-

A Game That Changed My Life

In the first of a regular feature, long-time Wanderers supporter, Trust member and President of the Official Wycombe Wanderers Supporters Association, Andy Worboys tells us about the game that got him hooked on the Chairboys.

November 21st 1970 goes down as one of the most significant days of my life. No, not the day I got married, nor the day either of my daughters was born (nor me for that matter!) but the day my father and uncle decided to take me and my cousin to a football match. Having been brought up in Farnham Common, we moved to Knotty Green in 1968 and my uncle’s family were over for the week-end. Before their night-long card games and demolishing bottles of Bacardi, they decided it would be a good idea to find a match to go to (my uncle was and still is an Arsenal shareholder and needed his Saturday fix).

We scoured the papers and decided to go to Loakes Park for the FA Cup 1st round derby between Wycombe and Slough Town. Nearly 7,000 turned up for this local grudge match and it ended all-square. Appropriately, the first ever Wycombe goal I saw was netted by the legendary Tony Horseman at the famous Gasworks End.

Tony Horseman c1960

Basically, that was it! I don’t know whether it was the quaint old ground with its sloping pitch, the aroma of pipe tobacco in the cowshed, the fanatical fans that ran from end to end as the sides chose which way to play or the unusual club colours of Oxford and Cambridge blue (note - not sky and navy)…but I was hooked. At that time I went to Wycombe RGS and a small group of us started to go along to matches together. I went by train from Beaconsfield and as you walked up the slight hill towards the ground there was always a tingling feeling of anticipation. That ground had something so special you would make a fortune if you could bottle it and sell it!

View of the FA Cup match between Wycombe and Peterborough United at the western end of Loakes Park, Dec 1973

Later that season I went to my first away game – a vital 1-0 win at Sutton United, the goal scored I think by Larry Pritchard. From then onwards I bought a season-ticket and I’ve still got one today. Some great games still seem like yesterday – beating Football League opposition for the first time (Newport County) in 1973 and winning 2-1 at Bournemouth the following year after a 0-0 draw at Loakes Park. And then there were the two titanic battles with Middlesbrough in the 3rd Round. Seeing Wycombe play in front of 30,000 at Ayresome Park was breathtaking. And of course the FA Cup run in 2001 and reaching the Semi-Final of the Carling Cup – pure drama!

There have also been some spectacular lows too. One of the worst-ever was driving back from Leeds University in 1977 to pick up some friends, then driving on to Minehead to see us lose 2-0 in the FA Cup. I was in Minehead a couple of months ago on business and could at least have a wry smile looking at the respective clubs today. Perhaps the most gut-wrenching was losing 2-1 to Hendon in the Amateur Cup Semi-Final at Brentford when thousands went from Wycombe. Nevertheless, the 3 visits to Wembley made up for it and I rate our win over Preston North End as the finest Wycombe performance I’ve ever seen. There have been some strange moments too – like seeing us beat Corinthian Casuals 2-1 in an Isthmian League game in December 1972, a match which was played on the outfield of the Oval cricket ground.

There must have been something in the air that day in 1970. Many of you will know Ian Blacklidge – it was his first Wycombe game too. And most of the people I knew then are still coming to every home game (and many away games), be they from London, Lincoln, Derby, Loughborough or around the Wycombe area. There’s a special bond between the Wanderers and their fans – but particularly those who were brought up watching the Blues at that famous old sloping ground next to the hospital.

Looking NE, a view of the town centre, Loakes Park and the north eastern outskirts from Tom Burt's Hill in the 1970's

Article by Andy Worboys
Pictures courtesy of Sharing Wycombe's Old Photographs

posted in special-features | 13.01.2009. 08:59

Comments:

This article hasn't been commented yet.

Write a comment

* = required field

:

:

:

:

Click to reload captcha image