Chelsea FC in the Swinging '60s

by Greg Tesser

  The answer was no with a capital N, for ‘Chopper’ Harris and his men, no doubt chastened by the Åtvidabergs experience and the subsequent criticism of their performance, buckled down and proceeded to produce the goods, resulting in an 11-game unbeaten run in all competitions. Yes, the Blues were back on track.

  The victories included a memorable 3–2 home win over Spurs in the first leg of the League Cup semi-final three days before Christmas, but a 1–0 reverse at Derby on New Year’s Day was a blip, and the first day of 1972 saw them in a mid-table position of tenth.

  The decisive second leg of the semi-final with Spurs on 5 January was a stormy affair, with Chelsea scraping into the final 5–4 on aggregate, thanks to goals from Hudson and a Hollins spot-kick.

  According to Hudson: ‘Os had a running battle with Mike England all night.’

  However, seven days before the final with Stoke, they suffered an embarrassing 3–2 FA Cup fifth round defeat at Second Division Orient, despite at one stage leading 2–0, Osgood and Webb on target.

  Then to the League Cup Final itself at Wembley Stadium on Saturday 4 March, which in so many respects was the precursor to the break-up of that flamboyant Blues side that so encapsulated the spirit of the age. There was, however, an aspect of the pre-final build-up that did much to enhance the Kings of King’s Road’s rock ’n’ roll credentials, and what better way to do this than with a top-five hit record. Welcome to ‘Blue is the Colour’, produced by the ‘Teenage Raqe’ of the 1950s, Larry Page. The man who, back in ’64, had paid for my slap-up feast at the Pickwick Club. Talk about life going round and round in never-ending circles!

  ‘Blue is the Colour’ was released on 26 February 1972 on Penny Farthing Records. In March, it reached number five in the charts, and the Chelsea team members who made the record under Page’s direction appeared on BBC TV’s flagship show, Top of The Pops.

  ‘We appeared just the once on Top of The Pops,’ Alan Hudson told me. ‘I think if we’d won the final against Stoke, the record would have made number one. After the show we joined up with Babs and a couple of the other Pan’s People at Alexander’s in Chelsea – it was a great night.’

  ‘What did you get for being part of such a successful pop disc?’ I asked.

  ‘Just a tax bill!’ quipped the former Chelsea midfielder. ‘One thing in particular I remember about the recording was that as we approached the studios, I noticed that The Bee Gees were leaving. And when we reached the main door they were walking towards us, having just finished their recording. They looked at us, and we looked at them. It was almost surreal. Anyway, their record was not a hit, but ours was massive, which just goes to show what can happen. I also remember what I was wearing that day, it was a white cashmere polo neck sweater from Cecil Gee.

  ‘These days the record is played before each and every home game, but I receive nothing for that.’

  Hudson also started to make friends in the rock music world, most notably with Frank Allen of The Searchers, which brings me to my own brief ‘association’ with the hit 1960s group. In 1964, I had a meeting with their manager Les Ackerley – our company was about to launch some Searchers pennants. He immediately struck me as the archetypal Northern showbiz promoter of the time, blunt and to the point. He chain-smoked and consumed a new cocktail that supposedly contained monkey glands; a drink that was meant to keep you looking more youthful. Well, judging from Les’ looks, it had failed miserably.

  As for Frank Allen, he had replaced bass guitarist Tony Jackson in their line-up in 1964, and was soon involved in the smash-hit ‘When You Walk in the Room’, a record notable for the first use of the electric twelve-string guitar.

  Another rock star to befriend Hudson was a true icon – The Who’s Keith Moon. Hudson and Allen would often spend their evenings in Moon’s company at the La Chasse club in Soho. I saw Moon and his mates live more than once in 1964, and they were sensational – what a noise! What a racket! No wonder I am a tinnitus sufferer these days!

