Red Machine
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Later, Johnston shows me a selection of personal photos from his iPad – many black and white – taken during his decade in English football. He bought his first camera with an £8-a-week pay packet from Middlesbrough. Many of the pictures are from nights out with the Liverpool team: Rush slumped in a chair; Souness caked in mud during an end-of-season trip to Israel; Beardsley dressed as a sheikh; Barnes infamously in Ku Klux Klan apparel at a Christmas party.
There are others pictures not related to football that are equally atmospheric, many of which have featured in successful London gallery exhibitions. Ahead of this interview, Johnston had been to Las Vegas to take snaps at the wedding of Australian midfielder Tim Cahill.
His rebirth as a photographer has coincided with a new relationship. Together with partner Viv, he now lives in Orlando, Florida, but travels to London and Australia throughout the course of the year. Despite resuming a nomadic lifestyle he is so used to, he still has regrets as he returns to a mood of self-reproach.
‘I never fulfilled my potential as a footballer because the older I was getting, the more I understood it. I was finding that the simple things in football are the most important. It’s a real shame and it still frustrates me.’ He also wishes he’d represented his country at international level. ‘Bob and subsequent managers said that if I went and played for Australia, I wouldn’t be in the first team when I came back.’
He’d still like to try football management.
‘I’ve got some very strong ideas about it. I think a lot of it is about getting the most out of a person. Up to a point it’s a bit of a con game, because you’ve got to get people thinking that they’re better than they really are. If I do it one day, I’ll do it in my own style.’
Johnston says his life has been littered by lapses in judgement. ‘Buying a Porsche when I first went to Liverpool was a biggy,’ he laughs. ‘The boss thought I was really flash. But when you’re on your deathbed, I’d imagine that you look back and think about what you’ve achieved. Not everybody can live through truly great football moments – moments when you stand there and say, “Oh my god – how did they do that?”
‘When I’m at death’s door, I’m sure I’ll be thinking about my family, but I’ll also be thinking about a crisp, sunny morning at Melwood with a slight bit of dew on the field. Ronnie Moran will be in an aggressive mood screaming, “One touch, you big-headed bastards” – ensuring that everyone would be thinking about the next pass before the ball had even come to you. Dalglish, Souness will be dominating the play. And every now and again, I’ll be a part of the move.’
CHAPTER EIGHT
SOUTHERNER, Nigel Spackman
WHEN NIGEL SPACKMAN TOLD A NATIONAL NEWSPAPER THAT HE would always support Liverpool, a group of Chelsea supporters lobbied for the removal of the ‘Spackman Hospitality Entrance’ that leads inside Stamford Bridge’s West Stand. ‘It should be replaced with a title more historically fitting and appropriate,’ read the petition.
‘It’s unfortunate they feel that way,’ Spackman says, eyes radiating hurt. ‘But Liverpool have always been my club. I get stick all the time at the Bridge for pledging my allegiance. Even though I was at Chelsea for longer than I was at Liverpool, I can’t help but feel the way I do.’
Spackman, who played 63 times for the Reds between 1987 and 1989 without scoring a goal, appreciates that he also divides opinion at Anfield. Some Liverpudlians feel that he should have defended Liverpool as a club in the time after Roman Abramovich’s arrival in English football and the bickering that followed between José Mourinho and Rafa Benítez, igniting ire between both sets of supporters. Seemingly, he can say nothing right.
‘I have huge respect for Chelsea, although they are a completely different club to the one that I played for,’ he concludes diplomatically on the issue. ‘But when it comes head to head, Liverpool are my team – not Chelsea. It wasn’t until I went to Liverpool that I really started to learn how the game should be played.’
I meet Spackman inside a pub in Bloomsbury, an area of London where both Charles Dickens and Karl Marx once lived and drank. Spackman orders a pint of ale at the bar, which could pass for a pirate’s galleon. There are wooden panels everywhere and I’m just waiting for Oliver Reed to walk in when the barmaid offers the words ‘Allo, squire,’ that chirpy welcome familiar to many London boozers. The exterior of the pub, consumed in ivy, has a placard covering its otherwise tastefully coloured stained-glass window: ‘Watch the England ’ere.’ Amidst this most London of settings, it is easy to forget that Spackman was born and raised outside of the capital.
