A Fatherly Hand

I recently asked #twitterblades to vote for their favourite three games of recent times. In response I received a tweet on twitlonger from Blades fan Tristan Woods-Scawen (@mrwoodpigeon) explaining his choice. His well chosen words resonated strongly with me and with his permission I have reproduced his words here. Hopefully they will strike the same chord with a wider audience. Football is a bond that unites us all and many of us will recognise elements of Tristan's story. 

You can choose your friends, but you can’t choose your family. It could be said the same for your football team too. Like many other boys growing up, I was “given” my team by my dad. Although I have never lived in or even near Sheffield, it was The Blades for me.

My dad went to Sheffield University in the early 1960s and having spent his formative years living down south and going to see Aldershot Town play, it was time for a step up in quality and with recent promotion to the First Division, it was BDTBL that he headed and it was an affair that was going to last the rest of his life.

I was born in December 1978, not the best year to have been born a Blade with the team being relegated to Division 3 at the end of that season. By this time my dad had moved with us to live in Essex – not really known to be a hotbed of blades fans. With work and family taking over his weekends, it was more difficult to get to any matches, but the passion remained and I remember Saturday afternoons in the 80s say with my dad watching Teletext refreshing and the occasional celebration.

We moved house again with his work and found ourselves very much in the heart of Coventry City supporters. As 1987 came and the infamous Coventry FA Cup win happened, I confided in my dad that I thought I wanted to go to Highfield Road as all my friends did and asked if he would take me.

You should know that my dad was someone who always said he didn’t really like football unless it was The Blades playing. He was never one to sit down on Sunday to watch West Brom v Blackburn or some equally “non-match” as he would describe them. He had no real interest in going to see Coventry City, but he took me along.

We watched a season together at Highfield Road, but before every game he always whispered to me at kick off that next season he would take me to see some “proper football”. I knew what this meant and whilst Sheffield was basically a foreign country to me, I was excited.

So from my first trip with my dad to BDTBL (Beautiful Down Town Bramall Lane for non-United fans) in 1990, I was hooked. My parents had split up in the early 80s and I hadn’t lived with my dad for years, but doing the weekly 3-hour round trip to Sheffield or travelling to the countless away games was our time together and I’ll never forget it.

The game that stood out for me is the FA Cup Quarter Final against Coventry. As well as having everything a game could have, we were going home to friends and family who were Sky Blues fans. It meant more to us than most I think and at the final whistle we just uncontrollably jumped and hugged. I couldn't wait to get home and rub it in with my Sky Blue mates.

If you are reading this, I’m pretty sure you know that life as a Blade is never dull. There has been some success over the last 25 years, but mostly it’s a catalogue of disappointments of missing out on promotion, relegation, selling the best players and penny-pinching chairmen.

I always read people complaining and they usually have a point, but this is why our club is the greatest club there is. We have had some amazing times at BTDTL (the greatest are usually evening matches it seems to me) and there is always something newsworthy happening at the club. Football with Sheffield United FC is the best soap opera you’ll ever see, the greatest movie plot you’ll ever hear and like the Hollywood greats, it’ll make you laugh and make you cry.

My dad was unexpectedly diagnosed with a brain tumour in 2011 and I didn’t know it at the time but we had been to our last match together. After some pretty heavy treatment, he lost much of his speech and it was tough to make conversation. But through the last few months, we talked so much about the matches we had seen and what was happening that season.

We knew he was coming to the end and so was the 2011-2012 season. Ched was gone, but I thought we could still hang on to the automatic promotion place. I thought that would be a great season for us to finish on if we could get that promotion spot.

Nothing is ever straightforward with the Blades though and of course we had to go through the pain of the play offs. I sat with my dad watching the TV as the 432 penalties (or something like that) were taken at Wembley in the final. As Simmo missed his penalty and the game was lost, he just raised his eyebrows and shook his head.

He passed away 12 days later. He was 65 years old.

Somehow, we both knew the season had summed up what it was to be a Blade and that the last match he ever saw was strangely appropriate.

We moan about this club of ours, but a football club will give us much more than we ever realise. It pulls people together; it creates great moments to share and memories to treasure forever.

Interview with Keith Waugh - Part 1 (Black Cat goes Posh)

In the latest of my interviews with former Blades heroes I have spoken to a player from a slightly earlier era to those that I have spoken to before. He joined United as the club was at its lowest ebb and played a key role in the team’s immediate revival. As United won the 4^th Division title, goalkeeper Keith Waugh played all bar one league game earning the respect of his fellow players and being chosen for the PFA Divisional Team of the Season.

His career also took in spells at Peterborough United, Bristol City, Coventry City and Watford and garnered league and cup medals alongside Wembley success.

 

 

As his twitter username (@blackcatkw) suggests, Keith is a big Sunderland fan. Growing up in the city and representing Durham Schoolboys.

"The county borders differed back then! I played local school football and progressed to county football. I did well for Durham and I was invited to international trials for England schoolboys. Sadly I didn't make it. However I was noticed by my home town club. I signed schoolboy forms with Sunderland and then as an apprentice at Sunderland in the summer of 1973, just as I left school at 16. As you can imagine it was a terrific time to join the club, a poignant time for Sunderland fans, on the back of the Cup final victory over Leeds."

As a regular at Roker Park prior to signing, I ask if he made it to Wembley to support his team?

