I definitely felt I’d grown up since the start of the season. If adult life was going to prove to be a series of crushing disappointments mixed in with the occasional glimpse of joy, which I suspected would be the case, then supporting Bromley had prepared me well for the future.
I’d also learnt that supporting a club meant sticking with them when times got tough. The reward came when they did have a win – it meant so much more than being one of tens of thousands of spectators who turned up week after week to watch their expensively assembled team thrash yet another hapless opponent. When Bromley actually won a game, it meant I could take a real sense of achievement out of the result and I’d be walking around with a smile on my face for the whole of the following week. Or until they next lost.
It was in this mood of feeling really quite pleased how things had worked out that I decided to re-assess the criteria for judging what sort of season it had been for Bromley.
In the post-match euphoria which these days came from a close defeat, it suddenly became obvious that the true measure of a team’s success was not where they finished in the league, but how they did in their home and away games against the team who ended up winning the title.
The fact that Bromley had held Enfield to a 1–1 draw back in August and now come agonisingly close to a similar result in their final game meant my team were as good as anyone in the Isthmian League, despite the apparently overwhelming evidence to the contrary.
There were other factors that proved Bromley were an improved side from the previous season, where they had finished much higher in the table. The biggest loss had then been 9–0 to Sutton. This season the 8–0 defeat at Barking had been the worst.
Then there were the games against Hillingdon Borough. Last season, we’d lost 7–0 to them in the FA Cup. This season it was a much closer 4–1.
By the time I got home from Bromley’s 28th game in a row without a win, I had managed to convince myself that it had been a magnificent season, marred only by finishing a distant last in the table with just ten points from 38 games, having scored a pathetic 31 goals and conceding 111.
I don’t think the Bromley and Kentish Times agreed with this assessment. I eagerly turned to the back page of the edition that came out a few days after the game and was shocked to see that it was the first time football hadn’t made the lead story all season.
The big news was that the Beckenham Ladies Swimming Club were facing an increase in charges for hiring the local pool.
•••
Back in August, I had been looking forward to seeing Moore, Hurst and Peters at Hayes Lane. Now, almost a year later, I couldn’t wait to see them play in the World Cup in Mexico on our new colour telly. Dave and I had decided to watch all 32 games, starting with the hosts against Russia.
We were even more in love with football than ever – everyone at school was. Our teams had all redeemed themselves in their final games of the season. I was ecstatic with Bromley’s result at Enfield, the Arsenal fans were overjoyed because their team had won the Inter-Cities Fairs Cup thanks to goals from my love rival Jon Sammels, Dave’s hero Eddie Kelly and John Radford, who managed the feat without wearing his Sensational John Radford Football Boots. The Palace fans were just as happy, as they celebrated somehow avoiding relegation.
As I looked through my almost-complete collection of Esso World Cup coins and listened to the England squad’s single ‘Back Home’, I felt proud and optimistic. There were plenty of signs pointing towards an England victory.
Bromley’s future seemed equally assured. The performance against Enfield a few weeks ago showed that even without Alan Stonebridge, we had managed to assemble a team capable of winning the Isthmian League when it kicked off again in just a few months time.
The 1969/70 season was already a distant memory.
ISTHMIAN LEAGUE HOW THEY STAND
END OF SEASON
Epilogue
What happened next?
Well, England didn’t win the 1970 World Cup. Or the one after that. Or the one after that. Or the one after that. Or the one after that. Or the one after that. Or the one after that. Or the one after that. Or the one after that. Or the one after that.
Bromley had to wait until August 22nd to get their first win of 1970. It was against Corinthian Casuals and the scorer of the only goal was Jim Roberts. By that time, everyone had forgotten my claims that he was my uncle. The team managed to finish the season a far more respectable fifth-from-bottom.
I left Bromley in the mid-seventies and have only watched the team play twice since then. The first time was at Hayes Lane, where 21 players were involved in a mass brawl after Junior Crooks (an Extrudor Operator) headbutted the opposing goalie. The second time was at Swindon in the FA Cup a year later, when Bromley lost 7–0 and got a standing ovation from the home fans.