‘My mum gave birth to me in Romsey hospital, but my dad was a policeman and his work took us to Andover, so I spent my childhood there,’ Spackman explains. ‘Dad was an old-style policeman – a clip around the ear and be done with you. Police jobs did not earn a lot of money, and I think he relied on earning a decent pension. We lived in a police house, and it had a toilet in the back yard where there was a small area for growing vegetables. Andover was probably more middle class, but my family only had a modest income.’
Andover in Hampshire was a market overspill town originally built to deal with the increasing population of London.
‘It grew in the ’60s and ’70s when the Twinings tea group built a factory. Nothing really happened there. The best thing about Andover was the road out of it.’
Spackman – the youngest of four siblings – grew up playing football with his older brother.
‘We spent a lot of time up the rec,’ he says, like one of the cast from Grange Hill. ‘My brother was five years older than me and I played with his mates. It toughened me up quickly, because they were all a lot more physical. It also improved my dribbling because, although I was smaller, I was also a lot quicker with the ball at my feet, so I had to play to my strengths. We played on the streets until midnight – sometimes with a tennis ball. One time, I bust my toe on the kerb and because I only had plimsolls on the blood changed the colour of the shoe. Until the older ones started discovering booze and birds, it was an education for me.
‘It’s a shame that kids don’t really do that now. The landscape of youth culture has changed. Kids stay indoors and spend hours on the PlayStation rather than getting outside and having a knockabout. The roads are too busy with cars, and neighbours complain when a ball goes in their garden because it happens to land in a bed of chrysanthemums. Attitudes like that are stunting the sporting development of our children, and it’s no real surprise that fewer and fewer kids are playing football – learning in their own natural way.’
Academically, Spackman got by – without impressing.
‘Every year, my report read: “Nigel does enough.” At one parents’ night, the teacher told my mother that if I put as much effort into my school work as I did football, then I’d achieve a lot more. “Unfortunately, your son is never going to make a living out of football,” she added. I got six O levels and went on to do a diploma in business studies, but I was no Einstein.
‘There has never been any incentive in this country to encourage kids to embark on a sports career. In Spain or America, they have scholarships, but here – if you don’t know the capital of Lithuania or the square root of 342, you’re left to one side to struggle. It shouldn’t be that way, but it never seems to change.’
Spackman started supporting Liverpool before he entered his teens.
‘There was a girl in my class who I quite fancied,’ he smiles. ‘She was an Arsenal fan and they were due to play Liverpool in the 1971 FA Cup final. Until then, although I played football, I didn’t really have a team. Because I wanted to attract her attention, I made everyone know that I was supporting Liverpool. Southampton were my nearest professional team and had some fantastic players – Mick Channon, Terry Paine and Ron Davies – but I never really felt the same link with the club. Liverpool lost to Arsenal in that final, but I sympathised with them and from then on they were my team. I also liked Alun Evans because I had a similar haircut.’
‘I chose football, though,’ he recalls. ‘Andover wasn’t a hotbed of football, and it was difficult for me because Hampshire is a bit of a no-man’s-land if you try to come up with a shortlist of famous footballers from the area. Scouts from the London clubs never really came that far down to look for players because there were no academies or the network of scouts that there are today. I was meant to go for a trial at Southampton in ’76, but I broke my collarbone and missed out. It meant that I started out with the junior teams at Andover who were in the old version of the Conference.’
Spackman was spotted by Bournemouth at 18 playing as a centre-forward for a college team. After signing a contract with Alec Stock (famously with QPR), he made his debut under Dave Webb, a manager who brought his own ideas to the club.
‘He got rid of a lot of old pros and played me 48 times in my first season. We lost 4–0 away at York on my debut. Because I was so young, after the match Dave sent me into the bath while he tore a strip off the rest of the older players. He wanted to protect the young boys.’
