There we were, minding our own business and showing supporters round The Story of the U's, Coconuts' mini-museum in the Supporters' Club.

The next minute, the tiny space was jam-packed with fashionable beards and tracksuits.

We were delighted to welcome the entire Cambridge United first-team squad to our display during the club's open day at the Abbey Stadium yesterday.

Gary 'Deegs' Deegan was particularly taken with the 1950s-vintage shinpads, and keepers Dimitar 'Dimi' Mitov and David 'Fordey' Forde could only marvel at their predecessor Rodney Slack's gloves, hand-crocheted in the 1960s.

The gloves were hand-crocheted, not Rodney.

Meanwhile, over by the Abbey Arms, Marvin 'Marv' the Moose was 'avin' a go at the coconuts, and many a child went home wondering what to do with their prize, the whiskery fruit of the Cocos nucifera.

Thanks to the Abbey Lounge/Cambridge United Supporters' Club and to Cambridge United and its community trust for their continued support for 100 Years of Coconuts.

See you all again next year. Meanwhile, if you'd like to visit The Story of the U's and learn more about the story of your club – or if you don't know what to do with the kids during the school holidays – contact us here or drop a line to 100yearsofcoconuts@gmail.com.

An edited version of this article appeared in the Cambridge United matchday programme for the game against Luton Town on 3 March 2018.

When talk turns to big clubs’ practice of ‘stockpiling’ young players, whereby the closest most will ever get to first-team football is on loan at another club, the word ‘Chelsea’ often crops up.

With good reason: at the time of writing, Roman Abramovich’s pet project had 38 players out on loan, and goodness knows how many other youngsters queuing up behind them.

The West London giants have always had an eye for young talent, but there was no question of stockpiling when they snapped up the 19-year-old Ian Hutchinson from United in 1968. Nor is there any suggestion that the Pensioners had anything but the best of intentions for the career of Abbey United’s youthful George Alsop when he left for Stamford Bridge in the early 1920s.

This is a revised version of an article that appeared in the Cambridge United matchday programme for the game against Cochester United on 2 September 2017.

They’re off … and as they pass the Abbey Church in Newmarket Road it’s Warren and Ellis jostling for the lead. Ellis last year’s winner, of course.

Past the brickyards, and at the Paper Mills it’s Warren making the pace. Out on the muddy Quy road it’s still Warren, looking remarkably fresh. He reaches the turn at Bottisham Swan in style, with Ellis looking good too, but trailing. My word, this is fast.

The runners are facing a stiff headwind on the return leg, but that doesn’t bother Warren.

The following is a revised version of an article that appeared in the Cambridge United matchday programme for the game against Leeds United on 9 January 2017.

Before a recent match the Coconuts team were selling copies of Andrew Bennett’s Newmarket Road Roughs and, while they were at it, handing out Let’s Kick Racism Out Of Football stickers and badges. The chat turned to a BBC documentary, broadcast in November 2016, about West Bromwich legend Len Cantello’s 1979 testimonial match, Whites vs Blacks: How Football Changed a Nation.

You couldn’t imagine a game pitting a team of black players against an all-white XI taking place today. But back in 1979 black footballers were still a rarity in England, and the few there were often had to listen to horrifying, lengthy racist broadsides from the terraces. Thank God more enlightened attitudes have prevailed … at least in most places.

What a glorious contribution black players have made to the Cambridge United cause – and it started way back in the 1960s.

Ask any U’s fan of a certain age about the identity of the first black player to pull on an amber shirt and they’ll probably say it was Dennis Walker in 1968. We posed the same question to the late Andrew Bennett, and he put us right: the first black U was Attu Mensah.

The 20-year-old Ghana international came to England in 1964 and did the rounds of trials at Charlton, Norwich, St Neots, Newmarket and Cambridge City before landing at the Abbey.

His only U’s appearance was in the almost legendary Mithras Cup, in which United had drawn Hornchurch. In the second leg at the Abbey on October 5, Mensah scored his team’s second goal in a 4-1 win, dictating the midfield play and supplying pinpoint passes. ‘The crowd loved the Ghanaian, who responded to the praise of the fans,’ said the Cambridge Daily News.

