Nearly Reach the Sky

by Brian Williams

  You, Billy, are truly one of the West Ham greats. You may not have had giant Upton Park stands named in your honour, nor are there statues gracing the roads around the ground that you brought to life every time you stepped on to its precious turf – or battled your way through its cloying mud – yet you have a special place in the hearts of every one of us who saw you fight the good fight on our behalf.

  Enshrined as you are in West Ham folklore, it’s easy to forget now that you didn’t begin your career at Upton Park. As you will know better than anyone, you joined the Hammers from Charlton for a transfer fee of £49,500. I put that figure into an inflation calculator and it comes out as being worth a bit more than three-quarters of a million in today’s terms. That’s the sort of money that gets bandied about in the lower leagues for very ordinary players. I’m no expert – I’ve never had to wheel and deal in the transfer market – but it’s my guess that you’d struggle to get a real-life Captain Marvel for £800,000 in this day and age.

  Your first year in claret and blue, of course, was 1967. By then I’d been supporting West Ham for three years but that was the first season I got to see a proper game – so in some ways we started at the same time. Astonishingly, it would be more than twenty years before you finally hung up your boots. Incidentally, do retired players really hang up their boots? I’m guessing they’re not the sort of things you’d want dangling on a hook in the shed for years on end – they’d go mouldy. And you couldn’t leave them in the house for any length of time; not if you’re married. I don’t suppose you’ve still got yours, have you? If so, you should put them on eBay – they’d sell for a small fortune.

  You were three months short of your forty-second birthday when you played your final game at Southampton in April 1988. The previous season, when you had clocked up the Big Four-O, you were actually named Hammer of the Year! I am proud to say I voted for you. Normally, the idea with Hammer of the Year is to leave it until the final few fixtures before deciding how you’re going to fill in your ballot paper. I made my mind up after watching you against Forest in early September. It was a fortnight before you turned forty – and you were still the best player on the pitch.

  Remember Billy Jennings? He was the fella we signed from Watford in 1974 who scored thirty-odd goals for us in something approaching 100 appearances. While you were still flogging yourself up and down the Boleyn Ground at an age when other men are considering taking up bowls he had packed up the game and was running a really nice little bar opposite the Daily Express, which was paying my wages at the time. I guess you’re not much of a drinker but I have to admit a small proportion of my salary did find itself being spent in Billy’s most days. And while I was there I used to pick his brains about the West Ham players he had known.

  Billy didn’t have a bad word to say about anyone – well, not to me anyway. But he was especially complimentary about you. And he wasn’t the least bit surprised that you had been able to carry on playing for as long as you did. According to him, you were the most dedicated individual he ever saw on a training ground in his entire career. Five-a-sides? You’d play like it was the Cup final. Timekeeping? You’d be the first to arrive and the last to leave. A cross-country run? There was only ever going to be one winner. Mind you, when it came to running he reckoned you left the others standing because you had an unfair advantage. Apparently you have a remarkable metabolism. The way Billy told it, your heart beats once every six hours and you barely need oxygen at all.

  You probably won’t remember this but the year Billy Jennings came to Upton Park a Japanese soldier called Hiroo Onoda emerged from the jungle in the Philippines after he was finally persuaded to lay down his arms and stop fighting the Second World War, which he believed was still going on. At the time it was thought he was the last of his kind. Then, as you were approaching retirement, the story went round that Onoda was not alone – and another Japanese soldier who didn’t know that hostilities had ended had been found in a different part of the forest.

  Reluctantly he agreed to come out under a flag of truce – but refused to surrender until he was certain that the Land of the Rising Sun really had run up the white flag. His would-be rescuers tried to convince him that the world had moved on since he had volunteered for active service. He listened suspiciously as he was told that since Japan had laid down its arms humankind had been to the moon and flown an aeroplane faster than the speed of sound – and, not only was Winston Churchill dead and buried, Britain had elected its first woman Prime Minister. On hearing all this he shook his head in disbelief, picked up his rusty rifle and headed back to the jungle, pausing briefly to turn and ask: ‘What sort of idiot do you take me for? Next you’ll try telling me Billy Bonds is still playing for West Ham.’