Webb, who had played most of his career in the First Division, managed to attract a clutch of experienced players to Bournemouth. Charlie George, Don Givens and Steve Kember all arrived at Dean Court, helping the club out of the old Fourth Division. After Webb was later sacked, Don Megson signed George Best, then 36.
‘There was a rumour that George was going to sign for us, but nothing happened. One day he was coming, the next day he wasn’t. Finally, we arrived at training and he was there, kicking the ball against a wall. He was much smaller than I thought he was going to be. We were doing this session, then all of a sudden a woman appeared on the side of the pitch in a velour tracksuit. My chin was on the floor and my tongue was hanging out. I’ve never seen a lady with no make-up look so beautiful. It was Mary Stavin – Miss World [Stavin, Swedish by birth, was a Bond girl in the film Octopussy]. I couldn’t believe that she’d be there at Bournemouth, watching the training. I was 18 or 19 from a country town looking at Miss World and playing with George Best. It doesn’t get much better than that, does it?’
Although Best only stayed on the south coast for five games, he did enough to pass on invaluable experience to younger players like Spackman.
‘I spoke to him one day in the dressing-room, and because he was just one of the lads and very approachable I asked him essentially where it all went wrong for him. He told me that when he moved from a small town in Northern Ireland to a place like Manchester, he didn’t get enough support from the club or the team. He was just 18, then all of a sudden he was besieged by stardom. Having had no experience of drink, he was thrust into an alien culture. At first he said no, but eventually it became easier to say yes rather than explain why he couldn’t. Neither he nor Manchester United could quite appreciate what was happening. He said that he went from being the best footballer in the world to being the best drinker in the world. I think he felt a bit of resentment towards United for not helping him more.’
Spackman respects Best for playing as long as he could – even though many observers say he should have been at the top for a lot longer.
‘By the beginning of the ’80s, top professional footballers were finished at 30. Many of them – like George – had taken too many cortisones and their bodies wouldn’t let them play in the First Division any more. Because they’d earned a decent wage in their career without it being enough to retire on, it meant they had to carry on playing until their late 30s – often in the lower leagues or non-league football. It was healthy, because younger players like me got to play against people like Chopper Harris and Stan Bowles. They had to earn a living, whereas that’s not the case any more when players can retire after a month’s wages. These guys in the ’80s were pushing their bodies as far as they could just to survive. They’d open a shop or run a pub as well to keep their income ticking along. For me, that was a vital experience. I got to play with and against senior pros who were tough and knew their way around the field. It sped up my maturity as a player and meant a lot of other players at the same age as me became better as well. That’s one of the reasons why there were lots of players progressing from the lower leagues to the top back then, and it explains why there are so few now. You’re never going to get Alan Shearer playing for Gateshead or a player going from Gateshead to Newcastle, are you?’
Soon, Harry Redknapp arrived at Bournemouth as first-team coach. Spackman did not foresee his future career as a manager.
‘Because Harry was a winger in his career, all the coaching he seemed to do was based on attacking. You could tell he enjoyed coaching the attacking players with crossing and finishing sessions but was fairly limited with his defensive work, and I know it sometimes frustrated our lads at the back. I never for a minute thought he’d go on to achieve what he has. He seemed happy as a coach in the lower leagues. The two big moments for him were beating Man United in the FA Cup after taking over as manager at Bournemouth then going back to West Ham as Billy Bonds’ assistant. West Ham was his club and the fans revered him, so there was always a chance he would get a chance at management there. Things just fell into place for him.’
Redknapp was just as flash then as he is now.
‘We never had a permanent training base at Bournemouth, so a lot of the time we had to go to some park covered in dog shit. One of the places was in the New Forest in Barton-on-Sea, but the pitch was terrible and I turned my ankle over. Harry had a BMW and said that I could go and wait there while we finished the training session, because there were no changing facilities. I sat in the car and his sons were in there, Jamie and Mark. Jamie must have only been 12 or 13. Because I’d been running my balls off and it was freezing outside, the windows began to steam up. To get some air in, I asked Jamie how to wind the windows down. Harry’s Beemer was fancy and had electric windows. But when I pushed the button to pull them down, the window fell out and it smashed on the floor. Harry wasn’t happy about it. I just said, “It was your cheap old banger, mate.”’
