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How Steeple Sinderby Wanderers Won the FA Cup by J L Carr

The Quince Tree Press, 129 p. First published in 1975 but this edition is from 1992 as it has a cyclostyled letter from the author on page 1, signed J L Carr, 1992. The book’s Wiki page tells us that The Quince Tree Press is the author’s own imprint.

This is, of course, a fantasy. A mere glance at the title tells you that. That a village team would win the FA Cup could not have happened at the time it was written and certainly could not happen now. But that is, I suppose, still the abiding dream of any small club and its supporters, that a “mob of milkmen, farmers, the parson and a job lot of pitmen” could match “Big Business whose performers cost the Mint.” Yet, despite protestations in Part One that this novel is about football, it really isn’t. There are few descriptions of games and those are fairly cursory. What it is about is the dynamics of village life and the triumph of hope over expectation. And how fleeting it all is. I suppose it might be termed a comic novel though there isn’t anything laugh out loud in it.

The text is a curious mixture of the personal recollections of Steeple Sinderby Wanderers committee member Joe Gidner, minutes of committee meetings, absurdly purple-prosed local newspaper accounts of matches penned by Ginchy Trigger “who did funerals, inquests, weddings, council meetings and all sport” for the East Barset Weekly Messenger and even an excerpt from Hansard. There are also six black and white illustrations, a prefatory one of the author’s football team when he played for South Milford White Rose for one season as an eighteen year-old, 4 postcards displaying Steeple Sinderby landmarks, one (uncaptioned) photograph of a woman – perhaps Ginchy Trigger – and one sketch of the Fangfoss household.

Mr Arthur Fangfoss is Chairman of the Wanderers because he was chairman of everything in Steeple Sinderby. He has an unusual household arrangement, living with his wife and her sister, whose roles are commonly held to be reversed. The team has two ex-professionals, Alex Slingsby, retired from football to look after his wife after she suffered a catastrophic accident and Sid Swift, a one-season goalscoring wonder who overnight lost all confidence in his purpose in life but has been restored to vitality by the vicar’s formidable proselytising sister Biddy. The team’s playing philosophy is a bit like total football but underscored by local Hungarian refugee from the Nazis, Dr Kossuth, and his Seven Postulations (though I only recall six being written down here) – produced after watching a couple of Wanderers games and one at Leicester City. Principally these are: have a good goalkeeper, everyone except the goalie must contribute to all aspects of the game, make the most of home advantage (Wanderers adopt a highly sloping patch of ground for the new season) but when away make yourself feel at home and the opposition feel away, and avoid high balls for the most part as professionals control headers much better than amateurs.

When the decision to enter the FA Cup is made one committee member says, incidentally highlighting the fantasy inherent in the author’s conceit, how hard it will be to progress, “‘particularly this year, when the top Scottish clubs are coming in for the first time.’” There is a historical inaccuracy here (perhaps Carr’s oversight): some Scottish clubs played in the FA Cup in its early days in the nineteenth century.

Despite using the dread word “soccer” (but then, he was English) Carr does appear to know his football, “by and large, football supporters are not creatures of intellect but of emotion.” The home crowd at Tambling, “bellowed disbelief at incompetence, cried scornfully to the grey heavens in god-like despair, clamoured angrily for revenge.” That is a football crowd for you. “For 20p. they did all this and were not called to account.” Well, they think that if they’ve paid to watch, it’s their right to dish out abuse. (But 20p! Time has flown – and prices flown even higher.)

Carr also has part narrator Gidner assert that, “Since all Anglicans know theirs is the true faith, they don’t go around stuffing it down other people’s throats.” (Try telling that to folk in the former colonies.) About village life he says, “in rural England, people live wrapped in a tight cocoon” communicating “as their fathers did by a flick of the eyeballs, passing down grudges either improved upon or, at very least, in mint condition from generation to generation.”

The Cup Final was in the old English tradition – “Abide with me” and all – despite Steeple Sinderby’s opponents being Glasgow Rangers. (The singing of religious songs at games involving Scottish clubs has never been the custom – for obvious reasons. Surely Carr cannot have been unaware of this state of affairs?)

I don’t suppose this can be counted as great literature but it is entertaining and likely to be so both for those who like football and those who don’t.

Pedant’s corner:- a missing comma before a piece of direct speech (x 2,) “Antarex skirt and trench coat” (Antartex?) crutch (crotch,) elegaic (elegiac,) Tokio (Tokyo,) “McBain shipping line” (the real one is MacBrayne’s,) “I was stood there” (standing.)