Sadly, that was the last those fans were to see of Mensah. He moved on to Ely City, St Neots and Port Vale, and represented his country in the 1968 Olympic Games before moving to the USA to study, play and coach football.

The next black player to happen along Newmarket Road was Alva Anderson, who became the first Jamaican to represent United. He was studying for an economics and marketing degree at Fitzwilliam College, had earned a boxing Blue and had already played for Jamaica in a World Cup match.

His first appearance was at wing half in a 3-1 home friendly defeat of Luton in October 1965, and he made three Midland Floodlit League appearances before moving back to Jamaica. There he represented his country at both football and hockey and has since followed a distinguished career in sports administration and business.

It was three years before former Busby Babe Dennis Walker arrived. The 23-year-old had already become the first black player to play for Manchester United, and had appeared more than 150 times in four years for York City before joining the U’s.

Appointed team captain, he drove United on to the Southern League championship and the Southern League Cup in his first season. It was Walker’s free kick that Tony Butcher converted to open the scoring in the 3-0 title clincher against Kettering on 3 May 1969.

He maintained his place at the heart of the side in 1969/70 and, once in the Football League from 1970 on, showed his versatility by filling in at centre half and up front when needed. He was granted a free transfer and moved on to Poole Town in 1972.
​
Sadly, the trailblazing Walker died in 2003.His United record was 23 goals in 202 appearances, and he left many magical memories.

This is an edited version of an article that appeared in the Cambridge United matchday programme for the game against Bristol Rovers on 30 October 2015.
 
It was good to see Steve Fallon back at the Abbey in March, when he took his place among those shortlisted for a place in the Cambridge United Hall of Fame.

We were nodding our heads as his old teammate Alan Biley said that of all the men he played with at United, Steve was the most suited to grace the top of the game.

He never played at English football's highest level. It's that division's loss: it is the poorer for never seeing Steve show just how good a footballer he was.

He's been associated with Cambridge so long, it’s easy to forget that he grew up near the other place.

Yes, he’s a native of Whittlesey and as an impressionable youngster professed a fondness for Tottenham Hotspur and Posh.

​Those youthful indiscretions have long been forgiven, for Steve matured into one of the greatest footballers and servants of the game our city has ever had.

Count ’em: 446 appearances (and the little matter of 30 goals) in all competitions for United, in a career that spanned 13 seasons.

Then he goes and makes a good fist of a job in the club’s commercial department while limbering up for a management career that took in Cambridge City, Histon, Soham Town Rangers and Histon again.

The years he spent in his first spell at Bridge Road, taking the team from the Eastern Counties League to the Conference play-off semi-finals, may have coloured some younger fans’ views of the man, but who will forget his appearance at the head of the United supporters’ solidarity march ahead of our last Football League game of 2005?

Ken Shellito didn’t say much worth listening to during his brief tenure as gaffer in 1985, but it was nail-on-head stuff when he explained why he made Steve his captain: ‘I thought [he] should have the job because he is Cambridge United … In the time I have been at Cambridge I have never heard anyone say a bad word about him as a player or as a person.’

It was a much more successful manager, Ron Atkinson, who had brought Steve from Kettering to Newmarket Road in March 1975.

We think of him as a centre back of skill, strength and intelligence, but it was as a left back and in midfield that he established himself, before teaming up with the likes of Brendon Batson and Dave Stringer as his central defensive career flourished.

Those illustrious names would later be joined as defensive partners by such black-and-amber legends as Lindsay ‘Wolfie’ Smith, David Moyes, Andy Beattie, Keith Osgood and Chris Turner.

He knew where the goal was, too, as an unforgettable, 40-yard volleyed screamer at Gillingham in January 1978 showed.

He was at it again, from closer range this time, as United overcame Exeter 2-1 later that season to climb into the Second Division.

Top clubs like Tottenham and Derby offered sums up to £200,000 for his services, but his United career was far from finished.

Steve was a tower of strength throughout United’s amazing six-year spell in the second tier and beyond, as the club’s fortunes plummeted in the mid-80s.