After an enquiry from Everton, Spackman signed for Chelsea in 1983.
‘Ken Bates had taken over the club after ending his association with Wigan Athletic. Because Wigan still owed him money, Ken took John Neal [the Chelsea manager] to a match against Bournemouth and hoped to cherry-pick one or two of their better players on the cheap. On a wet, cold Tuesday night at Springfield Park, they were sitting it out in the stands while we slogged it on the pitch. The story goes that Ken kept on nudging John every ten minutes saying, “Have you seen anyone yet?” In a typical Middlesbrough accent, John kept responding, “No”, before probably lighting up another fag. This routine was repeated until halfway through the second half when John leant over and said, “I like the look of the number 4.”
‘Ken said, “The Wigan number 4 is 30 years of age – we’re not having him.” John then pointed out that he liked the look of the number 4 for Bournemouth. Luckily, it was me and unfortunately for Ken Bates he had to pay out. I signed on the same day as Pat Nevin.’
Ken Bates was brash in the extreme.
‘He was big-time, but I was young and eager to please, so I just went along with whatever he said. He wasn’t around the club as much as you’d imagine and spent a lot of time on his yacht somewhere down in Monaco, but I know he probably irritated a lot of the lads because we were just footballers but he was full of his own self-importance. Then again, I supposed he was entitled to be because he rescued the club from financial ruin.’
On one occasion, Bates’s ego got the better of him. In the tunnel at Stamford Bridge ahead of a match and with a loose ball at his feet, he asked former Liverpool left-back Joey Jones to tackle him. So Jones did, leaving Bates in a heap.
‘Joey was a tough lad,’ Spackman says. ‘He and Mickey Thomas were nutters. They drove down to London every other day for training from their home in North Wales. Ev
ery Monday morning, John Neal would come into the dressing-room and say, “Sorry, lads, training’s been put back an hour – Mickey and Joey are stuck on the motorway.”
‘Because Ken Bates wouldn’t pay for them to stay in a hotel, they’d sleep in the referee’s room at Stamford Bridge on a Friday night before a game. It was a big room with a TV and a sofa, but not the ideal place to sleep if you’re a footballer preparing for kick-off. They’d walk up the King’s Road on a Saturday morning for a fry-up then go back to the ground and wait for everybody else to arrive. It was a ridiculous arrangement.’
Stamford Bridge was hardly a place you’d wish to watch a game of football, never mind spend the night.
‘It was big but a bit of a dump,’ Spackman continues. ‘There was one huge stand, but the rest of the ground seemed so far away from the pitch because of the greyhound track. You needed 25,000 in there to create any sort of atmosphere. The pitch was terrible, too. I was used to a nice bowling-green surface at Bournemouth, but at Chelsea – a club then in the Second Division – the pitch was a dustbowl. It made it difficult to play pretty football. Over the years, that’s probably why Liverpool found it difficult going there.’
Stamford Bridge was an awkward place to play for other reasons as well. In the ’80s, a violent nihilism coexisted there with an extreme right-wing philosophy.
‘I’d never really experienced racism in football before I signed for Chelsea. Bournemouth was a small place and we had a few black players in the team. I’m certain they were always welcomed by the home supporters. Traditionally, Chelsea were a club well supported with a tight core of fans getting behind the team. But in the ’80s, the club became synonymous with racism and hooliganism – for good reason. Paul Canoville [the black winger] was a Chelsea boy through and through, but the abuse he took from supporters was ridiculous. There was a time when his form was really, really good – scoring some great goals – but whenever he touched the ball, they’d boo him. It has to be said that in my opinion it was a small group doing it, but they had the loudest voices. Were they football supporters or were they just thugs attaching themselves to a football club so they could mask who they really were?’