The Doc

So 2020 continued to be a miserable sod right till the end, when it took Tommy Docherty away from us.

The Doc was probably most famous for being manager of Manchester Uinted though he had previous spells at Chelsea and other clubs, plus as Scotland manager. After Man U he managed seven more clubs.

His senior playing career began at Celtic but he could not displace Parkhead legend Bobby Evans from the team and moved south to Preston North End and later Chelsea.

He played for Scotland 25 times including in the 1954 World Cup (but we’ll swiftly draw a veil over the 7-0 defeat to Uruguay – I read once of a player’s recollection that the Scotland team were in heavy woollen jerseys as if playing in winter rather than the heat of a Swiss summer and were shod in big old-fashioned boots – with the Uruguayans in more modern footwear he described as like slippers in comparison. We were lucky it was only seven was the verdict.)

It was as a manager that The Doc made the most impact, taking over a very declined Man United and not able to turn the club’s fortunes round till after a relegation but leading them to a swift – one season – return to the top flight and then to an FA Cup win against Liverpool (denying that club what would have been a first ever treble by any English side.) Who knows what might have transpired if The Doc had not had an affair with the wife of the club’s physio Laurie Brown and as a consequence got the sack? (I note from the obituaries that Docherty was still married to Mary Brown when he died.)

Despite plying his trade mostly in England Docherty, like most of his ilk, remained a proud Scot.

There was a tale told – I think it was of Joe Donnelly, Dumbarton’s perennial substitute in the 1971-1972 season (only one sub allowed in those days and that for injury) that the player had once been involved in an altercation with an English team mate who had called him a “Scottish b*****d.” Docherty, as their manager, took them into his office, got them to settle the matter reasonably amicably then let the Englishman leave the room. Whereon he immediately turned to Donnelly and said, “You didn’t hit him hard enough.”

A character, then.

Thomas Henderson (Tommy) Docherty (The Doc): 24/4/1928 – 31/12/2020. So it goes.

Salford City 1-1 Hartlepool United

FA Cup Round 2, Moor Lane Stadium, 4/12/15.

I posted about Hartlepool United this time last year at the same stage of the competition and again when the club miraculously retained its football league status in April.

So once again Pools were on live television courtesy of the BBC and its FA Cup coverage but apart from converting a penalty weren’t much in the game first half where Salford had much more possession and looked more threatening especially with the dead ball – culminating in a goal when their player reacted quickly in a second ball situation from a free kick.

Second half there was an improvement by Pools perhaps catalysed by the wonderfully named sub Rakish Bingham who looked very lively. Unfortunately he missed a header from five yards as did Scott Fenwick both of which would have removed the necessity for a replay. Salford also had their chances but couldn’t get past Trevor Carson in Pools’ goal.

1-1 at the end. At least I’m not a televisual jinx.

Manager Ronnie Moore was scathing about the performance after the match. His assessment was spot on. If Pools play for 90 mins in the replay they ought to get through.

Despite a winning start to the season Pools still lurk towards the bottom of League Two. I’m still nervous about that.

Hartlepool Cheer

You may remember me posting about Hartlepool United’s FA Cup loss to non-league Blyth Spartans back in December. Even then their plight looked pretty desperate but in early March it was worse. The club looked doomed to be relegated to the Conference. Rooted to the bottom of the English League Two table for what had felt like months they were ten or so points behind the second bottom side. Since then the turn round – no doubt inspired by new manager Ronnie Moore – has been remarkable.

As I write today, even yet Hartlepool have won only twelve league games all season – out of a total of forty-five. Five of these though were in the last eight. A run of four successive wins on the 14th, 17th, 21th and 28th of the month and a draw in the first game in April took them from dead last to third bottom. Football can be amazing at times. And Saturday’s 2-1 win over Exeter City combined with losses for both Cheltenham and Tranmere Rovers confirmed that the club would stay in the Football League for at least another season. Was there dancing in the streets of Hartlepool do you think?

I feel a bit sad for Tranmere Rovers who have been members of the Football League for over 90 years but Hartlepool hold a greater place in my affections. Cheltenham are more Johnny-come-lately in this respect.

I hope this relief isn’t short-lived and a measure of success (rather than avoiding failure) awaits next season but given the history outlined in my December post I wouldn’t discount another struggle against relegation. The heady days of vying for promotion to, and competitivenes in, League One seem long ago now.