  ‘Blue is the Colour’ has true cult status, and has been covered by various singers in a host of different countries. In what was then Czechoslovakia, Frantisek Ringo Cech came out with a version called ‘Zelena je trava’ (Green is The Grass), which became a popular football anthem in that country

  In 1972 the Danish Olympic team used the tune as their anthem, ‘Rod-hvide farver’ (Red and White Colours). Six years later, the ditty was re-recorded as ‘White is the Colour’ for the Vancouver Whitecaps soccer team, and sold enough copies to become a minor Canadian hit.

  One version which never appealed to ardent Chelsea fans was the one used by the Tory Party for their successful General Election campaign in 1979. The late Tony Banks, ardent Chelsea fan and Labour MP and minster was one such objector. Here the words were changed to, ‘Blue is the Colour, Maggie is her name; we’re all together’ etc.

  Speaking of the late and lamented Tony Banks, who died in 2006 aged sixty-three, one player from the Kings of King’s Road era to become close to the Labour politician in the 1990s was Alan Hudson. Banks helped Alan launch his highly acclaimed autobiography, The Working Man’s Ballet, at a reception at the House of Commons. As Huddy said of the former MP for Newham North West: ‘Tony was a real one-off, and a real fan of the club.’

  Hudson more than hinted to me that number one would have been theirs for the taking, if the boys had clinched their third pot in as many years. And certainly, it was a major upset when the ageing Stoke outfit prevailed 2–1, with thirty-five-year-old George Eastham claiming the winner after Ossie had brought Chelsea back level, following Terry Conroy’s opener.

  Some twenty-six years later, Peter Osgood gave me his impressions of the final. ‘They had some real gems in their line-up. You know, any side with the likes of Gordon Banks, George Eastham and Peter Dobing had to be respected. I suppose you could say in boxing terms we deserved to win on points. But they got the vital goal when Peter Bonetti blocked Jimmy Greenhoff’s shot only for George Eastham to follow up and score from about a yard.’

  The final fifteen minutes saw a non-stop siege of the Stoke goal, but Banks was in inspired form. For Stoke, it was their first major trophy in 109 years. As for the Blues, to quote Bob Dylan’s 1965 classic song, you could say ‘It’s all over now, Baby Blue’.

  ‘We did enough to win three Cup Finals,’ Hudson pointed out.

  In First Division terms the season ended with just the one victory from the last six games, and the final position of seventh represented something of a backward step.

  FIFTEEN

  AUSTERITY AND

  THE BIG BREAK UP

  Industrial action was the curse of Great Britain during the early years of the 1970s. Despite general improvements in living standards, it was essentially a period of what was termed ‘stagflation’, and a return to a massive rise in unemployment. By 1973, inflation was a staggering 20 per cent.

  At the 1971 Annual Conference of the National Union of Mineworkers, it was decided to ask for a 43 per cent pay rise, at a time when the Tory Government of beleaguered Prime Minister Edward Heath was willing to offer a figure of between 7 and 8 per cent. In late ’71, the miners voted to take industrial action if their pay demands were not met in full.

  So, on 5 January 1972, the NUM Executive Committee rejected out-of-hand a small pay increase put on the table by the National Coal Board, who then just two days later withdrew all pay offers. On 9 January, miners from all over Great Britain came out on strike.

  On 9 February a state of emergency was declared, and three days later, the three-day working week was introduced, coupled with a programme of daily power-cuts: Heath’s leadership of the country lasted a mere three years and 259 days, but it was packed with crisis after crisis. All the optimism that had been engendered during the 1960s had dissolved. And in so many ways, Chelsea FC was the perfect microcosm of this.

  Soon after the Stoke disappointment, one of the club’s three prime showmen was on his way when Charlie Cooke signed for Crystal Palace f
or £85,000. There was a touch of pure irony when he later re-signed for the Blues in 1974, the same year that saw both Hudson and Osgood depart.

  Their league form was patchy, with a final placing of twelfth being the club’s worst top-flight ranking since the relegation season of 1961–62. They again displayed their pedigree in knockout situations, by reaching the FA Cup quarter-finals, losing to Arsenal 2–1 at Highbury after a 1–1 draw at the Bridge. In the League Cup the team went one better, bowing out to Norwich City at the semi-final stage.

  Ossie did collect one particular accolade during this season, when his goal against Arsenal in their first FA Cup meeting was voted goal of the season.