  Sorry, Billy. You must have heard that joke a million times. But, you have to admit, the statistics are pretty remarkable. In all, you were at West Ham for twenty-seven years – twenty-one of those as a player – and you made an incredible 793 appearances for the Hammers. You were captain for ten years. You are the only West Ham skipper to lift the FA Cup twice. You were Hammer of the Year four times and runner-up on three other occasions. You were honoured by being made a Member of the British Empire for services to football (although if it had been me giving out the gongs it would have been a knighthood plus the Victoria Cross and the George Medal). It was an amazing career.

  Those FA Cup wins were something special, weren’t they? Between you and me I’m starting to have serious doubts that today’s generation of West Ham supporters will ever get the chance to experience the same thrill we did. God knows, I hope I’m wrong. And I suppose we did come within a bootlace of beating Liverpool in the final a few years ago. But now the game is all about survival in the Premier League – what manager is going to risk his job by taking a full-blown tilt at the Cup?

  By the way, what would you have said to Lionel Scaloni if you’d been his captain when he rolled the ball out like that in the final minute at the Millennium Stadium? I’m all for giving the ball back to the opposition after an injury, but why didn’t he make sure they fished it out of the River Taff first? You’d know better than me, of course – but I’m sure even Ron Greenwood would have allowed him an honest-to-goodness hoof on that occasion.

  We didn’t hoof it much in the ’75 final against Fulham, did we? That game was dismissed as boring by much of the media, but it looked exciting enough from where I was sitting (near the halfway line, opposite the Royal Box). Perhaps we did win too easily to make it a classic but I’d take that over blowing a 3–2 lead in the final minute and then losing the penalty shoot-out after extra time any day of the week.

  I can only guess what it must have been like for you to receive the Cup. I once got a runners’ up medal in a five-a-side tournament, but that’s not quite the same thing, is it? I can tell you what it was like watching you do it, though. First, there was the mixed emotion of the final whistle. We were two up and coasting by then: I didn’t want the game to end – Alan Taylor might have got his hat-trick (or Billy Jennings might have nicked one) and we were never going to concede. Still, the last shrill note meant victory was ours, and that was a fantastic feeling. It was the triumphant end to a long journey that had begun in January and taken us from Upton Park to Wembley via random stop-off points such as Swindon and Villa Park. Winning was the object of the exercise and we had done just that.

  There’s always that wonderful confused frenzy for the winning side on the big occasions. You fellas on the pitch are desperately trying to congratulate one another while, in the stands, we are celebrating in our own way. All British reserve goes out the window for once – you raise your arms to the heavens; you dance on the spot; you can even go completely wild and embrace a stranger because, for a few glorious moments, there are no strangers. If they’re cheering, they’re family.

  It all calms down slightly when your captain begins the long climb up the most famous thirty-nine steps in football to collect the trophy, followed by his team. Our
team. Ecstasy gives way to pride. It’s permissible to applaud, but I kept silent as you scaled that staircase. I was saving myself for the special moment that I knew would come soon. You received the trophy and looked at it briefly. I remained silent. You kissed the Cup and teased us with it before glancing at your teammates as if to confirm you did this together. Still nothing from me. Then you raised the holy grail to the sky – sharing it with us like a priest shares the blood of Christ at Holy Communion. That’s when I finally roared my heartfelt thanks for this wonderful gift you had given us.

  The descent was far more informal as parts of the trophy were passed from hand to hand and the scarves were draped around your neck. A small point, I know, but I remember you made no attempt to shake them off as you came down the steps as I suspect the immaculate Bobby Moore would have down. These were the scarves we wore. This was our uniform. I had always believed you were one of us, Billy. Now I knew.