"Yes, I got two tickets through being associated with the club. It was quite strange as my mum and her family were all Sunderland fans, whilst my dad and his family were all Newcastle supporters. It was fun growing up in my family, I can tell you. I actually took my dad to Wembley with my spare ticket and my mum and all the rest of her family queued for tickets at Roker."

It was a family influence that led to Keith being a goalkeeper.

"Well my dad had always played in goal in local football and I heard his stories of being a keeper and so I naturally followed in his footsteps. Watching Sunderland as a lad I idolised Jim Montgomery, he was my hero and I tried to model myself on Monty. Then when I joined the club he was the goalkeeper"

“My strength was shot stopping, I was known for having good reactions. I guess my weakness was commanding my area and dealing with high balls. The criticism for this bugged me at the time; I’m not that bad I used to think. People always had an opinion and as a keeper you worked on all aspects of your game, but when one mistake can prove fatal that sets people’s viewpoint.”

 

 

Sadly, Keith never made a breakthrough at Sunderland.

"I mainly played junior and reserve team, football. I was always going to struggle to knock a club legend like Jim out of the team. I was released at 19 and in reality I could have no arguments about it. When Bob Stokoe told me I felt hurt by it, but I could see it was probably for the best at my age. It was very sad, I always wanted to play for my hometown club, but sometimes you have to move on to progress your career."

It was a big time in a young player's career and Keith was facing a career defining decision about what to do next.

"I was facing the likelihood of moving away from home and integrating into a new club. That was assuming I would find a club, something I was a bit concerned about. I was 19, without any first team experience. My name was circulated and I was lucky enough to go for talks at one or two clubs; Crewe and Grimsby. I was travelling back on the train from Blundell Park and I called my mum from Doncaster Station. "You haven’t signed anything have you?" she asked. "Because Peterborough are interested and would like to meet you." I got back home and met with Posh Assistant Manager John Barnwell at a Newcastle hotel where we discussed future plans. I then went down to meet Noel Cantwell, who was in charge at London Road. I felt comfortable with them and so I signed.”

This was the summer of 1976 and Peterborough were then in the old 3rd Division.

"I loved the set-up at London Road and immediately felt comfortable. Eric Steele - now coach at Manchester United - was the goalkeeper at the time and was reasonably well established. It was my job to work hard and try and put pressure on him for his place and see how things would progress."

In the end, Keith didn't have to wait long for his opportunity and it went nearly as well as he could have hoped, apart from the score line.

“It was mid-October 1976 and we had conceded 6 at Preston North End on the Saturday. In the week after the Preston game Noel Cantwell approached me to say I was going to make my debut the following Saturday, away at Brighton & Hove Albion. It was incredibly exciting and a potentially tough match, as Brighton were top of Division 3 at that time and I think they had scored 7 the week before."

"It was a bit worried, thinking about making my debut against a team doing so well, when we were having a bit of a hard time. I remember it feeling so different, I was used to playing in large football grounds, but they were usually empty for youth and reserve team matches. The Goldstone Ground was a proper, old fashioned football ground, large banks of terracing on several sides. I think the crowd was around 20,000 and they generated a great atmosphere. The other thing that sticks in the memory is the distinct smell of a football stadium."

"I was extremely excited going on to the pitch and didn't really feel the nerves. I felt that I had a decent, steady game and despite our 1-0 defeat I got decent write ups in the match reports. It was a good introduction to league football. I was in the team and it was up to me to keep my place. I got a great lift from my performance and I didn't want to lose the feeling. I wanted to forge a career as a professional footballer."

 

 

Keith successfully established himself in the first team at London Road and went on to spend 5 years there.

"After a couple of seasons I was linked with moves. I think Ipswich (then under Bobby Robson) and Tottenham had reportedly been watching me. It was great to hear yourself linked with big clubs, but you never knew if anything was going to come from it."

"In my final season at Posh we had a successful cup run, reaching the FA Cup 5th round where we lost 1-0 to Manchester City, who eventually lost to Spurs in the replay in the final thanks to Ricky Villa. It was a full house at London Road, a cracking atmosphere. I guess that increased exposure, at what was then a 4th Division club, helped raise my profile further."

With Keith coming to the end of his contract a call from old Sunderland team-mate Ian Porterfield led to a move to Bramall Lane.

“Ian knew me from my days at Sunderland and had just taken over as manager (United had suffered final day relegation and entered the 4th Division for the first time in their history) and I had a call from him inviting me down for talks. I felt at home straight away, arriving at Bramall Lane and thinking "Phwoar! This is for me!" I’d been linked with 1st Division clubs, but everything about the place said anything but 4th Division; the infrastructure, the support, the team that was being built and I was really bought into Ian's plans to take the club back to the top. I thought here was a club who I could go up through the leagues with. I had no hesitation in signing."

Porterfield had been given an unprecedented 10 year contract by Chairman Reg Brealey, who was keen to see his impressive on/off pitch plans come to fruition. United had a large number of players from the North East in the team at the time and this helped Keith settle.

“It helps you settle and bond as a team. There was a strong Sunderland connection as well – thanks to Ian Porterfield’s recruitment. Mick Henderson, Kevin Arnott, Joe Bolton and John McPhail were all in the squad. John played with me at Bristol City and I still see him occasionally when I go to Sunderland matches.” 

In Part 2, we talk about successful and disappointing times with the Blades and Wembley success with Bristol City.