  On a personal level, my phone was not chirping merrily as it once did, and even when Vince Powell called me about using some footballers in a new TV comedy series he had planned, he asked for not just Ossie, but ‘a few more, to include players from other clubs’.

  I told him I could get a couple of QPR players (Don Givens and Phil Parkes) plus Charlie Cooke and Os, and Vince seemed happy enough. But it just wasn’t the same. Life was constantly changing, and the 1960s hedonists were no longer of much interest to either the media or the public at large. Dealing with power cuts and the cost of living had driven the fun out of life. Again to quote Dylan: ‘A Hard Rain’s A-Gonna Fall.’

  By now Rodney Marsh had mooched off from QPR to Manchester City for £200,000, so it came as no surprise when he phoned me to terminate our business relationship. He was probably right: for me, a player had to be based in London. Having to swan up to Manchester on a regular basis was never on for me, particularly as by now our Star Posters operation was buzzing with new lines.

  These ‘new lines’ sold by the bucket, but this gave me no pleasure at all, for gone were the bohemian and rebellious designs and posters of stars like John Lennon and Jimi Hendrix and Frank Zappa, to be replaced by David Cassidy and Donny Osmond, yuck!

  I was also now mired in a series of personal crises, and my life seemed to be caught in a rut of producing rubbish that was popular. I tried to break out by putting pen to paper and producing articles for several more intelligent but poorly-paid journals, but this failed to change my mood.

  At Stamford Bridge, the celebs were still in situ, but to say that the mood was not good would be an understatement. Os’ relationship with boss Sexton, which had often verged on fragile in the past, was now seemingly at an all-time low, and Hudson was also having regular run-ins with the manager.

  Season 1973–74: knocked out of the FA Cup in round three by QPR (1–0 in a replay) and dismissed from the League Cup at the first hurdle by Stoke, again 1–0. And in the league, they ended the campaign in seventeenth spot, just five points clear of second-from-bottom relegated Manchester United.

  For Ossie there was one shining light: his recall to the England team on 14 November 1973 for the confrontation with Italy. It was his Wembley international debut, and as he told me some twenty-six years later, it was a game that remained high on his list of ‘Great Matches’.

  ‘I really turned it on that evening. The Italy coach said after the game that I was the most talented player on the park.

  ‘Even Don Revie, never my number one fan, who took over from Alf (Ramsey) a year later as national boss was ecstatic about my all-round display. Everything to do with the Italy game was tinged with irony. It was my England Wembley debut, and at the same time, my final game for my country. It was also Sir Alf’s last match in charge as England boss in this country. It was also Bobby Moore’s 108th and last international.

  ‘The fact that Don Revie eulogised all over the shop about me makes me smile even to this day.’

  Another little fact about the encounter was that Italy’s 86th minute winner in their 1–0 victory was put away by a future England manager. Yes, you’ve guessed it – one Fabio Capello!

  Then in January 1974, all the underlying tensions that existed between Peter Osgood and Alan Hudson on one side and Dave Sexton on the other simmered ever more violently, and subsequently boiled over in the manner of a saucepan of milk left unattended on the cooker. The big break up was imminent: the Kings of King’s Road, as exciting and as exuberant a bunch of players that had ever been seen at the Bridge were slowly but surely decamping and going their separate ways.

  Hudson has told me of his friendship with Eddie McCreadie, who these days lives in the Southern States of America. Eddie has real heart, and knowing how much Alan had suffered following the road accident in December 1997 in which he so nearly lost his life, and knowing that subsequently his friend had had to endure no less than seventy further operations, the Scotsman invited him out to his house across the pond. ‘He and his wife really looked after me,’ Alan told me.

  And it was following a drinking session with his ‘best mate’ that the ongoing schism with Sexton turned separation into divorce. The following day, the manager confronted Alan, accusing him of smelling of booze; essentially telling him in no uncertain terms that the midfielder’s alcohol consumption was one of the main reasons why Chelsea were dropping points. In a real ‘all for one, and one for all’ gesture, Ossie spoke up in Hudson’s defence, stating that he had been the team’s best player all season.

