The roar from the crowd inside Wembley was one that sent down chills to those of us gathered outside, desperate to part of something that we thought would never happen again; England in a semi-final of a major tournament, the opposition, the old enemy, as my Dad once glorified in shouting at the television whenever an international match came on television, his absurd way of shuffling forward in his chair and then standing erect with his head bowed as God Save The Queen, a man of the old school, good, forthright, obedient.
We had all travelled down from Oxford on the afternoon of the game, a group of us who had gone through school together, and who now, by determined design, good fortune and the willingness to blag a day off work, had all met up to be part of the story unfolding inside the venue of legends.
A group of lads, and one girl stood on the concourse, drinking in the atmosphere, following every audible applause, every scream and imagined rude gesture as Germany and England battled it out on the pitch. Inside my head was another war, one that had been brewing since we all came together in the last years of junior school, one that I knew today, outside the home of English football, finally, I was going to be crowned the victor.
This battle started in 1980. Around me, young boys got in line and volunteered to be part of something that would consume their lives every spring for the next sixteen years, and twice a year when there was an international set of games going on.
Our Great grandfathers had fought in France, Shelley’s had fought at Gallipoli, mine had been an ardent pacifist, refusing to take part, dying in agony in a later, more brutal war, as the munitions factory he was ordered to work in, crumbled around him and shook to the sound of hundreds of bombs wiping Birmingham from the Luftwaffe map. Our war had no casualties, the odd bruised and scuffed knee, trousers torn, hair pulled, fists thrown in desperation and for what, the chance to compete and to complete.
It all started, for me anyway, as I watched from the side lines, the substitute who would never be picked to play with the boys in their games, marbles, conkers, tag, British Bulldog, I would never be allowed to climb to the top of the apparatus and the metal beams that stood in the playground, lorded over in turn by fourth year boys as they contemplated being the small fish again as soon as the first day of senior school started, their ill-fitting uniforms flapping aimlessly around their ankles and wrists and which their mothers would appease their offspring’s doubts by the timeless words, you will grow into it, whilst spitting on a piece of rag and wiping off some imaginary stain that would soon be replaced by their overprotective lips. I envied that.
I desperately wanted to be part of this cult that had been playing out in front of me, each autumn, conker fights, then marble championships, tag which grew more violent as the minutes passed by, crazes, trends, all with their own rules hidden behind years of handed down knowledge but which like my father’s other favourite sport, always seemed to have different ways of determining a champion.
“In the red corner, with a marble that has been undefeated sixteen times, Barry Thomas, five foot and a mother who drinks gin on a Sunday whilst praying for solace in the church of St. Hilda’s, the Master of Ceremonies would proudly pronounce to the assembled circling the small divot in the playground’s surface by the temporary prefab classes which were still standing some 25 years after they were opened and in the blue corner, Ramjit, the terror of the laundrette, and whose father will swear at you from the back room if you dare make a noise louder than the commercial washing machines which have had better days; his marble is three times the size of Barry’s so he has the physical advantage”.
Nobody would ever explain to me what the advantage was, why it would take Barry six attempts to score one point, whereas Ramjit would simply roll his marble and, in the words of the popular song, the winner would take it all.
I watched earnestly as I leaned against the fence that had kept several hundred kids locked inside from nine till three thirty, Monday to Friday, excluding holidays and the days in which the parents made their own pact with the Devil, or God, depending on their point of view, since the school had opened its doors, its promise of a new beginning in the aftermath of conflict had not been lost on the children who went to the junior school. Beyond the fence on one side of the playground stood the old people’s home, mostly old-fashioned and gnarled women who looked like witches, the growths on their noses and their chins causing alarm to the kids who looked their way during dinner times and on the afternoons when the teachers knew they could no longer be bothered to hear an eight year old play Three Blind Mice with any sort of feigned interest, instead suggesting that the whole class might benefit from an hour in the playground.
Marbles and conkers were okay, British Bulldog was exciting to watch and how I dearly wanted to join in, to move away from the fence that separated me from the old women and the smell of cabbage and the sound of Frank Sinatra, or if we were on the other side of the of playground, the fence that kept us away from the boneyard, the final resting place of old school children who turned to adults with dreams that had met their inevitable end. It was though in the lazy summer days of nineteen eighty in which I saw a new fashion hit the playground, where being top dog in Marbles reduced a boy king to a quivering wreck, where anyone could join in and be regarded as cool; you only had to be a boy to apply.
