View Full Version : Why I'm an eagle
This time last year we had a 'Why I'm an eagle' discussion- Unfortunately these were lost- http://cpfc.org/ubb/frown.gif I thought it would be good to start it up again.
Heres mine
I first moved to London in 1990 and to be honest I had no real football allegiances at the time. I did support Celtic, too expensive to watch and Cliftonville, a Belfast team- too dangerous to watch.
During 1990 I was living in forest hill and went to watch football every weekend with the other guys who I was living with. We went to virtually every London ground watching football in a non-partisan fashion although several friends were Man city fans and a few supported pool.
In all the time I lived in Forest hill and surrounding areas I never once went to see Palace at Selhurst until one Saturday morning a friend called Terry called to our house with two tickets for Palace V Sheffield Utd. I had no intention of going to football that Saturday as I had been clubbing the night before and had not slept yet.
After several minutes of cajoling from Tel I reluctantly agreed to go. Several pints of lager were consumed in hostelries around Thornton Heath before several more in Selhurst.
By the time we got inside I was very drunk and can neither remember the score or the team we played. What I can remember was a great Palace side- A good Salako, Thomas, Shaw, Southgate and Bright/Wright up front and a fantastic atmosphere.
I have been a Palace fan ever since.
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Dave BBS Administrator | dave@cpfc.org
The Wee Red
06-09-1999, 05:10 PM
Same Celtic/Cliftonville allegiances as Dave as we are from the same stock http://cpfc.org/ubb/redface.gif. My parents are Irish but met in London and lived in Caterham were my brother and sister were born. They moved back to Ireland in 1968. As a ten year old in 1979 I came to see family who had stayed here and was brought along to see the Notts. Co. game towards the end of the promotion season ... one visit was all it took. Red and Blue ever since.
Holmesdale-Lower
06-09-1999, 05:25 PM
In 1982-ish my Dad decided to take me to watch Crystal Palace. We lived about twenty minutes walk from the ground and my Dad had supported them as had his Dad, etc, etc.
I was about 7 and had watched football a lot on telly and loved playing it, however I was quite partial to Tottenham, probably because they had won the FA Cup 2 years running and had Hoddle, Ardiles, Villa, etc, in the side, anyway, my Dad took me to my first game, Palace v Swansea I think........and it was very cold!
We stood on the Sainsburys terrace with me perched on one of the bars, don't remember much about the game just remembered how big everything seemed and actually smelling the grass, after that I kept begging my Dad to take me again and again, which he did, and I was hooked.
One thing that almost stopped me going was my younger brother, because he was only about 4 my Mum decided he was too young to go, so on the way home my Dad would always stop at Lorimers Toyshop in Sth Norwood High Street and buy him a toy so that it was fair, me being treated to Palace and my brother not missing out, but I started to want the toys more than the football, didn't last long though 'cos I would nick 'em of him!!
Having spoken to my Dad recently about it, he has said that he decided to take me with him after noticing that I was displaying tendencies of supporting Spurs!!
And I have been going ever since, I was going to say, 'and we all lived happily ever after' but after the last year it wouldn't be apt!!
Still wouldn't support Spurs though........or anyone else for that matter.
Chocky
07-09-1999, 01:45 AM
Dave, I've still got my story, but it's at home on another computer. Could you pop round and pick it up for me? I'll e-mail you my house keys.
So you missed the highs of Villa Park & the Final? Never mind, Steve'll get us there again soon.
Chocky I will just break a window- OK?
exiled in Wales
24-09-1999, 07:30 PM
I was 13 years old and staying the night at my mate Joes house. We decided to get drunk but were unsure exactly how to go about this. Joe procured a bottle of Smirnoff blue from his parents booze cabinet and we drank the bloody lot. Needless to say I was ill for a week. Unfortunately the next day we were going on a family holiday, I was feeling very ill and wanted to avoid discussion with parents so buried my head in the Croydon Advertiser as we drove down to Dover. In desperation to keep busy I read the supplement describing Palaces promotion season and the Glories of Wright and Bright, for some unknown reason this really grabbed me and I decided I would go to a match as I had heard some kids at school talking about Palace and knew it wasn't too far away.
Unfortunately no-one I knew wanted to go with me, eventually I got a mate who was Scottish and supported to Celtic to come with me - also usfull as he had been to matches previous so knew what was going on.
First match Palace 4 Millwall 3, hooked for life then later in the season the Semi- at Villa Park, queing all night for my final tickets - twice. And that was that.
Chocky
25-09-1999, 04:10 AM
Up until the age of 12, I never really followed football, only watching cup finals on TV, although I had to 'support' a team because everyone else did at school. So I ended up 'following' a couple of clubs just because my best friend at the time liked them. It was Chelsea first, because my next door neighbour supported them as they'd won the cup a few years earlier. That wore off after a couple of months, until I met a new best friend at school, and he supported West Ham because his dad did. So I got a Hammers badge and got all excited when they won the cup in '75. (I'm cringing as I write).
Now this other friend I had at school, well he was the only lad I knew who actually went to real life, not on the telly football. He went to all the games with his dad. I never took anything he said seriously about football because he supported a silly third division team. And who the hell was this Swindlehurst anyway?
Then something happened November 1975 that woke this wandering lost soul up. My West Ham buddy told me that there was an England U23 international coming up, against Portugal, and it was being played at 'the Palace ground', and he was going. So I asked my dad if he'd take me, he agreed and bought a couple of tickets for the Old Stand. Come that tuesday, I spent every lesson at school excited about seeing a real, important match (well it was to me!), and my Palace mate Adrian, who was also going, told me to watch out for a player called Peter Taylor. "He's Palace's best player, and he's brilliant." When we got to the ground, and climbed the stairs, I was suddenly faced with this brightly lit, huge green pitch, a 20,000 ish crowd, the floodlights - the book "Fever Pitch" summed up the feeling perfectly.
I was seated midway between the halfway line and the Holmesdale, and only 5 minutes or so into the game a cross was whipped into the penalty box, and, no exaggeration, the England no11 Peter Taylor volleyed into the back of the blue net. That was the moment. Years of tears, heartache, frustration and some immense joy was lined up for me as I turned to my dad whilst up celebrating and said "That's the Palace player Adrian was on about".
http://members.aol.com./Chocky141/taylor.gif
At half time it was announced that Palace would be 'entertaining' Walton and Hersham in the first round of the FA Cup that following saturday, and I asked dad if we could go to that. "No, I don't think so" was all he said. In the second half England scored again miles and miles away down the other end, can't remember who scored it, but I knew it wasn't the Palace player because he was blond. 2-0 it ended and as we left, that announcement was made again. Same question, same reply. My poor mum got it in her earole for two days about how brilliant it was and can we go and see this Peter Taylor player again, and it's only down the road, and oh please mum, ask dad. When I got home from school on the thursday there were two tickets on the table for the game, this time down the other end of the Old stand.
An excited boy I was again, and could Adrian be my new best friend now? All I can remember about the game was the distinctive red and blue stripes (that's why I was passionate about getting our beloved stripes back), and David Kemp scoring in front of me, and winning 1-0. Then the pestering started again, and as I was later to find out, as my dad had enjoyed those trips to Selhurst as much as me, it didn't really take all that much persuading to get him to take me to the next game. We changed stands for some reason, maybe because we didn't have tickets and went in the mainly unreserved 'New Stand'. Attired in my new red and blue bobble hat and scarf, we sat right in the middle, three rows behind the old wall, and watched Palace stuff Mansfield 4-1. We got those same seats as often as possible for the remainder of that season, during which I was to find out why Aid went on about David Swindlehurst, and was to experience my first heart-ache, bawling my eyes out on holiday when I found out we weren't going to Wembley. My dad purchased season tickets for those two seats in the then New Stand for the following year, and we've had the same seats to this day, the only diffence is I pay for them now!
Incidentally, I went to my first England game at Wembley because of Peter Taylor as well. Like me, he too was making his debut at the twin towers, and England beat N. Ireland 4-0 in a Home International.
And that's it, why I support my local team.
2374
Boyandy
25-09-1999, 04:36 AM
I was press-ganged into it. My uncle was always into Palace and I remember getting the Blue Adidas Sash top when I was about 5 or 6. But I was never really into it until about 1987. My Uncle ended up being a steward in the family part of the Arthur Wait around 1989 which meant I could go more regularly without having to pay. I managed to see all the home games in the three years after we got promotion for nowt, which helped things out no end.
eagle mart
06-10-1999, 05:44 PM
Although I was a keen footballer from a young age I never really was too interested in supporting a club just playing it. However, whenever I was asked the question, Liverpool was always my answer. My dads side of the family were all Palace fans and my dad used to go to with his two brothers when they were young. While my uncles were passionate Palace fans my dad was more of a passive observer. His keen interest was Ice Hockey and used to follow Streatham all over the country. While he would watch Palace in silence my uncles would have to pull him back over the barriers at an Ice Hockey match.
My first Palace game was against Cardiff City in probably 83/84 in early December. I may have been about 6 or 7 but the memories are still vivid. I remember Trevor Aylott scoring down the Holmesdale in a 1-1 draw. I also seem to remember Jim Cannon narrowly heading over. Perhaps the most funniest thing of the game was George Wood flicking V's at the Holmesdale as they gave him abuse just before the game kicked-off.
That was that for a couple of years and I drifted through a few Liverpool home strips before I next crossed Palace path when I was 12. I had started Senior school and befriended a Programme Seller called John. I started going with him in the year of 87/88. With the likes of Stebbing, Brush, Madden, Thomas...etc. It wasn't before long I was going every week getting my Ł5 of my dad to stand at the front of the Holmesdale. (He sometimes came along.)
My first away game was either (I need help here) the Villa Park semi-final vs Liverpool or a Testimonial for a West Ham player (name escapes me.) In the very early Nineties I became a ballboy then after that finished I got a saturday job, but it wasn't long before I packed that in to get back down to Selhurst. Best moment was being there and witnessing Villa Park Semi-Final 1990 victory.Boy did I get my own back on those Liverpool fans at school.
Most disappointing has to be the decline of this proud club.
Cheers to John and I'll makesure my first child has a Palace bib,jumpsuit,high chair........
My playing got as far as a call from Harry Redknapp while he was West Ham Youth Team manager. He phoned twice, so I was told, but nobody was in. Just imagine the Hammers back four could have been Psycho, Razor, Rio & Eagle Mart.... http://cpfc.org/ubb/smile.gif
Crystal Palace Forever
[This message has been edited by eagle mart (edited 06 January 2000).]
[This message has been edited by eagle mart (edited 06 January 2000).]
Les Butler
06-10-1999, 09:11 PM
I am only half an Eagle. The otherhalf...... The Glaziers ! I was kidnapped at a real early age and then brainwashed by the ole man and I have never ever taken an interest in any other team.We used to get five quid for our birthdays (Twins, and I am the quite one) and off we would go to Huwits(whatever) to get the shirt,shorts and socks then straight back over Purley way playing fields to be John Jackson or whoever.Then the game, you cannot beat a cold October night,floodlights,hot Bovril the peanut's and don't talk to the ole man while he is reading his program or you get the look and the tuts then you want to piss but you look at that shack at the back of the Holmesdale and think ,do I really want to go in there ? The palace run on to the pitch and Glad all over bursts out and we bang the boards as the kids do now,Good ole days.
It started for me in about 1974 (I was 7) when we were in the 3rd Division. Nothing in particular made me support them - my Dad was a Chelsea fan, and no-one else in my family does/did support Palace as far as I knew - but others at school did so I sort of went along with the crowd, and soon had my first kit (blue and red stripes) which I insisted on wearing to bed the first night I had it! The earliest I remember seeing them on TV was that game against Grimsby, when they had to wear our red and blue kit.
My first actual game at Selhurst was Middlesbrough at home in September 1980 (the year it all went wrong). We'd played 2 so far that season but not won. I stood in the Whitehorse Lane stand, front row. We wore the white adidas strip, Sansom (my favourite player along with Peter Taylor) had gone, and Paul Barron was in goal. I got Clive Allen's autograph before the game and he went on to score a hat-trick in a 5-2 win (we were 2-1 down at half time). The crowd looked huge to me, at least 40,000, so I was gutted to read 16,000 in the papers next day.
We didn't win again that season until I went again in about December 1980, when we beat Leicester 2-1 at home. It was on MOTD, Allen scored a penalty at the Whitehorse Lane end, and Hilaire scored a screamer having cut in from the right and bending it from the edge of the area into the top left corner in front of the Holmesdale. That season was so miserable - lots of dire performances, heart ripped out of the club by Venables & co, 4 managers etc, but I went back the following season, and every season after that.
[This message has been edited by JJ (edited 05 January 2000).]
John from Beare Green
27-10-1999, 10:04 PM
It was a fascination with league tables that got me into Palace. My Dad was a Palace supporter but he hadn't been to a game for many years. My earliest soccer hero was Jimmy Greaves because he score lots of goals so I decided that I was a Spurs supporter and I remember being glued to the 67 cup final on the TV.
When I became numerate, I developed a fascination with league tables and was fully conversant with the situation in each division. I remember Watford and Walsall occupying consecutive positions in the old division three for weeks, and I remember Stenhousemuir always being bottom team in Scotland. Thus it was early in '69, that I became interested in Palace: they were mid-table but they had all these games in hand and if they won them ... and then they did start to win them ... and my Dad encouraged this interest ... and there was lots about Palace in the local press ... and Palace had a star player called Steve Kember ... and Palace were promoted ... and I begged my Dad to get us season tickets like our next door neighbour had.
It was another couple of seasons before I attended my first game but I was hooked.
Symon10
28-10-1999, 01:44 AM
quite simply...because of my next door neighbour
Joey L
28-10-1999, 05:19 AM
I started being a Palace fan in 1990, I was 15 years old then. I saw the FA Cup final between Man United and Palace on Dutch TV and I chose to support the underdog, Crystal Palace. Palace had a real good team with Wright up front, Salako and Martyn in goal. Too bad they didn't win the replay of the final. I liked the club so much that I started following them in the seasons after that Cup final. These years I followed them almost only on Ceefax. I know they were relegated and promoted a few times and reached the semi final of both the League Cup and the FA Cup in the same season. Since I am connected to the web I get more info on Palace so it's easier for me to follow the club. Last summer I finally had the chance to go to England and of course I went to see Selhurst Park. I also went to see them play a friendly against Millwall at the Den. I was pretty impressed about the atmosphere in the Palace area during that match. I hope the club can get out of their financial trouble soon and that they can stay in the first division this season. Come on Eagles!
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Dutch Eagle
2a8c
Matt_Hep
29-10-1999, 02:31 AM
I was born in to it and had no choice. it's quite amazing when you think but ALL of my family are palace fans. My Grandad used to go my Dad and Mum used to stand on the terraces, my great uncle, my uncle etc. EVERYONE in the family was/is Palace. Therefore I had no choice, my first game was when I was 4, I sat in the Arthur Waite stand. I've been hooked ever since!!!
I beleive that this is how it should be done, with the potenttial supporter being born into it and only thinking about supporting his local team.
banjo
29-10-1999, 11:23 PM
Yep, me too Matt.
My whole familyare Palace. Thru and thru. Always have been always will be.
My granps was born round the corner in the road next to Pawsons on the bridge.
Nearest team I suppose.
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I am the Eggman, we are the Eggmen, I am the Banjo
banjo
30-10-1999, 12:34 AM
1985ish it was. My Dad managed to persaude my Mum that football was a safe place to take a child. She had been worried with the escalating violence on the terraces, with Hysel the previous summer.
It was winter time ish, I remember cos my hands were bloody freezing. We played a team in White with Black trim. It was a draw I think. We were in the Oldstand cos my Dad had a season ticket. Had done for years.
I remember him saying watch that Cannon bloke, he is well good. Hhmm, Jim Cannon, keeper was George Wood. I made a comment that 'your' keeper was a bit fat! As the game progressed, it went from being 'your' team to 'our' team.
Memory goes blank somewhat. I remember telling my mates at school who I supported. We had Spurs, Chelsea and Arsenal 'fans' at school. Funnyly enough, Carshalton is full on these types of teams. They said "who", when I told them I supported this Crystal Palace team. They did'nt know who we were, they only knew the 'big league' teams.
I got laughed at a lot, still do. Palace, we never were fashionable.
I had intermittent matches between then and 1989 for reasons best kept secret. The promotion season was the year I went what you would call regular. Wow, that Brighton match...the penalties(Pembo), and Wrighty's goal. For some reason or another I missed the playoff final. I t made my heart bleed, cos by now I realised the importance of it all. I remember listening to it on the radio as England played Poland on the same day. I stayed up really late to watch the highlights, to see Wright seal it on 117 mins.
I bloody missed the Semi. I got tickets for the Final, at Wembley, against Man Utd. To this day I will always remember the singing of 'Abide With Me' and choking the tears cos my team, yes my little Palace who everyone laughed at were in the Cup Final. I dont need to describe the match. It remains my finest football moment, probably my finest ever moment in life.
I think I was glad that I missed the replay. I had to act in the school play. They were always on the Thursday ya see.
I had intermittant games between them, Mum and Dad never really got on that well, but I have been there on all the really, really important occasions. ZDS Cup Final, and the Playoffs 96 and 97. Normal matches are just really important games.
I think the mickey taking as a kid was the spur to carry on what had started that bloody cold day in the mid-eighties. I could never picture myself, even think of myself supporting someone else. Why would I? I support the greatest team in the world.
Palace is the only thing that can ever make me cry.
Kevin T
30-10-1999, 04:24 AM
I was about 8 years old and one day my Dad was at a loose end. Perhaps, he couldn't get a tee time or maybe he was on antibiotics so couldn't get hammered. I don't know, but anyway he suddenly said "Son, fancy going to football today?" "Where, I said" "Up the Palace of course?" he retorted. So off we went and I stood on the Whitehorse in a crowd of about 6000 and we had a crap team. And we probably lost. And it probably rained. And my hands got cold. And Micky Droy had a silly beard. And the taste of Bovril made me sick. And smoke kept blowing in my face. And someone from the New Stand kept mooing. And I was hooked.
Neil the Eagle
30-10-1999, 04:35 AM
My brother Ray took me to my first game at Bromley when I was about 3 or 4. Bromley were playing Palace, but it wasn't a first team game and John Jackson wasn't playing (he was the only Palace player I knew), so I lost interest in the game.
By 1970, I decided I was a Forest fan 'cos Dad was (he came from there orginally) and badgered him to take me to my first game. Forest's first game in London that season was at Palace, Dad took me in the new stand whilst Ray went to his usual spot with his mates on the Holmesdale.
Palace, rather unpredictably, won 2-0. Apparently I spent most of my time playing on the steps, but at the end of the game announced to my father that I was now a Palace fan and that Forest were rubbish, which did not please the old man (a) because he's missed half the match stopping me from running about (b) because Forest had lost & (c) cos I was right! (OK I made the last one up, but y'know what I mean). He did say he'd never take me again though.
So I didn't get to go to Selhurst for another year until my brother started to take me with him. I even had a little fold-out step so I could see properly. By then I was captivated by the match atmosphere had no thoughts of playing up.
My clearest memory from those early days is beating Sheffield United 5-1 - I knew then, without any shadow of doubt, that Palace were indeed by FAR the greatest team the world would ever see and I could never love another.
Allowing for a sabbatical during Mullery the anti-Christ's encroachment into God's own football team, I've been at most home games since the seventies and nearly every away game since 1986.
bunghole
07-12-1999, 03:43 AM
Back in the seventies when I was at school I used to look up the results of the English football every Monday afternoon when doing my paper run. For some reason I was taken by the name of a club who were usually in the old second division and decided that this club would become my team. That team was of course Palace.
I remember being at school one day when one of my mates who was English asked me if I followed the UK football and did I support a team. Straight away I told him that I followed a team called Crystal Palace and half expected him to say Crystal Who?
To my surprise he told me that he was pleased to meet someone who followed a team other than Man U, Arsenal or Liverpool, as virtually everyone down here seemed to follow one of these teams.
For many years my support for Palace remained limited to reading the results in Monday's papers. I had no idea who played for Palace, who managed them or even which ground we played at! The only time I saw Palace play was during the seasons in the eighties when we made Division 1 (early eighties from memory) and the highlights from Palace's matches were included in a one hour hightlights package shown on TV down here on a Monday night.
About ten years ago, one of the radio stations down here started up a UK soccer program. The program is hosted by Colin Turner whom I believe used to call matches in the UK.
The program commences at eleven pm each Saturday night and for the majority of the season the matches kick off at 2.00am. The program features talkback prior to the game and listeners are invited to call in and predict the scores on selected matches in England and Scotland to win prizes.
At 2.00am the station crosses to the UK to take Radio 5's coverage of the afternoon football with the coverage finishing at about 4.00am. For the past ten years I could count on one hand the number of times I've been asleep before 4.00am on a Sunday morning!
Getting the internet hooked up at work a couple of years ago suddenly ended years of frustration at not being able to get much info about the team I support. Suddenly I had all the info I needed by simply switching on my computer. Subscribing to the CPFRIS and the BBS has made me feel at times like I'm almost in the UK.
Reading the contributions from Palace supporters around the world has helped me understand why this club means so much to me. I remember watching the 1990 FA Cup final and being moved to tears when I saw the red and blue baloons being released prior to the game and listening to all the Palace supporters singing their hearts out throughout the game.
For many years after this match I often wondered why I got so emotional when watching that game. It's only been since I've had access to the internet and been able to read and correspond with Palace supporters both in the UK and abroad that I've come to realise that following Palace is emotional not only for myself but for all supporters of the club.
Whilst we don't always see eye to eye about different issues happening at the club, the one common denominator running through the veins of all the club's supporters is the unconditional love we all share for our great team.
Finally (and apologies for going on for so long!), I'm sure that many of you reading this in the UK are probably thinking that people from overseas (especially someone who has never been to the UK) couldn't possibly have the same affection for the club as home based supporters.
Well I can assure you that we do, all of us from around the globe.
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Coppell - A Palace Legend!
[This message has been edited by bunghole (edited 06 December 1999).]
[This message has been edited by bunghole (edited 07 December 1999).]
2336
Sandy of Cornwall
07-12-1999, 05:45 PM
My Dad took me to my first match in 1969. He used to take me for "access" visits on Saturdays and we had all but done the pictures (the Odeon in Croydon High Street) and Chessington Zoo so for a change, and to my Mum's disgust, he took me to Selhurst.
I hated it, didn't understand what was going on and couldn't see properly. I ended up sitting on his shoulders at the back of the Holmesdale whining "when can we go home?"
Dad wasn't fazed by this annoying child though. Come the next home match, we were there again and, by this time, he had found the peanut lady and pacified me with bags full of these. Maybe football wasn't too bad after all.
By the third match, I was asking if we could go down the front so I could see. Ensconced at the front (this time, the Old Stand Enclosure) and actually seeing the match and the players up close, I became transfixed and kept asking questions. "Who's he, Dad?" By the end of the third match, I knew I loved Tony Taylor and was quite dazzled by his amazing runs down the wing (I didn't know it was a wing though then).
This was the turning point for me. I was taken every Saturday, home and away, for about 2 years.
Dad then re-married and went to live in Dover and didn't have a car. His visits stopped.
Not to be deterred, I decided to go on my own. I was about 13. Mum was not a happy woman. "Grounded" was a word I frequently heard on Saturdays, especially when we were playing away.
Never mind, Mum only had to pop out to hang out washing or something and I would be away - making my way to Selhurst to find some grownups with transport who were willing to take me with them to wherever Palace were playing. Most Saturdays I managed to find some kind souls to look after me. I remember some men (who, I know know were probably in their early 20's) taking me on their minibus to places like Leicester, Liverpool, Bolton etc., and hiding me in pubs beforehand and generally looking after me. At the time, I couldn't see why Mum was so worried. Sorry, Mum.
By 13, I was well and truly addicted and have often run away from home for my Palace.
I have had numerous rows with my Mum over Palace, I divorced my ex-husband because of Palace (he wouldn't let me go). I married my second husband because of Palace (we met on away coach 1). I am skint because of Palace. My children are as addicted as I am. I am not in the pub now with my colleagues because I am typing this.
Palace have done this to me but I'm glad (all over) and wouldn't change it for the world. Thanks Dad.
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James Varcoe
07-12-1999, 06:03 PM
Firstly I have to say God I love you guys, all of you. I have read this thread cried and laughed. Bunghole I will never, ever again be so amazed by such passion from a man who has never been to Selhurst. You deserve all our respect.
My story is so dreary and unromantic by comparison I feel it's not really worth telling so in precis.
1970 1st game with my dad thought it was great. Over the next few years went on and off always enjoyed the third divsion days the most.I really was in a crowd on 30,000 plus for a CP v Seaweed game in the 3rd division.
I spent the next years playing every Saturday and never going to games and forgot my love.
In 1985 my brother came back down from Manchester and started going on his own week in week out. As this coincided with the first in a long line of serious injuries I went with him and within 30 seconds of standing in The arthur Waite enclosure I was hooked.
I've never looked back it has cost me thousands, one marriage and at least one job but has given me so much more in return.
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A very Merry Christmas to one and all
Missshy
07-12-1999, 06:18 PM
My dad is from Geordie land (poor man)to piss him off my mother bought Palace kits for my two older brothers, not that she knew anything about football it just happened Palace was the closest team to where we lived/live, I think I am still in the same house! anyway I remember us all sitting watching the FA cup final and my mum saying Palace were going to loose as they were wearing those lovely yellow & black shirts (big mouth)
Don't know why I went to my first match when I did but I remember it being against Norwich in the Southern area final of the ZDS cup, I was hooked from then on and haven't looked back since.
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jonesy
07-12-1999, 06:31 PM
Revised and Reposted further down Please delete!!
Jonesy.
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TRUST THE TRUST
[This message has been edited by jonesy (edited 07 December 1999).]
[This message has been edited by jonesy (edited 11 January 2000).]
banjo
07-12-1999, 06:57 PM
Jonesy, I can see where that Pub used to be from my house.
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Walking in Papa Smurf's Wonderland
jonesy
07-12-1999, 07:08 PM
Banjo, It wasn't by the Circle(They were nearly all Chels). More Wallington.Its still there(but not in name) and is now an Irish Theme pub. http://cpfc.org/ubb/wink.gif
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TRUST THE TRUST
GreatGonzo
08-12-1999, 06:35 AM
I printed this thread out and read in my room a few hours ago and got lumps in my throat when reading many of them an mine will seem like just a mixture of many of them but here goes......
My first game was when i was about 3 or 4 but needless to say that i was a little too young to understand everything that it meant.
I started to go to games regularly when i was about 7 making it in 1986. i remember very little about my first couple of years going every now and then and getting in free with my dad. There is one thing i remember and that was this fella onthe pitch called JIM CANNON i thought he was amazing and the best player in our team. I couldn't understand but at the end of the 1988 season my dad told me he was retiring from professional football. Now i don't know how many of you remember how you felt when the big kid first told you santa didn't exist but i felt even worse. A kid just turned 9 being told that his hero would no longer be around and that could easily have been the end of it for me but i kept going and 2 years later was to have memories implanted in my brain i do not think i will ever forget.
The queueing for cambridge, the semi and both finals and the atmosphere on the day tickets went on sale. I went to all those games and remeber bits from all of them. Porbably the best would be when all the balloons were let off at wembley for the final. You couldn't see 2 feet infront of you and the sound of gun-fire as they were popped. I went to work for the lottery ticket department in an attempt to make the game cheap enough in 95 when i was 16 and no longer a concession as i was going to almost every game.
Then disater happened and i went to work for sainsburys and was working saturdays and got to very few games. However i made both play-off finals instead of working for double pay and was reduced to tears at the end of both.
Last season i went to uni so gave up my job on saturdays and was back at the Palace every game i could get to. I was back to my fanatical best and then in August i came out to the USA for 4 months and have been on the internet every saturday at 12 local time to check the result.
So why am i an eagle?
Cos what else costs you over 1000 pounds a year makes you cry, breaks up your relationships, ensures your misery and gets the piss taken out of you. YET YOU WOULDN"T CHANGE IT FOR THE WORLD
WE CAN SURVIVE, WE WILL SURVIVE, WE MUST SURVIVE
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[This message has been edited by GreatGonzo (edited 08 December 1999).]
2077
Steve Morris
08-12-1999, 02:17 PM
Well it was the Glaziers when I started. We had moved to Sydenham from Battersea and my Dad supported Chelsea but he could not be arsed to go all the way there , so when he took me to my first football match it was to Selhurst we went. We sat in the Old Stand well it was the only stand then and watched Palace beat Huddersfield 3-0.
