Title
The excitement of an away game: 'It was an escapade'
Subject
Sid Gittens
Description
An excerpt from a recording of an oral history interview with Sid Gittens. Sid describes the excitement of an away game, watching FA Cup football in London, and visiting Wembley with his father.
Creator
Michael Romyn
Source
Sid Gittens Oral History Recording
Publisher
Kent's Sporting Memories
Date
Interview recorded on 6 March, 2019
Contributor
Sid Gittens; Michael Romyn
Rights
Kent's Sporting Memories
Format
MP3 file
Language
English
Type
Audio Recording
Identifier
Sid Gittens
Duration
(5:28)
Transcription
MR: Before working was your life very much orientated around the village?
SG: Yeah, like I say local sport, that’s what made it quite exciting. By playing away, in the loosest possible terms, it was an escapade, an exciting, ‘Ooh, we’re going to Charing today, ooh, we’re going to Appledore tomorrow afternoon!’, you know, that’s how it was and you were with the gang and, you play the game and you either one or you lost or, and you used to come home happy or miserable or, like we all are with sport now. Yeah, I think that’s how it was, life was far more condensed, even though we used to go to London to watch football a lot. When I say a lot, look, I can remember one, I think it was Good Friday or Easter Monday, we went up and we saw West Ham and Cardiff in the morning, Spurs and Blackburn in the afternoon and Leyton Orient and Luton in the evening. It was three or four of us went and that’s what we used to do. I used to go to Wembley. I can remember the times when I went with the school to the school [unclear], it was so exciting you know to go a fifty-mile journey up the road in a coach and then go in this Wembley where there are a hundred thousand people. It was, I couldn’t grasp, it was lovely, it was wonderful. We went to the quarter finals of the world cup in sixty-six, things like that. I used to just stand there and I was in awe, you know, wonderful.
MR: Was it hard to get tickets for that?
SG: I can’t remember how we quite done it now. I can’t remember. And I used to go to various cup finals, because you get local teams are allocated, and it still happens now. Local leagues are allocated FA Cup final tickets through the FA and that filters into [unclear] FA, and then that filters down into our local leagues. And I suspect they still do it now but it used to be on a rota or depending on how many people are interested in going and clubs used to get two tickets, and we always used to apply for them so I’d go to quite a few finals if the tickets came along, cause even though you’ve got thirty or forty blokes in a club with two teams quite often not that many would want to go to a final. Me I just wanted to go because I wanted to watch football, even though I’m an Arsenal man. Lots of people won’t go and watch unless it’s their team in the final. Well I just go for the love of football really. And I still do now, you know, I still go to Arsenal now from time to time. A mate of mine’s got a season ticket. But it was so exciting, yeah, it was wonderful.
MR: Do you remember what age you were when you first went to London to watch a football game?
SG: The first time I was about twelve or thirteen, with the secondary school because the school used to organise a trip through the school’s FA I suppose, yeah.
MR: And do you remember that vividly? Your first game?
SG: Yeah, I can do. Barry Bridges was playing, he went on and played for Chelsea. There’s a mate of mine who still lives in Ashford, Bobby Laverick, he played for Chelsea when he was a youngster, he was a schoolboy international, he came down from the northeast and he can remember Bridges and people like that at Chelsea, and he said ‘well how do you know them then?’ and I said ‘well, I can remember him playing for England Schoolboys’. I can’t remember him playing because he played in fifty-four or something, which was a bit before me. Yeah, I can remember it, all these screaming kids there and I’ve never been in such a large crowd. And I can always remember my father saying to me, because he’d been to various cup finals and things through the local club, because the club used to get the tickets way back then, and he said ‘whatever you do when you’re coming out don’t put your hands in your pockets’, And I thought: ‘What an earth is he on about?’ And I realised afterwards because you just, you’re lifted from the floor, and it’s just like a big sausage of people going out, you know. And it’s difficult to explain, I’ve tried to explain to my wife, you know, you’ve got a load of people pressing like that, it’s not quite so bad now because they’ve restricted entrances and turnstiles and things like that, but you used to come down these stairs and it was just as if you were being traveled out to the outer concourse, you know, it was a bit frightening really.