  I guess when I saw you carry out the same ritual five years later I was starting to become a little blasé. I never thought Wembley would become a second home exactly, but I felt that with a team as good as ours we would appear in a showcase final every few years. Got that one wrong, didn’t I?

  By rights, Arsenal only had to turn up that day to collect the Cup. But it didn’t quite work out like that, did it? Trevor Brooking got all the headlines, naturally. He scored the winning goal. The only goal. That’s how headlines work. But you were fantastic, Billy. Next to you in the centre of defence was the man who would eventually receive the captain’s armband from you, but in 1980 Alvin Martin was considered to still be a bit raw round the edges and it was felt you might need to look after him. In the event, neither of you put a foot wrong. And it was your well-timed tackle on Alan Sunderland that sparked the counter-attack which produced our goal.

  I watched an old video of the game recently. ‘Billy Bonds – he seems to grow in stature as the years go by,’ observed Motty as you masterminded our second-half rearguard action. I am not Mr Motson’s biggest fan, but he called that one right.

  What made it all so special was the fact we were such massive underdogs – we were in the second division, for God’s sake! It is a matter of eternal pride to me that we were the last side from outside the top flight to win the Cup, and I don’t see us giving up that distinction any time soon.

  The fact that we were able to do that is a huge testament to the loyalty of men such as yourself and Sir Trev. We had been in the second division for two years by the time we got to Wembley and were facing yet another season out of the top flight. It’s inconceivable that players of your stature would stay with a lower-league club for that length of time nowadays, but you did. That will never be forgotten by us, the people who can’t walk away.

  What’s it like for you guys after a big win such as that? Obviously there’s the initial elation we all feel, but do you get a sense of anticlimax when that wears off? Perhaps it’s just me, but the emotions that come with victory never last quite as long as those that follow defeat. If winning is like a glass of champagne, losing is an all-day hangover. The pain of one lasts far longer than the pleasure of the other. There was a time when I was younger I could barely bring myself to speak to other people until Tuesday after we’d lost on a Saturday – and it seemed to me you felt the same way.

  I guess it can’t be much fun at the training ground after you’ve lost a match, but going in to work after a defeat is awful for supporters. School; factory; office; I’ve had to face them all in the wake of a West Ham loss, and it often feels as if it’s you against the world. A run-of-the-mill defeat is bad enough but it’s truly humiliating when the team has thrown in the towel. You made sure that didn’t happen on your watch. You never backed out of a tackle. You never hid when things weren’t going well; you never seemed to tire – and you made sure teammates followed your example. Woe betide anyone who didn’t put in a full shift; Ted MacDougall can testify to that!

  What really did happen at Leeds in 1973? In your autobiography you say that it was nothing more than a heated argument, but in later years you seem to have let it slip that you did actually lamp him in the dressing room. No one would blame you if you did, of course. Losing 4–1 is bad enough but, as I say, it’s so much harder for the supporters to take when you feel the players aren’t trying. And that, in your eyes, was MacDougall’s crime at Elland Road. The story goes that Ron Greenwood let you get on it with it, which speaks volumes when you consider how much he abhorred violence. He didn’t like his defenders kicking opposition strikers but he was prepared to turn a blind eye when you gave his big-money signing from Manchester United a knuckle sandwich. MacDougall was gone a month later; ahead of you there were still fifteen years before the West Ham mast. I think it’s fair to say there was only one winner in that contest.

  Not that there is any suggestion you were some sort of thug. Hard, yes. Hard as nails, in fact. But never unfairly so. That’s why, in time, you even won the grudging respect of opposition supporters – and there aren’t many players from any club who can claim to have done that over the years.

  By my reckoning you were only ever sent off twice – although the second time it happened it nearly cost you your place in the Arsenal final. That would have been a disaster. It’s true that some of the tackles you made in your early days as a right back would have got you into early bathfuls of hot water with today’s referees, but it was a different game back then.