I was hooked from then on and so it happens was my Dad and we started to go to every home match.
When I got older I went on my own and stood on the terraces (when at half time you could walk round from one end to another)and started to go to the away matches.
I have been through all the ups & downs and managers from Bert Head to Stevie.
It is even more pertinent now that I live up North It is something I can identify with & it is great to go to away matches and hear South London Accents & humour it is a sense of belonging. I am proud to come from South
London & to be an Eagle.
We will survive and thrive.
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interested in sydney.
08-12-1999, 02:29 PM
Same as Steve Morris.I also came from Sydenham and my brother was a Charlton supporter.Dick Graham was manager and the first game i saw we beat Bournemouth 2-0. Whitehouse Lucas Glazier and I beleive the Pele of his day Bert Howe was playing . In those days we played in all white. Anyway i remember my mates dad taking us all along , he had a car , very posh, and that was it. Over here most people I come across have a sneaking regard if not affection for the Palace. Blue and Red (or all white as was) till the end.
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Pistike
08-12-1999, 05:39 PM
I almost always hated Croydon, it is such a naff provincial town. All Luther Vandross records, white socks and nasty imported lager.
OK so I went with my kid brother to the same game (wasn't it 1969 Jim? Wednesday I think we lost 1-0). Then again to various matches in the 1970's whilst at school. I recall getting run of the Holmesdale by the front wheelers from Norf London in the late 70's.
Then when I got back from Manchester Poly (in 1982 or 83) I was stuck for something to do one evening and saw on the local ITV news that Palace were playing Oxford that evening. Trevor - the donkey - Aylott scored in a 1-0 victory and its been in my blood ever since.
Now on the odd occasion that I travel away I enjoy inflicting my Croydon on the "good" people of Shrewsbury, Grimsby, Nottingham or where ever. After all I have had a life time of it, so why shouldn't they put up with us for one afternoon a year.
I took my son to his first match (the last Holmesdale game vs Watford) before his first birthday.
He will take his son, who will take his son...
We will survive - no doubts exist in my mind.
http://cpfc.org/ubb/wink.gif
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Hajra Újpest
Hajra Palace
[This message has been edited by Pistike (edited 08 December 1999).]
Gavin Axten
08-12-1999, 06:11 PM
My whole family are Chelsea supporters as we originate from Wandsworth/Clapham but I was brought up in Dulwich.My father took me to Selhurst on a few occassions in between trips to Stamford Bridge, I think Palace v Aldershot was my first match around 1973 atlthough I cannot really remember. The first match I can really remember was against Liverpool in the F.A Cup in 1977 when we lost 3-2, since that match I have not missed a home game up to this day unless it was absolutley vital(illness, brothers wedding day etc)and when I could go on my own I went to nearly every away match between 1983 & 1991, at the last count I have done 70 grounds. My father still goes to the odd match and never goes to Chelsea anymore. I think that excellant team we had in the late 70's plus the big gates we used to get really got me hooked. I used to always stand against the wall in the Whitehorse and witnessed many a punch up(which I supposed added to the excitement) as it was the away end then although if I remember also had thousands of Palace fans in there every match. I still sniff my programme and the smell always reminds me of when I was young (am I the only one that does this???). I have just started to take my 4 year old son to matches so hopefully the future generations of Axtens will be Palace instead of Chelsea.
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Peace on you all
ruediger
08-12-1999, 07:47 PM
Gavin,
strange but you're not alone.
Just recently I took my collection of Palace programmes out of a box. I couldn't resist taking a sniff and all those beautiful memories came alive: 1973 Big Mal mania, Peter Jones BBC radio 2 commentary (as it was then), Tuesday mornings hurrying to the post box to collect CP matchprogramme, student life etc.
I think I'll have a sniff every two or three years. Yes I'm addicted, but who cares.
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[This message has been edited by ruediger (edited 08 December 1999).]
RednBlue
08-12-1999, 09:04 PM
I originally come from the Sydenham / Penge borders - top half of the road in SE26, bottom half in SE20.
As with many of us, I first went to see Palace with my Grandad when I was about 7. I can't remember exactly who against, but it was back in the 3rd division South days. He used to put me right down the front of the Old Park Road terrace opposite the centre spot, and looking at the pictures on Neil the Eagle's site it seems funny, now I've got used to the Arther Waite, to see what it looked like then.
When I was 15 my parents moved to Bracknell, so I didn't go so often at first, although occasionally the firm my Mum worked for, which had relocated from Sydenham to Bracknell with the New Towns ran a coach trip up to evening games, and I was fortunate to see a Palace vs. All Stars game in the late 50's, and the game against a full strength Real Madrid team with Gento and Di Stefano etc. to celebrate the new lights.
Between 1976 and 1984 I worked in Brussels, and I remember listening to games on BBC World Service and especially remember the game when we came back up to the First Division - brilliant. Tears and Champagne.
Why am I an Eagle? It's in the blood - passed from Grandfather to Grandson (my Dad was a North Londoner...no links there!!). I've been through the good and the bad, and the ecstasy and the agony, and I still look forward to every game....I don't always enjoy them, but that's part of being an Eagle too!!
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RnB
[This message has been edited by RednBlue (edited 08 February 2000).]
CPFC_R_GREAT
09-12-1999, 03:05 AM
I'am an Eagle cos i damn well want to be......and beacuse i was in Croydon and my dad supports them but i do it out of my own choice. Don't you think we were all going really well and just settling doen into a stride with Jansen and all the new signings and the GOLDBERK http://cpfc.org/ubb/redface.gif came along and ruined it all for us now we're stuggling to stay alive never mind stay up. DAMN YOU GOLDBERG DAMN YOU! http://cpfc.org/ubb/frown.gif
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Keep the Eagles Alive For All our Sakes
And Kill Goldberg!
oh yer and feed me.
1fbc
Al From Bromley
15-12-1999, 02:46 PM
This is a brilliant thread (Dave, wasn't there an idea to make something like this into a book? If we invited Palace fans everywhere to post their memories on here it could be cut and pasted and sold at the trust office? Just an idea!)
Anyway, I'm a bit like Goldberg( ho,ho!) in so far as I can't exactly remember all the details of my first visit to Selhurst - but it was in 1966/7 season (I would have been 7 or 8)and I think it was against Birmingham - it was a 0-0 draw anyway. I used to go with my dad and we'd either sit in the main stand or stand in the enclosure in the old stand. Sadly, my dad died in 1972 but my enthusiasm for Palace didn't wain and I was a regular at Selhurst during most of the seventies, standing on the Holmesdale terrace mostly, with the occasional visit to the Arthur Wait enclosure, which was where most of the old bovver boys graduated to when they became too old for trouble (not that I was one of them you understand).
The early 80's was a bit of a wilderness period - I got married and moved further away, money was tight and my wife wasn't a footie fan, so that was that! I still remember every Saturday listening to the radio or checking the text to see how Palace had done though. It never leaves you, wherever you are. Last week in Portugal the first duty of the day was to find a paper for the results if Palace had been playing the day before (wish I hadn't bothered mind you!
The greatest thing about being a Palace fan down the years is that we never expected anything - so anything we achieved was always a bonus - a promotion, a cup run- Beating Leeds, Sunderland, Chelsea in the FA cup in 76 only to be robbed in the semi-final - at least Southampton went on to win it! The Blackburn play off victory in the Wright and Bright years. The ZDS Cup (OK a meaningless trophy but we still had to beat Everton and break Martin Keown's nose)Losing to Leciester with the last kick of the play off. Hoppo scoring the year after to reverse the emotion. Lombardo playing out his skin against Everton in the sunshine at Goodison and me thinking it was going to be a good season.
It's always been a rollercoaster ride - but what a ride!
I just hope that we don't get chucked off.
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http://cpfc.org/ubb/uploads/CPST logo2.gif
Al From Bromley
30-12-1999, 06:28 PM
Amazed no one else has put type to screen on this thread. Come on. Let's hear your memories!!!!
Fester
30-12-1999, 06:39 PM
Dad took me to a game in the late seventies/early eighties - can't remeber which one. Spent several seasons begging him to take me to more, but because of his financial constraints at the time I used to manage no more than a couple a season. Until, that is, my picture appeared on the front cover of a programme following one game, whilst my dad was obscured by Gavin Nebbeling's leg as he powered in a goalbound header during a 4-1 win(??)- yet again I forget the game. Anyway, to cut a long story short, my dad copped the hump as he'd been going to the Palace on and off since the late fifties and never had his name (let alone photo) in the programme, and there was number one son in all his glory on the front cover after a handful of games and apart from 85-87 when my dad tried his hand at management, we've been going pretty regularly ever since with the old fella still yet to get his name or photo in the program!!! Ha Ha Ha! Never mind, there's always next season!
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Son of Selhurst
30-12-1999, 07:12 PM
Me dad was born and bred in Thorton Heath and us four kids was born in Streatham, so it's in the blood and the birthplace. I have faint memories of constantly asking my dad why he took my sisters and my brother but not me, and he saying I was too young. Then in the 1972/73 season he finally gave in and took his youngest as well.
Many a Saturday was spent in the Whitehorse Lane end, running up and down the terraces from behind the goal to up in front of the white wall of the second tier where me mum and dad stood. "Roasted peanuts, sixpence a bag!"
We moved to Twickenham in 1975 and games became less frequent as the 80's came in. Dad said us kids should support someone more local....!!!
But none of us did (you ALL know why) and I guess we all became armchair supporters because of where we all live and family commitments. Scary thing is, for some reason none of the four siblings have married football lovers.
For the past few years, though, I have made a huge effort to get to as many games as I can, especially away games where we need the support, and my daughter went to Selhurst for the first time against Forest, and my sisters 11 year-old kid (who plays in goal) is an avid Palace fan and has all the Palace goalkeeping merchandise (shirt, gloves, pies, brown envelopes, etc..).
My other sister's 3-year-old got a baby Palace kit for Xmas, (from his uncle SoS) and goes round shouting "Crybbal Panace!" all the time whenever he wears it.
Let's hope we can keep them that way before the red menace infects them with it's brain-washing ways.....
SoS
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northernsouler
30-12-1999, 07:15 PM
I was first taken to SP by my Dad to watch George Best play. 3-5 if I recall right. Of course it was a huge crowd and even now I remember the crush and the sway in the Old main stand enclosure. Later that season we stood on the whitehorse terraces with the away mobs.
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Al From Bromley
30-12-1999, 07:22 PM
See!!!! Don't these stories just fill you up with nostalgic memories and give you a few laughs as well. I'm telling you - it has to be a book one day. We've got enough subscribers on this site!
(For a moment there, I was sorely tempted to pen a spoof Goldberg posting, but thought better of it)
Fester
30-12-1999, 07:27 PM
It wouldn't do your flu any good at all, Al. Thanks for resurrecting the thread though, I had a wistful 15 minutes there myself, promotions, relegations, Wembley, away trips to Newcastle in the middle of the week, 9-0 thrashings etc etc Hardly boring is it?
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as216
30-12-1999, 07:30 PM
I can't actually remember what the first game I attended at Selhurst was but it was just before Coppell took over (the first time). I know this because I remember being so chuffed that a famous (ex-)player was coming to Palace. To be honest I was never that interested in watching the football itself and spent most matches playing football with other kids under the Whitehorse. The first game I actually have a clear memory of was losing 3-0 to Oldham ('88? '89?) with it raining constantly throughout the entire 90 minutes.
Supporting Palace was never something I made a conscious decision to do. It just happened that way.
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28eb
fatboyfat
30-12-1999, 07:40 PM
Mine started from the age of 5-6. My Uncle had been a Palace fan for eye on 38-39 years and has gradually enticed the whole family into the Palace way of life, one of my first memories was a game against Huddersfield on Boxing Day which from what i can remember we one but the day was ruined due to the fact that the people we were at the game with demolished a whole tin of my quality street choclates that were a christmas present in no longer the 20 mins, I would for the next 10 years go to the games when the old man could afford it until one day I was bought a season ticket for 95-96 and went to every home game and that is when I was solidly hooked, I remember the 96 play-off against leicster and standing just outside victoria station with hoards of palace fans diving onto tour coaches full of tourists singin from the tops and the palace chants that seemed to engulf the whole of central london (when i'm up there workin it still pops into my head), i remember sitting throughout the game at Wembley thinking that if it came to penaties Martyn would do the buisness but i wasn't to happen, sitting next to my little sister who at the time wasn't a huge palace fan trying to choke the tears back and not look like a tart. I remember the quiteness on the train journey home to Redhill and the grief i got at the school the next day ( suddenly everyone seemed to support leicster !) I then due to work commitments only able to get to a couple of games a season but my sister then got the Palace bug and went to every home game and several of the away games with my mum and dad. I'm now back on the upper tier of the holmesdale and enjoying it to the full again and lookin forwards to a hopefully Stronger palace in the future
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Mat ov CPFC
30-12-1999, 08:06 PM
For me it was a strange journey to being a Palace fan coming from a family that had a strong history of supporting the scum from New Cross but the thing that finally clinched it was the 1976 cup final run and all the hype that surrounded it. I loved it. ( In my mind Malcom Allison is STILL the greatest Palace manager ). My first game was against Fulham in 1977 and what a game!. George Best was playing, he broke Ian Evans leg, there was a penalty, a sending off and we lost 3-2. ( please accept my apologies if I have mixed my facts up but it was a long time ago )
The game that really cemented CPFC in my heart for ever was an evening match against Aston Villa in the league cup. It was 1-1 after extra time but seeing Selhurst for the first time at night was a majical moment and I still love the first sight of the glow of the flood lights as you approach the ground in the evening.
There are too many memories to list here but for me there have been three special moments that stand out.
The first was in 1979 against Burnley. I hardly saw any of the match but the atmosphere was beyond belief and that night I slept wearing my Palace scarf. The next was the Play off game against Blackburn away when Eddie scored that goal. Even though Blackburn went on to get another I KNEW that we would beat them at Selhurst.
And the last, but most glorious, was the semi-final in 1990. The most glorious moment was when we equalised to make it 3-3. ( In truth I was still in a state of shock when we scored the winner and have no real recollection of the moment ). In fact for the first time in my life I was lost for words ( it has only happend once since but that is another story ) and it was as though my brain was refusing to accpet what my eyes where telling it.
Being a Palace fan for me is something akin to the feelings you have for your family. There are times when you hate them, times when they make you want to scream and shout in anger, and times when they make you want to jump for joy. In short it is for me, an unconditional love that can NEVER be replaced by another football team no matter what the future holds for us.
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Trust the Trust
Monty
30-12-1999, 08:25 PM
Mat - that's beautiful.
FatboyFat - the story about the Quality Street is "quality"!
This has got to be a book - it would definitely be a best seller.
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Tony Humphreys
30-12-1999, 08:26 PM
I went to school in Blackheath, so everyone else supported Charleytown. Living in Penge gave me the perfect excuse to be different, so 12 November 1959 I found myself at Selhurst v Hartlepools. 5-2 and I was away.
Plenty of excitement since, of the right and wrong sort, tears of joy, tears of sorrow, moments of exhilaration, hair torn in frustration, fingernails bitten in anxiety, a rollercoaster of emotion (whoops, sorry, mustn't get too poetic). I wouldn't have missed it for anything; long may it continue.
gutbucket
30-12-1999, 10:17 PM
I started watching the Eagles in the Late seventies (my memory is a bit hazy but I think it was late seventies). I hadn't supported a proper team up to then, my Saturdays were spent watching Sutton United (not overly inspiring, except for one trip to Wembly). The first game I saw at Selhurst was against Blackburn, we won 5-0 and Rachid Harkouk got a brace !!. Were were brilliant that day and I was in what seemed a packed Whitehorse End (well it seemed packed after Sutton Utd) being pressed a gainst this gorgeous girl who filled out a pair of jeans better than anyone I've ever seen. Top Footie Top Totty aah the Halcyon days !!!! It doesn't get any better.
It would be dead boring if we supported a side who could take the lead and then defend it comfortably for the rest of the game, although I might like to try it for a while just to see what its like.
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GUTBUCKET
James
31-12-1999, 06:37 AM
This is an extract from something I had published in 'Eagle Eye' in 1997:
I was first taken to Selhurst Park by my late Grandfather in 1958. I was seven years old at the time, and that probably explains why I can't remember much about it. I do remember that everyone seemed to be wearing a hat and there were a few rattles being waved about (I think the game was played in black and white, like the 1966 World Cup Final, but I can't be sure about this).
This visit allows me to boast to anyone who cares to listen that I have been supporting Palace, man and boy, for nearly 40 years.
In fact, I didn't really become a proper supporter until 1969.
Denise Warren was a girl who I had lusted after for quite some time. She had a lot of admirers as I recall - a fabulous pair of legs and was extremely well built for a 17 year old. When she asked me if I would like to accompany her to the Palace that May Saturday afternoon in 1969 I jumped at the chance. It wasn't Selhurst Park that particularly excited me: if she had suggested that I join her on a trip to the Croydon abattoir, I would have been just as quick to accept. Palace (or the `Glaziers' as they were then called by almost no-one) were playing their last home game of the Season against local rivals, Fulham. A win would mean promotion to the First Division for the first time in the Club's history. Fulham were already relegated to Division Two.
At half time Palace were two nil down and I spent the interval chatting casually to Denise and trying to pretend that I wasn't looking at the interesting contours of her tight sweater. The game was the last thing on my mind.
.... And then something happened which changed my life forever. Palace scored and I experienced for the first time that feeling of communal elation that greets a goal at the Holmsdale end. Minutes later, it happened again. Palace were level. Just before the final whistle, Palace scored the winner and I was hugging - no not Denise - but a 20 stone, sweaty individual that I would have crossed the road to avoid in other circumstances. But this wasn't other circumstances - this was our team and we had won promotion. The 11 men on the field were no longer strangers; they were my team. Denise drifted away, and I didn't notice. I was on the pitch celebrating with the crowd.
Since that day, Palace have been a huge part of my life. I have missed only a handful of home games since then. Heroes have come and gone and the players (who in 1969 were a bunch of elderly individuals) have got younger and younger - like policemen. New stands have been built and Managers (and Chairmen) have come and gone, but the Club remains essentially the same.
Last year I took my 11 year old daughter to the Play Off Final at Wembley. When dear old David Hopkin curved that shot towards where we were sitting, and into the Sheffield United net, I could see that she had caught the Palace bug. What have I done to her? Have I condemned her to a life of frustration and failed expectation? Probably. But on balance, I wouldn't want it any other way. Winning a Play Off final, or a Zenith Data Systems Cup, may be the best that we will ever do, but I can't believe that any Manchester United fan enjoyed their League win last year more than I enjoyed the Play Off Final. It's all about expectation, isn't it? As Palace fans we don't expect too much and appreciate the wins when they come along. We know how to enjoy the (relative) successes as we have suffered the many disappointments of relegation over the years.
By the way..... does anyone know what happened to Denise?
James
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2156
PalaceFan in Alabama
31-12-1999, 08:45 AM
This old git remembers when the players played in Leather Boots, with Leather Studs and the Ball was Leather(if my memory is correct, we still used ration books at this time?). My first visit to Selhurst Park is just a distant memory, I do remember that it rained all day and when I stood next to my brother on those lovely grass banks (now the AW Stand), next thing I knew I was disappearing down the banks on my arse. We had to walk home to Upper Norwood because of the state I was in. I have supported the Palace since that day. My brother, his son and my two sons are Palace supporters. My Father supported Arsenal, because he worked at the Woolwich Arsenal??? Another distant memory about why my Father support them, was because that was where the Arse Holes first played?
Suppose to take ex wife to watch Real Madrid (just a girlfriend then), she did not turn up on time, so I left and she was a little p*ssed; can't understand why! Took current wife(American) to her first game and spent the whole game trying to explain what was going on (pissed off a lot of people in the AW Stand)!
I have meet Palace supporters in Koh Samui (Thailand), On a flight from Hong Kong to Frankfurt, on a cruise from Victoria BC. On a flight from JFK to Heathrow. In a bar in Bangkok, in a bar in New Orleans. In one of the Airport lounges in Atlanta. Here in Mobile is a Doctor from Purley, been a Palace fan for forty years, a student at a local University is from Forest Hill, states he is a Palace fan!
Why am I a Palace Supporter? like many of you, they are the only team I have ever supported. I did not know any better then and now that I should know better; I still support them! Pray tell me what else should I do on a Saturday morning (during the Football season)? Memory coming back, Saturdays were such a special day (single or married) down the Pub or Club with the lads and off to the game. After the game back down to the pub or the Club. Last steps would be for that Curry (my arse has never been the same since those days). Sorry got a little carried away, maybe I should be carried away?
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Why oh why does Uncle Ron say he has strong feelings for our beloved Palace? His comments in the Standard do not fit with someone who has feelings for the Palace! I am glad he does not hate us??? http://cpfc.org/ubb/dead.gif
[This message has been edited by PalaceFan in Alabama (edited 31 December 1999).]
Gavin Axten
31-12-1999, 01:43 PM
[quote]Originally posted by Mat ov CPFC on 12-30-1999 04:06 PM
The game that really cemented CPFC in my heart for ever was an evening match against Aston Villa in the league cup. It was 1-1 after extra time but seeing Selhurst for the first time at night was a majical moment and I still love the first sight of the glow of the flood lights as you approach the ground in the evening.
I remember that game well, we we're in the 2nd division then and during the cup games around that time(late 70's) I remember all the press photographers running round the pitch to get behind our opponents goal as we were more likely to score than our 1st division opponents. Also at that Burnley game I will never forget my old mans mate running up the terrace towards me crying like a baby after we had won, he then gave me his scarf than ran back onto the pitch again. I still have that scarf and everytime I look at it it takes me back to that wonderful night. After losing to Leicster in the play off we went drinking in Victoria but I was so gutted I could hardly manage my pint but the year after the drink up after the Sheffield match in Croydon was amazing, outside the George it was like a street party.
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"You'll never know just how much I love you until you've taken my Palace away"
as216
31-12-1999, 06:18 PM
Supporting Palace has always been something I have always had to justify. At middle school I was alone among a sea of Spurs and Everton fans (mid-eighties) and once I was in secondary school I always had to ight off claims that I only went because "they got to the cup-final". The best time to have been Palace was the first day back at school after the semi-final win (the match itself was during the Easter break). The smug feeling I had being able to take the piss out of the two Liverpool fans who had so mercilessly crucified me seven months previously was so good.
Now I am university in Eastbourne surrounded by seaweeds, supporting Palace has actually been more enjoyable than it was at school. There are a lot more people here who are genuine fans of whoever they happen to support and discussions/arguments are a lot more informed. It also helps that I am no longer alone in supporting Palace. It is also fun at the moment winding up my two Sheff Wednesday supporting mates about the thrashings we are going to give them next season.
little al
31-12-1999, 10:09 PM
My parents were never really into football, although my mum "followed" QPR, as thats where she originated from, and my dad was, for years, forced to go to Plough Lane, to watch Wimbledon, as he was born and bred 'round the corner. ( I confess to having a soft spot for both).
I went to Norwood Park Infant School, in West Norwood, where everybody at the time "supported" Liverpool, Leeds, or Chelsea. All except one young lad who said he supported "Crystal Palace". One day I asked this boy, (who was bullied BTW) why he supported a club who caused him such grief. He replied " Because my dad takes me there and they are our local team". I thought right then, thats the team for me!!. I befriended this boy, and his dad took me to a couple of games, I was hooked!! The lollipop lady used to be in the know at the club, and used to get me programmes, and one Christmas, got me a signed menu card, with team photo, from the Xmas bash, which I still have. (although, as a youngster I cut the autographs out to fit them into my autograph book http://cpfc.org/ubb/frown.gif). The first game I ever "remember" was Palace V Newcastle, when my then non Palace hero, Kevin Keegan played for them. I stopped going for a few years as I didn't have a "responsible adult" to go with. I started going again about the 87/88 season. I only purchased my first season ticket this year!!
I'd love to be able to remember this boys name, but for the life of me I can't. I remember he had black hair and glasses. He would be about 30 now and would have been in Mrs Powers class!!
I would love to buy him a pint/punch him in the mouth for what he has put me through.
My name then was Alan Larcombe.
If you are him or know him, please get in touch!!!
Christ, with my typing skills, I'm glad I typed that offline, would've cost me a fortune!!!!!!
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Alan all round bloody nice bloke!!
alan@cpfc.org
Gunnar
31-12-1999, 11:01 PM
For me it started on our best season 90-91,
but my grandfather was a big supporter of
the club.It did"t come from him.I started
to support the Eagles because everybody in
my school supported Liverpool or Arsenal.
But I don"t regred it,I love this club and
don"t want supported another club.Eagle til
I die.
I want to say happy new year to every fan of
Crystal Palace FC and this is the best internet site of Palace .Dave,Kevin T,Albamba
fan,Jonsey,James,Joey in Holland,Rudiger in
Germany, enjoy the Millenium and lets hope
for a bright future of our great club
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21d8
SteveB
01-01-2000, 12:04 AM
I knew nothing about Palace when I made the fatal decision to support them. I was vaguely interested in football, and asked my dad what was the nearest team to us. He replied "Crystal Palace", so I decided to support them. This was back in 57/58, and I think that he might have given me some sort of warning, or at least encouraged me to support Chelsea, as he does (he was born round the corner from the old Den, and transferred allegiance from Millwall when he moved away). Life as a Chelsea supporter must be much easier.
I have not made the same mistake with my son: he is a fanatical Palace supporter and season ticket holder, despite being born in Brighton, and living theoretically in the middle of a Seagulls area. In practice, the only shirts you see locally are red - ManU or the arse.
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hong_kong_hg
01-01-2000, 12:21 AM
First game vs Wrexham 1977, I think. 3-3. Wore red and blue stipes, not the usual home kit, I was 4 years old.
Early eighties at Winterbourne, Thornton Heath everybody supported Liverpool or West Ham, I got laughed at cos my dad took me to Selhurst.
First really got into Palace big style funnily enough when I saw my dad crying in front of the TV after a 4-1 defeat at Coventry in 80-81.
Why are you crying dad? Grandstand showing Palace marooned at the bottom of Div 1.
A little while later Dad took me to Selhurst for a match vs Birmigham, we were long since relagated but we won 3-1, ever since I have been devoted. All because we had a family namesake playing, Billy Gilbert!
And I had the pleasure(?) of playing in the same Winterbourner junior team with Dean Gordon (1 yr below me, very quiet bloke) and Jamie Moralee, same year, utter t*at.
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hong_kong_hg
01-01-2000, 12:27 AM
PS did anyone else out there go to Winterbourne between 1980-1983?
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Jeraff
01-01-2000, 08:58 AM
First time posting for me but some of these bring a lump to the throat.
My story won't though and the dates might be wrong but this is how I remember it. I moved to Thornton Heath / Croydon from across the water in the mid eighties without any real interest in football. I played as a kid for youth club and watched the world cup, FA cup and the like but nothing much. I had 'Supported' Everton as a youngster for a short while because my big brother and his friends did (absolutely no idea why). I had a blue shirt with a piece of pyjama cord my mum had hand sewed in the shape of a 9 (Joe Royle). I wish I could be saying this about Palace though. Anyway, having moved into the area and realising that Crystal Palace were the local team I wanted to go just to see but not knowing anyone and being put off by the thought of trouble I missed out on some of the best days. I remember the lead up to the 1990 cup final and being in the Cartoon and every so often a big EAGLES! EAGLES! would erupt. It sounded fun but I wasn't part of it yet. In '95 Ray Houghton joined and this increased my interest (he had scored against the Italians) and I saw Palace on the TV during a relegation struggle and Chris Amstrong scored a wonder goal from the right wing and I thought 'this team can't go down' but alas they eventually did. I was saddened but still not part of it.
The next season me and my girlfriend talked about going but we didn't even know how to get tickets, thinking that you had to be a member of the club with an id card to get in (that’s what the press hype concerning the clampdown on hooliganism made us believe). That was until my girlfriends sister got a part time job in the ticket office and told us how easy it was (did you know that part timers in the ticket office were allowed to see the second half free if they wanted - they just didn't get paid instead). So, our first match was against Reading in Oct 95. I know we lost and I think it was 0-1 with Richard Shaw scoring an own goal (correct me if I'm wrong but I seem to remember the ball glancing of his big mop into the Holmsdale goal). But the bug had bitten and we ended up going to all the home games for the rest of that season and the play offs. We've had season tickets since. Apart from the obvious highs and lows in this short time, one memorable game is away to Sheffield Wednesday. Why? - It was the weekend of my girlfriends birthday and the family decided to throw her a surprise party on the Sunday. I needed to get her out of the house so being the romantic old fool I am, I said 'fancy going to Sheffield Wednesday on Saturday and staying over?'. Just as well we won that game because it was the weekend of the snooker in Sheffield and the only place we could get to stay was the bleedin Stakis Hotel. Cost me a fortune that did, but well worth it.