Hartlepool United 1-2 Blyth Spartans

FA Cup Second Round, Victoria Park, 5/12/14.

Normally in a situation like this my sympathies would be with the underdog, in this case Blyth. However, long ago in my youth I conceived a liking for Hartlepool United, adopting then as my wee English team. (Not that I have a big English team.) This may have been because Pools were continually crap for much of my childhood several times having to be re-elected to the Football League. (In those days the Conference did not exist and there was no relegation from the League.) Under Brian Clough as manager – his first such job – their fortunes improved and they gained promotion just after he left. Immediate relegation was followed by two re-election close shaves. They had another such brush with loss of league status in the year before automatic relegation came in and only just missed that the next season.

When Cyril Knowles took over as manager (yes, Nice One Cyril himself) things got better. Despite his tragic death they won promotion in 1992 but were relegated again two years later.

In the very early years of this century they endured promotion play-off defeats three years in a row before finally achieving elevation again in 2003, competed well in the higher division for a while but dropped back down in 2013.

This game was my first glimpse – courtesy of the BBC – both of Pools and of Victoria Park, which looks a tidy ground. At its start Pools were rock bottom of the Football League once more.

You couldn’t have told that from the first half, they played well, knocked the ball about, created chances which only desperate defending and an inspired goalkeeping save prevented and scored a beautifully crafted goal. But if you don’t put your opponents away when you’re on top football can punish you. A silly free-kick concession gave Blyth the opportunity to score – with a dead ball strike from a former Pools player – and the sucker punch came in the last minute of normal time, a defensive error allowing Blyth their one and only chance from open play, which they took.

In the first half I couldn’t understand how Pools were in the league position they are; they looked way better than Exeter whom I had caught sight of in Round One of this season’s FA Cup. In the second they just faded away. The Conference looms.

Arsenal 2-2 Hull City (3-2 a.e.t.)

FA Cup Final, Wembley Stadium, 17/5/14

Not quite such a historic (nor romantic) outcome to this one. Still a shock looked on the cards after ten minutes when Hull were two up. But eighty minutes is a long time to hold out especially against a team capable of keeping the ball.

Arsenal did not really create much in the way of chances but big clubs tend to prevail in these situations.

And Hull have the consolation of playing in a “proper” European competition* next season. Not that that did Stoke or Birmingham much good – though Wigan reached the play-offs tis year despite the distraction.

*They did once take part in the Anglo-Italian Cup in the long ago.

The Outsider: A History of the Goalkeeper by Jonathan Wilson

Orion, 2012, 351 p

If football is symbolic, if the ball is a substitute sun requiring to be buried (in the goal) to ensure fertility, what then are we to make of the one player in the team whose primary object is to prevent that desirable consummation? Such is the question with which Wilson starts his history of the goalkeeper, who in this context can be seen as the outsider, an anti-footballer.

While not denying the goalkeeper’s essential difference I immediately started thinking, what about the stopper centre half, the holding midfielder, the midfield destroyer? Aren’t their roles equally anti-football in that sense? Of course these players may advance into the opponents’ half, even score the odd goal or two, but the goalkeeper generally isn’t expected/permitted even to do that. Except what, then, to make of the Paraguayan great, Jose Luis Chilavert, who took penalties and free-kicks and scored 62 goals, 8 of them for Paraguay and all while playing as a goalkeeper? (Brazil’s Rogério Ceni has since overtaken Chilavert as the highest scoring keeper.) The South American attitude to goalkeepers has tended to be less restrictive, though. In Europe keepers generally only charge upfield in desperate circumstances.

In any case Wilson’s title partly goes against the thrust of the history. When football was first codified it started with all players able to handle the ball in certain circumstances. That dispensation quickly became restricted to the designated one, who was detached from the team – and made to stand out by virtue of wearing a different coloured jersey/shirt. A gradual process of goalkeepers playing beyond the penalty area – the change of rules in 1912 which forbade handling outside the box (up till then they had been allowed to anywhere in their own half) delayed this process – by intervening with their feet or initiating attacks has reduced this difference. Arguably the keeper’s reintegration into the team was finally more or less institutionalised by the back pass rule. (Even before that, though, the custodian was not totally estranged, was a vital component of retaining possession. I remember reading elsewhere that Liverpool’s long domination of the European Cup was predicated on passing the ball back to Bruce Grobbelaar as much as possible during away legs. The sweeper-keeper had evolved even prior to this, though.) In Jose Luis Chilavert’s case the reintegration of keeper with team was surely at its most complete.