MR: Is this Wembley?
SG: Yeah, Wembley, the old Wembley as we know it, yeah.
SG: Yeah, like I say local sport, that’s what made it quite exciting. By playing away, in the loosest possible terms, it was an escapade, an exciting, ‘Ooh, we’re going to Charing today, ooh, we’re going to Appledore tomorrow afternoon!’, you know, that’s how it was and you were with the gang and, you play the game and you either one or you lost or, and you used to come home happy or miserable or, like we all are with sport now. Yeah, I think that’s how it was, life was far more condensed, even though we used to go to London to watch football a lot. When I say a lot, look, I can remember one, I think it was Good Friday or Easter Monday, we went up and we saw West Ham and Cardiff in the morning, Spurs and Blackburn in the afternoon and Leyton Orient and Luton in the evening. It was three or four of us went and that’s what we used to do. I used to go to Wembley. I can remember the times when I went with the school to the school [unclear], it was so exciting you know to go a fifty-mile journey up the road in a coach and then go in this Wembley where there are a hundred thousand people. It was, I couldn’t grasp, it was lovely, it was wonderful. We went to the quarter finals of the world cup in sixty-six, things like that. I used to just stand there and I was in awe, you know, wonderful.
MR: Was it hard to get tickets for that?
SG: I can’t remember how we quite done it now. I can’t remember. And I used to go to various cup finals, because you get local teams are allocated, and it still happens now. Local leagues are allocated FA Cup final tickets through the FA and that filters into [unclear] FA, and then that filters down into our local leagues. And I suspect they still do it now but it used to be on a rota or depending on how many people are interested in going and clubs used to get two tickets, and we always used to apply for them so I’d go to quite a few finals if the tickets came along, cause even though you’ve got thirty or forty blokes in a club with two teams quite often not that many would want to go to a final. Me I just wanted to go because I wanted to watch football, even though I’m an Arsenal man. Lots of people won’t go and watch unless it’s their team in the final. Well I just go for the love of football really. And I still do now, you know, I still go to Arsenal now from time to time. A mate of mine’s got a season ticket. But it was so exciting, yeah, it was wonderful.
MR: Do you remember what age you were when you first went to London to watch a football game?
SG: The first time I was about twelve or thirteen, with the secondary school because the school used to organise a trip through the school’s FA I suppose, yeah.
MR: And do you remember that vividly? Your first game?
SG: Yeah, I can do. Barry Bridges was playing, he went on and played for Chelsea. There’s a mate of mine who still lives in Ashford, Bobby Laverick, he played for Chelsea when he was a youngster, he was a schoolboy international, he came down from the northeast and he can remember Bridges and people like that at Chelsea, and he said ‘well how do you know them then?’ and I said ‘well, I can remember him playing for England Schoolboys’. I can’t remember him playing because he played in fifty-four or something, which was a bit before me. Yeah, I can remember it, all these screaming kids there and I’ve never been in such a large crowd. And I can always remember my father saying to me, because he’d been to various cup finals and things through the local club, because the club used to get the tickets way back then, and he said ‘whatever you do when you’re coming out don’t put your hands in your pockets’, And I thought: ‘What an earth is he on about?’ And I realised afterwards because you just, you’re lifted from the floor, and it’s just like a big sausage of people going out, you know. And it’s difficult to explain, I’ve tried to explain to my wife, you know, you’ve got a load of people pressing like that, it’s not quite so bad now because they’ve restricted entrances and turnstiles and things like that, but you used to come down these stairs and it was just as if you were being traveled out to the outer concourse, you know, it was a bit frightening really.
MR: Is this Wembley?
SG: Yeah, Wembley, the old Wembley as we know it, yeah.