illegal to drink alcohol while watching a men’s professional football match, so it has been a priority for the club to ensure all catering facilities are totally out of sight of the pitch, which allows Pompey to sell alcoholic beverages throughout the match, for those who enjoy, or need, a pint at the football. 

Sadly, Joyce is no longer with us, but the club is able to offer many more part-time job opportunities on match days than was previously the case, emphasising the contribution Pompey makes to the local economy. The hospitality and catering team, led by Kayleigh Young, have a challenging job in that football stadia are only opened to fans on match days, whenever they may be, whether weeks apart, or three times in eight days. Getting the food and drink stocks for each game on such an irregular basis is a bit of a gamble, which explains in part why a limited choice of food and drink is available. It is not easy getting the stock levels right for perishable products under such circumstances. Look in the Victory Bar after a win and it will be buzzing, but after a defeat, even with a full house at the game, there can be more staff than customers, as supporters head for home. As ever, success on the pitch is a big factor in how well the club does in all aspects of the operation.

After a traditional Christmas lunch, eating is the last thing on your mind, or you may have been saving yourself to tuck into a hospitality meal at Fratton Park today. Whichever it is, I hope that Pompey and QPR can provide a cracker of a match and Pompey can put the icing on the cake with a win this Boxing Day. Happy Christmas.

n.b. A version of this article was published in the Pompey v QPR match day programme on Boxing Day, 2025.

Chris Perry

25th May 2026

 

Some Foreign Field

/ Christopher Perry / Leave a comment 
Roads and streets unfamiliar
Filled with grey drawn faces
That peer down at tipsy slabs underfoot
Coats pulled tight to tucked in chins
Fists pushed deep into pockets
Stooped figures limping toward the electric-white glow
Pale shadows struggle to keep up
With these sad shufflers
Wrapt in hopeful talk.
The same battered cars line kerbs
Bumpers kissing
Litter blown by stiff north-easterly draughts
Sticks carelessly to railings
Ice in rain fills holes in the cold breeze
Pricks pins in my face
Grey sky adopts a gloomy shade
Their stadium leans in on itself
Perpetually introvert
Morose
Its pointless activity
Steals any joy
From coming dawns
Scarves and shirts in reds and whites
Accents more rural than this dockland setting
Suggest spaces more green
Less concrete
Than this
This is far from our home
Where blue skies shine
Brilliant sun parades
Strong enough to make eyes squint
When we wake
It warms our blood
Calls us to play
Unfettered by fear of failure
At night the star and crescent
Heaven's light
Our guide.
This is their place
I leave them
Happy
To be miserable

CLP 27/10/2018

Vince – The Vince Hilaire Autobiography Released

/ Christopher Perry / Leave a comment

Vince Hilaire was £85,000 and worth every penny

Many, many Pompey fans will want this book that came out in July 2018.

It has a lot about Vince Hilaire’s time at Pompey with the amazing squad that played for Alan Ball. Never has the Pompey team been so in tune with the character of Pompey supporters. We were a complete unit on the road and at home. What Bally achieved and how is a big part of this book.

It also gives an insight to the racism and bigotry Vince Hilaire faced during his career. This guy was an absolutely fantastic footballer who I could not believe ever joined Pompey. He was that good and he had some of his best playing years at Fratton Park. That he was such a winner despite the barriers he faced shows the strength of character of the man.

Vince Hilaire Pompey Hall of Fame Tribute here

More about the book from Backbite Publishing here

A must read!

———————–

CLP 13/09/2018

“How to be a Footballer” by Peter Crouch

/ Christopher Perry / Leave a comment

E935B2C3-88AF-4494-9E54-0EAD3F46B9DE

Fratton Park just two stops on the carousel of Peter Crouch’s football career.

For those of you interested in books by former employees of Pompey, this one may be worth a look. It is currently half-price in Waterstones (at at 12th September, 2018), representing a saving of £10 for a hardback copy. However, this is not a book review, just my excuse to write about Peter Crouch, a player I had great respect for during his two contracts at Pompey at Championship and Premier League levels.

Crouch was originally bought by Pompey from QPR for £1.5m in 2001. It was at QPR that he had first signed as a school boy before going to Spurs as youth player and then being sold back to QPR for £50,000.  This was the first inkling that he was a player happy to move back and forth between clubs if it meant he would get a game. He later returned to Pompey after a while at Aston Villa (sold there by Pompey for £5m in 2002); via a loan trip to Norwich; a transfer to the west Hampshire club now owned 80% by Gao Jisheng;  then Liverpool who paid £7m to sign him and then back to Fratton Park for £11m in 2008. Crouchy was then transferred for £10m to Spurs. Clearly a popular worker to have been welcomed back by so many former employers.

Is there any other top league player who has been able to dance between clubs with such agility? That he also had a spell at Chelsea as a ball boy, despite supporting QPR, suggests he gives a good interview.