Wilson mentions that the first ‘Prince of Goalkeepers’ was Dumbarton’s James McAulay. Another Sons keeper to be mentioned in the text is Joshua Wilkinson, whose father was convinced his death from peritonitis in 1921 was due to a blow he’d received in a game against Rangers the previous Saturday.

In the very early days it had been almost open season on goalkeepers. The famous William ‘Fatty’ Foulke – reputedly 28st (179 kilograms) when he played for Chelsea – often took his revenge on physical forwards, turning them upside down and depositing them on their heads. Despite the obvious dangers – Celtic’s John Thomson (to whom a section of Kirkcaldy’s newly refurbished museum is dedicated – he came from nearby Cardenden – there was also a tribute to him there before the modernisation) received an accidental but fatal knee to the head in 1931 also against Rangers; Sunderland’s Jim Thorpe died in 1936 after several blows in a physical game in 1936 prompted a reccurence of a diabetic condition – it was not until after Bert Trautman’s broken neck and several other injuries to keepers in FA Cup finals in the 1950s, though, that British goalkeepers began to receive extended protection from referees.

Goalkeeping is not, in the end, a simple business. He/she is not necessarily only a shot stopper; there is a difference between the reactive keeper and the proactive. The former expects to make saves (spectacular or mundane) the latter’s best game is the one in which she/he has no saves to make at all, because the way he/she has organised the defence ensures, in an ideal world, that no danger occurs.

There are even national differences in approach. Both Brazilian and Italian defences tend to play deeply and so breed reactive keepers. In other countries a higher line is adopted, a goalkeeper’s play has to be more attuned to that. In Russia, Soviet Russia in particular, goalkeepers have been the subject of a reverence that borders on love.

Africa is represented here by the Cameroonians Tommy Nkono (who inspired Gianluigi Buffon) and Joseph-Antoine Bell, the Spanish, German, Italian, English, Brazilian, Scottish and US traditions are covered in detail. From Asia only Ali Al-Habsi gets a mention and that in passing. Oceanian custodians escape Wilson’s purview completely. Maybe no notable keepers have as yet been bred there.

So many great goalkeepers seem to have had unfortunate debuts, on the end of drubbings of various sorts. What distinguishes them all is that they are liable to be remembered, their careers defined, not for their great performances but for one, or – in the case of David Seaman – two mistakes. (My abiding memory of Ray Clemence is of him allowing a soft one from Kenny Dalglish to evade him in a Scotland-England game at Hampden. Proof if any were needed that there is no national tendency to persistently outstanding goalkeeping.) Poor Moacyr Barbosa of Brazil was forever blighted by conceding the winning goal in the 1950 World Cup final. In 1970 a woman in a shop said to her young son, “Look! There’s the man who made all Brazil cry.” Barbosa himself later complained that in Brazil, “the maximum sentence is 30 years. My imprisonment has been for 50.” That loss to Uruguay was perhaps, though, the single most traumatic moment in Brazil’s history as a nation. It was only founded in 1889 and has never fought a war.* Brazilians apparently are not really football fans. It is winning they like.

Wilson makes the point that the existence of a highly proficient one or two goalkeepers from one country at one time is not evidence of strength in depth, nor any guarantee of continued excellence. The apparent decline of English goalkeeping is a case in point.

The author certainly knows his football history – there is even a digression into the treatments of the sport in literature and film, most of which lean heavily on the goalkeeper; a further nice touch is that the book’s back cover is decorated with a “1” – and he thinks deeply about the game. Having read the book I’ll observe goalkeeping in a different light.

One final note. Even if a book is about football it might be thought a touch insensitive to describe the Spanish Civil War as “perhaps the clásico to end them all” – even more insensitive when Wilson observes that Real Madrid didn’t become Franco’s team till the 1940s.

*Edited to add. I have since found out that this is only true of the Brazilian Republic and not of the Empire which preceded it.

Bert Trautmann

Bert Trautmann, one of the icons of post Second World War British goalkeeping (ironic since he was a German,) has died.

His signing by Manchester City in 1949 upset quite a few people who so soon after the war felt insulted that a German should take up such a high profile position.

His war record is astonishing. Like most of his generation he was under the influence of Nazism, joining the Jungvolk. When the war came he joined the Luftwaffe as a radio operator before volunteering to become a paratrooper. He was posted to the Russian front and won an Iron Cross First Class. At one point he was captured but a German counter-attack freed him. In Russia his unit suffered 70% casualties. He was transferred to the West where he was captured twice more, with two more escapes, before jumping over a fence and landing at the feet of a British soldier who said, “Hello Fritz, fancy a cup of tea?” He spent time as a POW, refused repatriation when it was offered after the war, going back to Germany a year or so later but decided he preferred Britain.