  A few days later more ‘words’ were exchanged, this time even more acrimonious than before, and the upshot was that both players were placed on the transfer list, with Sexton insisting that he had been trying to get Hudson out of the club for a very long time, which was an odd response considering that the manager turned down the midfielder’s previous transfer requests and had stated that ‘you would leave this club over my dead body’.

  As Hudson wrote recently: ‘I once bumped into tennis star Tom Okker – ‘The Flying Dutchman’ – in Alexander’s. He’d obviously had more than just a couple of Heinekens, I say that Dave (Sexton) wouldn’t have liked it, knowing that Tom had been out relaxing, having a wonderful meal on the night before a big match on the Centre Court at Wimbledon. No, you must be tucked up with your following day’s instructions in your hands.’

  Those Hudson comments clarify perfectly why the Cooke/Hudson/Osgood ethos was always going to be anathema to the Stamford Bridge boss. So long as games were being won, they tolerated each other, but it was all just a façade, just one big lie. And once things began to not go according to plan, it was ‘decree nisi’ time.

  By February 1974, Hudson was on his way to Stoke, and a month later Ossie signed for Southampton for a club record fee of £275,000. With Cooke already gone, the end had been reached. Chelsea as a force were no more, and for some twenty-odd years, being a Blues fan proved to be a soul-destroying experience.

  At Stoke, Alan was at his most imperious, producing a series of stellar displays, which saw them zoom up the First Division table to within touching distance of their first-ever title.

  As for Os, he inspired Southampton to that memorable 1976 FA Cup final victory over red-hot favourites Manchester United, and certainly at both clubs in the dignified shapes of Messrs Waddington and McMenemy, the two rebels had at last discovered managers blessed with that rare touch of humanity; an attribute, which despite his devotion to Roman Catholicism, Sexton clearly lacked.

  Earlier this year the BBC football correspondent Mike Ingham compared the recent internal politics of player power at Stamford Bridge involving the likes of Terry and Lampard to the days of Hudson and Osgood, when player power was, in his view, very much to the fore. I would disagree totally with this comparison. The current ructions are all about who runs the club: back then it was simply the matter of one man – Sexton – not attempting to understand the 1960s counterculture, which, to his dismay, involved his beloved game of football, whether he liked it or not.

  As for me, with Marsh at Manchester City, and Os now in Hampshire at unfashionable Southampton, and Chelsea’s fortunes at their lowest ebb for a dozen years or more, I also called it a day.

  Let us forward our tape eighteen years to Yeovil Town Football Club. It is 1992, and there is a gala din
ner with a special guest speaker: none other than the King of Stamford Bridge himself, Peter Osgood. After his entertaining spiel, I went up to him, rather sheepishly, I have to admit. ‘Ossie, it’s me Greg Tesser,’ I said, my voice almost a whisper.

  ‘I recognised you straight away,’ he said. ‘Give me your number and we’ll talk.’

  And talk we did, and for just a few years it was like old times again as I arranged after-dinner engagements for the great man, plus a few magazine interviews and the odd TV show.

  A couple or so more years elapsed and I was in the company of Alan Hudson once more. He still looked the business in a sharp suit, and we had a few drinks at various locations in London. I also helped him plug his autobiography The Working Man’s Ballet with the odd radio interview. There was one, in particular, at BBC London with Garth Crooks and Simon Crosse. We had both been drinking, and how we sounded on air the Lord only knows; but just for half an hour so, we had climbed into our time machine and were back in those great days when the sun shone and the drink was smooth and the women were good company and the clothes were colourful, and the King’s Road was the centre of the Universe.

  March 2006: I received a call from the BBC telling me that Peter Osgood had died of a heart attack. I was shocked to the core. Ossie had always seemed indestructible. Back in the 1960s we had felt immortal, but that glorious decade has since been thrust into the waste bin of history.

  As I grow older, I still think of Peter Osgood; I think of Houseman and Hutch and Weller, who have gone. I think of Alan Hudson and his brave fight against serious injury. I think of what might have been and I think of Peter Osgood.