Category: Risen From The Dust

You're having a laugh

11/24/2018

An edited version of this article appeared in the Cambridge United matchday programme for the game against Bury on 24 November 2018.

There are times when, if you’re a United supporter and especially if you inhabit the Habbin, you don’t know whether to laugh or cry.

But we’re lucky in that we’ve always had people who have helped to make the decision easy. Some players take it as read that their job is to entertain as well as to win matches.

Larger-than-life characters have always stalked the Abbey’s corridors, and there was none larger than player-turned-manager Chris Turner. As far as Turns was concerned every day was April Fool’s Day, but we’re leaving the reporting of his exploits to Ian Darler: the butt of more than one Turner prank, Ian is publishing his memoirs next autumn.

But for more tales of mirthful merrymaking, you need only turn to Celery & Coconuts, Andrew Bennett’s peerless history of our club. Volume two, Risen from the Dust, examines the case of ‘Gentleman’ Jim Sharkey in some detail.

Kevin Tully in 1974/75: call him Twinkletoes

Former Celtic forward Jim, who arrived at the Abbey in 1962, was a ball player and joker par excellence. Seldom to be seen without his bowler hat and rolled-up umbrella – sometimes even on the pitch – he enjoyed a good wind-up as much as the next man.

Frank Dersley, who tended to injured players with his magic sponge in the 60s and 70s, remembered the time when Sharkey went down in the far corner of an Abbey pitch that had been saturated by days of torrential rain.

It was still pelting down, Frank recalled. ‘I ran across and was covered in mud and soaked to the skin by the time I arrived at Sharkey, and as I got there he looked up at me, winked and said: “Give us a kiss.” He had only feigned injury to get me soaked.’

One of Sharkey’s successors as clown prince was signed by Bill Leivers in 1974. Going by the name of Kevin ‘Call me Twinkletoes’ Tully, he was a gifted left winger and a dedicated japester who just didn’t know when to stop.

Some of Tully’s antics are recorded in Champagne & Corona, volume three of Celery & Coconuts, which is on sale via the CFU online store and at the caravan on match days..

He had once sat on the Blackpool bench fully clothed under his tracksuit, praying he wouldn’t be needed. A habitual thumb-sucker, he probably wasn’t too surprised when the players hung a huge baby’s dummy on his peg.

During a 4-1 win at Exeter at the end of 1974/75, Tully enjoyed top billing as United showed off a bit. At one point he knelt on the ball, daring the Grecians to try to take it off him, and later celebrated a goal by prancing around with his shorts at half-mast around his knees.

Ron Atkinson, Leivers’ successor as manager, eventually tired of the Tully capers. In his autobiography he noted that fines made not the slightest impression on the errant entertainer’s behaviour.

‘One day I’d had enough,’ recalled Big Ron. ‘I called him into the dressing room, locked all the doors, and clocked him.’

But Atkinson was fond of a joke too: ‘Even though I was always having to discipline him, some of his antics were so funny that there were occasions when I laughed at him instead of frowning.’

Cheerio
Harry

Left, golf fanatic Jim Sharkey during his time as a porter at Pembroke College; photo: Pembroke College. Above, bowler-hatted in earlier days; photo: Cambridge Evening News

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Moore, please

11/19/2018

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An edited version of this article appeared in the Cambridge United matchday programme for the game against Notts County on 20 February 2018.

Half-close your eyes and squint at the fuzzy, poor-quality photograph on the right. There are some unforgettable faces there; award yourself five points if you can name them all.

Clue: you’re looking for the likes of John ‘Shaggy’ Taylor, Tom Youngs, Alex Russell, ‘Dancing’ Shaun Marshall, Paul ‘Captain Fantastic’ Wanless, Andy Duncan and Martin Butler.

Above: Cambridge United players and manager with the 1997/98 PFA Bobby Moore Fair Play Trophy; below the trophy, which is on display in Coconuts' mini-museum, The Story of the U's

There are several others; some of them achieved great things at United and elsewhere. It’s a talented group of young men and also, it appears, a happy bunch.

Why wouldn’t they be? They’ve obviously passed a fun half-hour in creating an imaginative backdrop and they’re grouped round one of England’s most respected players and managers of recent decades – a man who a few months later would lead them to promotion to Division Three.

And Roy McFarland (for it is he) is showing off a rather handsome pot earned by the lads the previous season – the PFA Bobby Moore Fair Play Trophy for 1997/98 – topped by a black 'n' amber Father Christmas titfer.