His most famous accomplishment in football was finishing the 1956 FA Cup final after sustaining a broken neck. He knew he was injured but its serious extent did not become known till three days later after the X-rays.

It was several incidents like this in FA Cup finals around that time that eventually saw the goalkeeper afforded more protection in Britain.

Bernhard Carl Trautmann: 22/10/1923-19/07/2013. So it goes.

Athletic Bonanza

A magnificent achievement by Wigan Athletic to win the FA Cup yesterday. A place in Europe to boot.

One more illustration of the unpredictability of football – and the romance of the FA Cup.

Wigan join a long list of Lancashire clubs (including Blackburn Olympic, the first to do so) to win the trophy. Congratulations to the Latics.

Given that Wigan were playing Moneybags United (sorry; Moneybags City*) they ought not to have had a prayer. Yet it’s there in the record books for ever now. And manager Roberto Martinez has won one more major trophy than new Manchester United boss David Moyes. It’s a funny old world.

Not least that, come Tuesday night, Wigan could be relegated.

There was another unlikely event involving teams named Athletic on Saturday. In the SFL Div 2 play-offs Dunfermline of that ilk eventually beat Forfar Athletic on aggregate over two games and extra time.

Yet by that extra time Forfar were down to eight men, thus giving Dunfermline an overwhelming advantage. I was listening to the radio reports coming in from the game. Forfar had taken the lead (4-1 on aggregate) and it struck me that with the one man down they were at the time, extra time was the most likely outcome. Given that Dunfermline were at home even that one man advantage would probably mean they would go on to win.

But how fair is it that Forfar would have to play extra time with a disadvantage in numbers? A football game lasts only 90 mins. In effect extra time is a new game, why should the sending-off extend into the 30 minute extension? I had an idle thought. Should not both teams be allowed to have a full complement of numbers for the extra period? (Unless there are further sendings-off, of course.)

When I discovered that Forfar were down to only eight players for extra time I knew it was curtains for them. But had they thought of it there was a way out. A way which goes against the spirit of the game – but so does any sending off really.

I believe there is a provision in the laws of football that should a team have fewer than eight men the game must be abandoned. I remember Neil Warnock, when he was manager of Sheffield United I think, – in exactly that situation of eight men remaining – encouraging his players to get themselves sent off to ensure an abandonment. Full marks to Forfar for not going down that road.

Dunfermline will be playing yet another Athletic – Alloa – in the play-off final.

*Wigan’s owner Dave Whelan is not short of a bob himself but the scale is a little different.

Braintree Town 0-3 Tranmere Rovers

FA Cup, Round 1, Cressing Road,* 13/11/12

Since I lived in Braintree for two years Braintree Town is the English club nearest to what I could claim as a “local team.” While I lived there, though, the club was deep down in the English football pyramid and I never actually went to watch them. Somehow Saturdays were always spent going to Colchester or somewhere else to go round shops. I have continued to look out for their results in the intervening years and noted their climb to the Conference South and finally the Premier.

Last night was surely the biggest in their history what with a home First Round FA Cup tie against Tranmere Rovers and a live TV appearance thanks to ITV 4. My first time watching them in action. It was also my first time watching Tranmere for 90 mins.

The history I found on Wikipedia was interesting to me as they were for a long time associated with (as Manor Works and Critall Athletic the works team of) Critall Windows from where their nickname The Iron is derived.

They were playing in distinctive colours; shirts which were a shade of red that was close to orange (on Wiki it is orange) and light blue shorts. It was nice to see clips of their manager Alan Devonshire in his West Ham pomp before the game.

There was no doubt that Tranmere were the more accomplished side, stronger on the ball, quicker to it and generally more comfortable with it but Braintree had their moments and with some composure in front of goal might have scored. They were a bit unlucky with the first goal as the keeper made a great stop only for it to fall kindly for the attacker. Tranmere’s second and third were well worked and created though, the last coming in stoppage time and perhaps flattering the away team a touch. Braintree played some nice stuff, attempting to pass, spreading it wide but the gap in Divisions was obvious.

Comparisons are odious they say but as to how my beloved Dumbarton would match up I think that, presently, Braintree would come out on top.

*Sponsored as the Amlin Stadium.

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