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Old Everton Pictures

1st September 1962. The referee calls for urgent treatment for Everton goalkeeper Gordon West following a clash with Fulham winger Graham Leggat, at Craven Cottage. -
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T LEAFE said:
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Terry Christian, My first ever United game

http://www.sportingmemoriesnetwork.com/l1861/terry_christian_my_first_ever_united_game.aspx

I didn’t get to go to a United first team game at Old Trafford until I was 7. It was United’s first home game of 1969/70 Wednesday August 13th against glamour club Everton. Due to the fact that the World Cup was to take place the following summer, that season kicked off early, on the 9th August with Manchester United taking on the newly promoted Crystal Palace at Selhurst Park. Alex Stepney, United’s goalkeeper was injured at the time, so Jimmy Rimmer (later to become an excellent first team keeper with Aston Villa’s successful sides of the mid seventies to early eighties) was deputising. Of course I’d seen Jimmy Rimmer in the reserves for United on those forgettable occasions our Tony had tried to put me off football for life. The United team had struggled against Palace in that opening game, drawing 2-2 with United ‘s goals coming from dashing Scottish winger Willie Morgan and the stalwart Bobby Charlton. Now their first home game was against Everton on a Wednesday night, August 13th, a match which provided me with that pessimistic streak all us true United fans carry deep in our hearts .

Football even then wasn’t cheap. It cost 2/6 for a junior (12.5 pence, now it seems cheap, but my pocket money at the time was 9d a week 4p in modern money) to stand in the Stretford End Paddock, which was where the Stretford End curved round onto the south stand with all the executive boxes. Basically the Paddock was the Stretford End for kids and people who didn’t like strangers urinating down the backs of their legs. It was a 7.30pm kick off and we arrived at the ground by 6pm. I’ll always feel sorry for youngsters now who will never see over sixty thousand spectators at Old Trafford with the massed ranks of United fans leading the chorus and singing their hearts out .

To the tune of Al Jolson’s Mammy ” Oh Denis, Denis, I’d walk a million miles for one of your goals, oh Denis. “ To the tune of Gin Gan Goolie “We’ve got Willie, Willie, Willie Morgan on the wing, on the wing”, " Champions of Europe ” , “You’re going home by F…..ing ambulance." "We don’t carry bottles, we don’t carry lead, we only carry hatchets to bury in your head, we are the great supporters and that is everyone, we only hate Man City, Leeds and Everton." And to the tune of, Land Of Hope and Glory, "We hate Nottingham Forest, we hate Liverpool too (and Leicester), we hate Manchester City, but United we love you “. "I get a funny feeling inside of me, when I see United score, Maybe it’s because I’m from Manchester, where the king is Denis Law.”

The crowd around us swelled until we could hardly breathe as the ground filled with more and more people with the approach of kick off. We were down by the wall and tried to climb up and sit on it, only to be shoved off it by the stewards . Standing on tip toes I could see the players from what seemed like the legs up, before the weight of people from behind caused me to duck suffocatingly beneath the mass of bodies. My cousin Phillip seemed most perturbed. He didn’t like big crowds or wide open spaces. He caught his asthmatic breath and looked around him nervously, the sweat shining off his face accentuating his teenage acne. My Aunty Mag later said that Phillip was both claustrophobic and agoraphobic and I now know that there’s only one thing worse than agoraphobia …. and that’s going out. From the scoreboard end the Everton fans were singing. "Everton, Everton", in the gaps the United fans shouted "[Poor language removed] , [Poor language removed]." My shoulders were squashed inwards, my feet were suffering cramp from standing on tip toes. Would I be able to see over this wall when Bobby Charlton scored? There were more songs about Dennis Law. But as the teams came onto the field choruses of ” Kiddo, Kiddo" rose up from around the ground hailing United’s young striker and more importantly to the United crowd local boy made good, Brian Kidd. The Everton team in their royal blue shirts were full of big names. Howard Kendall, Alan Ball, Brian Labone, Ray Wilson, Colin Harvey, Jimmy Husband, Joe Royle, Gordon West. Our Tony pointed out that there were so many internationals in that team and he was worried as United were without Nobby Stiles, Eire international left back Tony Dunne as well as first choice goalie Alex Stepney with Jimmy Rimmer who went on to play for Arsenal and win a league championship medal with Aston Villa deputising.

The match took on a familiar pattern with Everton seeming to be first to every fifty fifty ball. United may have been the best team in the world, but on this particular night Everton made them look very much second rate and the Goodison school of science made my first trip to Old Trafford an unhappy one. The final score was Man United 0 v 2 Everton; I had seen my first United game at Old Trafford, but it was to be some time before I could understand what our Tony had got so excited about. Still I’d seen all those players from my football cards in the flesh, it meant a lot to me, and with the way some of them played, I had no doubt that I could and would one day do much better than them when it was my turn to pull on that red jersey in front of sixty thousand people and hear my name ringing from the terraces.
 



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