I know that I've only been here five minutes compared to most of you but whatever happens now, I know that neither of us will ever support another team.
Happy days will come again.
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cdm61
01-01-2000, 09:31 AM
We are Palace We are Palace Super Palace from Selhurst we are Palace Super Palace We are Palace from Shelhurst........
Too many tales not enough time........
But the book sums it up........WE ARE PALACE
Will the 5th Of January be our new year?
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Small number
01-01-2000, 07:18 PM
I haven't got a clue y I'm a eagle.... before I woz six my Dad use to take me to any old football match between any old teams helping me choose a team to support. He didn't put any pressure on me to support his team (thank god I would have been a tiger). then one day in about 1990 I think, could have been 1991 I went to my first ever Palace match.. at home to Coventry it woz freezing cold( I mean really, really, really cold) and it woz a boring 0-0. and from that day forth my heart has belonged to the club. (don't ask me y)
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http://www.zyworld.com/smallnumber2/palace5.htm
I apolagis, DOH
I apolgise, DOH
I apoligies. DOH
I say sorry in advance for any bad spelling and bad language I use!
Mike Douglas
01-01-2000, 08:35 PM
In April 1969, I was visiting a mate in Thirsk Rd. and with nothing to do he suggested walking up to Selhurst Park. So we went and stood on the Park Rd terrace, which was about to become the AJW stand, and watched Palace beat Fulham (3-2?), to gain promotion to Division One. The team in the program is Jackson, Sewell, Loughlan, Payne, McCormack, Hoy, Lazarus, Kember, Jackson, Taylor (T), Taylor (C) and sub Snowdon. At this point I was hooked, and have been watching ever since, apart from the Mullery years when I staged a one man protest refusing to watch whilst he was in charge (ex Brighton memories for those old enough to remember). Admission prices from that same program may amuse, Ground 5/- (25p), Covered enclosure 6/- (30p), Centre Stand 11/- (55p),
Programme 1/- (5p). Last week I paid Ł16 to watch from the Sainsbury. Doesn't time fly!!
You must admit it's never boring supporting the Palace. High point must be the Semi-Final at Villa, Low point relegation when the Arse beat somebody on the last day of the season. My brain has dismissed all other details.
High and low together, breaking my Sternum in the Mailcoach Pub when dumped from a mates shoulders onto a concrete floor covered only by thin carpet celebrating the next promotion in 1979.
Lets' hope things get better in 2000, they can hardly get worse.
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2a19
James
02-01-2000, 12:49 AM
Yes Mike, it was 3-2. I don't blame you for not reading my contribution (above), because it was long and self indulgent - but it's the same game. You and I got hooked on the same day in 1969.
James
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lightweight
02-01-2000, 04:02 AM
OK here goes - I haven't read all the entries above - so don't know if any of this will overlap - but thought I'd add to it. Please excuse me if any details are incorrect!!!
I don't know which was the first game I went to - I've told my Dad off on several occassions about this! - but I was born into a Palace supporting family - so I think it must be genetic. My Dad, Uncles, Cousins etc are nearly all Palace supporters - so I didn't have much choice. I first went when I was about 7 - we were in the stands (Mum wouldn't let Dad take me on the terraces) and I couldn't understand why we were sitting in the stands!! (childhood logic for you) My Mum would never let me have a whole packet of crisps in one go - but she let me take one to the match - so a couple of weeks later when asked again if i wanted to go - I said yes!! (if only because I knew I'd get more crisps http://cpfc.org/ubb/smile.gif ) I have since found old 'palace news' from the days of Hilaire, Swindlehurst etc - where I started the season writing down all the scores, scorers and league tables!! However for several years after that I didn't have much interest - I must have still liked football as my "boyfriend" when I was 10 gave me all his football stickers and I was really chuffed!! I didn't really become a 'proper' supporter until the 90's - I went to the odd game - here and there (for instance the fa cup replay but not the final - can't believe it now ) with my Dad who by this stage was in a wheelchair - so had an 'wheelchair escort' season ticket. I think one of the turning points was the cup game against Lincoln in 1994 - in which Dean Gordon scored in about the 93rd minute - I was listening to it on the radio - and it suddenly occured to me that I should be there following the team - not going to a tap dancing class instead (don't laugh!!!!) http://cpfc.org/ubb/embarass.gif That ended up being (apart from Barnsley on the first game of the 95/96 season when I was away on holiday in Sweden) the last home game I missed. The 94/95 season was also when I started going to away games other than Wimbledon http://cpfc.org/ubb/smile.gif It's quite ironic that when my Dad said about going to Watford - my reaction that it was a long way to go for a match!!! because that season not only did we go to watford - but Chelsea, QPR - and the semi final at Villa Park. Also - on the last game of the season - not knowing anyone else that was going didn't seem a good enough reason not to go to Newcastle - being on my own wasn't a problem - and on that and one or two other games I never felt alone amongst all the other Palace fans - to the extent that now even if i wanted to i don't think I'd manage to go a whole trip without seeing loads of people I know!!! Really from then on I was well and truly hooked - last season I only missed 5 games - and this year so far only 2 - due to being in New York for Sheff Utd game, and travelling to Edinburgh for the Leicester game.
It's amazing to think how much the football club you support affects your life - the things you do, places you go to, people you meet that wouldn't have happened without Crystal Palace - and how much of your life is affected by it. It's quite frightening really if you work it out.
I wouldn't change it for the world though - days like the Wembley play off final agains Sheffield United, and at Wolves in the semi, Everton and Leeds away in the premiership, Norwich last season, just watching someone like Lombardo playing for us - getting involved with the disabled children's party, going on trips abroad with other palace fans - more than make up for the disappointment of numerous relegations,
Wembley play off against Leicester, losing to Barnsley in the premiership, etc etc.
I'm palace and proud of it - and keeping everything crossed that things will take a turn for the better in 2000.
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Small number
02-01-2000, 03:13 PM
o yeah if anybody is intrested the the team that played v Coventry woz:
1, Martyn
2, Humpreys
3, Shaw
4, Coleman
5, Young
6, Thorn
7, Bowry
8, Thomas
9, Armstrong
10, Rodger
11, Mcgoldrick
subs:
12, Southgate
13, Ndar (maybe wrong spelling)
GK, Woodman
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http://www.zyworld.com/smallnumber2/palace5.htm
I apolagis, DOH
I apolgise, DOH
I apoligies. DOH
I say sorry in advance for any bad spelling and bad language I use!
Jimmy The Lips
02-01-2000, 11:23 PM
I, as many others, was born into Palace. Both grandfathers and my dad were regulars, and there are photos of me at 4 months old with a claret and blue hat on. I'm sure it wasn't the first game I went to, but the first I remember was the Burnley night - I was 6 years old and couldn't see a thing. And very soon Palace were the best team in the country. Things went downhill of course, but I still went with my family.
In 1986, when I was at the age of 14, my granddad died. He'd had lung cancer for a while, so it wasn't too much of shock, yet I didn't show any grief in the week up to the funeral. During the service the priest spoke about his life, culminating by saying that my grandad's greatest pleasure in life had been taking me to Selhurst, where I'd stand on the little box he made for me. At this point I broke down, was unable to do the reading I was meant to and didn't hear another word of the service. It really struck home that I'd never see him again.
When we won at Villa Park, I thought of him.
I think that's the best example of why I can only ever be a Crystal Palace supporter.
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James
03-01-2000, 01:04 AM
Mike Douglas said:
James, I don't want to turn this into a chat line, but having a "legend" with the same "birthday" is almost like finding a long lost relative. Lets hope the next 30 years is as much fun as the last 30.
It IS a bit like a birthday isn't it? My life certainly changed on that day.... 30 years huh? ... and what fantastic memories. If the next 30 years is half as much fun, I won't be complaining.
James
Mike Douglas
03-01-2000, 04:06 AM
James, I don't want to turn this into a chat line, but having a "legend" with the same "birthday" is almost like finding a long lost relative. Lets hope the next 30 years is as much fun as the last 30.
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Steve Lower Holmesdale
03-01-2000, 06:47 AM
Well it is now 1.55am monday morning and I cant see my screen for the tears I have shedded whilst reading the MOTHER OF ALL
THREADS dave al james sandy chocky and all
who have contributed FAN-TASTIC
My dad started taking me when I was about five in 1966 I Went to school in streatham and sill live here now and in those school
days most of the other kids did support
the then glaziers and the renamed Eagles.
By the way james or al who used to ring the
bell in the old stand enclosure and whatever happened to them????.
Dad kept taking me until he and my mum split
up.my two brothers,my sister and me then
ended up in a childrens home.well like sandy when palace were at home I used to scale the
walls and escape. when I would arrive back
to the usual grounding and loss of pocket money.Sorry to my dad who used to get grief
from the governor of the home for my exploits , but good ole dad never passed on that grief to me.Well by now I am truly hooked.
Like all of you been up to Hatlepool and also down to aldershot those were both cup
games,all five wembley finals ,the pre season friendlies the club used to organize
against wimbledon ,the magical night against burnley approx 52,000 ,going to stoke city
(old ground)steve perrin scores scorching
30 yarder .
Well my dad still goes (season ticket holder in whitehorse)same place where he took me as a kid except he sits now.
When I started goingout with the other half,
every other sat and some mid week occasions
was asked why not available for dates,my other half first game not good Ian wright
breaks leg (think was against derby 1-1).
we now have a daughter.when we were in prem league, took her to anfield and highbury.
She goes to the same junior school I went to,
things have changed the kids all support ever
ybody else usual glory hunters except for a
couple of other boys.
By the way my daughter is now hooked will she thank me when she gets older.
Those of you who have kids if you have not done so do this. last jan against strangly
enough stockport for a birthday treat we
did the cpfc birthday party (2-2) my daughter now has seven soul mates who keep
asking when are we going to see Palace again
only downside have to sit in family enclosure
This piece I have written wont perhaps move you to tears but maybe who knows my little
sibling may (better be over palace and nothing else)in years to come!!!!!!!!!!
wishing you could bottle this thread
Oh well 2.49am suppose I better get off to
bed now
PALACE TILL I DIE
,
the way was it you al or perhaps james
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Sicknote
1f91
selhurst heaven
04-01-2000, 09:29 PM
As this thread will probably go down in BBS history I have got to add my little story...
Right,
Let's go back in time, way back. To a time when stripey belts were joined by silver snakes heads, the latest trainers were called "Zephers" and Curlywurleys seemed flippin' MASSIVE!
Now, a "friend" of mine supported a team called Man United. I hadn't heard too much abouth them or indeed anything about football at the ripe old age of 8, but seeing as I wanted to get involved......I started supporting United. I'm happy to say that my affair lasted a couple of days/weeks as another friend of mine, supported Crystal Palace. He was by far more cool, so naturally, I started following Palace!
Although my dad was born in Newcastle, he (thankfully) preferred Rugby to football, so no "Toon" influence came from him. This paved the way for Palace, and I remember going to my first match in 1979. Palace V Man City. We lost 3-2, and all I remember was a massive brawl on the pitch, Jim Cannon MUST have been involved!!
That night, I caught a quick advert for The Big Match on ITV (that show had a top theme tune), and persuaded Mum and Dad to let me watch the match as, and I quote, "I was eating a hot dog at half time, right, and then the camera's went over to me, right, and I waved at the cameras, so I'll be on TV tonight,etc". This, they agreed, was a perfectly good reason for an eight year old to stay up all night and watch the footie on a Saturday.
From then on, I have been Palace all the way. My Dad often asks who I'd support if Palace went under, or if I felt like supporting another club because Palace were doing badly at the time. (That's Rugby fans for you......)
But, like it or not, when you've stood in the Liverpool end and watched your team being SLAUGHTERED on the pitch 9-0, and you glanced over to the Palace fans, who are clapping and singing "We know you don't believe us, We're gonna win the League", you know in your heart that you support the best flippin' team IN THE WORLD!!!!!EVER!!!
This thread fills my heart. Can you imagine Moan U fans or Chelsea fans writing a thread like this?????
If Palace die, then part of me dies too.
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[This message has been edited by selhurst heaven (edited 05 January 2000).]
SteveB
06-01-2000, 12:36 AM
Egg Sample - was it a John Sewell corner in that game against Leeds? I remembered it as a free kick. Sewell only took one type of free kick, and it was exactly as if a bloke had thrown the ball forward with a shovel - hence his nickname of Shovelfoot. I also recall that when Sewell saw that Sprake was about to catch the ball, he turned round to cover the ensuing kick upfield, and therefore had his back turned away when Sprake dropped the ball into the net.
I may be embellishing the story here, but in my view this only improves it.
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Mat ov CPFC
06-01-2000, 12:52 AM
Originally posted by Egg Sample on 01-05-2000 12:12 PM
Funny Moments - seeing all those sad train spotters avoiding all the beer cans being thrown at them as the Palace Football Special trundles through Crewe station.
Ah happy days !
Although I would like to stress to those of you with a sensitive nature that the cans were empty http://cpfc.org/ubb/smile.gif http://cpfc.org/ubb/beer.gif http://cpfc.org/ubb/beer.gif http://cpfc.org/ubb/beer.gif
Egg Sample
06-01-2000, 04:12 AM
My Grandfather came down from Scotland in 1930 to join the Croydon Police. A little far from Dunfermline he began supporting his local team. (I'm actually fortunate to be here writing this because if you remember the Bentley case (warehouse shooting/"let him have it") my grandfather had changed shifts with the poor copper that got shot. Anyhow, I digress.
So when my father arrived on the scene he was also taken to Selhurst and became so hooked he spent his career as a sports journalist eventually specialising in CPFC. "Every weekend", according to Mum, "up and down the country watching football". Poor thing. And things only got worse when they gave birth to a football mad son.
Apparently, my first game I was 5 ish, a boring 0-0 against N.Forest in 1969?. Funny that as not so long ago I took (actually pushed in his pram) my own son to his first game, also a boring 0-0 versus Southampton.
My grandfather was 90 on New years day and I'm hoping to be able to get all 4 generations of the family to a home game this year. Unfortunately, due to arthritis and old bones I'm going to need a warmer day than at present.
So I guess, all in all, it must be in the genes.
Memories - like everyone else there are so many. First game I can recall was against Leeds when Sprake famously dropped Sewell's corner. I was sitting in the Old stand in line with it. Also the big games against Chelsea when we played them in FACup and then league and lost 5-0, 4-0, one of these games setting the the then record crowd of 49,000 odd (I think). Standing at the front banging the advertising boards to 'Glad all over'. John Jackson, John Hughes (I still have my Yogi Bear dresed in full kit), Don Rodgers, hot dogs, rosettes, oh the excitement, the nerves, the thrill of it all. Big Mal, fedora hats, Peter Taylor,
team of the 80's, brighton away on Boxing Day , infact any day, promotion, relegation, Ian Wright, promotion, relegation.....and Mark Bloody Hughes..and...Ron Bloody Noades ..and...Mark Bloody Goldberg.. and..Terry Bloody Venables ...and what the hell, We are Palace from Selhurst.
Most Embarassed moment - was taken on a special trip to see Palace at Old Trafford in early 70's. , a Weds eve , a day off school to see my heroes. Charlie Cook took the ball, beat one player, beat 2 and was off down the wing...and the twat tripped over the ball and sprawled everywhere. 50,000 just laughed at him.
Funny Moments - seeing all those sad train spotters avoiding all the beer cans being thrown at them as the Palace Football Special trundles through Crewe station.
And also after the QPR Clive Allen Cup game, with hundreds of fans rioting (not funny), the police just wanted to get them into the tube station and out of the area. Imagine the scene, and then there is the lone Underground employee trying to check everyones ticket! Said employee was then pushed into his little box and said box was then physically lifted and moved into a corner trapping said emplyee inside! (By the way I did have a ticket)
Saddest Moment - Was after Cup Replay when I decided that I was not going to football any more. Had gone with my wife,Mum,sister, sat(or stood) in Palace area surrounded by manscum fans. Horrible, nasty and frightening
Did indeed stop going (though always looked for the scores)
Most annoyed - Having been taken all over the country as a kid watching Palace my dad did not take me to the games at Leeds and Sunderland in the 70's cup run. Had to make do with " 97.3fm, 261mw, LBC, where news comes first"
I'll finish on a happier note!
Favourite Song - Wise Men Say, Only fools run away, But I can't help, falling in love, with
you.
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215b
interested in sydney.
06-01-2000, 04:35 AM
God the tears reading some of these. Brian Dean's dad (No not the centre forward) took me early 60s.Palace 2-0 against Bournemouth. Only 1 stand then and a lot of mud.After that I was hooked but could only go when my mum would let me. I can remember missing a game against Derby years ago for letting a banger off in the house . But after that it was see as much as you could.I thought it was really cool to see my first away game Charlton , and we lost on a penalty. You can go on forever Cardiff in 70 something losers doen winners up we drew 1-1 stewart Jump , and still went down. Evertone has memories that maybe can bore people . BUT when people ask what do you miss about England it is always PALACE , mates,pub somethings can NEVER be taken away
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Egg Sample
06-01-2000, 01:51 PM
Could have been free kick, I was only 6 ish and hven't seen many replays of this on the telly. Any chance of getting this as an MPG?
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Dai the Swansea Eagle
06-01-2000, 05:07 PM
I am unsure as to where my Palace supporting life came from. Neither of my parents are interested in football in the slightest so it’s certainly not inherited although I have cousins who are Palace supporters. As young children my mum liked to take us to Crystal Palace park regularly, I can only think that hearing the name of a football club close to something that was part of my life must have set me off. I was taken to my first game by the chap who used to live next door to us. I will always be grateful to him even though I don’t suppose I’ve seen him in over 15 years. It was against Aston Villa in the back end of 1979. I remember very little about the game except that Billy Gilbert cut his head. However what is still with me today from that game was the way the ground shook after each of the Palace goals which was the most amazing feeling and something that I’ve not experienced since at any game I’ve been to since. Not even the pure bedlam following Hopkins goal at Wembley can match that initial taste of Palace.
The 80’s came and went. In the early 80’s I went to a couple of games with my football team, who were coached by a Palace fan who I’d sometimes spy at Palace home games up until 2 or 3 seasons ago. I remember listening to the Burnley relegation game on the radio under the bed covers, and a couple of Palace players not bothering to turn up to our football prize giving night. By the mid 80’s I was getting up at the crack of dawn everyday to do a paper round with a view to getting to as many games as I could afford. At that stage I went with a small group of school friends and the occasional dad. By the end of the decade my brother used to come with us and there would be four of us going to Selhurst as often as possible. We all went together to the Walsall game two weeks ago for the first time since Alan Smith left the club - it made my Christmas.
I’ve spent quite a bit of the 90’s here in Wales. It wasn’t until I moved away from home that I realised just how much Palace meant to me. I think a lot of my passion for the club has rubbed off on others I’ve met along the way. Now, as has always been the case I go to games as often as I can afford to – I don’t earn a great deal, I have no savings and I owe a lot of money, but if I have a month where I’ve got some extra cash it goes on Palace. Last season the wheel turned full circle so to speak when I took my nephew to see us play for the first time, at Oxford. It was lashing down and we got into the ground as the gates opened so that I could get him somewhere decent on the terrace. After each of the goals the look on his face showed he was as close as it is possible to get to feeling the way I felt nearly 20 years earlier. It was a special game for me. I wonder if in 2020 he’ll still be thanking me?
mikestock
07-01-2000, 12:07 AM
a) they're my local team
b) it annoyed my dad who's a spurs fan
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Mike S
visit my site at
http://website.lineone.net/~mike.stockle/
Tony Humphreys
07-01-2000, 12:21 AM
Steve B
I don't know if it was a free kick but it was certainly a Shovel special - an up-and-under. Amusingly enough Big Jack C was not amused, but the rest of the country were.
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Skid Row
07-01-2000, 03:39 AM
This isnt exactly an exciting story and I didnt really want to post it because it wont compare to anything above or below but what the heck.
Back in my youth in 1990 I, like probably many of you, had a commodore 64. (after the atari of course). Anyway, my mate and I used to play a game called Might & Magic 2 and also a football manager game funnily enough called Football Manager. He used to pick Liverpool but then change the team name to Lincoln Hawks for some unknown reason, apparently he liked the name. We really liked this M&M2 game and I found out that M&M3 wasnt going to be released on the C64 but it was going to be on the Amiga 500. So I bought an Amiga to play this game and I also bought another FM game, (forget what it was called). With this FM game you couldnt change the team names so been in the Lincoln Hawks mode I picked the symbol of the teams which closely resembled the Hawk which of course was the mighty Eagle of Crystal Palace. This was about around the end of the relegation season, I had never followed any results before this but when I started to Palace were down the bottom of the then Div 1. The next season was the championship season and I couldnt wait to get the monday paper to see the results from the weekend and I swear we always won that season. No need to explain the rest of the years as you'll all know more than me but I like Bunghole used to stay up until 4am Sunday mornings (bloody day light savings)listening to 5 live to get the results.
My M&M2 mate called me the other week and asked if I had any soccer symbols he can scan and put for a cover on a playstation soccer game he's burnt. I told him I've got plenty of Palace stuff but he said he wanted a Man U logo. I said I wasnt sure but he said he was going to come over to get see what I had. He didnt end up coming over and luckily for him because I was going to bash him. Bloody give him manu.
James
08-01-2000, 02:15 AM
Egg Sample asked about the Sewell fluke:
......Any chance of getting this as an MPG?
I'm sure that I prepared an mpg of this goal a couple of years back - I'll see if I can find it. It was on one of Danny Bakers' (spit) 'Own Goals and Gaffs' tapes.
James
Navigator
08-01-2000, 02:33 AM
My first memories of Palace where when I was just a nipper sitting on the old mans shoulders .I dont remember who we played that day but I remember the crowd yelling "come on John" and "give the ball to Johny" and from that day on I was smitten.Playing football in the school playground Iwas Johny Byrne.
I remember in the 70s and 80s the massive travelling support and how the fans all looked out for each other when trouble called.
Now in these desperate times the same hardcore support turns out week in week out and sitting in the Holmesdale there is no other place in the world I`d rather be.
This is why I`m PALACE .
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21fe
PalaceFan in Alabama
08-01-2000, 08:42 AM
"Is there a writer in the House"? someone needs to put pen to paper and record this thread. Reading and re-reading this thread has made this old git a very happy man! To think that such a cross-section of pepole could have a love affair with the same Football Club is something that should be written about. As someone else has mentioned the likes of Moan Utd, Chelshit, and ArseHoles could never show their feelings like those above. No matter what happens to our beloved CPFC, I for one am so very grateful to every member of this Board; we may not always agree with each other, but we have ONE THING IN COMMON "OUR LOVE OF CPFC". I will say goodnight before I start crying!
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James Varcoe
08-01-2000, 02:50 PM
This is the best of threads and really should
be published, does anyone out there know a way in which this can be put into book format and sold to raise trust funds?
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This no smoking thing is killing me
James
08-01-2000, 05:17 PM
Tony Humphreys' memory is defective - he wrote:
I don't know if it was a free kick but it was certainly a Shovel special - an up-and-under. Amusingly enough Big Jack C was not amused, but the rest of the country were.
No it wasn't a free kick. An mpg clip of the famous goal is here:
http://www.rushmere.demon.co.uk/mpg/oops.mpg
http://www.rushmere.demon.co.uk/pics/sewell.jpg
Sewell celebrates a rare goal!
as216
09-01-2000, 03:20 AM
Dave, this is one thread that has to remain.
So many memories.
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Can't think of anything funny to put here.
Brett
09-01-2000, 03:34 AM
I might have to edit my own as since I posted it, some things have come to light that have sparked the better part of my memory.
And yes we should have more people posting on this.
Perhaps to save loading time of the thread, how about several child threads that would have postings related to your name ie Why I'm an Eagle, A-E.
It sounds simple to me but this is the writing of a merry man so think round it.
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Al From Bromley
09-01-2000, 04:10 AM
James and Alabama - I've been banging on about putting it into book format for ages. You may have seen my posting on the general discussion thread - trying to direct traffic here to post. There are almost 800 people on the BBS, but we've only got 80 posting on "Why I'm an Eagle". If we get 200 or more I will happily arrange to have it published/printed in some format. I'm happy to edit/tidy up as well - but we need far more postings!!!
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[This message has been edited by Al from Bromley (edited 08 January 2000).]
RednBlue
11-01-2000, 01:00 AM
Back to the top
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RnB
Flanders
11-01-2000, 01:45 AM
here goes
Must have been about 4 or 5 when i went to my first game with my dad, have no idea who we were playing, would have been about 1977ish , team included Cannon, murphy & all the rest, my first real memory was of John Burridge, remember him coming on to the pitch doing hand stands before the game, to be honest i think i enjoyed that more than the actual match at first!!
Wasnt a regular at selhurst at that age as my dad went with his mates & obviously didit want me & my brother tagging along!.
when we didnt go, my brother & i used to sit on our front gate & listen to the noise from the crowd, hoping to hear a huge cheer to signal a palace goal.
Unfortunately due to my dads job change we moved to brighton, my affection for palace then grew even stronger, AT 10/11 when people tell you to do something you seem to do the opposit, & when all the guys at school were telling me to support brighton it made me more determined than ever to continue to be an eagle..
at 16 i got my first job & with cash on the hip im able to go to palace regularly, think ive now had a season ticket for 8 years.
my best memory is of the playoff final, not the game itself (although it was top quality), but Victoria before the match, we just took the whole place over, it was just a sea of red & blue, i dont think i will ever forget that day.
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Coppell is God
[This message has been edited by Flanders (edited 10 January 2000).]
Tony Humphreys
11-01-2000, 02:10 AM
James
How is my memory defective? The clip shows exactly what I said - a Shovel up and under.
Anyway, thanks for posting it - it's certainly a Palace memory to cherish. And Leeds thought Peter Lorimer could shoot.....
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James
11-01-2000, 02:27 AM
Apologies - it was SteveB who thought it was a Free Kick.
Glad you enjoyed the clip.
James
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PalaceFan in Alabama
11-01-2000, 07:50 AM
Flanders you mentioned Victoria in your post. When I came over from the States for the Cup Final, we spent Friday night in Penge and Saturday morning Six of us jumped into my rental car and headed for Victoria, one of my sons said we should have no problem parking near the Stage Door (PH), what a joke. Anyway I dropped him off at a cash point and he said he would walk to the Stage Door and "by the way Dad look for my mates they will be in the Stage Door, you can't miss them they will be wearing Palace tops" (another good one eh!). You can quess what awaited us as we turned the corner to the Stage Door! The whole fcuking street was a mass of Palace Tops. Anyway my son found his friends and we left Victoria with EIGHT people in the car and parked near to Wembley. We had tickets in different parts of Wembley, I sat with a crowd from Coulsdon, who were also at the Stage Door. They were going back to the Stage Door after the game. After the game we all meet back at the car and headed back to Victoria and had a great time at the Stage Door, I do believe the people attending Buddy Holly had trouble listening to the play. Two Black guys came towards the Stage Door from Victoria St and the crowd chanted "Ian Wright Ian Wright", boy you should have seen the look on their faces!
Prior to the game as the tourist buses stopped on Victoria St, the crowd would chant "Eagles, or we are Palace and many others". I am currently sitting in JFK airport (New York) awaiting to board my flight) and I can see the whole thing as if it had just happened. This is just one of so many memories about my beloved Palace. This is my second posting on this thread, I am sorry but it came back so life like I had to post it. This is one of the many reasons "Why I am an Eagle".
You can take the boy away from the Palace, but you can't take the Palace away from the boy! They will be with me until I die, so many memories, so many tears and yet always Super Palace from Selhurst.
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2e23
Egg Sample
11-01-2000, 01:13 PM
James, thankyou for the clip.
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jonesy
11-01-2000, 03:04 PM
Up until I was round about 10 I never really had an allegance as such.My Dad never really supported any of the big teams prefering Saturday afternoons watching Carshalton Athletic which was just across the park from us,not that he was that keen on them but they had a bar that opened early(Would have made a good Palace fan would Vic! RIP)
One of my Uncles done the Hospital Radio at the Den and kept threatening to take me there to see some "Proper football" luckily me Mum didn't think it such a good Idea.then one of her mates Husband took me to Craven Cottage to see Foolem v Stockport but still something was missing even though I managed to get a certain J Haynes' Autograph.