Roy Mac, although proud of his charges for achieving the best disciplinary record in the Premier and Football Leagues, was at pains to stress the team’s fighting qualities when he spoke to reporters. ‘We are not a soft touch and not a lightweight side,’ he insisted.

It’s true that United, with battlers like Wanless, Duncan and Ian Ashbee in the side, could never have been accused of being softies. And the hefty presence up front of Trevor Benjamin ruled out any ‘lightweight’ jibes.

Indeed, the U’s claimed the award despite seeing two players – Messrs Wanless and Butler – make early use of the showers in one game. Then again, that match was the infamous FA Cup second round replay at Stevenage Borough in December 1997, when United were eliminated thanks to one of the most ridiculously inept refereeing performances ever seen in the Home Counties.

You can inspect the Fair Play Trophy at close quarters when you visit The Story of the U’s, our little museum in the Supporters’ Club. Write to 100yearsofcoconuts@gmail.com to arrange that visit. (To answer the disappointed punter who wrote words to the effect of ‘is that it?’ in the visitors’ book: yes, we know it’s small, but it’s a start.)

Our email enquiry to the PFA about the current status of the award met with a response from no less a personage than the union’s chief executive. ‘Yes,’ wrote Golden Gordon, ‘the award still exists, with prize money of £15,000 for community work and players and management.’

Established in 1988, it was of course named after a man who exemplified the spirit of fair play and was also one of the game’s greatest practitioners. Bobby Moore was, according to Franz Beckenbauer, ‘the best defender in the history of the game’, and Jock Stein observed: ‘There should be a law against him. He knows what's happening 20 minutes before everyone else.’

United’s connections with Moore don’t end with the capture of the 1997/98 trophy. As Andrew Bennett revealed in Risen from the Dust, the U’s provided the opposition to an all-star XI in Chelmsford manager Peter Harburn’s testimonial on 10 May 1966, and Moore and Geoff Hurst were among the guest players.

Hurst nabbed three goals in a 4-3 win for the stars. I wonder when his next hat-trick was.

Cheerio
Harry

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It's a record breaker!

8/7/2018

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It was an unforgettable occasion for any Cambridge United supporter … the day Chelsea brought the FA Cup to the Abbey Stadium.

It was 1 May 1970 and, as Coconuts vice-chair Barry Benton remembers, the Pensioners had won the Cup just two days before, after a replay in a bruising encounter with Leeds United.

A couple of years before that, when they bought gangly young striker Ian Hutchinson from the U's, they had agreed to play a money-spinning friendly against United.

It was hardly surprising that United's record home attendance of 14,000 – a record that will probably never be beaten – was set that day. Every square inch of the ground was occupied as Chelsea paraded the Cup before kick-off.

Luckily, someone took a cine camera along to record the proceedings for posterity. We're immensely grateful to David Smith for providing the resultant film in video format. Click the button above to relive history.

Details of the events can be found in Risen from the Dust, the second volume of Andrew Bennett's Celery & Coconuts history of our club. Buy your copy at the CFU online shop or from the caravan on a match day.

Suffice it to say that, as the U's had a rather important fixture the following day – the home game against Margate that would bring them their second successive Southern League title – they wanted to take it easy, and a Chelsea reserve side took their place for the second half.

Moments from that Margate match are also preserved in David Smith's wonderful film. A George Harris penalty and a Bill Cassidy clincher effectively took United into the Football League.

Footage of the celebrations and of the Southern League championship shield being borne aloft in a sea of bodies brings it all back … precious memories of an amazing two days in Cambridge United history.

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A foot in both camps

1/6/2018

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An edited version of this article first appeared in the 24-30 May 2017 issue of the Cambridge Independent.

Andrew Bennett’s definitive history of Cambridge United, Risen from the Dust (available from the CFU store) picks up where the first volume, Newmarket Road Roughs, left off in 1951, and ends with United being elected to the Football League in 1970.

It’s memory-stirring stuff for us old codgers for many reasons, but perhaps the most evocative passages are those that cover the old U’s-City rivalry.

Younger readers will probably struggle with this: back then, the battle for football supremacy in Cambridge meant just as much to supporters as those in Liverpool or Manchester. We lived in a divided city.

Eagerly awaited derbies drew massive crowds, and as a fan you were either a U or a Lilywhite. But there have always been players who were happy to be either.

It started in 1921, when Abbey United loaned top scorer Wally Wilson to Cambridge Town for a big FA Cup tie against Kettering. As United began to rise up the Cambs League, their players started to attract regular attention from the bigger, wealthier Town.

