Our attendances in the early and mid 90s

I seem to remember Graham Sharpe played a part that day ,cheers.

 

Wasn't that the Everton match where Neville Southall got dogs abuse from the ponte regarding the sexual shenanigans of his ex wife seem to remember about 10 thousand reds fans claiming rather loudly that they'd had some adult fun with the ex Mrs Southall every time he touched the ball.

 

Our coach broke down on way to Stoke that day. Managed to hitch a lift on another coach and got to ground at about 5 to 3 thinking we’d cracked it. Then we saw the car park with about 3000 Reds still trying to get in, maybe even more.
Was well into second half before we finally got in after they opened the big gates. We were 3-1 up at that point. All we got to see was two late Stoke goals to snatch a draw.

 

Think your spot on pal

 

Here you go mate!

 

I think and stand corrected, Cooper performed his back flip on a few occasions afore that replay. I'm not so sure who did the first ever. But it became Beagries trade mark.

 

I remember the police holding all the coaches up not far from Leek.By the time we set off there was no chance of getting into the ground on time.It ended up being a very serious situation and I'm not over egging it but people could have died that day.

 

I'm guessing a lot of folk just couldn't afford to go with local industry being decimated by Thatcher in the immediately preceding years. Either that or we had a lot of fickle fans back then

 

It was chaos outside with tempers frayed, both fans and police. Mounted coppers made things worse too. Like I said before they gave up in the end and just opened the gates with about half an hour left. Not even sure if the game was all ticket, pretty certain it was just pay on the day? We must have taken at least 5000 that day.

 

Loads went to Leek for a drink and were eventually rounded up by the police and sent to the game. Traffic was horrific with loads jumping off to piss wherever they could. We were in the queue as the goals were going in. We’d hear a roar, word would get out who’d scored, and the whole queue would jump up and down. Quite a lot of Stoke got in late as well.

 

Am I right in saying mounted police outside, getting crushed.
Remember it being like Orgreave all over again.

 

I thought I must have missed our and their 2nd.

 

I went down to Stoke on the National Express from Liverpool. There was this insufferable middle aged woman on the coach who knew Mark Higgins and was going on and on, as she was his guest at the game. I didn’t realise that Stoke was seven little towns, but when we got dropped off in Hanley I was pointed to the bus I needed to get. About halfway there a young lad came up to me and told me to fasten my jacket up and take my badge off my collar, “cos I know who’ll be getting on at the next stop”. That lad saved my bacon and I whispered a thank you to him on the way off. A gang of half a dozen really nasty looking oiks, who were loudly telling each other, and everyone else on the bus, what they were going to do to any Reds fans they came across.

My son has just chosen drama for one of his GCSE options, but he will never beat my performance that afternoon as ‘young lad calmly gazing out of a bus window on a pleasant afternoon, probably going to meet his girlfriend or go shopping or something’, whilst my insides had turned to jelly and I was considering climbing out of the window in a moving bus. But I made it to the ground and was one of the first people through the turnstile. I figured inside the ground was the safest place to be. I was meeting my mates just inside the ground, one of whom was at university in Stoke. I think it demonstrates how early I got in the ground that I was probably chatting to one of their security guards for close to an hour before everyone else started coming in. Felt like an hour anyway. His first words to me were “have you still got that short keeper with the rache who saves everything”. Yes we have, and he’s still my favourite Reds keeper.

Inside the ground it was fairly spacious to start with. Until all of a sudden we were packed like sardines. Someone said they had just opened the gates and let people in, cos it was mayhem outside. Only the way the fans were filtered down tunnels and then back up on to the terrace prevented a major incident from occurring a couple of rounds before it did. When we scored the third a great big bloke next to me punched the air…except he didn’t, he punched my eye. Crikey it hurt. Eventually they opened up another bit of the terrace and we could spread out a bit.

After the game it resembled the fall of Rome outside. It was like The Warriors trying to negotiate a path through the fighting to the bus stop. As I neared it I became very aware of a group of lads following me, so time again for my inner thespian to come out. As I neared the bus stop I saw there was a young lass with 2 shopping bags, so as I came towards her I flashed as close to a trusting smile as I could muster and said “could you please smile at me as if you know me and hand me one of your bags, so that this gang walking up behind me don’t feel compelled to use me as a football”. Amazingly, she obliged!

I made it back to the National Express and once aboard finally unbuttoned my jacket again, as it had been buttoned up prior to leaving the ground. The middle aged woman had a face like thunder, cos if I remember correctly Mark Higgins had been stretchered off. She wasn’t happy anyway. When I finally made it back home to the nurses home I was living in, I went round to a girl’s from my set to tell them of my scary day out and there were a few more students from my set there. I started telling them about the scary bus ride and all the fighting and that I had been punched, but before I could say “by this bloke next to me, celebrating our third goal” they all said yes, we can see. I looked in the mirror and I had a black eye. Val got a bag of frozen peas out and I decided I’d leave the bit out about it being an accident and instead took the sympathy!

Not the scariest bus ride to watch the Reds, whilst I was living in Liverpool though. For some reason I thought it was a good idea to book a seat on an Everton supporters coach to watch us play them, not in the next round, but in that much postponed Full Members Cup game. The journey to Barnsley was fine, although I had to try to get through the police to the home end without drawing attention to myself. On the way back, however, we were joined by a gang of scallies who said they had got a taxi to Barnsley and were explaining about how many heads of Reds fans they had kicked in pre-match. I just slid down in my seat until they couldn’t see me. I was the last on the coach, so I think a couple of the older passengers had clocked me as a Reds fan, but fortunately not this group, who all had some battle scars. I didn’t much fancy getting off the coach with them all in Walton, so as we neared the end of the M62 I just put my head down and marched through them and asked the driver to drop me off at the Rocket, as I could walk home from there, whilst making a mental note to never, ever travel to a Reds match on the supporters coach of the opposition team, no matter how convenient it may be!