A few weeks later salvation of a sort arrived on a visit to another Uncles afer seeing my Dad off to the States for 6 weeks. they had a colour telly and he was showing it off. It was a Sunday afternoon and The Big Match was on.I noticed this team playing in a real top kit and discovered that it was the 'Mighty Glaziers' of South London. They seemed to be playing well and the goalie,a certain Mr Jackson pulled off some brilliant saves.
The Seeds were sewn.A few weeks later me and Butchie my best mate(who already supported CPFC were over the park when his brother and his crowd(about 5 Years older than us) came over in their Ben Shermans and DM's etc. One of them said who do you support then? I said I didn't know.With that I was on the floor and threatned with a good kick in if I didn't say Palace.Well who was I to argue?!
To be fair they all used to bring us back their programmes and give us a debrief of what had happened at the game and after and the things they had got up to with their
birds post match(Cor! we used to think!)
My first game was a while in coming,last game of the season Home to Huddersfield 0-0 and pissing with rain (had to work saturday morning at my Dads mates Lawn Mower Repair Shop to get the money.Weird thing is my House backs on to where it was).Got absolutely soaked standing on the Holmesdale but I was well and truely hooked what with the songs and atmosphere(Knees-up Mother Brown being a particular favorite) and didn't miss a home game next season.
One particular game I recall was against Southampton,when me and my mate were sitting on the train.2 blokes got in our compartment at Wallington and started a conversation,they were about 17.As the train left Waddon one of them got up walked over to me and started undoing my scarf.I pushed him off and he belted me one,and nicked my scarf.As the train pulled into West Croydon he shouted "Spurs Rule ****** "! and they jumped off.My mate shouted out to a few people on the platform about what had happened and some of the Palace that were there chased after them.Never got my scarf back but it just made me more determined(Had a fair old shiner though!)
As I got older I was allowed to go to a few away games which were even more enjoyable though I'm sure my parents would have put a stop to that if they'd known I was going with a certain crowd from a Pub close to Carshalton that is no more but had a bit of a name shall we say.(Kept out of anything that was dodgy, though wished I'd seen that Spurs ******* again then!).
Jacko,Yogi,Bert Head,Don Rogers 5-0,Wrestlers Burgers,Mrs Minchella,Jimmy Cannon scoring on his debut against Chels, Big Mal came along and.... we got relegated (twice!!)Peter Taylor,Thousands away(and I mean THOUSANDS)in the 3rd,The Youngsters, Brighton, THE cup run Promotion THAT Night against Burnley,Samson,Hilaire, Team of the Eighties,Top of the League, Veneables going taking most the team, relegation, Mullery, Noades,Nearly Bankrupt, Stevie C,on the rise, Wrighty, Brighty, Back where we belong!9-0,Big Nige,Cup run.4-3,Wembley,That twat Hughes,Replay,3rd,Europe(nearly)Yo-Yo time,Sgt Baldock,Weekends in Mersyside,Smiffy, ******* Cantona (Should have gone down IMHO),A certain Old Palace terrace personality trying to put Ince in the picture,more Cup action,Solemn Semi Replay,New Stand,Lombardo,Mrs Goldbergs Little Boy,Brolin,Venables back for more dosh,Sir Stevies miracle ,The hope of youth,The Trust,The BBS,Les Butler, .... Its certainly not boring supporting the Mighty Palace!
Who would have thought all those years ago how things have ended up!!
One thing I can honestly say though is:
<big><big>NO REGRETS CPFC FOREVER</big></big>.
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TRUST THE TRUST
budgie
11-01-2000, 03:22 PM
My family all come from Ireland, and so all my early sporting memories are from watching Gaelic games I think at New Eltham. I didn't know much about football so I did what all good kids of Irish origin do, and started to support Man Utd.
I had heard of Palace and when I found they didn't play far from Upper Norwood where I lived I thought I would go along. The first game I went to at the grand age of 12 was Middlesborough which was a boring 0-0 draw which I watched from the Whitehorse in 1969, I don't remember much from that season other than the Fulham game which really hooked me, and all summer holidays all I could dream of was watching my team the Palace in the First Division.
Obviously it's been over 30yrs since then, and I've seen the Palace Home and Away at wonderful grounds such as Old Trafford, Highbury, and the Racecourse Ground. I feel lucky to have been at all our big games most notably in the 90's such as Villa Park and Wembley, but to those of you who were at Wrexham when we won 4-2, I'm sure you'll agree that was one of the best.
Here's to next 30+yrs of Heartbreak and Glory.
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I'm Palace til I die.
Al From Bromley
12-01-2000, 04:02 AM
That Middlesbrough game was dire, but was it the next day they played Portsmouth and won 3-2 or was it the Fulham game - I can't remember.
At the Wrexham game one my mates got arrested for trying to climb up one of the floodlight pylons - he was that overcome with emotion!!!!
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budgie
12-01-2000, 04:42 AM
I think everyone got knicked that day, a mate of mine got knicked trying to get a Pie from a hut that was shut, and then on the way back to the station, one of the old bill smashed my brothers nose in just for been happy.
Still a great day though!
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I'm Palace til I die.
Archiebald Leitch
24-01-2000, 02:51 AM
I don't know why I wanted to go to Palace but I just did. I was a young boy living in Thornton Heath, my Mum drew me a map of how to get to the ground and on getting to the High St. I put the map in my pocket and followed some blokes in claret & blue scarves. As I entered the Whitehorse and walked up the steps I had an overwhelming deja vu and I just knew what the ground would look like as I walked over the grassy bank to get my first glimpse of the pitch. It was 1968 and we beat Birmingham.
I went to plenty more games that season, can't remember too many, but ones that have stuck with me are Charlton 3-3 when I made my first venture away from the Whitehorse onto the Park Rd terrace, Middlesboro 0-0 at Easter in front of a record crowd and of course Fulham 3-2. i was hooked.
I had to be there for the Man Utd opening fixture next season and arrived well before the gates opened. I took up my usual position at the front of the Whitehorse and quickly became surrounded by Man U supporters. A policeman took any Palace, who wanted to, to the Holmesdale, so I joined others and walked the cinder track for my first visit to the Holmesdale terrace. I didnt miss many that season either. The memory of the crowd at the Chelsea match, where I made anotehr visit to the Holmesdale and had to stand on the floodlight pylon is vivid.
So it continued and away matches started, my first was at Arsenal in their double year when we beat them.
As a Palace fan there is no inbetween - relegated at Norwich I stood at the back of the terrace unable to believe it. Sure we would bounce back it was left to that rainy night in Cardiff and relegation again.
Division three was when I moved my permanent position to the Holmesdale and made it to most away ganes as well, where did the money come from?
Leeds, Chelsea and Sunderland in the cup - so what if we were in division three we were going places again. I listened to the Sunderland match on a radio at Seaburn station. I was on the train that arrived late, got into the ground, glimpsed the pitch and then a punch up started. It was the only time I have had to leave the ground on police advice.
Hereford away - the car I was in broke down in Norbury, we had to see the match so got a cab there and back, even had to pay for the driver to get into the match.
Wrexham away, none of my mates thought it was worth going so I went on my own. Bliss.
When we did make division two with TV I still always felt it was Malcolms team. We were brilliant, no one took the mickey anymore because I supported Palace. Orient away, Leicester and Burnley, we were champions.
A great start - top of the league - Ron Greenwood saying he would build the England team around Palace players - it was me laughing now.
Then the nose dive, managers galore but I didnt give up, even when Mullery was brought in, though I did consider it having been very close to him in the cup replay against Brighton at Stamford Bridge previously. They were dark days but it was still my club.
Then the man arrived and although things started slowly we were on the up again. Steve is Palace like the rest of us. Great days again. I even managed to move from the Holmesdale for a couple of seasons to the Concorde Suite. COME OARRRRRN PALACE. Remember that James?.
The matches were as ever unpredictable - Blackburn away,Blackburn home. The semi Final, Winning the FA Cup (I don't believe Hughes scored at Wembley - he can't have done, we were meant to win, third in the league, the ZDS, it goes forever. So what if we are a yo yo club, its exciting and its my club.
Then my son wanted to come to Palace. He's in his sixth season now - hooked just like I was..., sitting in the Holmesdale and taking in away games whenever possible. I get great pleasure from watching his reactions at games, I will never forget his second time at Wembley, Hopkin scores, my son is standing on his seat when he grabs me round the throat and shouts, 'we've won this time, YES!'
Now, though days are dark again, we all still love Palace and wait for the light to reappear.
I don't know why I wanted to go to Palace, I just did and always will.
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1f87
Al From Bromley
24-01-2000, 06:14 PM
Brilliant recolections Archie. The particularly relevant one for me was your reminiscence about the Sunderland game "I listened to the Sunderland match on a radio at Seaburn station. I was on the train that arrived late, got into the ground, glimpsed the pitch and then a punch up started. It was the only time I have had to leave the ground on police advice." You must have been on the same train and in the same part of the ground as me (enclosure very near home end?).
PS - Talking of 3-3 draws, does anyone remember the one against Plymouth Argyle when Paul mariner was playing for them. All I can remember is it was a blinder with spectatcular goals, balls hitting woodwork etc. I think Mark Linsdey was amongst our scorers that night.
** Anyway, as I've said before, this is an excllent thread and if we could get 200 replies I'm sure we could make it into a book.
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James
24-01-2000, 06:42 PM
It's a small world - well, it's a small Club anyway! This latest exchange between me, Archie and ammiller has resulted in a flurry of E-Mails and many fond memories.
It occurs to me that there must be many BBS subscribers who know each other, without realising it. We must try and arrange a mass meeting (i.e. not just the cliques) before a home match this Season and put some faces to names. Dave can then hand round the BBS T-Shirts (promised about 9 months ago if I remember correctly), so that we can easily identify each other in the future.
CumAAAAAAAArn!
James
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jonesy
24-01-2000, 06:58 PM
Al, I was thinking about that game just the other day.Remember it well for all the wrong reasons.
Argyle bought loads up,there was a bit on the Saturday Lunchtime news as they had smashed up a service station.
When they equalized I swore and was warned by a copper that if I swore again I'd be out.Said OK and with that he grabbed me and said "right you little ******* your out!"
Got marched up to the hut at the back of the Holmesdale,where they took my name adress and school and was told that I would be hearing from them.Was then escorted off the premises.Spent the next few weeks awaiting The Knock or a letter to my Dad or the School getting hold of me.Nothing happened though.
BTW didn't two PAFC fans run on the pitch at half-time and kick a potato or something in the goal in front of the Holmesdale?
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TRUST THE TRUST
Navigator
25-01-2000, 01:40 AM
Reading Archiebald Leitch`s post reminds me of the dedication of Palace fans in their determination to get to a game, this time a mid-week clash in the 70`s away to Plymouth.Four fans turned up at Selhurst only to find that the coaches were full.That was the last we saw of them until we were overtaken on the Kingston bypass by a black cab with Palace scarves streaming from the windows and the occupants giving us the ****** sign.That game too the cabbie stayed to watch.
Jonesy: The Cricketers,Cottage of Content,The Rose or St.Heliers Arms.
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Chris K
25-01-2000, 02:53 AM
Because I'm clinically insane
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Loyal Supporter
Chris K
25-01-2000, 03:05 AM
NO seriously though. From as young as I can remember I always had something in me saying I was Palace maybe that was my dad and my uncle drumming it into me. I remember my first game was Palace v Derby 86-87 and my dad took me up on the Holmesdale as he said that that was the place to see your first match from. I just remember that it was 1-0 by Alan Irvine maybe. The bit that stands out most was the Forest cup match being mentioned over the PA and me turning round to my dad and aking to go. Problem was my parents had split up so I only saw Palace when I saw my dad. The next game I saw was the 1-1(Cannon) West Brom game at Easter. Because I had gone so long without seeing a game I wanted to go more and more so by the time I went it was like a dream come true. From there its the same old story heartbreak bits of pleasure, another fat dose of dissappointment. I have my family to thank for making this into a full-on weekly habit were I now squander my student loan on season tickets and train fares to keep me going, and also ruining many Saturday nights.
But when those good times come its the best feeling in the world!
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Loyal Supporter
James
25-01-2000, 04:57 AM
Archiebald Leitch wrote:
....... I even managed to move from the Holmesdale for a couple of seasons to the Concorde Suite. COME OARRRRRN PALACE. Remember that James?.
Of course I do! Except that it was more of a 'Cumaaaaaaaarn'. The echoes are still reverberating.
ammiller has just E-Mail me to tell me about your posting, and in his message he said:
I am a lifelong friend of said Archie, and remember his shouts of COME
AAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRN from the back of the Old Stand (this was circa 89 - 92
and I used to sit near where the Richard Shaw/Cantona incident was).
I remember seeing that someone not from Archie's party was also joining in
this unique shout, and Archie assures me it was you.
Do you remember this?
I can confirm that it was me, and I still occasionally find myself shouting this bit of nonsense. As shouts go, it was pretty daft, as it wasn't aimed at anyone (or indeed any side) in particular. It was also shouted by Archie at odd times (often during a quiet moment, when nothing much was happening, such as a throw in).
I can't remember Archie shouting anything else in fact. Every now and then just as we least expected it, this cry would come from a couple of rows behind.
Since Archie decided to go back to his roots, the Directors' Box has become a very dull place to be.
James
interested in sydney.
25-01-2000, 11:32 AM
Archie's comment on two games are well remembered by me . Sunderland we got in a punch up after the game and would have been nicked by the local bill ,but for some older Sunderland supporters who pointed out that we did not start it, did finish it how ever.
Also the Plymouth game a headed goal by Chocky and my mate Doris , in his early days as an inside forward.
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jonesy
25-01-2000, 12:26 PM
Originally posted by Navigator on 01-24-2000 09:40 PM
Jonesy: The Cricketers,Cottage of Content,The Rose or St.Heliers Arms.
Navigator-A fine selection of Dodgy pubs!!Its unreal that not one of them exists any more.(Even the one I was refering to is now O'Neils Wallington - ex-Melbourne).Did you used to go in any of them?
1f87
Navigator
25-01-2000, 11:04 PM
Originally posted by jonesy on 01-25-2000 08:26 AM
Originally posted by Navigator on 01-24-2000 09:40 PM
Jonesy: The Cricketers,Cottage of Content,The Rose or St.Heliers Arms.
Navigator-A fine selection of Dodgy pubs!!Its unreal that not one of them exists any more.(Even the one I was refering to is now O'Neils Wallington - ex-Melbourne).Did you used to go in any of them?
Jonesy:the Melbourne was the first pub I had a drink in. Me and my mates were 14yrs old at the time . We walked up to the bar and my mate asked the barman for 4pints of beer. When the barman asked what sort he pointed to a punter and said "Whatever he`s drinking". So we ended up with 4pints of Crown bitter.Went home pissed that night and ended up with the old man holding my arms and the old lady my legs as they tried to carry me into the house before the neighbours clocked us.
Used to frequent the Merry- Go- Round as well.
Unfortunately do`nt live down that way anymore as my now ex-wife dragged me off to the Kent coast and I`m stuck here now . Still make the games though.
Rumour going down here that Albania are playing their World Cup home qualifiers in Dover.
Cheers........Navigator.
Navigator
25-01-2000, 11:05 PM
Originally posted by jonesy on 01-25-2000 08:26 AM
Originally posted by Navigator on 01-24-2000 09:40 PM
Jonesy: The Cricketers,Cottage of Content,The Rose or St.Heliers Arms.
Navigator-A fine selection of Dodgy pubs!!Its unreal that not one of them exists any more.(Even the one I was refering to is now O'Neils Wallington - ex-Melbourne).Did you used to go in any of them?
Jonesy:the Melbourne was the first pub I had a drink in. Me and my mates were 14yrs old at the time . We walked up to the bar and my mate asked the barman for 4pints of beer. When the barman asked what sort he pointed to a punter and said "Whatever he`s drinking". So we ended up with 4pints of Crown bitter.Went home pissed that night and ended up with the old man holding my arms and the old lady my legs as they tried to carry me into the house before the neighbours clocked us.
Used to frequent the Merry- Go- Round as well.
Unfortunately do`nt live down that way anymore as my now ex-wife dragged me off to the Kent coast and I`m stuck here now . Still make the games though.
Rumour going down here that Albania are playing their World Cup home qualifiers in Dover.
Cheers........Navigator.
Al From Bromley
02-02-2000, 01:54 PM
Any more people got stories to tell about why they are an Eagle? Come on, I can't believe out of over 800 we can only get just over 100 postings.
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Viking
03-02-2000, 10:54 PM
My Father and Grandfather used to play the pools in the early seventies. When they could not decide on a game they used me instead of a dice. I choised the team with the most cool and beautifull name and they didn´t win any money. One team in particular captured my interrest. Crystal Palace! Both a cool name AND underdogs. The team to support! They were also allways kind of yoyoing up and down the divisions in a most attractiv way. One saturday it happened! The announced game rained in or something and they shown Palace instead. I don´t remember mutch of it but we played away and we had to borrow the home teams away-jerseys. I was hooked! UP THE PALACE!!!
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Viking
For me the great days were travelling away in the late 1980s to mid 1990s.
I've seen Palace on more than 70 grounds – everywhere from Hartlepool (where we lost of course) to a tiny stadium set against the breathtaking backdrop of the Italian Alps where dear old Rudi Hedman converted the penalty which beat Sampdoria (Neil the Eagle will correct me if I'm wrong but I believe Lombardo played for them. Mancini certainly did, but not Vialli).
After a youthful flirtation with Chelsea, I was introduced to Palace by a school friend. He stopped going years ago and we've since lost contact, but I still thank him.
Stamford Bridge has always seemed to me to be riddled with hate, whereas Selhurst Park has an atmosphere of its own – 80% humour and 20% tension. Goals are greeted with relief as much as joy.
I've got a young family and no longer have the time or money to travel away. But I try to get to as many home matches as possible.
Recently I've really begun to notice other parents with their kids and I imagine myself in two or three years' time bringing my son and daughter.
They don't have to follow football and in some ways I'll be glad if they don't. They'll save themselves and awful lot of time, money and heartache. But I really hope they do.
I long to take them to the Goat House and buy them burgers and coke. Walking them down Holmesdale Road to get them scarves and programmes and introduce them to the good-hearted, emotional rollercoaster which is Crystal Palace FC.
I've thought long and hard about whether I want to put them through it. Do they need the relegations, the semi-final defeats (often all in the same season) and the inevitable departure of star players?
Would it be better to let them make their own choice of club? But they'll only end up supporting Man United and I can't have them going through life being laughed at.
When things are bad you always get letters complaining about the embarrassment to the 'Tizer. But in my eyes Palace are never a laughing stock no matter how bad things may be.
It's Man United fans and those who lack the moral fibre to stand up to a tidal wave of Premiership marketing, hype and self-interest who are football's biggest joke.
I once saw a man walking through London with three kids. One child had a Man United shirt on, one wore Arsenal colours and the other Blackburn's blue and white halves. What sort of parent allows this? Social Services should have taken the kids away.
Let's hope Palace can survive for the sake of the generations of fans yet to come.
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As far as putting this stuff into a book goes… please see the General palace Discussion where I've started a thread called 'fundraising book idea'
cheers
Tony
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Chocky
09-02-2000, 05:23 PM
Seeing as this thread is taking an age to load with so many replies, I think it'll be best to close it and start a "part 2" thread, to encourage those who may not want to wait so long to post their stories.
Chocky
09-02-2000, 05:29 PM
The original thread was taking an age to load (may have discouraged some who didn't want to wait from posting), so here's a fresh thread to carry on posting stories for Tony.
2123
Chocky
09-02-2000, 05:50 PM
Late 70s/early 80s "Special Trains"
Small thick cardboard ticket.
Very old "cattle truck" trains.
Everyone running to get a "first class" compartment.
Small food trolley with bugger all on it except for wagon wheels and coke.
Tupperware container of Vodka brew.
Light bulbs out the window.
Pinch the tasty dark haired travel club staff member's bottom (sorry, so drunk, gorgeous bum, I derserved a slap).
360 degree wee wees in the toilet.
Scream out the window on arrival.
Get off and sing "We're here because we're here because we're here because we're here".
Herded to ground in drunken state, on foot or by bus.
Herded back, in sobering up, usually peed off state.
Blinds pulled down as we set off home.
No booze left.
Food trolley run out of wagon wheels & coke.
Palace supporters wanting to ruck each other on the train 'cos they didn't get a fight at the ground.
Arrive back screaming on the platform.
Scream in the tube station.
Hear West Ham/Chelsea/Millwall have arrived back and are around.
Stop screaming (start running? Me? No never!).
Go down the Travel Club hut monday and get another cardboard ticket for West Brom on tuesday night.
ruediger
09-02-2000, 07:14 PM
I developped a Palace addiction in the summer of 1973. On a school visit to London and Oxford I got possession of some footy magazines covering big storys about Malcolm Allisons Crystal Palace beeing relegated from the 1. Division: Champagne flowing, bunny girls, Bloye smiling - bright future ahead and that sort of stuff.
Crystal Palace FC? Never heard before, but what a name! Playing in Croydon? Great. Wasn’t that the place where my favorite band „The Nice" did record their magnificient „Five Bridges Suite" live at the Fairfield Halls? Right.
And there was a certain Charlie Cooke on the books at Palace. Exactly the Charlie Cooke who had impressed me so much with a stirring performance (for Chelsea) that night in Athens. Well, Palace got my attention.
Then on Sept 12 in 1973 came that decisive moment I fell in love with the Eagles. I had tuned in to BBC World Service when presenter Paddy Feaney (name correct?) made his comments on Palace 3, Cardiff City 3:
„What on earth is happening to Big Mals Palace? The Eagles are still without a win all season."
Bright future ahead? Palace rock bottom of Divi 2. I couldn't believe it. I was stunned.
Since that very day I’m totally Palace. I do follow our Eagles via radio (I hardly didn’t miss a match in all those years), press (Times Monday edition and Croydon Advertiser - subscription since March 75) and the internet.
At 45 years of age it's my 27. season now. Hope there are as many still to come.
PS: I’ll be at the QPR and Charlton matches. CU soon.
[This message has been edited by ruediger (edited 11 February 2000).]
Andy in Rome
09-02-2000, 08:32 PM
It was towards the end of the Seventies - I was in my early twenties.
I'd been going to watch the Palace on and off for a few seasons with a schoolfriend of mine who was (and still is) a Palace nut, but I never really thought of myself as a Palace fan: just someone who went along to Selhurst Park because it was the nearest place to go to see a match.
Then I went on holiday to Italy with my girlfriend (who went on to become my wife - but that's a different story). We stayed in Florence with her step-brother for a few days.
Now this guy was the worst football anorak I've ever met. He followed what was going on in every division of every league in Europe. He could tell you the scorer of the winning goal in the season before last's match between El Anonymous and Los Nobodies in the third division of the Portugese League, and throw in the exact time it was scored for good measure.
One night, the conversation got around to English football, and inevitably he asked me what team I supported. I said "well, I sometimes go to see Crystal Palace...". At which point, the guy started laughing hysterically and rolling around on the floor. Why, he asked, with quality teams like Spurs and Arsenal almost on my doorstep, did I go and watch an inferior outfit like Palace?
This really riled me. I said that Palace might not be the best team in England, but they were entertaining and had a certain style to them: that Selhurst Park might not be the best stadium in London, but it was friendly and I felt comfortable going there - in fact all of the points that every Palace fan will have made at some time or another when asked to justify their allegiance.
... And then it hit me. I actually CARED about the team: I wasn't just going to see the football at all. I DID feel good when Palace won, and bad when Palace lost. When I didn't go to a match, I always checked the papers for the Palace result... In fact, I'd been a Palace fan for ages, but hadn't realised it.
After that sudden awakening, there didn't seem to be any point in denying it.From that point on, when I'm asked, I've been proud to say "..actually, I support Crystal Palace".
Just to bring the story up to date: one Friday night about five years ago, the girlfriend (now wife) said to me "I'm fed up with being left alone on a Saturday afternoon - can I come tomorrow?". End result - she's now a season ticket holder as well.
When the Palace bug bites, you stay bitten.
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Jonboy
10-02-2000, 12:59 AM
Being born & bred in the North East I used to go and see Newcastle as a boy. But I've seen the error of my ways now.
My affair with Palace began quietly in 1980 or 1981 – I can’t remember exactly – soon after I moved to West Norwood. My wife wanted to go shopping with her friend who lived right beside Selhurst Station and her husband suggested that I join him to go and see Palace. He had told me of the wonderful night against Burnley when he squeezed into Selhurst Park along with 50,000 (?) others so I thought why not? I don’t remember too much about the game except that we beat Man U 1-0, and Jim Cannon for us and a certain Steve Coppell for them impressed me.
I saw a few games over the years, and always look for the Palace results, without ever being a true fan.
Several contributors have written about an almost religious experience when they suddenly realised that following Palace had become more than entertainment, more than enjoying live sport, and was a part of themselves that could never be taken away.
For me this was in the 93/94 promotion season when Alan Smith was manager. My friend was back in England before Christmas so we saw the home game against Birmingham (2-1 Salako & Southgate). Towards the end of the season I went to the WBA game. Paul Stewart scored in the 1st or 2nd minute. There followed the slowest and most agonising 88 minutes as we hung on for the win. I was a nervous wreck at the end – and it had got to me. From that moment on I’m Palace till I die.
It’s a small world of Palace supporters. I missed THE playoff final as I was in Canada. Even worse, I could not find the result, as I wasn’t too clever with the web then and the international editions of the newspapers had all been published on the Saturday. On the Monday, on the ferry between Victoria & Vancouver, a man came up to my son who was wearing his Palace top and asked, rather desperately, “ you don’t know the score do you?”
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The e-mail of the species is more deadly than the mail.
2136
Egg Sample
10-02-2000, 04:57 AM
Re using this thread for book, couple of things. It's not on this thread but you may remember that tmjwat posted an article from the Tizer written by Dave McClelland on his best 10 matches of the 1900's. I hace checked with him and it is ok to use this (can't find its thread but tmjwat must have a copy)
Interesting because I posted my "why I'm an Eagle" before I knew of this article. In my comment you'll notice that my Most Annoyed moment was not being taken to the Leeds and Sunderland Cup ties by my Dad. And then the old bugger comes out and mentions them both in his best 10 games!
Also, perhaps we could all arrange a meet for a BBS photo call? Chance to show off your tatoos, pieces of memorabilia.. ?
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Spears
11-02-2000, 01:53 AM
It all started for me back in about 1970 when, at the age of 8, I finally persuaded my dad to take me to a Palace game. He had been going to Selhurst Park on and off since the 1950's and he and my mum both used to talk about the old grass bank that they used to watch the games from. My dad had started going to games again after they had gained promotion to the First Division and I was desperate to see what it was all about.
My first match was against Forest and it was one of those "life changing" moments. We walked into the Arthur Wait stand and I can still remember my feelings nearly 30 years later. I recall catching my first glimpse of the pitch and thinking that I had never seen grass looking so green. There was an almost overpowering smell of cigarette smoke as we found our seats. It seemed as if everyone was smoking, and for years afterwards I always associated that smell with Palace. When the players came out onto the pitch there was such a noise, with everyone on their feet and shouting, and then there was the music. It was my first experience of "Glad All Over" and I loved it, especially when all the kids down at the front hammered on the advertising hoardings in time to the song. The memory of the game itself has faded a little over the years, but I do remember a 2-0 win to Palace with one goal being scored by Gerry Queen. Jimmy Scott, who rapidly became my hero, scored the other. I remember him as a tricky little winger who rans rings around the defenders and excited the crowd everytime he had the ball.
After that match I was hooked and I just couldn't get enough of Palace. My games were strictly rationed during the next season but I still remember some wonderful matches. Seeing the great Leeds United side go 2-0 down in the first half and then come back for a 2-2 draw. One of my favourites was seeing John Craven score a hat-trick, including a great overhead kick, in the 3-0 defeat of Lazio in the Anglo-Italian Cup.
After the first few years my dad stopped going and I used to go to matches with a friend of his. Sadly he died, and I started going with friends from school. When they moved on to support more glamorous clubs, I continued on my own and over the years I have watched Palace with countless different friends and relatives. In the days of the old Arthur Wait terrace we always used to stand in the same place, just below the Tv gantry, and friends would know where to come and watch the match with us. These days the informality of the terrace has unfortunately gone. Things have now gone full circle for me - I have moved to the Holmesdale lower tier and now take my 5 year old son, Matthew, to all of the games. He absolutely loves watching Palace and is just like I was all those years ago and still am today - proud to be a Palace fan.
There have been so many wonderful memories over the last 30 years or so that it is impossible to detail them all. There have also been many bad times as well. But this is all part and parcel of supporting a club like Palace. Eternal hope, but also realism and an expectation that the worst can and probably will happen. It's what being an Eagle is all about.