During the 1920s, Bert Langford, Bill ‘Pim’ Stearn, Tom Caldecote, Frank Luff, Cyril Morley, ‘Erstie’ Clements and Harold ‘Darley’ Watson were all tempted to cross the river; at a time of rising unemployment, Town could offer the players off-pitch jobs.

In 1936, striker Harry Mann scored hat-tricks in his first two games for United, whereupon Town snapped him up. The exodus continued before and after World War II as Reg Kimberley, Joe Richardson and Den Smith moved north of the Cam but, once the U’s turned semi-pro in 1947, the flow slowed to a trickle.

Former Town players Tony Gallego, Len Hartley, Fred Mansfield and Stan Thurston all signed for United, although not directly from Milton Road. A turning point came in 1950 when Town’s top scorer, Neville Haylock, defected to the U’s, and Bill O’Donnell, Ted Culver and Len Linturn also later crossed to Newmarket Road, the latter causing a minor sensation in turning pro.

Matt McVittie, who played for both Cambridge clubs, scores for United in a Southern League Premier Division local derby match on 29 September 1962. City won 2-1 in front of a crowd of 6,892. Photo: Cambridge Evening News.

In 1958 City turned professional too. They signed the skilful Eddie Robinson from United in 1959, and when the U’s began employing only full-timers in 1960, hitman Brian Moore, wanting to keep his job at Pye Telecom, moved to Milton Road.

During the 1960s the rivalry intensified but the player traffic continued. United signed City full back Dai Jones in 1962, and a year later City exchanged cash and Willie Devine for U’s forward Freddie Bunce. United captured Barry Smith, Roy Poole and Billy Wall from Milton Road, while Frank Allen, John Hiner, Norman Bleanch, Matt McVittie and Gerry Graham (signed by former U Roy Kirk) moved north.

The clubs’ paths diverged in 1968 when City experienced relegation for the first time. From now on, players signing for the Lilywhites, such as Gerry Baker (1969) and Wes Maughan (1970), were surplus to requirements at United. When the U’s were elected to the League, decades of rivalry effectively ended.

But cross-Cam dealings have continued. The clubs may now be four pyramid levels apart, but players will doubtless swap amber for white as long as they exist.

Cheerio
Harry

Tony Gallego saves for Cambridge United at King's Lynn. Photo: Lynn News & Advertiser.

It was apt that Joe and Tony Gallego should play for both senior Cambridge clubs – which, at the time that they first appeared, were known as Cambridge Town and Abbey United.

It was our city that welcomed the brothers as refugees in 1937, when they fled their native Basque country to escape Hitler’s deadly Condor Legion bombers.

The Legion, flying in support of Francisco Franco’s Nationalists during the Spanish Civil War, killed the Gallego children’s father when it bombed the Basque town of Guernica.

Their mother placed five of her kids in an orphanage, but they were soon on their way to Britain aboard the liner Habana. They settled well in Cambridge – and football played a big role in the process.

‘Football meant everything to us; it was the only thing we knew about,’ Antonio (known as Tony) told El Pais in 2012. ‘We got attached to Cambridge and made a lot of friends here through playing football.’

Goalkeeper Tony and winger José (Joe) signed for Town as teenagers. Tony moved to the Abbey in 1943 before rejoining Joe at Milton Road, spending time as a professional with Norwich and then returning to United in 1947.

Joe left Town for Brentford and went on to play for Southampton and Colchester, but came back to United in 1951.

The Gallegos stayed in Cambridge for the rest of their lives, Joe dying in 2006 at the age of 82 and 90-year-old Tony passing away in 2015. I’ve Got a Lovely Bunch of Coconuts rang out loud and proud at the funeral.

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Review: Risen from the Dust

11/23/2017

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Andrew Stephen, editor of the CFU fanzine Amber News, gives his impressions of volume two of Celery & Coconuts, Andrew Bennett's history of Abbey/Cambridge United.

I find it almost impossible to like books about sport in general and about football in particular. Most writers who know about their sport find it difficult to convey the sense of excitement generated by a live event. Being there, when something that matters to you is happening, is a deeply personal thing. Football writers increasingly kill off their subjects with a kind of trainspotter’s approach to statistics, or, in the case of the tabloid ‘journalists’, a desire to dwell on celebrity and gossip rather than the nuances of the game.

Of course, Andrew Bennett has been writing match reports, with flair, insight and no little humour, for years. And he is a man who can be trusted with the history of the world’s greatest football team.