By now the number of knee operations was beginning to mount and, finally, he was forced to call it a day in November 1986, at the early age of 30.

This is an edited version of an article that appeared in the November 2017 issue of Amber News. With those puzzled by the introduction of a bridge motif on United away shirts in mind, Andy Fox, our resident badge and shirt expert – you might almost think of him as the Coconuts badger – tells the story of the classic United emblem and argues for a return to our roots.
 
My dad used to say we had a proper badge once. And he was right.
 
Here’s a short history lesson. (Sorry if that sounds patronising; I know a lot of you have graced this earth and supported United a lot longer than me.)
 
The pics reproduced here show our original badge … well, more or less. Let me explain.
 
Despite becoming Cambridge United in 1951, rendering the old ‘AU’ motif redundant, we didn’t have a badge until someone came up with this idea. It was designed and created in 1963, in time for the cover of the 1963/64 programme, and remained there until the late 1960s.
 
It’s incredible to think that we have never worn this badge on a shirt. OK, yes, there was a hybridised version on the yellow (eek!) and black quarter shirts between 1996 and 1998, when kit supplier Patrick went through one of its retro phases.
 
It’s equally astounding to note that U’s players didn’t wear a badge on their shirts from 1951 to 1974, full stop.
 
Twenty-three years and no badge on the shirt … that’s weird, even allowing for the spell in the 60s when badges on shirts became rather passé. Did no one question it? Dad?
 
The images show us the coat of arms of the city of Cambridge adorning a shield. This will be familiar if you’ve ever jumped in a cab outside the station or clocked the design above the entrance to the Guildhall.
 
The CUFC monogram needs no explanation. Did Carlisle and Colchester exist then?
 
The original badge (shown on the programme bottom right) featured two smaller shields, to the left and the right. On the left was the motif of the Cambridge & District Sportsmen’s Guild, a fundraising outfit formed in the early 1960s and based at the Supporters’ Club. To the right was the badge of the Supporters’ Club itself.
 
Come 1971, these emblems had disappeared from the badge – evidence perhaps of less than harmonious relations between various parties. Some may say those differences remain to this day, although the Guild was dissolved many years ago.
 
Moving down, we see the ‘Abbey’ construction, paying homage, folklore tells us, to the Abbey Church (the Church of St Andrew, to give it its full name) on Newmarket Road. This should need no clarification: it gives its name to the district that I and CUFC inhabit, to the city council ward, to the parish of St Andrew the Less and apparently to a little sporting institution that commenced proceedings in 1912.
 
The ball, the goal and the verdant turf remind us what sport we’re talking about.
 
Finally, we have the scroll at the bottom emblazoned with United In Endeavour, the club’s (un)official motto – as much CUFC as black and amber, Coconuts, Harry Habbin, Corona soft drinks and Ian Darler.
 
It was coined in the 1960s, when so many volunteers, unified in their hard work, contributed so much to the construction of the Abbey Stadium, particularly the Habbin Stand.
 
I mentioned 1971 above. That was the last time we saw this badge (minus the two shields) in any way representing Cambridge United.
 
Decent as it was to see it on the cover of every home programme during the 1971/72 season, one cannot help but view this as a rather ignominious exit for such a glorious creation.
 
Come the start of the 1972/73 season, the ‘book and ball’ badge was on its way, finding itself on the shirt front at the beginning of 1974/75. Only United could take two seasons to get a new badge from the programme cover on to the shirt – more weirdness.
 
And now I look at our current badge.
 
How has this ‘effort’ survived over 30 years? How much thinking went into it? If you took away the scroll at the bottom, who would be able to tell whose badge it is?

As these things always do, this week's unveiling of a new shirt – in this case the garment to be worn away from home in 2018/19 – has provoked lively debate on the information superhighway, as I believe it's called.

This year's shirt, fetchingly modelled on the right by our Greg, may not be to everyone's taste, but we at Coconuts salute United's nod to the history of our club and our city in the incorporation of a bridge motif.