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I remember when I was 14 or 15, I started drinking in pubs with my mates, and we used to drink(far too heavily of course) in the Three Tuns in Beckenham high street.We would be in there whenever it was open - lunchtimes and evenings, all weekend.
Occasionally on Saturday afternoon, we would fill in the gap between sessions by getting the bus to our nearest football ground - Selhurst Park, I suppose this would have been around '88-'89. Consequently my memories of the earliest games I went to are extremely hazy, teenage drinking is a terrible thing!The only things I remember are using people's front gardens in Park Road as a toilet and having to get off the bus to be sick.
I did make sporadic visits back to the ground over the next few years, but unfortunately, the term 'wasted' youth could have been invented for me, and I was usually lacking the motivation to step out of the pub.
After leaving school and spending a couple of years as a moody art student, I was eventually kicked out of the education system and re-emerged into real life. I began to take an interest in Palace again, it struck me how much I cared about them when they were relegated in'92/93.
I remember I had a new girlfriend at the time and she arrived at my house one Saturday afternoon. As she arrived she looked shocked at my appearance,"What's wrong?" she asked. I couldn't speak but pointed to the TV where Final Score was announcing that Palace had been relegated. She put her arms around me and I burst into tears, she understood - so I married her.
I was away a lot the next year but still managed to get to a few games and I was very excited about us going back up - 'We told you so'.
My Dad's birthday was on April 20th, we were already promoted. I had a great idea for his present, like most Fathers with teenage tearaway sons, we had had a strained relationship for a few years. Dad was a hard working honest man while I had always been a lazy good-for-nothing workshy art student with an unfortunate propensity for being drunk and disorderly.
Our relationship was polite but distant, I drew up a little voucher in his birthday card:
'This entitles the bearer to a season ticket next season at Crystal Palace'
Dad opened the card and looked at it, he didn't seem very excited but it turned out he thought I was sending him on his own.
"No Dad I'm getting the one next to you".
His face split into a broad grin, at last, a chance to get a proper Father/Son relationship - just me and him and several thousand other screaming people, grinning and shouting and being pissed off sat the same things at last.
Of course we lost the first game that season 6-1 at home to Liverpool. I remember Dad turned to me with 20 minutes to go and said,"Next year son, how about a pair of slippers".
I knew he didn't mean it. We haven't missed a home game since, as well as play- off games, cup games - home and away. We've rode the roller coaster together and we're better friends now than we've ever been I talk to him every day and we always talk about Palace.
He's had stomach cancer over the last 8 months and he's obviously been very ill - but he still hasn't missed a game. Luckily he's made a remarkable recovery - aided I think by the banter and fun he has at football.
The surgeon can't find any more cancer cells, but, as a precaution he's going to hospital on the 18th of March to have most of his stomach removed -it's a big operation and he'll be out cold for 24 hours, this means of course that he'll miss Port Vale at home.
Imagine that I told him - gutted twice in the same day!
When he comes round, what do you think will be the first thing he asks me? I think we all know the answer to that one.
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2450
ruediger
15-02-2000, 11:09 AM
Just an addition to my first entry (see above):
Yesterday I had an lively encounter with Robin Duchesne OBE, Secretary General of the Royal Yachting Associaton and Chairman of the International Sail Training Association (ISTA), who is organizing the traditional "Cutty Sark Tall Ships Race 2003", which is due to finish in my home town Lübeck-Travemünde.
During our conversation I couldn't stop telling him that I'll be in London this March to follow my favourite football team.
"Is it Arsenal, Chelsea or Tottenham?" he asked cockily. My answer took him by surprise: "No way - It's CRYSTAL PALACE!"
"Crystal Palace?? Crystal Palace??" He was shaking his head, still laughing.
When we parted after nearly 2 hours of good humoured talk he wished me well and - being a gentleman that he is - he made one final remark that made me smile proudly:
"I hope Crystal Palace will win."
Can you ask for more?
[This message has been edited by ruediger (edited 15 February 2000).]
Al From Bromley
16-02-2000, 06:11 PM
Brilliant stories guys. Brought tears to my eyes.
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PalaceFan in Alabama
16-02-2000, 09:13 PM
Grass Banks, where were they? I remember the MUD BANKS of Selhurst Park. The walk to the Ground from the Parade was great (all down hill), but that walk home!
It was a real bitch to wait for a bus and the train service, what train service!
There use to be about 8 of us, and today not one of us lives anywhere near London, let alone Sarf London.
It is with pride I tell anyone who wants to know that I support Crystal Palace! I have my Trust sticker and several others stickers on my cars and a Palace flag on my patio (a little weather beaten).
I am Palace Super Palace from Selhurst! Eaaaaaaaaaaaagles. ****! someone PLEASE get hold of those A/H and slap them around a bit and get them back on track.
[This message has been edited by PalaceFan in Alabama (edited 16 February 2000).]
David Battle
21-02-2000, 01:16 AM
.LUCKY OLD GLADYS
That’s what the bloke on the Holmsdale used to say everytime Glad All Over came on. It took me a couple of games to understand what he was on about but once I got the joke I thought it was the funniest thing I’d ever heard. Unfortunatley I still do but the love affair had begun.
Like others here I’m a product of the first promotion saeason in 68-69. I can’t remember the first game I went to that year but two games stand out.
Obviously the final Fulham game and the celebrations on the pitch
afterwards when the players started throwing their kit down to the
baying crowd from the directors box. I spent weeks pretending to
schoolmates that I had John Sewell’s sock. Another game was
against Blackburn. 1-0 up in the 89th minute and we managed to
lose. That set the tone of hope and despair for the next thirty years.
Its probably difficult for younger viewers to remember what a desert of decent football South London was in those days. Millwall were still going nowhere and all their supporters appeared to have skin problems, Charlton had enjoyed their brief spell of glory after the war and aren’t proper London and Wimbledon were still a pub side. The thought of Palace, who had never done anything, winning promotion and bringing Div 1 football was incredible and exciting. That’s when I started going,
first on the to be Arthur Wait mud patch and then on the fringes of the Palce aggro at the Holmsdale, dreaming of buying a crombie.
For me it was also a school thing. We roughly divided into Chelsea, Millwall or Palace fans; a few Tottenham but I can’t remember any Arsenal. But it was the Palace fans who were the most handsome and intelligent and who had a sense of irony and it was the Palace fans who just loved their club to bits and didn’t spend their time whinging and moaning. I think it was that heady combination of promotion and adolescence that did it.
Since the Palace have dominated my whole life. I think about the team ,the ground, my friends and those early memories all the time.The emotional intensity is only marginally eclipsed by the birth of a child. Nothing makes me as happy as seeing or hearing Palace score or win . . Nothing else at all makes me jump and down ,sing, hug strangers and behave like a scaffolder.
Others have listed their favourite times from the early games and certainly Man U 5-0 Sheffield 5-1 and Don Rogers debut stand out. Also saw the wins at Leeds and Sunderland in the cup run. The following year I saw the 1-0 defeat at Hartlepool. Is there anyone out there who can claim to have seen Palace lose at Hartlepool twice in the cup . They should have a stand named after them.
I don’t eat Peaches. Not after the named one scored against in the cup semi final. I rate John Hughes sending off against Everton as the best piece on field barbarism I’ ve witnessed. My favourite palyers are Ian Phillip, Vince Hilaire and Ian Wright. But it is Hilaire who I remember most fondly. Just the sheer elegance and beauty of his play. You could hear the intake of breath when he started running at the opposition and with what ease he drifted effortlessly past people. His lovely bum wiggle and shoulder dip rates even higher than John Cravens thighs. Other wierd memories hang around. A David Payne equalizer against Forest, a 0-0 draw at Wrexham, a John Craven disallowed goal, The horrible crunch when Peter Wall broke his leg, Bobby Kellard being substituted before he killed someone, getting kicked at Stoke, Mel Blyth’s own goal at Tottenham, Lee Sinott being a disgrace. Bright’s winner against Millwall. Its brilliant.
I missed the cup finals but made it to the Zenith Data final . It might have
been the Mickey Mouse chocolate teapot cup but it closed a circle for me. Just to see them at Wembley with all the balloons and the red and blue was over whelming. When we won and Geoff Thomas lifted up that cup I wept buckets. I’ ve seen Palace win at Wembley. I can die happy. The dreams of European domination still linger on and the present **** depresses me greatly but basically I’m just so proud and happy to be a be an Eagle.
And I’m sorry to say James that I’m a complete 100% unrequited Noades hater. But when did objective criteria ever apply to football.
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I bacame a Palace fan at the start of the 59-60 season. I had started to read the sports pages that summer for non-football things and then got caught up in the excitement of the soccer season. Palace were my local team - I had realised when we moved to our house a couple of years before that on a warmish day if the windows were open you could hear the roar of the crowd when the goals went in. In 59-60 we were in the fourth division but went up the next year, though Peterborough pipped us to the championship (and as a result I loathed them for years - no, decades).
The first "big" match I really remember was against Forest, who were in the first division, in the Cup in 64-65. We sang our hearts out as the lads played them off the pitch and won 3-1. But as always with Palace, you had a sprinkling of joy and disappointment through every season, the mood on Saturday evening being determined by how the team had done. But isn't that why we support them?
I remember having a badly timed holiday in France at the end of the 1976-77 season. Some joker broke the radio aerial off the car but I discovered that if we went to the highest point near Deaville and opened the car windows we could just about hear a crackly BBC, so we altered our plans so that we could be there just before 5pm on the final Saturday of the season and that was how I heard that Palace had got promotion to Division 2.
Since then, I have continued to follow Palace, at Selhurst or on the road when I could, and desperately tried to find out the result when out of the country - asking passers by, ringing friends, buying English papers at exhorbitant prices, and now thanking heaven for the internet.
I am proud to support the club that has pulled at my emotions so much over the years, through all the ups and downs. Where would we be without them? I hope we never have to find out.
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21ae
Rob T
22-02-2000, 08:13 PM
First heard of Palace when I was 5 and my Dad asked me and my sisters if we wanted to go and watch a Football match, Crystal Palace he mentioned, “who,” we said, so we went to see Chelsea as they were the team of the area and they had Peter Osgood, Charlie Cooke etc. Luckily a couple of years later we moved to Upper Sydenham near Crystal Palace park at the same time Palace were getting some TV coverage as the were top of the old 2nd Division. But where was the ground ? Later I found a mate who supported Palace and attended my first match against Forest in 1969 or 1970 as couple of others here seem to have done ( not sure about the year but I’ve got the autographed programme somewhere ) Did not go again that season but the following season went regularly and I was hooked. Shortly afterwards I started going to the matches with a 40 strong mob from Sydenham, meeting up at Sydenham station before the game. As I was one of the youngest there I was thankful for the protection. Lots of memories , high points and lows, including getting chased through some dodgy backstreets and car parks at away matches !
Actually one of my biggest memories did not include going to match. I was doing the ‘Big Trip ‘ round the world when in New Zealand I learnt that Palace only went and beat Liverpool in the Semi finals and were in the Cup Final. Decision time , should I stay or should I go ?, what the hell I have been travelling for a year and PALACE WERE AT WEMBLEY. Unfortunately my airline ticket only went as far as Los Angeles. Spent ages trying to sort some flights to get me back in time. Three concurrent night flights meant I would get back on Cup final day. Route was New Zealand to Tahiti, wait a week there, then a night flight to San Fran, then next night flight to Newark NJ via Las Vegas, bus to New York, next night flight to Heathrow arriving Saturday morning. Tube to Victoria, train to Purley and bus to my sisters house. Shouted through the letter box ‘ Eagles ‘ ( I had told know one I was coming back ). Grabbed some beers from the Off Licence 5 minutes before kick off. Phew!!!!! First half I was still in a state of shock and everything seemed a bit surreal. I had gone from swimming with sharks in the South Pacific,( I do not tell a lie ! ) through numerous time zones to watching Palace in the Cup Final. Still managed to get to Wembley for the replay as well.
Now I am busy brainwashing my son, little niece and new 4 week old daughter in everything Palace, despite Chelsea temptations being dangled in front of them from fellow pupils at school. How history repeats itself.
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Why am I an Eagle?
I cannot answer this without making a confession for which, I am afraid, many people will never be able to forgive me. The thing is, I was a Chelsea fan. I therefore cannot claim a lifelong, unswerving devotion to Palace. I cannot claim to have to have been on football specials to obscure third division towns in the north. I cannot even claim to have been at Selhurst against Burnley on 11th May 1979. But I can claim to support Palace now as loyally as anyone and I can also claim that I actually understand the reasons why I do. I didn't come to Palace by chance. I think rather that I found my way back to my natural home.
The story goes like this. I've always lived in the area and Palace has always been in my family. For example, in We all follow the Palace Jack Saunders writes on page 51 about supporting Palace in the 1920s and of "Scotty, a middle aged supporter who ran from one end of the enclosure to the other following the play throughout the match shouting quite unintelligible Scottish remarks non-stop." Scotty was my great-grandfather.
The first Palace game I remember being at was the first ever game in Division 1. August 9th 1969, 2-2 against Man Utd. This wasn't the first Palace game I saw just the first I can remember. At that time my dad used to take me to most of the London grounds. He just loved football so we'd go to whoever was at home out of Palace, Fulham, Chelsea etc. Over the years I had the Palace kits (Claret and Blue stripes with the blue round the neck, then with the orange round the neck, then the claret and blue panels) but I also had Chelsea kits, Liverpool kits even a Rangers kit.
Gradually Chelsea became dominant. They had Hudson, Hutchinson, Cooke Osgood etc. We started to go to Stamford Bridge all the time and I was a Chelsea fan. In 1970 they won the cup. In 1971 they won the cup-winners cup and. Then, in 1974, my dad died. After that I didn't go to football much at all. I still 'supported' Chelsea but by 1977 I was into punk and music held sway for the next few years.
In about 1986/87 people around me started going to football again. Half my mates went to Chelsea and half went to Palace. We'd all meet in the pub before we set off and then again after our respective games. Naturally, I started going to Chelsea. Gradually, if Chelsea were away, I started going with the Palace boys to Selhurst. Strangely, I started enjoying myself at Palace. Heretically, I even started going to Palace sometimes instead of Chelsea. Something was happening and the main thing that was happening was fun.
At Palace games there was a constant stream of p**s-taking from the fans at the top of Compound 1 on the Holmesdale. They were all Palace through and through (they had been on those football specials) but they weren't precious about it. They knew how to enjoy their football, even if it was pouring with rain and the game was rubbish. But at that time, the games weren't often rubbish. On the pitch there was an exciting side in the making. With Wright and Bright there was always the prospect of a goal, always the chance of a comeback if we (it had become 'we' by then) were losing. On top of that we always had a huge drink, sometimes pub-crawling our way from Selhurst to South Croydon.
My growing preference for Palace also stemmed from political reasons. Chelsea had a big right wing presence which began to make me feel very uncomfortable. At home games it was not so invasive because you sat among people you knew. However, one day I went to watch Chelsea play Charlton at Selhurst. I stood on the Holmesdale in roughly the same position in Compound 1 as I stood when I went to Palace games. The longer I stood there the more it was brought home to me that I had no place amongst Chelsea fans. All I could here around me was vitriol and racism. There was no humour, no fun, just base ignorance.
That was the beginning of the end for Chelsea and the end of the beginning for Palace. I went to Chelsea less and Palace more. In 1988/89 both clubs were promoted. Chelsea were champions. I went to the play offs with Palace.
The next season (89/90) I don't think I went to Chelsea at all, except with Palace. I went to most Palace home games and some away games. And I went to Villa Park. Even though I was a relative newcomer to Palace that day in the semi-final remains the most exciting, stunning, moving and thrilling day of my footballing life. From there it was Wembley three times, more semi-finals, relegations, promotions and season tickets ever since.
So I've now supported Palace exclusively for about 10 years. I support Palace because it is a club with a soul. Its supporters know what it its like to be up with the best and down with the worst. They appreciate that it is only if you've suffered the bad times that you can truly know how good the good times are. Unlike the supporters of some clubs, we know we have no divine right to succeed. Thus when we fail, we accept it knowing that it's all part of the deal.
So, as Pete Wylie said "that's my story and I'm sticking to that." I cannot finish without recording my thanks to those who led me on the path to salvation. Take a bow, all those of you who used to stand in Compound 1 of the Holmesdale and especially Chrissie P, Jack Adder, Rupert, Vince, Micky Norman, Fossie, Jonesy, Ginger Dave, Johnny Erwood, Bobby Beardmuller et cetera.
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2514
James Varcoe
01-03-2000, 09:11 PM
Written by Greg Grimmer, a mate of mine without access to BBS
At a very tender age I discovered the glorious game, it was the time of
Best, Charlton and Law of Marsh and Worthington , magicians of the mystic
art we know as football , however I had a problem... a surrey boy with a
fair weather Chelsea fan as a dad.
He didn't want to trapse all the way to Fulham to hear blue is the colour
amongst the racist throng and was even less inclined to take me along. So
early Saturdays were spent with Peter Jones and Ron Butler and the jangly
theme of sports report as I tried to memorise every result and have a view
on Queen of the South's poor away record.
Then a spark of light into my life... an uncle with a season ticket for
those snappily dressed Crystal Palace chaps. Not only that, he was a
reverend uncle, a man of god...surely when he told me that they were THE
club he was speaking the divine truth; they could do no wrong, recently
promoted, a couple of flair players , the best kit in the league , a name
like no other that smacked of royalty and penache .
I was intrigued but like all six year olds not yet convinced it was a big
wide world out there and I wasn't about to be hoodwinked into making a
quick decision about the most important choice in my life . Whilst too
young to realise it's true magnitude I had already leant the old adage that
wives could be divorced but football clubs couldn't , therefore I mulled
over my decision. Only a couple of kids at school were Eagles and they were
a bit wierd......obviously being leafy Surrey there were loads of M** U
"fans", these flighty types had tales of euro glory, of the biggest club
in the world, of theatres of dreams , I wasn't impressed.
As luck would have it soon after this playground conversation the
forerunner to the Lytham St Annes fixture computer ( a big version of the
Shoot! wallchart ) threw up the fixture that would make my mind up ;
The super soaraway Eagles versus the northern giants at Selhurst Stadia .
The Palace were resplendent in their hooped colour co-ordinated strips
which looked as though it had come straight form a Milan fashion show ,
especially as modelled by that dashing figure called Don Rogers , ManU on
the other hand were in that dodgy red strip that every primary school had
as their own kit - the omens were good.
And behold in front of an excited Brian Moore the drama unfolded , Rogers ,
Craven et al ripped into the ageing side from the grim North , every Eagle
knows the result. Rogers rampant , Mulligan in support , Whittle finishing
them off . As Palin post python would have put it.......FIVE BLOODY NIL.
Yep 5-0 to the Palace it had a nice ring to it , my choice had been made
any team that could rip apart the Busby ( oh all right the O Farrell Babes
) had be the team for me . I wasn't prescient enough to foresee the team
of the 80's but never mind for me the Palace were going to be the team of
the 70's 80's 90's and forever .
Alas what I didn't know was this was described by our own Bert Head as the
worst Man Utd team he had ever seen and when were relegated next May the
tears I shed in the playground were only stopped by the irony of the Red
hordes sharing the same fate.
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Very tanned and luxuriant
RDSdaEAGLE
01-03-2000, 11:01 PM
Well, this is a long story, but here go's.
In the 1930's, my great-grandfather had decided to go and watch a football match, and he decided to take my grandfather and my great-uncle. I can say which match it was, but he said it was great. So he went again, and again and again. After 10+ years, Opa (Grandfather) was called up, and had to leave his beloved palace behind.
By 1950, my Grandfather had decided to buy season tickets, and 10 years later, took my mum to her first match, with my uncle. Up until the around 1978, the Palace were an important fixture in the lives of the Halletts. They went to see them beat the European Cup winning Man Utd team of the 60's, and were in attendance at the Burnley match, with the highest attendance for palace ever. My mum had got married, and moved to Germany with my dad, due to work reasons.
Since that time, she had not seen Crystal Palace play until 1996/7, when we got promotion. My first game was against Swindon, when we went 1-0 up, and lost 2-1.
My Grandfather, by the mid 80's, could not watch palace any more, due to a heart condition. By 1999, Ted Hallett had almost seen it all. Until a certain Financial discrepency took place. In my Grandfathers own words "I've seen it bad, but never this bad". Later in 1999, Ted Hallett died, as a happy man, but an unhappy palace supporter.
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Mikkel Beck- WHO?
Juventus- Tossers
Strasbourg- French Tossers
Goldberg- Who cares
[quote]Originally posted by ruediger on 02-09-2000 03:14 PM
Playing in Croydon? Great. Wasn’t that the place where my favorite band „The Nice" did record their magnificient „Five Bridges Suite" live at the Fairfield Halls? Right.
quote]
There's the sound of a cough at the start of the 2nd movement (I think - lost my copy of Five Bridges years ago) I sure that was me!
Magnificent record. http://cpfc.org/ubb/supergrin.gif
ruediger
03-03-2000, 11:47 PM
I'd always wanted to know the name of the guy who spoiled the show. Nice one, tmjwat.
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Its back
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BBS ADMIN staff@cpfc.org
ruediger
16-03-2000, 11:24 AM
Dave, we do have a thread "why I am an eagle, part 2" running already.
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Matty
16-03-2000, 07:14 PM
I can remember the first time I saw Palace - I'm just not sure when it was. I think it was Jan 1970 - FA Cup third round away v Spurs.
Anyway, I was about ten but got interested in football when I went up to junior school. For some reason I have no clear recollection of the World Cup in 1966 but my family were never really sports fans.
it was may grandfather who started to take me to matches between 1968 and late 1969 we'd been to practically all of the London grounds, but not Palace for some reason, using public transport. We went to Spurs quite a bit and west Ham more so but didn't support either. Everybody at school supported Spurs or Chelsea.
Then my Uncle started coming taking us in the car, so the criteria was somewhere we could dirve to from Orpington and park close to the ground - so we ended up going to what was essentially our local club.
Anyway the first time I saw them was away at Spurs. It was 0-0 and we won 1-0 at home in the replay. I fell for the kit - claret with light blue stripes, yellow collar and cuffs. I still think its our best kit ever and it grieves me whenever Villa where something similar. IT'S OUR KIT! I thought John Jackson was the best player (we've often had good goalies: Paul Barron, John Burridge, especially Nigel Martyn). Then we bought Gerrie Queen and he scored the winner against Liverpool. We saw a lot of games over the next few seasons of which Man U 5-0 (and losing 5-3) and Sheffield U 5-1 (I was corrected on another thread) stand out.
Kits and players come and go, but 30 years on, I'm still a mad keen (mad at least) season ticket holder. I've converted the wife from Man U (I showed her real football 18 years ago when we started going out). Both our sons go too. My eldest's first two games - he borrowed my season ticket as I was away - were the big wins in the League Cup v Villa and Man C and he went to the Cantona game!
Why do I support Palace? I think it was love at first sight, but deep down I know there's more to life than winning everything. we've had big highs when we've greatly exceeded any of our expectations and deep lows when things can't seem to get much worse. Somethings always happening. I just hope it keeps happeneing for much more than another 30 years.
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Support the trust
1f74
Gooders
17-03-2000, 03:19 PM
OK bow - my turn.
As I've said on another thread I am Palace thanks to Archiebald Leitch.
As a misguided 8/9 year old growing up in Thornton Heath and just getting interested in senior football, I thought I was an Arsenal fan.
Everyone at school (Winterbourne) supported Chelsea or Spurs - this was probably due to it being around the time of the '67 Cup Final that we started getting into football - although Croydon has always had a lot of Chelsea in it.
I had never even heard of Crystal Palace. My older sisters used to go (before the Arthur Wait was built) but I never realised this. One of them took me to a pre-season game against Morton (also mentioned on another thread) but I wasn't really hooked then, I don't think.
Then one Saturday, Archie called on me and said "fancy coming up to Palace with me" and my parents said it was ok (that's the bit I find really unbelievable, that at 10 or 11 years old or whatever we were allowed to go on our own to football - I wouldn't have dreamt of letting my sons go to say Reading on their own, at that age.
We used to stand at the front of the Whitehorse End, where the away support was. I remember one particular game against Notts Forest (we won 2-0) where Archie and I got rather attached to a couple of very nice looking girlie's from Nottingham and we followed them all the way back to Thornton Heath station, giving them gyp. God, we must have been a right pain in those days.
Archie will also recall the time that he bought a bag of monkey-nuts off one of those sellers who used to patrol the perimeter of the pitch (were they "sixpence", I think so?) and the guy took his money but didn't give him nuts. Archie was going ballistic but the bloke thought he was just trying to get a freebie and he wouldn't play ball. Oh how we laughed.
Anyway, how could anyone watch a team with people like craggy John McCormick, Schoolmasterly John Sewell, bandy-legged Bobby Tambling (and Tony Taylor) and gangly Jimmy Scott in it without falling for them hook, line and sinker? They were so bad it was untrue on occasions but they always had characters like those above in the team and they were great days.
I was with Archie in Sunderland on that fateful day. We never even saw the pitch. And we weren't "advised" to leave the ground, we just legged it when it all went off. Archie, do you remember the bloke we saw outside that had lost every tooth in his head? I suspect someone had put a size 10 Doc Marten in it.
And when we overheard that Whitlle had scored on the radio in the kiosk at the station we went crazy and a load of coppers (who had also obviously been listening to the commentary) piled out of a meat-wagon and told us to shut up.
And then there was the idiot who turned up in a Newcastle shirt and got chased along the railway line by hoardes of mackems. Marvellous entertainment.
So, it's all Archie's fault. And I'm not the only one who he introduced to Palace, although I may be the only one who still goes regularly.
I never sat in the director's box with him so I can't comment on the "cumaaarn" shout but before that when we stood on the Holmesdale he used to make a point, just as the game was about to kick off and there was a momentary expectant pause, of shouting as loud as he could, "wah wah wah wah wha wah wah wah wah PALACE!!!"
Christ alone knows why he did it, but it always raised a titter.
Thanks for the "curse", bow. I wouldn't have had it any other way.
Arsenal, Chelsea and Spurs?
Nah.
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Archiebald Leitch
17-03-2000, 03:42 PM
...and I still believe I am owed a bag of peanuts from Mrs Minchimilla or whatever she was called. She used to walk round the pitch perimeter shouting in a strange voice, 'roasted peanuts, sixpence a bag'. I think she had a lisp.
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ruediger
20-03-2000, 05:58 PM
No new entries so far - which is a pity - but still worth reading.
Deserves to be on the same page as "Why I am an Eagle".
[This message has been edited by ruediger (edited 20 March 2000).]
Justin
20-03-2000, 06:16 PM
I am bit of a glory hunter i am afraid. Whole family suppported Palace but my best mate at the time ( i was 9) supported Sunderland so had my radiator painted red and white! Anyway after Palace had beaten Sunderland in the Cup in 1976 and then Chelsea I said to my dad i wanted to go to the Semi Final and so that was my first live game ever. Even got lost and so got announced over tannoy at half time and walked across the pitch. Been going ever since. Why?? 1991 sums it up best. Finish third- denied our rightful place in Europe by the FA getting Liverpool in. Englan's end of Season tour was basically a Palace one. Great hopes for the next season if we could just buy one or two more players. What happens?? Ron says black players are no good in the winter. That is Palace and why i love em!! We've been on a rollercoaster ever since i've supported them Who can ever forget Wrexham at home in 1977 ( too young for the away)
Why?? 1991
Dario
20-03-2000, 06:22 PM
My love affair with Palace started in september 1986 when I was only a nipper and the Old man took me and my brother to watch us play Shrewsbury at Selhurst. My memories of this game are somewhat hazy, but I remember us losing 3-2 and reliable old George Wood costing us a point by sticking his arm up for offside, allowing their geezer ito walk it round him and score the winner.my brother who was about 7 at the time just burst into tears as we entered the living room upon our return and had to be comforted by my dad and mum. I remember my dad trying to explain the psychology of supporting a football club, one week you're s***, the next you can beat anyone. Being naive we both trusted him, i mean he was only trying to cheer us up, but the next home game was Grimsby and we lost three nil. The floodgates opened and I was inconsolable. Little did I know that this was the worst it would get and that Coppell like he is today, was slowly forming a Palace revolution!
Matty
20-03-2000, 06:52 PM
When I was small, the early days of my Palace love affair (1970 and the next few years), there used to be a chant that other fans used to sing to other other teams: "You're worse than Crystal Palace!"
We must have been the most famous team in the country in those days.