My first memory of seeing Crouch playing was from 4th February 2000 in the 1-1 draw away at QPR. The young centre forward proved to be a challenge for the Pompey defence that afternoon and the QPR fans protested shrilly at the rough treatment their No 9  received  at the hands, knees and elbows of player-manager Steve Claridge’s team. Despite Crouch’s spindly frame and light-weight, there was something about the timing of his jumps and his ability to hold and lay the ball off that was impressive. He did very well in the first half and was unlucky not to score, but nodded the ball down to Paul Peschisolido for the early QPR goal. The other thing that impressed me that afternoon was that he actually finished the game, showing great determination and grit despite the battering he was getting.

In the second half, before or just after Lee Bradbury’s equaliser (I can’t remember precisely), there was a tangle of limbs and Crouch fell to the ground in a pile with Darren Moore. Both players were a little off balance, QPR fans howled for a penalty and became even more incensed as the massive frame of the centre-back Moore clambered to his feet, made a slight stumble and had to kneel on Crouch’s ribcage to return to standing. Needless to say Crouch didn’t move very far for a while.

I am pretty certain that Crouch lost his effectiveness in this game at that point, but the 19 year old soldiered on. The BBC match report mentions that Crouch was lucky not to get a red card for a late tackle towards the end of the game, likely the frustration of being bullied by Darren Moore for 90 minutes finally getting to him. However, the youngster stuck it out.

I did not previously know that Peter Crouch played for Dulwich Hamlet and IFK Hassellholm on loan when first at Spurs – at least in Sweden at 6’7″ he would have felt as if he was a normal height. Apparently he went on loan with Alton Therwell to Sweden as part of a £70,000 transfer arrangement for Jon Jonsson who was wanted by Spurs. I had never heard of Alton Therwell, nor Jon Jonsson before I researched this article, so Crouch has a head start on these two when writing a book called, “How to be a Footballer.”

Other memorable moments from the career of Peter Crouch that I recall are his scoring a last minute winning penalty against us in an outrageously badly refereed FA Cup game in west Hampshire, (when Matt Taylor was so unfairly penalised for the ball hitting the point of his shoulder); two extra time goals for Pompey in Portugal in the UEFA Cup group match to send us into the group stages and some spectacular overhead volleyed goals that demonstrated his agility and gift for scoring.  42 England caps and 22 international goals to add to 100 Premier League goals underline his credentials as a talented player. Crouchy has done well for himself and his multitudes of team-mates.

Born in January 1981 and still playing at Championship level with Stoke City in September 2018, Peter Crouch has given a good crack at a playing career. I am sure his second book will provide some unique insights to the work of a modern footballer. Peter Crouch has played at enough clubs to be able to give some sound advice about how to progress in this line of employment. HIs autobiography, “Walking Tall – My Story” was published in 2007 when he was at Liverpool. I wonder if he realised then he would still be playing 11 years later?

How to be a Footballer is published by Penguin Books

CLP  12/09/2018

Season’s End

/ Christopher Perry / Leave a comment

16A1E6D1-891D-46B0-A80A-439EEF5BCDE5.jpegAt last wind from the sea is welcome.

Dust not leaf litter blows along gutters

Pollarded beech trees add leafy tints

to Frensham Road.

 

The movement of people is looser

in summer shorts, blue shirt tops,

although blue and white of Pompey scarves

is still worn despite cricket weather heat.

 

Excitable sons gambol alongside

long-striding men looking ahead

to August,

ignoring twelve mid-year weeks,

while grandads show gentle interest,

kindly coaxing little lads back

onto root-lifted pavements,

answering high-pitched questions about who might play

and why another favourite won’t

and this and that and, and, and…Grandpa?

 

A block-shaped car

is parked particularly precisely,

a wheeled chair is removed,

unfolded, locked into shape

and careful, strong-gripped manoevres

position a determined animated,

colourfully dressed fan,

safe into place, ready to roll

to sit in concreted shade,

where eyes sharpened,

alight to athletic movement

on mown patterns, across white lines

pitched between flag-marked corners,

watch keenly every detail of pre-match

preparation and ritual.

 

Contrast from the shadowing South Stand,

marks near black on brilliant green,

cuts so sharp that momentary

sight loss flickers in eyes squinting

to adjust as they chase

colours, given stronger tone

by Sun set high with a perfect seat,

but who has to drag herself reluctantly away out west

before the final whistle,

but only after pouring one last gulped pint

of welcome warmth

into sun-glassed faces.

 

Impenetrable bright sky, sets off the scene in blue hue not seen inland,

so blue that stars behind become anxious

they will not get on to play tonight.

 

Wide-winged gulls’ cries of the sea are drowned at birth,

over-whelmed, engulfed in waves of voices,

by microphoned, amplified announcements,

strong rhythms, clapping, chants and songs.

 

For some this is the last match.

No substitute will step in when they get pulled from the pitch.

Some will know their part near played up,

others will depart the game in shock,

their removal a surprise to all.

 

Unfair, unwarned and fiercely questioned,

why did they get The Manager’s call?

Yet another sign of unfathomable tactics.

 

Next season, last game in fresh May

their names will be on the lips

of the man who reads The List

of those who once so happily

trooped along to Fratton Park.

 

 

CLP 05/05/2018

Dedicated to Albert Perry “Grampy”