'This year's jersey,' says the club, 'pays homage to the current club crest and its connections with Magdalene Bridge, previously known as the Great Bridge, located in the centre of the city between Magdalene Street and Bridge Street.'

You know, one of the bridges that are crowded with smart young men brandishing clipboards, hoping in vain to persuade me to part with a month's wages in return for a brief outing on a river already dangerously full of suckers. Sorry, that should be 'full of punters'.

'The bridge, which was built in 1823,' continues the club, 'marks the site of an important Roman-era river crossing that provided all routes, both long-distance and local, with a crossing point across the river Cam.'

​'But,' cries Disgusted of Prickwillow, 'Magdalene Bridge looks nothing like that! It hasn't got any castellations!'

That's true; the present bridge is not castellated. What we need to know here is that the motif on the shirt borrows from part of the city of Cambridge's coat of arms, which in turn forms part of the classic United crest beloved of 100 Years of Coconuts.

No need to mention names, but one Coconutter is so enamoured of that badge that he's had it painted on a wall in his house. Cast your eyes immediately to the right for this extraordinary piece of mural art.

At this point, we need to acquaint ourselves with the coat of arms in question (pictured below, right).

A proper description of the arms, in heraldry talk, is: 'Gules a Bridge of one arch surmounted by three Towers Or in chief a Fleur-de-Lys Gold between two Roses Argent the base barry wavy of the last and Azure thereon three Ships each with one mast and yardarm the sail furled also Sable.'

Need a translation? It goes something like this: Red background; a gold, single-arch bridge with three towers; above, a gold fleur-de-lys and two silver roses; below, wavy black lines and three black, single-masted ships with yardarms, their sails furled, on a blue background.

Let's not concern ourselves with the fiddly bits on top or the seahorses either side (although we prefer to think of the latter as hippocampi, creatures that, legend tells us, pulled Neptune's chariot). You can see quite clearly that the away shirt motif is a representation of the bridge in the coat of arms.

Have a look at the shield displayed in The Story of the U's, Coconuts' mini-museum in the Supporters' Club, pictured bottom right.

Again we have the bridge and again we have the fleur-de-lys and two white roses (all three symbolic of charters granted to Cambridge in medieval times).

Again we have the three ships, harking back to the time when the town was largely surrounded by water and much of its trade was river-borne.

Why is the bridge depicted as castellated? Your guess is as good as ours; maybe the Great Bridge did have castellations when the coat of arms was granted in 1575, although it's unlikely: all bridges in this location were built of timber until a stone crossing was put up in 1754.

If you're only interested in football and shirts, you can stop reading now, but we're not finished. We at Coconuts are equally fascinated by the history of our wonderful city and its buildings, and the story of the Great Bridge is immensely rewarding.

It goes back to at least the ninth century. By 1279, it was in such bad repair that carts often fell into the river, despite promises made by the sheriff (either Walter Shelfhanger – fantastic name! – or William le Moyne) that he would use the proceeds of a heavy 'pontage' tax he had imposed to rebuild it in stone.

He did nothing of the sort, preferring to patch the bridge up with hurdles and timber and probably pocketing the moneys he'd pulled in.

An edited version of this article appeared in the Cambridge United matchday programme for the game against Carlisle United on 16 April 2016.

Two characters who went on to play big roles in the Cambridge United story clashed when England played Northern Ireland at Wembley on 15 May 1974.

Roy McFarland, the home side’s assured, cultured 25-year-old centre half, was up against rather less cultured opposition in the shape of a certain Samuel John Morgan.

It didn’t go well for Roy: he was forced off with an Achilles injury after just 36 minutes, having come off worse in a challenge with our Sammy. He was neither the first nor the last to suffer that fate. 

It took him a year to recover, but he eventually played on, continuing his distinguished career with Derby County and earning 28 caps for his country before moving into player-managership with Bradford City.

Further spells in the gaffer’s chair followed at Derby and Bolton and, when Tommy Taylor left the Abbey Stadium, amid acrimony, for Leyton Orient, Roy applied for, and on 13 November 1996 secured, the manager’s job at Division Three United.