FAN ARTICLES

Remembering the Past

By David Brown :  13/01/2011 :  Comments (6) :

Anyway I grew up to support the Blue Boys and Jim eventually left London to live in Manchester. Often I would go there to meet him and go to see Everton play, sometimes dragging Jim along with me and, more often than not, I would cause some type of disruption to his life by some stupid problem like my car breaking down. Still the most notable of these disasters was the FA Cup semi-final against Liverpool played at Maine Road.

Both sets of supporters shared the old Kippax side of the ground and I stood there with my mate DC in the middle of a sea of blue. The swaying of the crowd was unbelievable throughout and we looked out of it at 2-1 down but we started to play well and made it 2-2. The supporters went crazy and we swayed down the terraces and back up again. In all the movement, my glasses fell off, as I went to pick them up we piled down the terraces again... when I finally had my glasses in my hand, one lens was shattered.

I had no choice other than to try to watch the rest of the game through that one lens which was crap as it proved almost impossible to see. Still Everton were on top now and the excitement was immense and we did score a winner through Bryan Hamilton only for it to be chalked off ? incredibly!! ? by ref Thomas the Book.

The next day, I tried to drive home with my mate DC being my eyes only the car would not start. Jim helped to push it and I ran over his foot. Eventually, we got away but hadn't got too far when we were driving down a one-way street the wrong way so we abandoned the trip and went back to Jim's.

I got back to London by train and pretended to work that I was stuck in Manchester as I decided to try to turn this broken lens situation in my favour by telling them I could not drive home until it was fixed which would be Thursday! To be honest I never thought my boss believed me but Jim got a ticket for me to see the replay at Old Trafford so I got back up to Manchester to see the game wearing some temporary glasses I'd sorted at a local optician in London that my Dad had driven me to.

My Dad died last October, it was not a major surprise, he was 90 and had a good innings. We were sad, of course, because he was still all there and loved his football... in fact, the last game we watched together was Everton's 3-3 draw with Man Utd.

Then, a week before Christmas, Jim passed away too; this was completely unexpected and a great shock to us all. My Brother would have been 66 the end of January. I miss them both and think of all the times watching football together then afterwards normally arguing with my Dad about the game but with Jim it was a discussion as he never argued with anyone.

I will be watching the game on TV Sunday and I know if there is anyway at all they will be watching too and, while they may not be Evertonians, you can bet they will want us to win. I hope we can do it not just for me but also for them.

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