•••
Dave and I are still friends. He became a reporter and moved to the US where he is now a sub-editor in Florida, which means the only way he can watch Arsenal is on American TV. He met some of the skinheads at a school reunion on his last visit home and described them as being ‘pleasant, middle-aged family men’.
The Grubby never left Bromley. He had awful luck with his health, but never complained about it. He is now working as a caretaker at his local church hall.
Derek continued to watch Bromley until family commitments meant he no longer had the time. He still has his tax-consultancy business and is a referee in the Orpington and Bromley District Sunday League. At 60, he has recently become a father for the third time.
Peter continues to be a mystery. The last I heard, he had moved down to Bath and was working for a government organisation.
Alan Stonebridge took early retirement from teaching in 1997, but has recently returned to it part time. He still coaches football in schools and local clubs, with a particular interest in encouraging girls to take up the game. His son, Ian, played for England at Under-18 level, alongside Joe Cole, Gareth Barry and Michael Carrick.
Eric Nottage, who owned his own electrical firm, retired recently. He still lives in the Bromley area and one of his regular jobs was maintaining the Hayes Lane floodlights.
After finishing his football career (and subsequent pizza making career), Jeff Bridge moved to South Australia, where he taught until retiring in June 2008. His wife sent me a recent photo and he looks in great shape.
Alan Basham reaped the benefits of staying fit by continuing to run his own building company well into his sixties.
Graham Gaston left the printing business and became a paramedic in Sevenoaks. Like so many of his team mates, he has recently retired.
After many years as a salesman, Phil Amato now runs his father’s shoe business.
‘Judo’ Al Hayes changed his name to Lord Alfred Hayes and found fame on the American TV wrestling programme, Tuesday Night Titans. He went on to become an announcer on Prime Time Wrestling, a career that was interrupted when he was taken hostage live on air by Sergeant Slaughter and his Iraqi allies.
Jon Sammels became a driving instructor in Leicester. Ian Ure was a social worker at Lower Mass Prison in Scotland.
Dave’s sister never married.
As for Roy, I completely lost touch with him.
•••
In 2007, Bromley won promotion into the Blue Square Southern Conference, which is only a couple of divisions away from the Football League. It was arguably the biggest achievement in their history.
Even though I was now living in New Zealand, I was able to watch the highlights of the play-off final against Billericay Town on Bromley’s website. It finished 1–1 and went to penalties, where Bromley won 4–2.
The crowd was enormous – far bigger than I had ever seen at Hayes Lane. The new stand looked far more impressive than the old Main Stand, which had burned down in 1992. There were now lifts, a café, five-a-side pitches and a brand-new club shop.
The ground had been renamed The Courage Stadium and there was no room for the tea hut, wh
ich had been torn down, or the old Supporters’ Club hut which seemed to have undergone a similar fate.
After the match highlights, there was an interview with Mark Goldberg, the Bromley manager. Standing just behind him, soaking up every word, was a grinning spectator in his early sixties. The wild, curly hair was unmistakable, even though it was now mainly grey. The glasses were bigger and thicker than he’d needed nearly 40 years beforehand and the face plumper and more lined. But Roy’s beaming smile was the same one I’d seen way back when our team had beaten Oxford City just before Christmas in 1969, or when we had almost held Enfield in the last game of that season.
I felt incredibly happy that Bromley had finally made it into the big time. And I was even happier that one of the Bromley Boys had been there to witness it.
Acknowledgements
Thanks to Derek Dobson for the memories and memorabilia, Tom Bromley for his enthusiasm, Bob Dunning for his knowledge of 1960s football boots, David Hayes for the advice and anecdotes, Birrell and Kevin Cummins for their suggestions and ideas, Mike Brunel for his support, and Mum and Dad for deciding to move to Bromley back in 1961.
The Bromley Boys Page 21