That was not to say that girls couldn’t collect stickers, we spent our pocket money on them, and probably in the same way, down the corner shop on a Saturday morning, waiting in line as those who had fought during the war told us so as they purchased their twenty Lambert and Butler and Benson and Hedges and the continuation of a conversation they had the previous week, oh, did I tell you Wilma, our Frank’s back in hospital, it’s his shoulder again, oh I know he has never been the same since he fell off that ladder inside the knicker factory, what was he doing up there, his poor wife, it’s bad enough that she has had to take in a lodger, a nice Indian chap, to be honest I have never seen her smile so much.”
We smiled outwardly at them as they muttered on for ages, their arms crossed in defiance, their stocking slipping down around their ankles, as they remained oblivious to everything and everyone that was behind them in the queue; only noticing when an impatient child starting clicking their ten pence pieces together like a pair of cheap imitation castanets. The scowl would terrify some that were in the line, some would ride it out and laugh behind small hands and giggle at the thought of Wilma’s husband, who was a known peeping tom, spending four weeks in hospital as his wife, at the tender age of forty five, spent Saturday afternoons in bed reading the Karma Sutra and no longer having to go out for the evening Argus or listen to the football results come in on the radio. It was all soft Jazz and curried lamb for a few blissful weeks.
The girls bought their stickers and swapped them with their friends, gentle, nicely, the odd flutter of hearts as the stickers slowly adorned their headboards, running down the sides of the bedpost and giving them the nightly thrill that would live with them through their teenage years.
I wanted none of that, I wanted what the boys had, far more interesting, animal-like, competitive, they scuffed their trousers and came away with black eyes as they fought like soldiers, like underweight boxers and crafty card sharks for the one sticker which meant they had realised the dream of finishing off a full page, a complete team, with manager and the extra special team badge.
It was the badge that won me over, the value of it increased the manliness of the person who held it their hand, the grubby paw which might have been hit sideways by an unforgiving mother as they played in the dirt, who might have been abused by their father in the quiet silence of the midweek night, suddenly had the chance to become a knight of the playground realm, the Liverpool badge, the alure of fake gold round the edge and rim of the foil, peeled back and with its mythical bird in full, plain sight, the dominant team of our youth, caught in the beauty of its gleaming badge, elevating the poor boy that nobody loved to the most popular kid in school…until the next day when someone opened up a packet during lunch and saw the same reflection of glory staring back at them.
I watched spellbound as the boys would fall into the ritual, got, got, got, need, need, got… their fingers flicking so quickly through a pile of football stickers, the shuffle and the flurry as their reflexes improved and their eyes not resting on one player in particular. Not for them the gaze of looking upon Trevor Francis as he swapped his shirt from Birmingham City Blue to Nottingham Forest Red, not the sight of Dennis Tuert looking proudly out at his own time as an F.A. Cup winner with Sunderland, instead being skipped over quickly as he found himself too much in circulation, every kid in class having at least a double of him in their own back pocket.
Another chance goes begging inside Wembley, the game locked at one apiece, what value would Alan Shearer have now, what price would some of my old school friends put on Stuart Pearce or Stefan Kuntz, what would they offer me now to do a private deal, what would they offer me to have a sneak peek at my wares, my treasures?
To go from knight of the playground and its few privileges to the King, well that took, as it always seems to, deep pockets and the facility to get one over the more gullible, the more susceptible to the art of the sleight of hand and the showmanship that surrounded it. A boy could guarantee his popularity forever if he was willing to make a trade of the one sticker that another needed to finish a team, a section, or are it be said, an entire album. It reminded me of the spiv on the corner of the street that my Granddad used to try to arrest, the one who would sell you a bargain, “ere madam, you look like you are in need of some new stockings, come on darlin’ good prices for excellent wear, hand made in Newcastle don’t ya know; I don’t sell rubbish, only good quality. You need fags sir, bottle of perfume for the lady, comics for the lad, bring your pennies and I will make you look like a King in front of your old lady, squire“.
In the summer of 1980, I was pulled in by the King, or rather the latest knight to try his luck with the masses, promising them the world but relishing in the small amount of childhood sadism that would see his subjects fawn at his feet and then rush about the playground as if their minds had lost sight of everything except for the stickers that had been thrown into the air and then sent tumbling, caught on the breeze, caught it seemed to me at that moment as if I was invited into the realm of the boys, as one sticker landed in my hand without any effort at all. A flood of thoughts raced through my mind and I found myself pulling away from the fence and starting to rush around the playground like a girl possessed, the king in the centre of the playground had thrown all his doubles and trebles into the sky and with the magic word had started off a frenzy to which I had been given a key to this insane, beautiful realm.