  I recall how Greenwood’s decision to move you out of the back four to provide some much-needed bite in the middle of the park raised a good few eyebrows at the time. But putting you alongside Sir Trev was a masterstroke. You were no mere holding midfielder though – you had licence to go where you liked, which was generally where the action was. The energy and inspiration you brought to the side from midfield were a revelation for those who thought of you as nothing more than a destroyer. I can close my eyes now and still see you flying into a challenge, emerging with the ball and then positioning yourself on the half-turn in the way Greenwood had taught you as you looked around for a better-placed colleague. Because not only could you win the ball and keep it, you could use it, too. You were a terrific passer of the ball, Billy. And you could score goals.

  Remember your hat-trick against Chelsea that ended our relegation fears and resulted in you being our leading scorer in the 1973/4 season? To be honest, I don’t – but it was 40 years ago and I must have missed that particular London derby. However, I do know that you never used to hang about when a game had finished, preferring to join the traffic queuing up to get through the Blackwall Tunnel and go home to your family rather than heading off to the pub for a pint with the boys. I hope you hung around long enough to collect the match ball after the Chelsea match though, because that was your one and only hat-trick for West Ham. (If that’s in the shed with your boots you could put them on eBay together – you’d have buyers queuing round the block.)

  About the time you were lining up with Sir Trev and the hugely underrated Graham Paddon in a midfield that absolutely dripped with class, I found myself kicking a ball about on a beach in Italy with my mate and a bunch of weirdos from the US who called themselves the Children of God.

  We were challenged to a game by a group of Italian lads, who clearly thought we were there for the taking. To be honest, we were. On paper, we didn’t have a chance. But, as they say, football isn’t played on paper, it’s played on grass. Or, in this case, sand.

  It was clear from the start which side had all the class. They were sleek, tanned and wearing sunglasses. We were a rag-bag of a team: the Americans were energetic but sadly lacking in talent. I hoped they would be able to use their religious connections to summon up some divine intervention, but as the early exchanges unfolded it was evident that heavenly help would not be forthcoming. Which is when I asked myself, what would Bonzo do in these circumstances?

  The only way we were going to avoid a hiding in this game was for me to win the ball, my more-than-useful mate to play
a bit and the Yanks to make thorough nuisances of themselves.

  The playmaker was a decent footballer. You could tell he was good because he kept his packet of Marlborough tucked in the waistband of his stylish swim-shorts. He was the one we had to stop.

  I got my opportunity after several minutes of backs-to-the-wall defending. He had moved out wide, received the ball and gone round one of the God squad when I clattered him on the water’s edge with the sort of tackle I had watched you make time and again. The impact was so forceful we both ended up in the sea, which was bad news for his Marlborough. I really cleaned him up – you’d have been so proud of me, Billy!

  I later read that before one of those great European nights at Upton Park you looked across at the opposing captain as you lined up in the tunnel shortly before kickoff and you could see from his face that the intimidating atmosphere had got to him – you knew then that the game was already won. I think I saw a similar look as that young Italian emerged from the water and contemplated his unsmokable cigarettes. We won ugly, but we won.

  Your international career, sadly, is about as notable as mine! Why you never played for England is a total mystery to me. There was an Under-23 appearance and you were on the bench for a World Cup qualifier against Italy in 1977. But at a time when some very ordinary players were being picked to represent their country and you were producing the best football of your life, you never got a full cap.

  The England manager for much of the time was Don Revie – who had never forgiven West Ham for thrashing his Leeds side 7–0 some years before. He believed, wrongly, that Greenwood had arrogantly snubbed him after that game. Did that colour his thinking, I wonder?

  Revie famously – and controversially – walked away from the England job in ’77 to take up a lucrative contract in the United Arab Emirates. The next year I followed him to Dubai to take a considerably less rewarding contract on a newspaper that was being launched there. I was asked to handle the sports pages and, as acting sports editor of the Gulf Daily News, tried to fix up an interview with Revie. Why he chose not to give you a game was one of the questions on my list. But he never returned my calls.