If you've lived through that, in your formative years, you experience an affinity with the club and a sense of solidarity with its fans that can never been broken.
I grew up in a small corner of North-West Kent where nobody else seemed to support Palace (all Spurs and Chelsea for reasons I could never understand). Fortunately that all seems to have changed and there are closet and not-so-closet fans all over the place.
And if you need to know who's worse than Crystal Palace...
EVERYONE!
21f7
select 5
21-03-2000, 10:08 PM
I support Palace for one reason,older(step) brother who was one of those yob types of the early 80's.I was living around the clock tower area of Thornton Heath and ,being about 8 yrs old I thought that the world ended just past the Mitchells T.V shop at the end of Thorton Heath High St.Anyway,one day step brother plus me plus three cousins go to the end of T.H High St,past said T.V shop and turn left into Whitehorse Lane,I really thought that I was in another country!(well I was only eight!) The game was against Arsehole and I think it finished 1-1.Didn't really enjoy the game but hero worshipped my step brother so Palace were my team. I didn't go for a few years but took it up again in the 87/88 season.In the mean time my Mum and Dad bought a house in Whitehorse lane right facing the ground!so I couldn't be any thing else but a Palace fan I still go with my mates who I've known since the first year infants and its true that Palace fans are a special breed,we can take the p*ss out of ourselves as well others.I knew that I was a bit mad being a Palace fan when one night out I got a kicking in a pub and was more upset at losing my Palace key ring that I'd had for years!Don't see my step bro' much now but I thank him for the introduction to the Palace and all the sodding heart ache thats gone with it.
ruediger
11-04-2000, 10:37 PM
There are a number of new names browsing the BBS. To get a bit more familiar here's the chance to tell "Why I'm an Eagle".
richit
13-04-2000, 04:45 AM
When I was just a lad, I rather fancied the idea of going to see a football match. Seeing as my father was a Palace fan - that's the only way I was ever going to get to see one, so it stuck - and there you go.
Dillenger
15-04-2000, 05:32 AM
My old mans a Spurs fan, and my first ever football games was Spurs vs Liverpool, about 1983. I remember wanting Spurs to win,but mostly just cos my old man did.
Growing up in Penge, most of my mates were either Palace, Millwall and West ham, with the usual glory hunters thrown in (but they don't count).
I remember having the option of either a) going to Tottenham with my dad, b) going to West Ham with my mate Danny, or c)going to Palace with my mate Stuart.
Guess what happened.
richit
16-04-2000, 02:39 AM
OK, my guess is option b.
Am I close?
Worthing Eagle
16-04-2000, 04:44 AM
my first recollection of Palace is my dad telling me we'd lost 2-0 to Liverpool; I don't remember the 9-0 but I do remember that game, it was towards the end of the season. My next memory is watching Final Score with my Dad, you know with the Bruce Hornsby music, "thats just the way it is", and Palace were 15th, two places above Man Utd. I don't remember exactly when I became a fan, it just happened naturally from my Dad's love for the club.
I'm a little embarressed to admit the first game I can remember watching was the Semi-Final 4-3 over Liverpool; after then I was hooked. I still resent the fact we missed the final on holiday in Spain; but I saw the replay and all i can remember is those horrible brown & yellow shirts and crying all night ;o)
so by now i was hooked for life; I remember discussing with my dad in 90/91 whether we could catch Arsenal and WIN THE LEAGUE!! I took that success for granted, now i appreciate how significant it was.
For some reason i didnt get to see Palace in the flesh til the Brighton friendly before the championship season; a 3-0 win. My Dad had lost interest in football and wasn't mad about Palace as he is again now, so it wasn't until the Ipswich game in 95/96 that I got to go to Selhurst.
From next season I should have a season ticket for the rest of my life; if our beloved club is still here of course.
DUTCH
16-04-2000, 06:54 PM
My first game was in '74 aged 8 as a birthday "treat" we played Bristol Rovers & won 2-0.
I didn't go again until '78 & continued on & off (dependant on money) until '85. An accident saw me finish going until '89 and from there I was able to buy season tickets.
I was born & brought-up in Milestone Rd, and although my parents were Millwall & Charlton fans from Deptford, they always encouraged supporting your local team.
I moved out to Sidcup then South Darenth when I was 23, but I still go to all Palace's home games & some away when possible. I'm married to a Chelsea season ticket holder, who has just given it up because of the cost (arrival of baby girl), and hope to be going in the future with my wife (her suggestion) and daughter, when she's old enough.
South Darenth should be a Charlton area, but most people seem to be Arsenal & Chelsea with a couple of Palace. I think being a Charlton fan is probably TOO embarassing. The Arsenal fans say that "The Arse" were from Woolwich which justifies their support & Chelsea are the new Man U (shirts everywhere but haven't actually been).
Big Fella
17-04-2000, 07:41 PM
My Family were and still are Palace through and through. My late Grandad stood on the Whitehorse and my Dad and Uncle stood on the Holmesdale (left side). They told me stories of Mel Blyth and Don Rogers; I just had to go to see this team. My 1st game was a reserve match (I think v's Hereford) in 1979 - whoever it was wore all white. We had Mike Flanngan and Mike Elwiss up front. Needless to say we lost 5-0, but from that day on Palace have been my only club. My 1st away game was the Play Off at Blackburn. I was in France when we played Swindon, so I had to go.We all know we lost, but this story begins on the coach back to Selhurst. One of the lads at the back wanted to watch a porno, so he waited for the only woman on the coach to fall asleep and put it on. To this day I maintain it was the filthiest (and only..of course) porno I have ever seen. It included an old man and his walking stick. Now that is why I'm an Eagle.
SIMON OF SELHURST
20-04-2000, 05:21 PM
Why am I an Eagle?
I can remember when I was eight, and nagging my Dad to take me to football with him, we lived in Church Road just off Crystal Palace Parade at the time, so Palace was his obvious choice. My first game was November 1962, Palace v Hereford in the FA Cup. I can remember sitting there in the main stand watching the groung fill up and thinking that I didn't know that so many people existed. When the teams came out and the noise began, I was totally mesmerised by it all, in those days there was no colour TV and computer games, most entertainment was live, I am sure that any bitten football fan will agree thatit was then (and still is now) just about the best thing in the history of the world including sliced bread. Palace won 2-0 then, I came away babbling enthusiastically about the game and my new found heroes, Ronnie Allen, Bill Glazier and so on. I have been since then smitten by both the game and my beloved Palace. I can remember the next round of the cup, another home tie against Mansfield, we scraped a draw with a last minute penalty, I screamed the house down when we heard on the radio during the week that they beat us 7-2 in the replay. I will never forget the marvellous Cliff Holton and the great Jim Cannon. I am so relieved that FIFA have pulled their socks up for us, there would have been a huge hole in my life if Palace had fallen over.
21ef
dickie
21-04-2000, 04:49 AM
"why i'm an eagle"
cos mal said we are no longer Glaziers!
Back to the top for all our new members http://www.cpfc.org/ubb/smile.gif
Lets hear your stories http://www.cpfc.org/ubb/smile.gif
Bintang
20-09-2000, 11:15 PM
Coming from a family where your father supports Portsmouth and your mother supports Coventry makes you realise why I've always supported the underdog.
I lived in Hertfordshire and the nearest League team was Spurs and I remember going to a couple of their games. One against Fulham when Johnny Haynes almost broke the crossbar with a thunder shot.
Couldn't afford to see many games, so supported Hoddesdon Town in the Spartan League. 3 old pence to enter and an extra 3 to sit in the "stand". The seats were the pews from an old church. Loved the weekly newspaper reports with headlines such as "Hoddesdon win by odd goal in 15". Remember when Micky Droy joined as a youngster. Went on to Slough and then on to bigger and better things.
After marriage moved to South London and met a Palace supporter. He had been going since the 50's and still never misses a game. First game was in October 1973. Palace were fast-tracking from the 1st to the 3rd. Stood in the Arthur Waite stand and watched Palace lose 1-2 to Blackpool. I was totally mesmerised by one player - Don Rogers. His every touch was magic.
I was hooked. So much so that I bought a season ticket the next year and when we bought a house, I drew a 5 mile circle around Selhurst and told my wife that that's where we were going to live. The day we moved into the house, Palace were playing at home. 'Er indoors was not too impressed when I mentioned the match. She finally said it was OK if I took our 3 year old daughter. I spent the whole game taking her to the loo and buying peanuts, pies and drinks. Still something must have rubbed off as my daughter and I will be going to our second match together next month at Bolton.
Didn't miss a home match for ten years until I left England in 1983. Always try to see a match or 3 on trips back. Best memory was the run up to the FA cup final. I always swore that wherever I was in the World, if Palace made the final I would be there. Problem was the final was on the same day as my wife's birthday. So what to do? Brilliant plan - I announced after the semi "Have I got a wonderful birthday treat for you". So we flew over, spent a fortune on black market seats and loved every minute. Queued for 8 hours for the replay and was disappointed when I could only get one ticket. Spoke to Noades and said "I've come all the way from Indonesia, could I get 2 tickets?" and he replied "I don't care where the f*** you came from". Sad man.
I'll be over next month and will see 2 home and 3 away matches. It's time for my annual fix.
brighton_eagle
21-09-2000, 12:29 AM
I somehow missed this thread the first time round, so thanks Dave for putting it to the top of the list again.
I have just spent an hour or so reading through it, and it's fantastic and really moving to hear everyone's stories. Here's to all of you.
http://www.cpfc.org/ubb/smile.gif
Anyway, my story is in three parts really. I went to my first Palace game when I was about 7 or 8, 1977 or thereabouts. Don't remember anything about it really,
it always amazes me that people can remember their childhood so clearly, but I do remember enjoying it, even though Palace lost!! (no change there then).
I also remember that I went with a school friend, it was his birthday outing, and there were a few of us. Unfortunately, I'm not in touch with any of them now, so I've no idea if any of them are still Palace fans. From then on I identified myself as a Palace fan, at school, when everyone supported Liverpool or Spurs, I was a Palace fan. Sometimes I felt like a bit of a phony cos I didn't go to games but it was MY club.
Fast forward to the age of about 17 or 18, when my girlfriend at the time lived in a flat next to Perry Suckling and his wife. I think this was around the time of the drubbing by Liverpool, cos I remember seeing Perry the following week, and remarking that he appeared to be in rather bad spirits!! Anyway, I folllowed the Palace results from then on, although half heartedly for a while when for some, unknown reason, I wasn't interested in footie at all(my dark years!!).
Around 7 years ago, I had been living in Brighton for a couple of years, and a mate of mine, who also came from Croydon, South Norwood infact, suggested that we go
to see a pre season friendly between Palace and BHA. We went, supporting Palace of course, and had a great time (the Eagles won). Alan Smith was manager. Since then, I have been an active supporter, but not going to that many games, maybe 9 or 10 a season. Last season I bought my first season ticket, which I renewed this season as well as persuading two of my mates and my girlfriend to get theirs. I've taken my neices to games, and tried to indoctrinate them, and I think it's worked, to a degree. I want them
to understand the concept of loyalty, and supporting a football club shows you what loyalty means.
So there we go, an on and off supporter in one sense, but I NEVER supported any other team, I've always been a Palace fan inside, even when I wasn't that interested in football. Why? Well, I think just the history of the last few years can explain that. Goldberg coming, Goldberg going, the return of Venables, the ups and the downs
that we have experienced in only a few years are like a condensed version of Palace's history. That sums up what it is to be a football fan, to support one club, through thick or thin, better or worse. Sometimes I
pity the glory-hunters. They are missing out on such a wealth of emotion and experience.
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Mellor = fat tosser
[This message has been edited by brighton_eagle (edited 20 September 2000).]
Darth Jordan
21-09-2000, 08:57 PM
I've only supported Palace since 1992, which is a pretty poor effort compared to most people who have contributed to this thread.
I was in my final year at college, and one of my flatmates asked if I was interested in going to see a football match. As I'd never been to a match before, I was pretty keen although I'd hardly heard of Crystal Palace before - I didn't even know what colour the strip was.
I believe we playing Liverpool in a cup game...which we won, but I don't remember the score (can anyone help?). Standing on the Holmesdale as it was, soaking up the atmosphere and joining in the shouting and singing was an unbelieveable experience - and I was completely hooked.
My ex-flatmate is now one of my best friends, and was my best man a couple of years ago. He also plays for the Palace Internet Team. Cheers Stephen, for introducing me to the beautiful game and for not supporting Man U!!
Psychokiller
21-09-2000, 09:16 PM
Basically, I'm an Eagle because of my old man! Although his father played for Portsmouth in the 1920's, he started going to Selhurst when he was 10 (about 1942), despite living in Central London at the time!
He took me to my first match when I was about 3 years old, whilst we were visiting my Gran in Streatham. I can actually remember a small piece of this game as it was the one when George Best broke Ian Evans' leg - I have vague recollections of him throwing me and my brother off of his lap and screaming obscenities in all directions!
After that there was no turning back, I was a Palace Fan for life and Vince Hilaire soon became GOD!
267f
Glaws Eagle
22-09-2000, 11:21 AM
It was back in 1972 when I was 12. My friend and I used to get a lift with my dads mate the 14 or so miles to watch Swindon Town play. My hero was Don Rogers. He was outstanding. He would mesmerise second and third division defences with skill rarely seen these days. Even on the muddiest pitch in the leagues, (apart from Orients), he would stand out as having the whitest, cleanest shorts, playing all his football on his feet.
When he was transferred to Palace in October ‘72 it broke my heart. I’ll never forget the day. I was in the changing rooms at school, getting ready for “games”, when one of my mates came up to me and told me Don had been sold to Crystal Palace. I couldn’t believe it.
As I had two Crystal Palace Subbuteo teams anyway, (two squads, in case one of the first team was stood on), I thought the natural thing was to start following Don at Selhurst.
I remember his debut like it was yesterday. November 4th, (bonfire night down here), 1972. Everton at home and it was on MOTD, (I think James has produced the MPEG of the goal).
In the afternoon, my friends and I, 12 & 13 year old’s remember, had cycled the 4 miles to play a game against a team of lads from a local village, (Ampney Crucis). Someone had a radio by the side of the pitch and I remember hearing the report that Don had scored on his debut to put Palace ahead.
How does the song go, “28 years of hurt …….”.
I can honestly say, through all the games I have seen, (33 some seasons), the miles of travelling, the utter and complete disappointment, the cold, wet Tuesday nights at Newport, I absolutely love Crystal Palace. And I will ‘til I die.
Ask my cat, Crystal!!
dosctid
22-09-2000, 06:53 PM
My brother got to baby sit me when I was about twelve it was 1986 so he took me kicking and screaming to Palace. I didn't like football then and wasn't really up for it at all.
So it was into the Aurthur Waite with all his mates, where all the noise used to come from back then. It was Mark Brights' debut against Ipswich and what a corker of a game that was 3-3 in the end some Ipswich bloke got a hat-trick (does any remember who???) and Brighty scored on his debut (anyone remember if he got two or who scored the others???).
That was it I was hooked and became somewhat of a mascot for the lads (next game was 2-0 Sunderland then 5-1 Hull City can't remember beyond that) as it took quite few games after that until I saw us lose.
I have some cracking memories that I know Psychokiller will remember Reading away in the rain is one that springs' to mind.
Have let the club down over the last decade (only 4 games I should be shot) but my interest has been renewed after seeing the Forest game (2nd Half performance) and I shall be going as often as I can (money).
Christ I didn't realise I'd missed as it much as I have.
Good to be back...just need some games under me belt then I might have a clue what I'm talking about.
Psychokiller
22-09-2000, 08:59 PM
Originally posted by dosctid:
So it was into the Aurthur Waite with all his mates, where all the noise used to come from back then. It was Mark Brights' debut against Ipswich and what a corker of a game that was 3-3 in the end some Ipswich bloke got a hat-trick (does any remember who???) and Brighty scored on his debut (anyone remember if he got two or who scored the others???).
Brighty only got one, the other scorers were Wright and Taylor I think.
The Ipswich bloke was Kevin Wilson, who ended up at Chelsea and naturally, was crap!
I am now an Eagle as of last week.
We got on the train wielding our Stella’s with pride and wearing our Palace shirts with huge smiles on our faces. When we got to the ground I was gutted that we couldn’t bring our lovely mates in cans in with us so they were guzzled faster than u could say ‘burp’. Once we got into the ground we headed straight for the bar and got another couple of refreshments to keep us going for the next 45 mins.
As we got to our seats Zombie Nation was blasting out of the speakers. I looked across to the United supporters and saw the zombie nation which was being described in the tune. Within moments, a song had begun from within our block singing ‘there’s only 10 of you singing’. How I laughed. How very accurate.
We were sitting in b block in the huge stand, which amused me no end when I realised that it was so massive compared to the others. We were within sight of the evil Sheffield United supporters who didn’t seem to appear with the same multitude as the Palace fans. Shame. It seemed that they were incapable of singing anything apart from their own team name for at least 20 mins – which Palace nicely ruined by signing their own interpretation of the word ‘united’. The rest of the time they were hanging around the back of the stadium hugging flags. Most strange behaviour. Almost baboon like.
The Sheffield supporters were obviously feeling brave and strong when they shouted ‘come on then’ at the palace fans and made hand signals which indicated that they were all fired up and ready for a fight. It occurred to me that without the brick wall, 10 pc plods and a handful of officials getting in the way of their ‘attack’ we’d have been done for. Or perhaps they might just have said it all a little quieter, or not at all. The Palace fans (who had obviously all eaten a few packs of tunes and lockets before the game) didn’t stop singing in their best Sunday school voices until the game began. When the teams came out we all did our obligatory cheers for the Palace team with an especially amusing cheer for Raaaazor. How very unrazor like he was. I asked my mate, who’s a regular at the matches, how old Raaaazor was. He told me that Raaazor was 32. Well. I couldn’t believe my ears. If Raaazor was 32 then someone at Palace hadn’t been doing their job properly cos he has been unashamedly fiddling about with his birth certificate. And as of his physique, lets just say it’s not one to be jealous of and not particularly Raaazor like.
The first half began and the long legs of Julian Gray were running about non-stop. What a good lad. Raaazor was running around too, but mostly into United players. Good man. I was a little surprised by some of the footballing abilities of some of the players. I thought a condition of being a footballer was that you could pass. How we all cheered when the United player seemed to forget what you are meant to do when he seemed to miss it and just kept on running anyway. Even more amusement.
The first half came to a close surprisingly quickly. But not before United had managed to get a goal. Drat, damn and blast it. United quickly replied with ‘you’re not singing anymore’ which was very true as a rather small pin could’ve been heard dropping in b block. I laughed when I realised that they were right. From behind me the singing began again and before we knew it half time had been called. Raaazor had better watch out cos judging by the speed that the Palace fans ran to the bar, he’s got a lot to worry about. As we queued for our drinks, the singing continued. Those Tunes and Lockets weren’t showing the slightest inclinations of wearing off especially when a group chanted ‘You’re not very good’ at the bar staff who quickly closed the bar much to everyone’s entertainment who already had their drinks. Once our drinks had been guzzled we stomped back to our seats where it all began again. Raaazor had already been booked and then got into a wee spit-spot of bother with his old counterpart Bent - aptly named for a dodgy character. The ref came running over clutching his top pocket like the valuables he keeps within his pants were at threat. Raaazor (quick as a flash!!) picked up the ball and started running away with it. Nice tactic. He was a gonna. He was sent off much to the disgust of the Palace fans. The ref was no-one’s favourite. Neither was Bent who had received a cheer when he ran onto the pitch to start the game.
THEN!!!!!!! Pollock – nice name for those with problems spelling – began instructing the crowd to pipe up and sing louder. Has he got wax in his ears? Perhaps if he had a hearing aid fitted, he’d have heard the contributions from the fans requesting him to play a little better. Certainly no brains from within his under-sized head. The Palace fans continued to sing and abuse the United fans with chants such as ‘sit down and sign on’ ringing through everyone’s ears. It got better.
The game finished with a 1-0 loss to Palace which was a shame. I can’t imagine how much of a laugh it would’ve been if they’d have won. I had certain criteria which I hoped would be fulfilled before the game … goals, a penalty, a ruck, loads of bookings. All of which were achieved in one way or other. I can safely say that I will be attending another Palace match as it was thoroughly entertaining and I am already looking forward to the next showdown.
2652
ozieaglesimon
12-11-2000, 06:45 AM
My first memory is of the early 80's, Wright and Bright terrorising the best defences in the top flight[then first div]. I was 12 and watching the weekly hour of highlights on telly in Sydney australia. Been stuck on palace ever since.
Teggers
12-11-2000, 05:39 PM
Local boy myself. Dad supporters them. So does my grandad. First game, at Millwall in the 70's. we won three nil. Marvellous.
dazza CPFC
12-11-2000, 06:16 PM
i went to my first game in 1992 last day of the season v sheff w a 1-1 draw mark bright scored in the last minuite iv been going ever since
MARK PALACE TILL I DIE
12-11-2000, 06:33 PM
Ist game 1965 I think against QPR. My dad used to take me when he could but he worked in a dairy so worked most Saturdays. I Think we won. Would be interested if anyone could look it up for me.
Remember watching the game from one end and then walking round and watching the game from the side. (Before the AW stand was built).
Been going ever since. Now I take my son and have done for the past 8 years now.
------------------
Mark, PTID.
My best mate used to go all the time, He took me along one day and I was hooked.1989 season .
dances with seaweeds
12-11-2000, 07:17 PM
i was 8 , my dad took my brother to arsenal and i saw them on the telly following day . up till then i hated football , but i was so dumbstruck that they were on the telly , i created such a fuss that my ol man had to take me to the next home game which happened to be at home to man utd , we lost 5-3 dennis law scored the flukiest overhead kick youd ever seen . but that was my initiation into all things palace and ive never looked back since. regretted going to a few games but that is what supporting palace is all about , more lows than highs , but good fun along the way
SIMON OF SELHURST
13-11-2000, 05:02 PM
I was born locally, (Mayday Hospital) and lived as a kid in Church Road (off Crystal Palace Parade), my Dad (a life long Palace fan)took me to my first game as a nine year old in 1962 and I was totally smitten, I have been a regular ever since (38 years), now my 19 year old son and I are season ticket holders in Holmesdale Upper Block Q Row 9, my boy has been a regular since his first game against Wimbledon boxing day 1992.
Chocky
13-11-2000, 05:06 PM
Excellent that newer members have started this thread again.
Go to the archives http://www.cpfc.org/ubb/Archives/Archive-000001/HTML/20000928-5-000061.html to read many more stories about why us lot are Eagles
then please add your reason to this thread
http://www.cpfc.org/ubb/Forum5/HTML/000131.html
Tomahawks
13-11-2000, 05:18 PM
First game v Man City 1979 Won 2-0 (8 years old) standing on a milk crate at the back of the Holmesdale (and still barely saw a thing). Ian Walsh definitely scored, maybe Swindlehurst got the other.
Team of the 80's etc... Burridge, Sansom, Hinshlewood, Cannon, Francis, Walsh, Swindlehurst, Hilaire etc Great days.
Vic Eagle
14-11-2000, 04:20 AM
I didn't start going until I was about 14...up to then I'd been to Chelsea a few times but never really got into it.
First match, 1980 Palace v. Arsenal at Selhurst...Palace won with a scrappy goal, Swindlehurst I think, and I was for some reason hooked. Even though a mob of Arsenal fans caught up with me just under the railway bridge by Selhurst station and managed to connect with a few kicks and punches.
Think I got into it because I felt an attraction to my local side...I was born and bred, and lived the first 19 years of my life in Norbury. Also handy that the firm my dad worked for, Irwin Desman on the Purley Way, let their staff have use of their season tickets.
Then again, I suppose you could say that, as I only started supporting Palace when they were already in the old First Division, that I started off as a glory hunter. http://www.cpfc.org/ubb/smile.gif
1989, JJ who frequents this board, dragged me along kicking and screaming. I lived in Sussex and supported Liverpool at the time.
Dont tell him but I'm extremely grateful to him for taking me and changing the whole course of my life.
Statto
14-11-2000, 04:30 AM
I'm only 18, my dad supports Chelsea but my ex-nieghbour was a steward. at about 5 I went to the holmesdale, I can remember very little. Then my mum took me to the family stan from about 8-12 then the arthur wait with my dad 12/13 then I brought a whitehorse season ticket on my own. Then moved with a mate from school to the Holmesdale block B, then another mate joined and I haven't missed a game for 4 years!
In the Holmsdale when it was a terrace I remeber watching CPFC vs. QPR when the ref got knocked out!
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Troo slum king (shutup Rob- you penis)
ozieaglesimon
14-11-2000, 07:04 AM
I got into the habit of watching the english league on telly in Sydney australia, late 70,s. Never really had a team, just picked one to barrack for on the main game highlights. Then came the eighties with venables and co, found myself waiting for the palace results with more and more interest. Later in the eighties, with the Bright-Wright era thought Palace could and would win everything, dreams eh!
Been following them from afar since the early 80's ca'nt remember exact dates or games [ 12yrs old in 1980 ].
I have a dream to see Palace @ selhurst one day?
Maybe a lottery win would help!
My local team is the Brisbane Strikers, they have always had a scary similarity to Palace in results and attempted self-ignition! Strikers have won the national-league here once six years ago but apart from that live on in a blissfull fog of brilliance/inneptitude, like Palace you never know what you will get one game to the next.
Strikers new strip is super, same as Parma in Serie A, blue and yellow hoops, now that would be a great away strip for the Palace!
Glaws Eagle
14-11-2000, 11:59 AM
This was already posted in "Why I'm an Eagle" part 1.
It was back in 1972 when I was 12. My friend and I used to get a lift with my dads mate the 14 or so miles to watch Swindon Town play. My hero was Don Rogers. He was outstanding. He would mesmerise second and third division defences with skill rarely seen these days. Even on the muddiest pitch in the leagues, (apart from Orients), he would stand out as having the whitest, cleanest shorts, playing all his football on his feet.
When he was transferred to Palace in October ‘72 it broke my heart. I’ll never forget the day. I was in the changing rooms at school, getting ready for “games”, when one of my mates came up to me and told me Don had been sold to Crystal Palace. I couldn’t believe it.
As I had two Crystal Palace Subbuteo teams anyway, (two squads, in case one of the first team was stood on), I thought the natural thing was to start following Don at Selhurst.
I remember his debut like it was yesterday. November 4th, (bonfire night down here), 1972. Everton at home and it was on MOTD, (I think James has produced the MPEG of the goal).
In the afternoon, my friends and I, 12 & 13 year old’s remember, had cycled the 4 miles to play a game against a team of lads from a local village, (Ampney Crucis). Someone had a radio by the side of the pitch and I remember hearing the report that Don had scored on his debut to put Palace ahead.
How does the song go, “28 years of hurt …….”.
I can honestly say, through all the games I have seen, (33 some seasons), the miles of travelling, the utter and complete disappointment, the cold, wet Tuesday nights at Newport, I absolutely love Crystal Palace. And I will ‘til I die.
Ask my cat, Crystal!!
2809
ruediger
17-11-2000, 11:49 AM
Wonderful thread (as is Part 1).
Ought to be printed in a fanzine one day.
philaire
17-11-2000, 03:54 PM
I’d been brought up in a family and a community where Aussie Rules footy ruled supreme and “soccer” was a game for the Greeks and Italians in Adelaide. Becoming a bit of a sports and tele addict in my early teens, I was a little bemused by the fairly dull presentation of English soccer at odd times. Then came The Big Match and my life changed somewhat. It was late 1972 and the team with the “different” name took my eye. Perhaps it was 5-0 Man U; probably was. The Monday papers got in the habit of publishing the UK results and ladders, helping me to further pursue my newfound interest – and my newfound team.
A baptism of fire with relegations through 73 and 74. The incredible highs and lows of 1975-76, with the huge lead at top of div 3, the cup run, then ending in tears. I took up the game at Uni, abandoning my Aussie Rules skills to have a go at this game! I found out that our local garage operator was a Palace fan, and he gave me clippings from the Croydon Advertiser, and some match programs. I sent to the club for some souvenirs, and kept up with the game through two-month old surface-mail “Shoot” magazines. I wrote to Terry Venables when we were promoted to div. 2 in 1977, and he wrote back!
My older brother went to the UK for the 79 cup final. He popped in the night before for the Burnley game and rang me when he got back to the hotel. In 1980 I made my one and only trip (to date) to England, with a girlfriend. My only trips ever to Selhurst were at Christmas time, when big Mal made his ill-timed return to Palace, but I saw us beat Norwich 4-1 and draw 2-2 with Arsenal in our relegation year.
