My Team
Rich James continues our series of sporting articles with his undying love of all things Everton #COYB Getty Images
I liked football. I liked sport. Actually, I liked watching sport. As a child I had zero aptitude for any physical activity. Reading and writing? Yes. Riding my bike and sitting in my dad’s tractor? Definitely. Watching the Fall Guy, Dukes of Hazzard and Danger Mouse? Without a doubt. Running and/ or kicking a football? Hahaha, no. My dad was a sports nut, we’d be at the cricket club during the summer and winter weekends were spent watching Grandstand or World of Sport. Didn’t matter what the sport was, if it was televised, it was on our TV. He was (and still is) a Manchester United fan, a regular at Old Trafford in the sixties even hitching weekly flights back from Germany to watch matches while stationed out there during his RAF days. He pushed me in that direction, but no. I liked Spurs. Ardiles, Villa and Hoddle had got my attention as I watched them
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on their way to lifting the FA Cup. We’d even braved St. Andrews and the cold to watch Tottenham in action the following season, a 0-0 draw and some horrific National Front skinheads put me off completely. So, 1982 and back to my Panini album. Liverpool winning everything, all the kids at school jumping on the bandwagon. I was always a contrary little sort, so as twenty of my classmates claimed to be die hard Liverpool fans my decision was made. “I’m an Everton fan. They’re clearly the better side from the city.” The first few years went by and I felt like I’d made the best decision in the world. Howard Kendall’s squad gelling and then excelling. The FA Cup in 1984, League Champions and Cup Winners Cup winners (I even got to stay up to watch that one) the year afterwards. A fight to wrest the league title back from the red half of the city in 1987. What an amazing side I was following from afar. Surely they’d go on to dominate football for the foreseeable future? Well, no. A European football ban saw the best players slowly filter off over the coming seasons leaving for the allure of the European Cup.
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o, why would a seven year old boy from South Warwickshire with little real exposure to football, end up making a choice that would lead to an adulthood of abject misery? In hindsight who knows, but here’s how I ended up supporting Everton.
The enforced dismantling of the best side I’ve ever seen still makes me think, “what could have been?”. And like that, the glory years were gone. Some spirited performances here and there but no trophies. Little would I know in 1988 that I’d only see Everton lift one more trophy in my lifetime. We’d won so much in such a short time, we were dominant, we would be back. Wouldn’t we? Not long after this I moved to Nuneaton and a new love affair was struck up. My love of football was unabating. My ability still had to manifest itself, so I was forced into a watching brief. Fourteen years old, 110 miles Continued on page 14.
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