Nostalgia I know, but when I was stood on there, third row of barriers, in the middle, it was a different world. Pipe smoke and beer smells wafting around, honest toilers on the pitch, horrible toilets off it, very loud crowd dishing out "advice" to the players. Great sense of humour at some of the things shouted. Players came off that pitch muddy, bloody and bruised.Elation and disappointment in equal measures, walking back up Grove Street swearing blind you'e NEVER set foot in Oakwell again. (This wore off after a few hours/beers) Rushing up to the newspaper shop to get the Green 'Un at half six and eagerly devouring every result, scorer, attendance, and match report. No player histrionics, swan dives, cheating, no multi millionaire players, no investment consortiums, no internet forums, greedy agents, betting apps, VAR, goal line technology, assistant referees, Sky TV, television pundits/expert analysers or sports science. By 10 o'clock on Saturday night the football was over and pretty much forgotten about for another fortnight, and people went about their real lives-until 3pm the next home game. It was a much simpler time to be a Red I do miss it
Spent a few seasons in there in my teens before I moved into Brewery stand - better class of moaners in there
Probably Dek. But I think a lot of those memories are due to the fact we were so young. In fact if you look at BFC Vids from the 70/80s it’s staggering how young the crowd is. Looks to be around 15 years of age. These days those 15 yr olds now make up the majority of the crowd - about 50 years of age! Probably explains why the most popular song from ‘the terraces‘ these days is Abide with me For our younger readers - that’s a little joke. Yes I know- very little!
thanks for sharing that! it was times spent in that stand with the wind and rain blowing in from the open access at the back with my dad that began my affiliation with tne reds and long may it continue! U Reds