And on it has gone. Ringing the club at the end of one of those miserable pre-Coppell 80s seasons to find out whether we’d avoided loss to Burnley and stayed up. Getting a mate in Hong Kong to give me half-hour updates on the Liverpool cup-semi. Having all my soccer mates round for the cup final. Ringing Leicester to find out we’d lost the play-off final.
My family remains bemused with my addiction, but tolerate it quite well. My ageing father’s phone calls to me often begin with a review of Palace’s latest result. My young daughters wonder a little who and what this Crystal Palace is. The BBS has been a fantastic source with which to feed my addiction. James’ photos of the games, especially the pre-match atmosphere, bring those memories of my brief visits flooding back. And I still love it.
arussell
17-11-2000, 09:10 PM
Yes but we love you more James http://www.cpfc.org/ubb/wink.gif
James Varcoe
18-11-2000, 04:02 AM
God I love you guys
ruediger
15-02-2001, 11:51 AM
Just want to bring up this topic again as there are many new posters around who ought to contribute.
ruediger
20-02-2001, 10:54 AM
New to the BBS?
Don't be shy. Get your story posted here.
Mr_Optimistic
02-03-2001, 02:32 AM
Why I joined the Palace................
Because they were my local club and all my mates suported Man U, Spurs, Arsenal, Chelsea etc...........yuk!
Mal Come Ally Son
31-05-2001, 02:13 PM
Why am I an Eagle? Because back in the 60s there was only one ground in the country that thoughtfully provided terracing and nice grassy banks on three sides of the ground. So when the football was crap you could go and sunbathe, or climb the advertising hordings at the top of the Whithorse and Park Lane sides. And you could wander from one end of the ground to the other so you could always get a view of the star forwards.
But that's when I was a Glazier. What an awful nickname. And the colours. Sometimes all white - sometimes claret and light blue - like a hammers reject. But in the 70's Malcolm Allison gave us his legacy that lasts to this day. The EAGLES name and the Red and Blue colours. I still wonder how he took us to the third division and enthralled us at the same time with some fantastic football. But not enough, I'm afraid. I remember in the season we went down to the 3rd - On Good Friday we played at Fulham and not only slaughthered them, but players like Alan Whittle were taking the mickey by juggling the ball. It was that easy. That win made it look as if we'd stay up. And then three days later at home WE LOSE TO THE SAME FULHAM SIDE !!!. And a few weeks later went down with a draw at Cardiff
So - I guess I'm an Eagle because until you experience the downs you can never properly appreciate the ups.
le piddler
01-06-2001, 07:32 AM
My Grandad started taking me in 80 in the Old Stand as all of my family are Palace on both sides including 3 season ticket holders from Basingstoke, & from The Old Stand I graduated to the Arthur Wait until it went all seater ,then the Holmesdale & now the Whitehorse with my 8 year old nephew Lucifer.
I have'nt regretted a single moment or game, it's been a real rollercoaster ride but never been boring!!!
Roll on next season & the demise of millwall :D :D :D when they sink back down to their level!!
ruediger
01-06-2001, 01:22 PM
What a wonderful thread (Part I and II) this is.:)
Hope it keeps going.
Why I'm An Eagle.
As a youngster, my Dad used to take me, my brother and sister over to see our Grandmother every Saturday morning, she lived right near South Norwood Swimming Pool. So around lunchtime we'd head over the road for our weekly swimming lessons.
When we'd come out the Swimming Pool building afterwards, there'd always be lots of loud, shouting 'older boys' and men leaving large buildings that had big hanging signs out front, and they'd all stink of a strange stale smelling chemical and most would invaribly be wearing a scarf attached to a wrist or a colourful bobble hat or flat cap.
'I want to be like them when I'm older' I remember thinking to myself.
After a couple of years of ignorant bliss and mystique at these strange and alarmingly punctual and reliable people, I eventually asked my Dad what was going on - he told me all about Crystal Palace Football Club and how he'd watched them play on and off for years (though he had stopped going altogether since we'd come along), just like his Dad before him, who would later tell me stories about watching them at the old ground - The Nest, where Selhurst train depot stands today.
A couple of years later and after much begging, my Dad finally took the three of us along to Selhurst Park. Apparently. I have no recollection of this visit. I think Star Wars was released that year...
The first visit I do remember is the Burnley promotion game in the 1979 season, I was eight years old and remember standing on a box high up in the packed Holmesdale terrace, crammed into the ground along with 51,000 odd others, all there to watch Palace's glorious victory take them into the top flight. Memories of the night are vague, but I can still feel the relief of the crowd as the first goal hits the net, and the sheer elation and incredible scenes at the final whistle. A fantastic night.
It would be a further couple of years before my next visit to Selhurst, during which I flirted briefly with both Liverpool and Nottingham Forest, both had conquered Europe within those years... but it was an outing to Selhurst in the early eighties with a junior school colleague and his father that really signed the deal for me. A three all draw - against Luton I think, me and my friend down the very front of the Holmesdale in that bit they used to reserve just for kids. The players, in their fantastic brilliant white with the red and blue sash strips signed our programmes, I bought peanuts off a peanut seller and threw them at other kids, which seemed an entirely agreeable pre-match pastime - every little bugger was at it, John Burridge walked onto the pitch on his hands - I heard language I'd never heard before but loved, the sun shone, the football really did ebb and flow, the pitch flattening VW Beetle amazed, and all-in-all I had a most excellent day out watching a team I knew I would now call my own, regardless of the success of all the Liverpools, Forests, Tottenhams and all their fun-poking supporters at school, I knew that myself and the other small band of Palace supporters, regularly experienced the excitement of live football while these lemmings were limited to watching The Big Match on Sunday afternoons.
Billy Gilbert, Jim Cannon, Kenny Samson, Vince Hilaire, Paul Hinshelwood etc - all heroes to me.
2fc1
PhillyEagle
02-06-2001, 09:15 PM
I grew up in Forest Hill...I suppose as I started to learn to read, and become aware of football, all those road signs and buses with 'Crystal Palace' written on them must have had an effect on my subconscious!
I naturally assumed that my father was a Palace supporter since he grew up in Upper Sydenham and watched them as a kid. It was a big shock to me the day he professed to having a soft spot for Leeds United!
I'm born and bred in Wolverhampton. I have absolutely no connection nor any ties with Crystal Palace, Selhurst nor Croydon. However, ever since the 1978-79 season, I have been hooked on Palace. My local 'friends' and family ask me, "why do you follow Palace?" They try and persuade me to follow Wolves, Villa, Man Utd, Liverpool, etc. However, I am proud to follow Crystal Palace FC. For me, there will never be another club. The pride and emotions we have encountered over the years, have been numerous, exciting and overwhelming.
Come on Palace.
markholmes1991
04-06-2001, 09:04 PM
Why I'm an eagle.
During 1988 I took an interest in football. I started going to watch Carshalton Athletic down at Colston Avenue with my Dad. They played a friendly against Palace later that year, & for some reason I knew my Allegiances were with Palace from that day.
I attended my first game in March 1990 where Garry Thompson scored after 4minutes on his debut against a then high flying Aston Villa. During 93' I had to weigh up whether I wanted to progress in playing football or follow Palace but after thinking long & hard there was no choice & I reverted back to Sunday league football.
Seeing Palace go down three times since supporting them has been a bitter pill to swallow but I’ll stick with Palace through thick & thin
Glaws Eagle
05-06-2001, 11:30 AM
It was back in 1972 when I was 12. My friend and I used to get a lift with my dads mate the 14 or so miles to watch Swindon Town play. My hero was Don Rogers. He was outstanding. He would mesmerise second and third division defences with skill rarely seen these days. Even on the muddiest pitch in the leagues, (apart from Orients), he would stand out as having the whitest, cleanest shorts, playing all his football on his feet.
When he was transferred to Palace in October ‘72 it broke my heart. I’ll never forget the day. I was in the changing rooms at school, getting ready for “games”, when one of my mates came up to me and told me Don had been sold to Crystal Palace. I couldn’t believe it.
As I had two Crystal Palace Subbuteo teams anyway, (two squads, in case one of the first team was stood on), I thought the natural thing was to start following Sir Don at Selhurst.
I remember his debut like it was yesterday. November 4th, (bonfire night down here), 1972. Everton at home and it was on MOTD, (James has produced the MPEG of the goal).
In the afternoon, my friends and I, 12 & 13 year old’s remember, had cycled the 4 miles to play a game against a team of lads from a local village, (Ampney Crucis). Someone had a radio by the side of the pitch and I remember hearing the report that Don had scored on his debut to put Palace ahead.
I can honestly say, through all the games I have seen, (34 some seasons), the miles of travelling, the utter and complete disappointment, the cold, wet Tuesday nights at Newport, I absolutely love Crystal Palace. And I will ‘til I die.
Ask my cat, Crystal!!
sydney eagle
05-06-2001, 11:41 AM
was born a palace fan
Iam a palace fan
will die a palace fan
I still have relatives (granddad,aunt and cousin)who live on Whitehorse Lane,right near the ground who all support Palace.
First game I remember seeing was against Shrewsbury town in '85 I think we lost 1-0.I had been to games years before this but this one is the first I remember(dunno why)
Last time I saw Palace was in '97(last time I was back home)0-0 with Arsenal,the game that Lombardo and Wrighty swapped shirts,and we kicked the sh*te out of Dennis Bergkamp:D
Gooders
01-07-2001, 07:24 AM
Originally posted by Ash
A three all draw - against Luton I think...
No wonder you got hooked Ash - I remember that game very well - one of the most entertaining and exciting games I've seen in 30 years at Selhurst Park. I think Kenny Sansom even scored that night, that's how rare an occurence that game was!
Honestly, that season was the best football Palace have ever played, bar none.
BristolEagle
05-07-2001, 10:51 PM
This is my first post, so here goes...
The first game I saw was Palace v Burnley May 1979, I remember going with my best mate Simon. We left school, went to his house grabbed a bite to eat and started queing at about 4:30 (KO 7:30 I think). The atmosphere inside took my breath away, literally, 52,000 supporters can do that to a young boy... The night just zipped past, Palace won, got promoted, good natured pitch invasion... I was well and truly hooked.
Been a Palace fan ever since and always will be...
One other thing 52,000 packed tighter than a camel arse in a sand storm, hardly any trouble and a really good natured crowd....
WICKED!!!!:D
Anerley Eagle
06-07-2001, 03:10 AM
Having a family which either supported Arsenal or Chelsea! I decided to be different, I went Red and Blue, and being from Anerley I made the choice of supporting my local team. My first game was against Chelsea back in 1990, Palace won 2-1 a Gray penalty and Wright in the second half, and just after Gray scored he got sent off along with Dennis Wise.
I decided to convert my sister into a palace fan her first game was Stoke back in 1996 the game Freedman scored his first goal for Palace and the game Gareth Taylor made his debut.
I think the emotions I went threw at Stockport and before the game at Portsmouth just sums Palace up always leaves things to the last minute and a game is never over till the referee blows the final whistle
Palace till I die
zonin2000
06-07-2001, 03:23 AM
Ask Tony:
Re: What are we buying when we buy a season ticket?
quote:
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Originally posted by Tonka
It's not the football quality because if that was the case we would all buy tickets for premiership clubs.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I think we do get quality… it's just a different kind of quality. If you want perfection then by all means go and watch Liverpool, for example. But is it art? To my mind, watching Liverpool has all the attraction of watching a piece of technical drawing. But the way Dean Austin looks up before he sweeps the ball out for a throw in… now that's real quality. He is a master of his art.
•Palace are the New York Dolls to Liverpool's Elaine Paige
•We are The Young Ones to Liverpool's To The Manor Born
•We are Hurricane Higgins to Liverpool's Steve Davis
•Palace are ice creams with flakes on the beach to Liverpool's Ferrero Rocher at Stuffy Diplomatic Receptions
Maybe more people would choose the Liverpool options in that list, but they would be utterly wrong.
Given the drama and unpredictability of it all, I can't believe Palace isn't sold out years in advance. No scriptwriter could come up with anything more unlikely or that would keep you guessing to the last page of every chapter.
In just over a decade since I first bought a season ticket we've seen promotion achieved by coming back from 3-1 down; the most thrilling FA Cup semi final in history; five trips to Wembley including a last minute defeat and a last minute victory in consecutive seasons; a divisional championship; three relegations; three chairmen, all in their own sweet ways deranged egomaniacs; somewhere in the region of 11 managers (if you dont count Noades and a few other five minute wonders) one of whom did the job three times and three others who did it twice; bankruptcy, administration and salvation; a last gasp escape from relegation; and four other major semi-finals (all against either Liverpool, Man U or Arsenal).
We've gone almost an entire season without winning at home, we've seen Ian Wright, Salako and Staunton all score from the halfway line, we've had Lombardo AND Craig Foster… in the same team!!!! We've taunted Fatboy Miller and hero-worshipped some of the worst players known to mankind.
And don't forget Tomas Brolin's size 42 shorts, being linked with Maradona, the disappearing Argentinians, the Israelis who couldn't play football, Venables and Fenwick, the Cantona Kung-fu kick, Fan Zhiyi's assaults on referees, Brucie missing a last minute FA Cup penalty v Nigel Martyn who was then cheered off, a Ł2.75m centre half being outjumped by Carl Leaburn, Iain Dowie's smile, Dean Gordon's last minute shot v Derby and the abject terror of Riccardo Fuller when he came on as sub against Wolves… and that's just bits and bobs I can remember off the top of my head.
We've taken more **** in the last three years than most fans will take from their clubs in a lifetime. We've celebrated a 1-0 win at Norwich with more passion that ten times as many Liverpool fans could muster for winning three trophies. Our fans have got more wit and passion than anyone in the league and are mostly nice people with it, not thugs or arrogant Premiership prima donnas.
Crystal Palace is cult viewing, like a late night TV show that only a few people know about, like a precious record that was never number one but makes everybody who knows it want to dance and sing… and sometimes cry.
To have seen the way Geoff Thomas ran like a duck, to have seen Mark Dennis's haymaker aimed at Gazza that would have floored Tyson, to have seen us win at every top ground in the country and lose at Hartlepool, to have seen The Ninja put his elbow into Keown's face, to have seen Dougie leave Stockport's defence on its arse, to have seen Stevie throw his jacket into the crowd, to have seen Butch Wilkins last half an hour; to have felt an explosion like dynamite under your feet when Dave the Mod tucked home that penalty against Blackburn, to have been there when Pembo set off on his mad run, or when we won a penalty shootout 6-5 having missed five pens in a row before that… money couldn't buy those things. Except money does buy it… a Crystal Palace season ticket is the best investment we'll ever make.
Time for another promotion I think…
2382
jordanismygod
06-07-2001, 04:09 AM
I was 8 and didn't really follow football.
My dad asked me if i wanted to go and see Crystal Palace.
We lived in Five oak green, in the depths of Kent.
My dad, for most of his life lived in several places in London.
I remember my dad buying me a scarf from the top of the holmesdale (I've still got it somewhere)
We stood on the holmesdale, and did so in the same area for a futher 16 years
I don't remeber anything really about the game. I know we beat Notts County 2-0. My dad then took me to Orient to see the Palace beat them 1-0.
Most people will know what game came next.
The Burnley game.
It seems a a lifetime ago!
dragged along by wingy_cpfc and hooked ever since.
1st game= wombles away 97.won 1-0 i think.
PalaceFan in Alabama
16-07-2001, 06:17 AM
Bunghole and Ruediger and those others who did not grow up in the Sarf Norwood/Upper Norwood/Crystal Palace/Thornton Heath/Croydon/Streatham (you get the point) area. I am a Palace Supporter because I know no better, but Bunghole reading the local chip wrapper and then listening to the Radio and Ruediger (who has explained why he is a Palace man, in the George) and all those who join together on the BBS on a Saturday during the season. I feel like a young kid on Saturdays when I sit down with breakfast to listen or type away 2 hours or so.
The trips I have made to games and BBS's get togethers (over the last couple of years) and those who I have visited when I have been in your neck of the woods I say thank you from the bottom of my heart. To me it is these that make being an Eagle so very special.
Reading this thread sums up so much, all we every wanted was to see our beloved Palace play:cool:
Look forward to seeing some of you in Gillingham or at the Millwall game.:cool:
zonin2000...
Your post is f*cking brilliant. Cheers, a great piece that had me laughing and very nearly crying :cool:
PalaceFan in Alabama
17-07-2001, 08:35 PM
Zonin2000 a most enjoyable post, having read this thread from start to finish yet again, I must say that I agree with Monty, someone should get this into print, if for nother reason, than to help with the support of the BBS.:cool:
Glaws Eagle
18-07-2001, 11:20 AM
Originally posted by zonin2000
Crystal Palace is cult viewing, like a late night TV show that only a few people know about, like a precious record that was never number one but makes everybody who knows it want to dance and sing… and sometimes cry.
Time for another promotion I think…
Absolute class Zonin, absolute class.
But so true!!
Thats kept me going today.
Gooders
18-07-2001, 12:41 PM
Having seen these recent eulogies I've just trawled back to find Zonin's post - that is quite simply the best posting I have ever seen on the BBS, bar none.
If you don't mind I'm going to print it off, have it enlarged, get it framed and hang it up at home to remind me every time I've been kicked in the teeth by this club that I love just why I keep coming back for more.
Absolutely wonderful stuff, Zonin.
:)
Men At Work
18-07-2001, 07:57 PM
Zonin gets the credit for re-posting it but it is Tony who deservedly gets the plaudits for originally writing that superb piece. I wonder if SJ would like to send that out with the application form for next year's season tickets :)
zonin2000
18-07-2001, 09:25 PM
Yes, sorry about the misunderstanding, I didn't reallymake it clear that I was just re-posting what Tony had posted on a different thread..
Sorry lads :)!
Gooders
18-07-2001, 09:45 PM
My bad.
Thanks to you then Zonin for bringing it to our attention and thanks to "Tony" for crafting such a wonderful piece of writing on Palace.
:)
iowpalace
19-07-2001, 01:16 AM
When I was about 6 my Dad always used to get me to sing Chelsea songs, even though I had no idea what I was singing about. Then out of the blue my second cousin came onto the scene and offered to take me to see the Palace in a Div 3 game. Of course I said I'd love to go and see a live football match, especially with the sizeable crowds we were getting then. Before the game my second cousin took me into the old Goal Post Palace shop and bought me a complete Palace kit, I told him I was supposed to be supporting Chelsea, but he told me in not so many words that it should be Palace I should support, seeing as I lived in Croydon. Anyway we carried on up to the ground and bought a red and blue striped scarf from a seller just outside the turnstiles and he tied it round my wrist and paid for us both to get into the ground. He said just copy the songs the fans will sing and i'll soon get used to the atmosphere, well the ground was buzzing and I felt really excited to be in selhurst for the first time. Then the chant of eagles was filling the whole ground with a deafening din, and I knew at this point that Crystal Palace was the club for me. There's nothing like that eagles chant and the pointing of the finger, sent shivers down my spine. When Palace scored it was an experience never to forget. The whole ground erupted and there was a surgefrom the top of the Holmesdale and pinned us against the metal support bars on the terracing, and I was just loving it.
When the end of the game came and we had won, the ground erupted again and I felt really elated. My 2nd cousin asked me if I had enjoyed it. I told him I loved it and could I come again, and I did and went to every home game until as an adult I joined the army and had to restrict myself to games when I came home on leave. Even now that I am out of the Army and have moved to the Isle of Wight, I cannot get Palace out of my system and nor do I wish to. I'm Palace till I die! :D
Al From Bromley
20-07-2001, 04:37 PM
"My parents are Irish but met in London and lived in Caterham " Wee Red.
What a great place to be born :)
Yes, i was born in Caterham and was first taken to the home of football in 67 by my dad. I started going a few times a season during the promotion year of 68/69 and became a Holmesdale regular in 73. As I explain to people who support glory teams, the difference between an Arsenal and a Palace is, we remember and cherish the good times, whereas an Arse fan expects victory all the time. Palace have given me some wonderful memories down the years - the 76 cup run (I really thought our name was on it). The 1990 cup run (I really thought our name was on it!) the ZDS...looking around and seeing 40,000 smiling happy faces, a sea of red and blue balloons drifting across the wembley turf, the guy next to me who had supported Palace for over 50 years and never thought he'd see them at Wembley. The play off diaster. The silence of the Palace fans contrasted with the joy of the Leicester supporters. The reverse the following year. Knowing the pain the Sheff United fans were feeling. having some humility in our hour of triumph. Administration. The Trust. Not knowing if we'd seen our last palace game ever. Norwich away that season. The joy, the agony, the tears. The fans. Ah yes, its never been dull following the palace. :)
1f91
CPFC Cheerleader Observer
21-07-2001, 06:43 PM
Lived in Coulsdon since I was 2, Dulwich before that, but my Nan used to live in Holmesdale Rd and my parents were round there one Sunday when my mum went into Labour and I endup up being born at my Nan's house, in Holmesdale Road!
So my dad took me to see Palace for as long as I remember.
orpingtoneagle
27-07-2001, 04:16 PM
Ohhh back in the late sixties - I was a young spurs supporter -never been to see em but loved Jimmy Greaves on TV.....my Dad bless him took me to see the local outfit, unfashionable team who played in pyjama like claret and blue !!
been hooked ever since !
charltonhater
31-07-2001, 01:54 PM
January 6th 1991, my dad took me as a 6 year old to see a cup game against Forest, the game ended 1-1 but i didn't care, I had already decided this would be the club I would support from then on. I had watched Palace on the TV and cheered when they got promoted, and moaned when they were beaten in the FA Cup final but watching on TV is completely diferent to watching live. For the 1992-1993 season my dad brought me a season ticket and now as a 17 year old I am about to enter my 10th year as a season ticket holder.
EAGLES!
James Verrinder
31-07-2001, 08:41 PM
First game I went to was a 0-0 draw with Plymouth sometime in the mid 80s. I had been in the cub football team and we were taken to Selhurst for a day out and got presentations from Steve Ketteridge. At the time,I was 7 or 8 and wasn’t too impressed with it all.Everyone else was either a Liverpool or Everton fan, no other team exsisted. Can’t remember anything about the match apart from sitting in the main stand,near the front and on the corner with the Whitehorse. I was queing up to buy something and the ball flew over and knocked the bobble hat that my grandad had bought me clean off my head. He was an avid CPFC fan and had virtually emptied the club shop when we arrived,decking me out in everything possible and hoping to convert me. After the game,we were back in the function room to meet the players and someone- possibly Andy Gray- came over and apologised for knocking my hat off and got me a rosette (remember them??) that had been signed by all the team.
Anyway, despite all this,a 0-0 draw had not inspired me into changing allegiances and it wasnt till 1989, when I next saw Palace,this time as a mature 12 year old. Once again it was with my grandad, a few weeks after 9-0. I had not shut up about it and he took me to show me how good Palace actually were. We stood in the Holmesdale and saw Spurs beat us 3-2 (I think) by the end of it, I was half frozen but converted. I went to lots of other games that year,and then after years watching and celebrating Liverpool winning on TV, sat in tears at the end of the replay as Man Utd paraded the FA Cup around.
The Blackadder
14-08-2001, 02:03 PM
When I was just a little boy I asked my father what would I be.............
unfortunately he replied Norwich! - then my Auntie, who used to play for the Palace ladies team, took me: an unaffiliated impressionable 10 year old to the 1990 cup final - WOOOOOOOWWWW, I feel in love with palace, I loved the style of the team and the chanting of EEEEEEAAAAAAGGGLLLLLLEEEEESSSSS which was ringing around the stadium, it truly sent goosebumps up my back.... She also took me to the ZDS cup final against the toffees, and I never looked back: Palace for life. Since then I've experienced all the highs and lows, and lows again, but will always get goosebumps when remembering my first Palace match, the occasional celebrations are worth percevering through the bad times for. I still have a poster from the cup final programme next to the mirror in our bathroom: It had a picture of Wembley with the slogan 'Virgin Territory' - a message of good luck to Palace in their first cup final from the sponsers. every time I look at it I know why I'm a Palace fan.
tauranga rob
17-08-2001, 04:47 PM
Why am I Palace - cos they were the local team.
Started when I was 5 - at the time, Man Utd, Chels & Leeds were the big teams. Glory hunting was probably ok at that age!
Got taken to the May 1970 game v Everton. I lived only about a 20 minute walk from Selhurst Park. I remember Alan Ball playing in white boots. I think Alan Whittle played for Everton as well! It was 0-0. After that, I went (with lads aged about 14, whose parents were friends of my folks) as often as my Mum would let me. Was gutted that I missed the Don Rogers v Man Utd match!
I guess that having been to a few matches, I could identify with the team - they weren't remote figures like Man Utd would be to most kids (at least B4 saturation media coverage). Palace were the local team - I was glad to be able to go & see a game. Even at junior school, I told other kids that they couldn't claim to really support a team unless they went to watch them play.
Too many memories to bore people with - CPFC just got into my blood. I saw hundreds of games until emigrating last year. It's frustrating, but I'm still glad all over. My eldest son's only 5, but I took him to a couple of games B4 we emigrated, and I think he's CPFC for life too (sorry boy!)
Smurph
17-08-2001, 05:30 PM
Why I'm Palace:
Well I was born in Mayday and lived my first 2 years in Thornton Heath, where all my family are from, and who all supported palace, so it's in the blood. I was brought up from a tot to support Palace. However I had a few lucky escapes (all childish abberations) along the way.
My parents moved about a lot when I was a kid. As my Dad says, to my credit, I always managed to find them. I saw my first professional game at Peterborough when I was 5, so for a little while I was also a Posh supporter.
We then moved to Saltdean near Brighton!!! Rest easy - I never became a Brighton supporter. Nearly as bad though, my Mum had a friend whose daughter was going out with Sammy Nelson, the Arsenal left-back. Rene knew I was football mad and got him to get me all the Arsenal players autographs. For 18 months I was also an Arse!!!
Fortunately we soon returned to the S. London\Surrey area and my family started taking me to the odd Palace game. All I remember about my first Palace game is being in the Old Stand enclosure and Peter Taylor hitting the post from a long way out. I think it was 0-0 draw.
Then there was a scary interlude. My best friend was a Chelsea supporter and his Dad took him to the games. I ended up going along to a couple of games but despite Chelsea having a good team at the time (Wilkins, Brittain, Stanley etc.) it never really grabbed me the way Palace did, thank God.
Then, in early 1977 we were back living in Thornton Heath and I started going to every home game and as many aways as possible, something I was to keep up for eight years until I went away to University, and resume once I returned.
Palace from birth, despite some severe tests!!!
26ff
KennyB
17-08-2001, 06:27 PM
I know why I'm a Palace fan.
It all started many years ago. My family originate from the Tulse Hill/Lamberhurst Road/Dulwich areas, and my grandmother’s brother had even been a gateman on the turnstiles here at Selhurst – I never knew him though. Crystal Palace were a team that all my family supported because ‘that’s where we are from’. Life was like that then.
We were then living in Sussex and so my Dad took me to a Brighton game once – no magic there I’m afraid !! We then moved to Berkshire so I still never got to SE London. But we all followed the results and their progress religiously.
When I left home in 68 and lived in London I finally went to my first game. Home in the cup against Chelsea – lost 0-3 -, AND I was in the wrong end as that was the only ticket I could get.
The feeling of high excitement on that winter night, the bright green, the floodlights, the noise, the emotion, the wave of feeling. I knew I had arrived. I was home.
I went to many games during the period 68 – 76, I saw Jim Scott chopped down in the penalty area against Leeds, but we only got an indirect free-kick. That was the game where the ball was crossed for Gerry Queen to head, but went too close to the keeper – one Gary Sprake – who proceeded to drop it into the net, right in front of us. Pandemonium.
I saw Don Roger’s goals against Stoke (5-1 or 5-0?).
I was there when there was 48,000 in against Spurs and the loudspeakers were asking us to all step forward one step to make more room ‘as the queue was back as far as the railway station’!!
I was at Hartlepool when we lost in the cup after taking the lead.
I have seen so many emotional games, so many highs and lows.
Why am I a Palace fan? It’s a love affair. Not the biggest club (who wants that?), not the biggest ground (so what?), not the most successful club (so what?)
When you stand on a frozen terrace on a Tuesday evening in February in driving rain, and watch your team, your beloved team, play crap football against Notts County or Grimsby or Stoke and lose, and when you turn up faithfully the next week for more of the same. That’s support.
I shed a tear that sunny day when the team came out to play the play-off semi against Wolves – it was just the sheer overwhelming pressure of the surrounding passion that lifted us all up.
That’s happened several times – the emotion of OUR boys in the red and blue coming out of the tunnel. I enjoy away games for the same reason.