The full-time whistle has gone, extra time and then the possibility of penalties, and still I hold onto my stash, my guarantee amongst my rivals that I will finally win the game. We are huddled together, me and the boys who were part of that day, that insanity and brief war in which we saw several gold badges fly over the end fence and into the small patch of grass underneath the war widow herself, the witch who scared us most, who would complain about the noise of the playground everyday to the headmaster, who would make up lies and tell tales on us all just to make herself feel important.
There was a hole in the very end part of the fence. A lad who had gone on to senior school the previous summer had, over the course of the previous year, dug a small hole underneath the fence and then been able to roll back the criss-crossed metal to such a point that he could reach his marbles that some girl had thrown over the fence in a fit of revenge because he made her cry the previous day as he tied her long hair into a knot around her school chair. As revenge goes, it was hardly Machiavellian in its cunning, but it served a purpose in the girl’s mind. And as all good things bleed into one another, the hole had remained, wide enough for several of us to crawl through one at a time with just a few scratches to show for our pains, with a cut here and there on our faces and our shirts and my three year old brown skirt.
Penalties are coming, the last few minutes of the game feels hurried to us huddled outside the stadium, the boys are nervous, more than I have seen them since Ramjit got married to his cousin and the remaining members of our gang acted as grooms and best men, I sweated hard that day in an ugly dress that my mother had approved of, a blown up peach that wanted to die of shame. Ramjit’s bride had insisted, Ramjit just wanted to appease his wife, and I was made to suffer the indignity of stifled chuckles from my friends who had not seen me in a dress since the last day of junior school and the dance where I stuck two fingers up to conventionality and purposely ripped it; declaring never again.
My fingers are in my coat pockets, I can feel the excitement building as I tug slightly at the elastic band, in my mind I wonder if it will be Gary who will go after them as I let them loose, perhaps Barry, a one time king of the playground, friends all, and who left me in that small garden to defend myself against the witch and her pointing finger, who left me to fend for myself as they hid behind trees and bushes as she dragged me by the ear into the old people’s home and who, along with the manager of the facility, demanded that I be caned for daring to get the one sticker that the others had been after.
It had landed on her windowsill. It had landed gently, and my hand was able to whip off with ease, but I hadn’t reckoned on her seeing me. I had thought the old woman was at least not quick enough to catch me, and from the back as I eventually would run back to the hole with my prize I knew she would not be able to pick me out of a line up, all the girls looked the same to those who think we are all criminals in waiting. She caught me by the wrist, her age belying her age and my supposed imagination of her infirmness. She cuffed me round the ear and forced me roughly back into her living room, all the time screeching, Mary, I’ve caught one of the little bastards.
If you played with boys back then, you played by their rules, you played to the laws of the playground. So, I didn’t tell on anyone, I said it was just me and I paid the price. However, I made a pact, a promise to myself that from then on, one year I would win the game and be King, it just took sixteen years to come forth, a lot of planning and the excuse of bringing us all back together under the Wembley lights for my plan to be executed, for the word Scramble to come from my mouth. I swiftly puts my hands in my pockets with glee, so much pleasure, and I steadied myself to watch a thousand stickers fly into the air, our short season campaign to finish this particular album,
The sixth English player to take a penalty stepped up, it was then I shouted the war cry out loud, the scream and declaration I had wanted to do since that fateful day when I was made to look foolish in front of the entire school and made to apologise to the old woman, was now over and watched the men, turned back in time in my own mind to boys on the playground, scramble for the prize and missing the German team win the match.
I had learned a lot from the small act of vengeance that I exacted upon that boy whose marbles I had thrown that day, the act of impulse may feel good, but it doesn’t satisfy as much as the long game. As I walked away, the lads rushing round the concourse of the stadium, as families, men, kids, some despondent after the final penalty miss, some jubilant as Germany won, all cracking a laugh at my friends in their mania and their shouts of frustration as stickers landed on the floor and got kicked around by unconcerned feet, I remembered that day, the vow I took when I went to work at the factory where the stickers were produced; football is not just a game for boys.
Dedicated to my friend, Stella Hudson.
Ian D. Hall 2020