I was nearly seven when the fifties came to an end but this book brings that vital decade vividly to life, explaining how Abbey United were gradually transformed into a much more professional outfit ready to dominate the Southern League. Those watching games in that era will tell you that Wilf Mannion, even at 38 years old, was the greatest player ever to play for Cambridge United. Volunteers continued to develop and sometimes build parts of the ground, players of pedigree came and went and the club’s directors became ever more ambitious.

For me, the acid test for this book covered the games between 1967 and our election to the Football League, my first three years as a fan.

Leaving aside scores and their significance, I was taken back to paying 1/6d at the turnstiles as a Junior, the smell of sweet pipe tobacco at the Newmarket Road End, buying pies from the Supporters’ Club on the terrace which is now the Disabled Enclosure and the expectation of winning every game.

As the pages turned, I could see once again Ian Hutchinson’s booming long throws, the bravery of Rodney Slack, the elegance of Robin Hardy and the class of George Harris. Life was simpler then; cash on the gate, only one manager, no ‘simulation’, no corporate pressures or obsession with image – but I digress.

And there were the downsides, like the fateful Easter when we lost twice to our big rivals Chelmsford City. The following season, having bought their four best players, we were ready to storm into the Football League. And the rest, as they say, is history.

Andrew is a fine writer and a real fan. If you like football, nostalgia and the story of a little club which became great because of its people, you’ll love this.

Risen from the Dust: The story of Cambridge United Football Club; 1951-1970 by Andrew Bennett. Published by Lovely Bunch. £19.99 (£1 discount for CFU members). Available online at cambridgefansunited.org/store/c4/Books.html and from the CFU caravan on a match day.

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Rise and shine

9/26/2017

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This article appeared in the Cambridge United programme for the match against Forest Green Rovers on 26 September 2017.

Several elements of the photograph on this page allow us to date it to the late 1960s/early1970s. The buzz cut, braces and button-down collar sported by the tall gent on the left, for example, were undoubtedly complemented by a pair of DMs, useful in the event of the aggro that was all too prevalent at the time.

The real giveaway, of course, forms the centrepiece of the tableau and permits us to pinpoint its exact date: 2 May 1970. The magnificent trophy held aloft by Malcolm Lindsay and his U’s teammates is the Southern League championship shield, and they had just won it by beating Margate 2-0 in the final league match of the season.

Play Spot the Player and you’ll pick out Jimmy Thompson, Robin Hardy and Terry Eades. Those of us who were around at the time could pass a happy half-hour playing Spot the Fan among the masses on the Abbey pitch.

It’s a memorable image, which is one reason it was chosen for the front cover of Risen from the Dust, the second volume of Andrew Bennett’s Celery & Coconuts history of Abbey/Cambridge United. It will be published next month; preorder your copy now from the CFU online store or the caravan in the front car park on a match day.

Another reason for the photograph’s choice is that it represents the culmination of two decades of sky-high ambition, dogged determination and sheer, unceasing hard work on the part of supporters, directors, officials and players. The rapidity of the club’s rise from local league part-timers to a position that made it almost impossible for Football League clubs not to elect United to join them was unprecedented. It will never be repeated.

In the early weeks of 1951, the year in which Risen from the Dust opens, the U’s were still called Abbey United and were grubbing around in the semi-pro United Counties League.

A limited liability company looking after the club’s affairs – a declaration of the ambition burning bright at Newmarket Road – had been set up the year before, but the change of name to Cambridge United and acceptance into the Eastern Counties League were still in the future. Even the Southern League, at that time the biggest non-League competition, was a very distant prospect.

The book recounts the story of the nineteen short years it took the U’s to surge upwards through the ECL and the Southern League, win the latter twice and its league cup three times and hammer irresistibly on the door of the Football League’s art deco headquarters in Lytham St Annes.

Over the course of 388 pages, Andrew (belated congratulations on your appointment as club historian, lad) covers all the great moments and talking points in his familiar, eminently readable style. They include the development of the Abbey funded and carried out by supporters, the sight of football legend Wilf Mannion in amber and black, the unforgettable derby tussles of the 60s, the incredibly successful pools operation driven by Dudley Arliss, the constant bitter argument over the issue of City-United amalgamation … it’s all there. And stats fans get page after page of the factual stuff.

It can be yours for the ridiculously low price of £19.99, or £1 less if you’re a CFU member. We look forward to taking your order.
Cheerio
Harry

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You're having a laugh

Moore, please

It's a record breaker!

A foot in both camps

Review: Risen from the Dust

Rise and shine

Happy Harry's blog

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