Dreaming the Impossible (eBook)

‘I have never thought of being black when going into a football match. I don’t think of myself as being black. I didn’t find it odd that there were no black people in the crowd. Sometimes I felt a little bit uncomfortable, that there should be more black people. But the number of people who are black in a crowd doesn’t mean anything. What matters is people wearing your colours.’

‘I just liked playing football. Never saw it as a problem. Went to Willesden High, which has produced black sportsmen like Chris Lewis, [Phillip] DeFreitas, not far away was John Kelly, where Mike Gatting, Ricky Hill and Brian Stein came from. As black players are athletic – we are a lot quicker – lots of the black players are forwards, get down the wings and cross, or get behind them. It is the pace that makes us different. When I started there was Clyde Best, Ade Coker, Brendon Batson and Laurie Cunningham. I was one of the forerunners. I did hear comments like black players are fine when the sun is out, not when it gets cold or, if you kick them you won’t see them. I got abuse from the crowd. They would call me black bastard, coon, nigger. Certain people would call me names. But it never worried me.’

‘In Willesden High I played in an all-black team bar one white player, John West, who was our skipper. He played in midfield but he had to earn our respect. When we played other schools there would be a hostile atmosphere. We would go to some schools where there were no black players and they would be shouting “coons, black bastards, niggers”, the lot. But when you are in a group together you can take it. It is you, your group, against them. You go out and you want to show them. You think, I will stick the ball in the net – that will show them. When you are in a group you are there to do a job and if you have done that you feel you have answered the people who are abusing you.’

‘I was the only black player in the Watford team, the only one in the park, probably the only one in the entire stadium. There were about 1,000 people. The Peterborough players were calling me names. But name-calling had never bothered me. I was not perturbed by the atmosphere. In those days I was very single-minded. Anyway, I was used to abuse. But it was the crowd – it was just horrendous. They were shouting everywhere, in the stands, on the terraces, everywhere. But the abuse and the shouting was horrible. Monkey noises – “Ugh-ugh-ugh-ugh-ugh” every time I got the ball – and shouts of coon and everything else. They didn’t throw things; it wasn’t fashionable to throw things. Even the Peterborough players were calling me names. One of our players said to take no notice. They said the best way to shut these people up is stick the ball in the net.’

‘If people spat at me, I ignored it. Players did spit on me, in isolated instances in the league, or supporters when I was going for a corner. As long as it was not against me in the face. But if anybody spat at me and it hit me in the face I would have turned on them. Then the gloves came off.’

‘Italy has fanatical support. I was very well treated. In Italy it is a national pastime. Everybody will have an opinion but there is no name-calling, no spitting. In Italy fanaticism is about football; it is not about hating the other team or their supporters. I think there is hate in English football, a lot of hate. I don’t know the real reason for it. But something has changed. It has become far more organised.’

‘I was seven years old when I came here from South Africa. My father was politically active in South Africa – he suffered 24-hour house arrest. He was always at home, and couldn’t read political material. We lived in Athlone, a coloured township, and the colour bar was a bit like a caste system. By the time I left South Africa I was aware. Edwin, my brother, was very aware. In England, when I met Ricky Hill and Paul Elliott, I realised they were aware. I had played football in Cape Town and I always wanted to be a footballer. My heroes were Pelé and George Best. In England we lived in Willesden and the first thing that struck me was that there were no black players. When I started playing I heard this myth about black players not having stamina. They couldn’t run for 90 minutes. Players lack stamina, and when it is snowing they can’t get going. This was in 1977. I was only 19 then.’

‘We knew the difference between black and white but as kids you can adapt to anything. Kids live from day to day. Terry Dyson, the Tottenham double hero, was the sports teacher. He didn’t particularly encourage me. My brother Edwin, former assistant manager at Birmingham, pushed me more. He got me motivated more than my schoolteachers. Edwin urged me to start playing. I went to college, got my A levels, but my parents weren’t wealthy – we had eight kids – and I stopped playing football after 15. Then Sudbury Colts came in and paid me £5, Edwin having persuaded them. At Sudbury I played under Des Taylor for six or seven teams. Smith was the manager of the first team and there were no problems of colour. I played for Sudbury for half a season. A chap came from Edgware and said that if you go to Edgware you can earn more money, so Edwin and I went. After a month and a half we had a lot of scouts watching. One Wednesday, the chairman of Edgware said Luton were interested and they signed me. Pleaty was the reserve team manager.’

‘You would get mostly supporters shouting “Ugh-ugh-ugh-ugh-ugh,” – monkey noises whenever you had the ball – or throwing bananas. Cup game against a team from the Third Division. Wigan or Hartlepool. Got a lot of stick. We played a game in the eighties. Cup match. One of the players called me black something. I did not let that go. I gave him a bit of stick. In the early eighties Chelsea crowds gave a lot of stick to Paul Canoville, terrible abuse, much more than either Ricky Hill or I received. They destroyed him. It was particularly nasty – Phil Walker and Trevor Lee had a terrible time.’

‘Early in my career, the north was much worse. Past Birmingham the black explosion of players did not develop. Blackburn was one of the worst. Burnley, they spat at me. At Blackburn I was a sub and I was walking through the tunnel. It was just before the match and the crowd were throwing things. Coins, bananas. By the tunnel at Black-burn the crowd were close. I was spat at. I was very upset. I nearly spat back. I felt like Cantona did when he was abused but I did not react like him,...