Also there’s never a dull moment – up one minute (season!) down the next.
And my wife still comes as well, as she did 30-odd years ago. And now our 3 kids (kids? 30, 23 and 21!) all come, all wearing the red-and-blue. And there’s even been times when I couldn’t make it but they still went – that’s family support.
For me one picture sums it up, and will stay in my mind for ever. It’s that TV shot of the girl at THAT Stockport game, about 5 or 6 minutes before the end, (who had her nails painted alternately red and blue), with tears streaming down her face, and the sheer emotion clear for all to see.
Why do we all do it I wonder ?
I think I know.
It’s because:-
We are Palace, from Selhurst.
coulsdon_eagle
17-08-2001, 06:55 PM
I was born in Bynes Road Sarf Croydon. All neighbours were Palace. Dad took me in 1970 aged 4. Big injection was 1979 v Burnley. Been very much hooked ever since. Have seen over 500 games.
Bobby Woodruff
21-08-2001, 10:35 PM
I started going occasionally with my dad in the late sixties (incidentally he's from Horsham in Sussex so technically he should be a seaweed supporter but has been solid Palace for as long as I can remember). Initially I was a ManUre fan around the time of their European Cup win at Wembley (which my dad went to).
My dad was a member of the old Glaziers club where the players went after the game and I used to get their autographs (I remember after the game against Millwall in the 68 69 promotion season which we won 4-2 that John Jackson had a ship rivet about as big as his fist that had been thrown at him).
By the Fulham game at the end of the season I was a committed Palace fan. That's about the same time that I went to secondry school in Brixton and inevitably I took stick from the Chelsea, Arsenal, West Ham etc supporters but I knew that I was a true supporter who went to games not a glory hunter.
Bobby Woodruff
24-08-2001, 01:11 AM
Sorry - load of rubbish:o
MARK PALACE TILL I DIE
24-08-2001, 03:56 PM
There really was not any specific time as to when I first started to support Palace. I just grew into it. I have never and never will support any other team.
First started going in about 1965. My dad took me but as he was a shift worker in a dairy he only used to get the odd Saturday off. I really wish that I could remember what my first game was. In my memory somewhere QPR rings a faint bell with a score with 2 in it. Perhaps someone would like to look it up for me.
Anyway by about 1967 I was old enough (10) to be allowed to go on my own with my cousin. I can remember always getting to the ground about 1.30pm and waiting for the turnstiles in the Holmesdale to open. We used to wait outside the same turnstile every game as one particular old chap would always let my cousin and I jump over and get in free along with hundreds of other kids.
So for the past 30 odd years every other Saturday through the football season along with hundreds of away games have been spent watching my beloved Palace. I have just about experienced every emotion possible watching them. I have seen many many changes during that time and apart from the reigns of Mullery and Smith’s 2nd spell the atmosphere really hasn’t changed that much.
For me Palace is and always will be the BEST club in the world.
:p
When I first got asked that tricky playground question "Who do you support?" I was about 5 and had to ask well who is there to support? Given a short list (I don't think it included Palace) I opted for West Ham for the sole reason that I could relate to the 'Ham' bit as my stomach has always been close to my heart. For the next few years I wisely graduated to using 'England' as my stock answer, as it avoided all that uneccessary my teams better than yours nonsense.
However the time came when I felt i was ready for the commitment! So I did the logical thing for an eight year old, I asked my mum which was our nearest football club? At the time we were living near Bromley so I count myself very lucky that she didn't get a map and discover that we were 100 yards closer to The Valley than Selhurst Park! Life however didn't become any easier. No sooner had I made up my mind, than we were off to live in Bristol! It's only when you get to a backwater like Bristol that you see how simple life is! 2 choices City or Rovers. When I piped up with Palace, it always totally threw them! Off course I now considered myself a Londoner on foreign territory and was proud that I supported a proper club!
The first Palace match I went to was on my birthday - Boxing Day. Palace away at Bristol Rovers in about 1976/7. I think Palace lost and it poured with rain the whole match. My mum & dad took me as part of my birthday present, but because the away end was open and the weather awful, we stood in the home end. They must of loved me shouting on about the Palace with all the home fans giving us filthy looks!
When I left school at 16 I moved back to SE London and immediately started travelling to Selhurst to watch the home games. It was a fairly crap time to watch them (83/84 season) but it didn't stop me buying my first season ticket for the following season. Before the start of the 1985/6 season I moved again to Sussex (Burgess Hill then Crawley) and continued going to most home games and for a while a lot of away games. I used to travel with a group of 'Eastbourne Eagles' who caught the same train as I did. All good lads, but I don't know if any of them still watch the Palace (I would be suprised if they don't as they were pretty fanatical). I used to take a big union jack with CPFC on it and the names of all the away grounds I had been to on it.
I've been to most of the big matches over the last 20 years, including Villa Park for the semis (to think of all those fans who didn't believe we could do it and didn't bother coming - SHAME ON YOU!) Wembley for the three finals, Blackburn away & home for the play offs.
I'm now a season ticket holder again in the upper tier of the Holmsdale. Nice view of the pitch, good bar, but nothing will ever beat being 18 and stood in the Arthur Wait with Brighton in the seats behind for an evening game when it all kicks off. Henry Houghton my hero!
2254
I first went in 1976.. and saw a 0-0 draw!! I was hooked though immediately and went a few time that season, standing on the Holmesdale. I would go with my Dad and then go and tell my Grandad all about the game afterwards.. who was also Palace. I only went a couple of time then the next year, and due to playing football for my school, I didn't go for many years.. finally returning to Selhurst in 1983. Then I just started to go and couldn't stop.. even though Palace were crap, you felt you had to be there, just in case something special happened and you might miss it.. like Birmingham 6-0.. home and away!! Certainly in the early to mid 80's times were hard as a Palace fan.. I remember going to watch Carlisle at home and it was pouring with rain for about 3 hours prior to kick off and then all through the game.. there was only about 3,700 there that afternoon and we all seemed to be in the arthur wait... including the Carlisle fans!!! Of course once you go once, you just keep going back... I remember Ian Wright and Andy Gray starting their careers and you just knew something would happen with those two.. they had an attitude.. but always managed to do something. Jim Cannon scoring with his thigh in the last minute at Millwall.. man were they pissed after that one!! beating Pompey in the last minute at Selhurst to deny them promotion... they had 10,000 packed on the Holmesdale... a great sight.. trashing teams like West Brom 4-1, Plymouth 5-1, Brum 6-0, scoring goals for fun.. going to Man City in front of 33,000, beating Leeds 2-1 at Elland Road.. going to QPR to witness my first match in the top flight with Palace... and not caring we'd lost 2-0 because I was just pleased to see Palace in the 1st division.. going to Man Utd and winning 2-1... beating Tottenham 1-0.. cup semi finals in the 90's.. cup finals in the 90's.. play off finals.. heartache and success... the 'Forest' cup ties.. Salako from the half way line (before Becks).. Nigel Martyn receiving a hero's welcome.. Miller not so.. both saved pens!!! Even when you're not at the match you find a way to hear the score... you just can't be without Palace...
Payney
31-08-2001, 07:02 AM
Usual story to start with.....The old man took me around 1980(8 years old)only remember Vince hilaire jinking around on the wing.I then only went to two or three games until 1985 when I started going all the time with a school mate,standing on the sainsburys.Had four season tickets in a row till 1990,moving into the Arther wait as I got older.The last eleven years I have been playing football on Saturdays,figure on may as well play why I still can.So these days I only go at the start of the season and at the end with as many midweek games in between as possible.I do miss watching Palace every week,but that time will come around soon as I find it more and more difficult to get fit every season.
Favorite player - Brighty / Barber
Favorite game - Millwall 4-3 / Liverpool 4-3
Paul Stevens
15-09-2001, 04:24 AM
I was sure I had posted on this one - but reading through some very interesting posts I realised I haven't - so here goes.
Born in May day helps, but apparently it was around 1959, I was 3 years old that my Grand-dad took me to Selhurst Park. He was a total sports fanatic and couldn't wait to take his first grandson to a game. We live, with my Grand Parents, in Thornton Heath so the first game was Palace. Close thing 'cause the old boy was a Charlton fan. Have to guess it was too far to travel with a 3 year old in a push chair. Thank the Lord.
I have been told that I never took my eyes of the pitch. Spell bound by the wonders of Div 3 South. Palace ever since.
The toughest moments have been taking my kids to their first game. You spend all your time telling them how wonderful Palace are, you build up their expectations and suddenly you're at the game and realise we could get beaten. I've been lucky. My lad was 6 and we beat Blackburn 2-0 in Div 2 - 1988. My daughter was 7 and we beat Everton 4-0 in the ZDS at Wembley - 1991. Both have remain loyal.
Next pressure point is taking my 3 year old grand child. Hopefully not for many years, but I will do it.
Thanks Grand-dad - RIP
howard
28-09-2001, 07:26 PM
WHY I AM AN EAGLE
Way back in 1969, during lunch break, a group of us eleven year olds are minding our own business out on the school playing fields .We are suddenly confronted by a gang of much older lads, they must have been at least twelve or thirteen!
‘Who do you support then?’
Not knowing a lot about the subject then, I decided to hang back and wait for others to lead the way.
‘Arsenal!’, ‘Spurs!’, ‘Chelsea!’
So far, so good. Then my mate Scottie utters ‘Palace’
Without exception the entire gang roar with laughter as they saunter away to do the rest of the rounds, luckily distracted enough to forget to ask the one person who could not give them an answer, me!
I just had to ask Scottie why the word ‘Palace’ should provoke the given response. Even after his explanation, little did I realize the long-term affect those few minutes from a lifetime, would have on my life.
Within a few weeks, Scottie was bidding a tearful farewell to start a new life in Skippy Land, never for the twain to meet again, but the seed was already deeply sewn. I was then on the lookout for a suitable recruit to take along to my first ever game at Selhurst Park.
It took a while, but eventually Tim accepted my invitation, on the provision that I would have to convince his father that I was responsible enough for us to go on our own. Despite the fact I had never been to Selhurst, I must have put on a convincing display to the father, as he agreed we could go, my last minute glance at the Bus timetable giving me enough information to swing it in our favor!
I chose the visit of Southampton for our first adventure, again not knowing how that team would feature in the distant future. Three bus rides later, Tim and I, still not sure exactly where to go, follow the claret and blue scarf wearers to the ground. The pungent smell of hot dogs coupled with the hopeful cries from traders offering scarves, rosettes and badges, all adding to the build up of excitement and atmosphere that would have an everlasting effect, on one of us anyway. The phrase ‘Hook line and sinker’ comes to mind because; I certainly caught the Palace bug that day although, sadly, Tim made a full recovery.
I, as every Eagles fan, can cite many events over the years that keeps the Palace blood flowing through our veins. The one that sums it all up for me personally was when in August 1975, as the result of a motor cycle accident, I was languishing in Orpington Hospital with life changing injuries. Unbeknown to me, an aunt had contacted the Palace telling them of my situation. Not content to merely send me their best wishes, they arranged a surprise visit by members of the team, Peter Taylor, Peter Wall, Paul Hinshelwood, Ian Evans and Dave Swindlehurst, along with physio Charlie Simpson and club photographer Hy Money.
I still treasure the programme from the home game with Rotherham on the 13th Sept. 75 showing the article.
When in September, Charlie Simpson was told that I would have to have my leg amputated, he made another visit to me, along with the club surgeon, to give me a second opinion and to give advice on my rehabilitation. He did not have to do this but it is a gesture I have never forgotten.
Once able to go home, I was invited along to Palace to see the game against Grimsby, after which I met the team in the players lounge, including ‘Big Mal’ himself!
The events of that summer changed my life and still live with me today, but what the people behind the scenes at Palace showed everyone around me was that they care about their supporters. This is why everything must be done to keep the club going, and why I am an Eagle.
Howard March 2000.
1f63
ruediger
28-09-2001, 07:39 PM
Brought tears to my eye, Howard. Moving story.:p
Terrace Bickle
30-09-2001, 03:31 PM
My parents got to me young, my mum even stood in the Arthur Wait when she was carrying me. My dads been Palace since the early 50's. But the clincher was the night of the Burnley game, I was 6 y.o. and begged my dad to take me but was understandably left at home. I was glued to the radio with my mum and when the first goal went in she threw me up in the air in celebration. Straight into the light pendant...so yes it was the bang on the head at such a tender age!
That and the kit with the red/blue sash:cool:. The early 80's were tough as everyone knows... a defeat at home to Grimsby in front of 5K had me begging my old man not to take me again.
So much ridicule later and I'm still here. But its all been worth it...I never thought another man would make me scream!! Thank you Hoppo and Dougie.
Palace are quite simply unique:).
Elephant with mouse gyp
05-10-2001, 04:43 PM
Originally posted by Terrace Bickle
[B]B]
Fantastic username.
Men At Work
05-10-2001, 06:48 PM
Mine was a very late love affair but, as in a lot of these cases, I've made up for lost time. In Australia in the 70's there was quite a lot of English football shown - a nod perhaps to the large number of British migrants. The local game was of a very poor quality and this only encouraged the romanticism of the game in a very distant land. Even back then there was a lionisation of two teams in particular from the North-West and although I had some attraction towards them it never went beyond a few souvenirs. Instead I plumped for my original hometown team of Hartlepool. I had never seen them play (although Dad kept telling me I should be happy about that) but everyone needed a team so they became mine. Apart from the obvious link there was also the bloody-mindedness of not being the same as everyone else at school. There were the odd high(?)lights on TV, the scores on the BBC world service and perhaps a very brief mention in Monday's papers. I used to cut all of them out and keep them in a scrapbook. I remember looking through it just before I came to England and noticing the two largest cutting concerned Hartlepool in massive cup upsets in 1984 and 1993. Can't remember who they were playing......
By the time I arrived back in England in late 1996 I was enjoying football regardless of who was playing. But now I wanted to watch a game at the ground and not on TV. I was looking around at where would be the best place to see a match. Despite living in New Cross the thought of going to Millwall was a horrible one - their reputation having reached Australia even in the pre-internet days. Then I noticed a ground fairly nearby that was in the Premiership and seemed to have lots of seats available. But I never did get around to going to Wimbledon. However, one day one of my flatmates - a season ticket holder - took pity on me and asked if I wanted to go to an F.A. Cup match. So I said yes and, filled with his warnings that it would no doubt be a very dour match, took my seat. After seven minutes it was 2-1 to Leeds. At the end it was 2-2 and then came that missed penalty.
I wasn't hooked although I had enjoyed the game and the atmosphere - something tremendously different from the cricket and occassional Aussie Rules game. I saw one other match that season sitting with the away supporters (Palace won and I think Waddle played for the other team). I knew the play-off final was on (my flatmate went) but didn't find out the result until he returned after being in a pub for three days afterwards. In the Premiership season I borrowed his ticket a couple of times (and saw us lose) but there was still no real spark there. Indeed I can even remember gently winding him up as Palace inevitably slipped towards relegation. During this time I had seen Hartlepool play a couple of times but it was only out of curiousity and I was slipping into the type of person beloved by Sky - one who watches football on the box but has no real allegiance.
However, there was something there to make me decide to buy a season ticket at Palace. A lot of it was to get a break from the amount of clubbing I had been doing but there was also a touch of missing the atmosphere of the game when watching it on TV. So the Venables return and an influx of Australian players brought in a new Australian fan. For the first few months it was most enjoyable. Only going to the home games meant I only saw us lose once. But then the problems kicked in, Coppell came back and it had all changed. Suddenly CPFC had become my club. I was starting to become (even more) grumpy after defeats. I was starting to reschedule events so they didn't clash with games. I started to write small match reports. I even took the plunge and travelled huge distances to away games - Watford and QPR!
By the time administration had arrived it hammered home the best aspect of CPFC and perhaps the one that had subconciously drawn me towards it. The fans. Meeting more and more of them over time meant it was starting to feel like a family gathering rather than a sporting event. And like the manner in which families become protective of their own when trouble threatens the dire straits the club found itself in meant I was suddenly very protective of 'my' club. There was no sudden point at which it occurred, just an ongoing process that, like most drugs, snuck up quietly and insidiously. By the time you had realised what had happened it was too late - you were hooked.
After that came more away games (the feeling at Norwich when we scored were akin to those at a rave) and, thanks to Dave's little toy, meeting a lot more people, making good friends, and the thing that defines and binds a society most tightly - the shared experiences of the game. It is something that has kept me in this country for longer than I should have stayed and something that will keep me awake into the early hours of the morning when I finally return home. And it all started with wanting to watch eleven blokes kick a ball around.
selhurstparkflyer
06-10-2001, 01:55 AM
My old man used to take me to the Reserves when I was about 3 (in about '76). In those days reserve games werre at Selhurst and on Saturday afternoons).
It was great- I remeber always getting a wagon wheel at half time.
I was so young I had no idea that there was a big 'Palace' team. Any way on 2nd Jan 1978, I saw Dad with his hat and scarf on and asked what the fuk he was doing.
Mum told me he was off to Palace and I was livid that I was not invited. After much arguing me and my liitle bro' (who was 3) persauded him to take us.
30,000 people v Millwall and Nicky Chatterton scored the winner. I was hooked. (My brother was scared so did not come back for a while).
Whilst I am sad that I just missed out on the '76 Cup Run, I am always thankful that I witnessed that great run between 1978 and 1980- a period of Palace whose romanticism will always be hard to match.
24ec
Oh dear, what's going on now, I (aged 8) thought as my grandad in Capri Road, Woodside, slipped me a ten bob note (a fortune!) and said I was to stroll off to my Auntie Eileen and Uncle Ron's and see the Palace.
Normally on a Saturday afternoon my cousin (Eileen and Ron's son) would pick me up on his new Honda motorbike and we'd go hare-ing off up and down Shirley Heights and that amazing gradient road down from Coulsdon or near abouts to the biggish road that eventually goes to Tonbridge. Where were we going this time?
Paul gave me a big wooden rattle and my auntie Eileen gave me my bobble hat she'd sewn for me, and we were off.
"Up the Palace," auntie Eileen said, as she waved at me and Paul and I strolled out of Gresham Road.
Round a few other roads, and there we were - me and my cousin going through the Holmesdale turnstiles for a real Crystal Palace football game.
Once inside, there were loads of other kids running round with scarves and rosettes and stuff but none had a bobble-hat like mine. We mucked around and took the piss out of eachother, until my cousin Paul grabbed me and said "oi, we watching the game or what."
It is to my eternal regret that I can't for the life of me remember who we were playing that day (though I could find out). But I loved it because we definitely scored and everyone cheered at the top of their voices and we kids ran down the aisles to the touchline and screamed and shouted, and I got a hot-dog at half-time and got told to look after myself and stop misbehaving, as Palace was winning (must have been a freak), and Auntie Eileen was making tea for us after the game, and we could see the rest of the scores on the telly if Uncle Ron was up for it (i.e agreed to turn the telly on), which he would do because Auntie Eileen would be doing the pools check and the Daily Sketch check.
So I stood with the grown-ups next to my cousin Paul and tried hard to see the game in between all the adults' bodies. And there was another huge rush forward cos we scored again and I loved it and wiggled my rattle and cheered with everyone else who all seemed so happy cos Palace had scored again, and decided that to make so many people this happy was a rare gift which only Crystal Palace could do, and so I solemnly decided I wanted to see Crystal Palace make us all so amazingly happy as often as possible, which meant I had to keep coming back to make it happen, and see everyone be so happy.
Then there were some diabolical lessons to be learnt soon in later games, like boring draws and even worse, home defeats, but I knew the only way I could be happy was if Palace won and however long it took, it was always worth the wait, and then I could go home to tell my auntie over tea about how the Palace won and made everyone happy.
That is how I became a Crystal Palace fan. My cousin Paul still is, though he doesn't go to games anymore. My auntie Eileen still is, and roots for the Palace all the time. They don't live in Norwood anymore but so what. Nor do I. :love:
I should add on re-reading ;Aged 8 - 1967- Up the Glaziers, Bert Head and someone called JOHN JACKSON
Hedgehog
09-10-2001, 05:02 AM
My old man used to take me to the Reserves when I was about 3 (in about '76). In those days reserve games werre at Selhurst and on Saturday afternoons).
I know this is a little off the subject, but I was glad somebody confirmed what I had been thinking for some time. I believe not only the reserves, but the youth team used to play at Selhurst in the 70's. So why is it everybody blames sharing the pitch with Wimbledon for its bad state? I know, any excuse to get rid of them, which cannot happen soon enough in my eyes, so trust me I’m not defending them.
sydney eagle
09-10-2001, 08:28 AM
Have been a Palace supporter since the day I was born,most of my family are Palace supporters and my granddad has lived on whitehorse lane ever since I can remember so the trip home is short and sweet...err I mean was(bit hard to travel from Sydney now) :p
dickie
11-10-2001, 01:50 AM
born n bred within the sound of the ground and they were the first team I was taken to see.
jlmatthews
18-10-2001, 01:17 AM
I am only a second year Eagle and wouldnt have even known they existed of not for a one year exchange student at Uni (EMT) - I remember at the beginning of last season he would always come into my room and listen to the matches over the net and i usually just kept sleeping (seeing as they are on at 9 am here)...but as the year progreessed it got to the point that id skip class for cup matches and id always get up for the matches and always had to know what was going on....i was gutted that on my trip over this summer that i missed the first friendly by 1 fekkin day..but maybe someday ill get to see a match live...i dont think this makes me any less of an eagle than anyone else, but still...here i sit everyday on the BBS and every weekend listening to the matches and i just cant get enough......
pete eagle
18-10-2001, 01:21 AM
I was born in Mayday Hospital in 1985 and lived in Thornton Heath until I was 10, supported Palace from the moment i stepped into the ground to watch my first game ( a 1-0 win over Liverpool :D )
PalaceBabe
18-10-2001, 01:13 PM
I was 7 the middle one of three girls and the only one to like football. I remember asking my Dad to take me to football and he did. He never had allegiance to Palace being a QPR fan but he took me nonetheless and I've been a Palace fan ever since.
Terrace Bickle
23-10-2001, 01:57 AM
The whole conviction of my life now rests upon the belief that supporting Palace far from being a rare and curious phenomenon is the central and inevitable fact of many a human’s existence.
Thomas Wolfe
(Well I think that's what he meant to write)
My support for the club began in early 1987 when I moved to Clifton Road, South Norwood, SE25 6QE (thats the postcode I used to use).
I first arrived in England on 12/9/86 as an totally naive 18 yr old student from Malaysia who had a soft spot for Liverpool. Mind you, most Malaysians support either Man U, Liverpool, Arsenal or Spurs (back then and even now...:(. Can't really blame them coz' being 10,000 kilometres from England, the only exposure to English footie is through the telly, and for commercial reasons, mostly premiership club games are shown.)
I spent the next 7 years in South London studying ( a bloody long time coz' I was never really good at it) and came to identify myself with S. London (it sort of just rubbed off on me). Around the time I moved to S. Norwood, I got myself a part time job at Tesco (fruit & veg dept). (Any one remember Mr. John Plummer (Head), John [], Dave Love, Steve Baker, Little Steve, Manoj or Ray Peche). Anyway, from then on supporting an English football club became "real" instead of just picking a team from the telly. Living and working in a community that was Palace and staying on the road which backs into Selhurst Park and having mates who were Palace fans (Tesco=Palace then) it was natural and obvious which team I would end up supporting.
I've been back in Malaysia since December 1993 and I've not been back to South London. I've also lost touch with my mates in but Palace remains in me. I might be far far away from Selhurst but Palace is still my local team. Funnily enough, I didn't really appreciate how much Palace meant to me until coming back to Malaysia.
Back then, as a student, money was really tight, so going for matches was a luxury. However, I always knew when Palace scored coz' of the loud cheers from Selhurst. Always made me punch the air in glee.
Every year, I make a resolution to return to Blighty but have not been able to fulfill that wish yet. Hopefully, next year my wish will materialise....however, I run the risk of being accused a fair weather supporter for showing up only to watch Palace's premier league footie matches....(fingers crossed)
1f48
Sires
27-10-2001, 09:14 PM
yeah yeah bla bla, same with all of us, I really think this topic isn't needed
biggus mickus
30-10-2001, 01:06 AM
Palace played Stoke on tuesday night about 1966-7 my first game.I cant remember a thing about it but I was hooked.My dad was a QPR fan and the rest of my lot didnt like football.
I think my dad wished I had never got involved with THE MIGHTY EAGLES as he spent the middle 70s getting me out of different filth stations around the country.
Happily married and living in SPAIN now.The wife is Palace mad as well and has spent many a midweek night travelling up and down the country watching us get beat.
It dont matter ,go where you need to,follow them to the end of the world .Pay the fine.Eat crap northern pies.Put up with West Midlands police.
Where did the 70s mob go.
Did you drink with the AERO or go to the CPH.Do you remember Quins big flag that went to every ground for 5 years,(The filth nicked it at Plymouth).
Palace through and through.
Jimmy2k
30-10-2001, 01:30 AM
Basically I grew up in Beckenham, and I aint a glory hunter.(also i love pissin off me dad so it only seemed right as he's a Millwall fan, old git):moo:
Walrus
30-10-2001, 09:12 PM
Because I grew up in Greenwich and couldn't stomach the thought of Charlton or Millwall. And the abiding memory of Vince Hilaire wearing THAT away shirt :D
On a side note, I wonder how many of the kids I went to school with in Greenwich and Charlton who were Liverpool/Moan U fans then are now glory hunting at The Valley ?
west country boy
30-10-2001, 09:17 PM
Born and bred in cow land (Wiltshire) and Swindon were my local team. Went to a couple of games which were fine but never felt any real empathy for them. Then my mum (born and bred in Bermondsey :eek: ) remarried - my stepdad used to live in Whitehorse Lane and I've never looked back. My first Palace game was in the League Cup away at Swindon (1988?). I think the score was two all but all I really really recall is the yellow away Virgin shirts which looked like the players had all had massive nosebleeds.
Hedgehog
24-11-2001, 04:48 AM
My first exposure to footy was when I was about 7 or 8, our games teacher was introducing us to playing the game (rules and things like that). To give us an insight into the game, using an old reel-to-reel cine-projector (8mm?) he showed us the 1960 European Cup final between Real Madrid and Eintracht Frankfurt. Anyone who knows this game will understand my instant addiction to the game of football. Real winning 7-3 with the likes the legends Puskas and Di Stefano playing for Real in probably the greatest game ever played.
It was quite obvious early on, I was never going to be any good as a player of the game, but never stopped me playing at every moment of daylight during the weekends and holidays, be it down the park, or just kicking a ball against a wall in the back garden. At this time I’m not sure I even knew Crystal Palace existed!
At home we got our first TV (black and white) just in time for the 1966 FA Cup Final. This was the Mike Trebilcock final, Everton trailing 2-0 to Sheffield Wednesday when Trebilcock brought the Toffees back to win 3-2. Again another shot of the football drug into my veins. Next of course was the 1966 World Cup. And we all know what happened then, “They think it’s all over” etc. etc..
I must have first got to know about Palace visiting my Grandmother, who lived in Long Lane, Croydon. My cousin Sandra, who she lived with, and was being brought up by my Gran, had started going to watch Palace with her next door neigbours. She started giving me her programmes and telling me all about how exciting it was. I remember wishing I could go with them, but we only ever visited on a Friday and I was too young anyway.
My first “real” game was at Bromley with some school friends, I remember being quite nervous walking to the ground, thinking there was going to be thousands of people there, after all, my only exposure so far had been Cup finals on TV. Needn’t have worried about that, but it was a great introduction to the sights and sounds of live football.
My best friend had started going to Charlton with his Dad, and as I hung around with him all the time, and even in those days Charlton were trying to recruit new fans, his Dad invited me along. Now, it’s here, but for the grace of God I’m not a Charlton supporter today! This was the greatest thing I had ever done in my life at that time. Charlton verses Middlebough, standing at the railings in the small terrace between the little main stand and the Covered End. The smell of liniment, the crunching of studs on the cinder track, the bright red shirts and shiny white shorts. When a corner was to be taken, you could reach out and touch the player. They seemed so much larger than life, their leg muscles seemed huge, and they seemed so old!
Walking to and from the ground, you saw and smelt thing that have stuck in my mind to this day; roasted chestnut cooking on a brazier, newsboys selling the Evening News shouting out “’Arf times, free firties” (took me years to figure out what a three thirty was), and street vendors selling rosettes, scarves and badges etc.
Funny thing was, as I continued to go to Charlton games, I found myself becoming more of a Palace fan. I think it was just to be the opposite of my best friend (I still do things like that today, why is that?). I found myself constantly looking at the old half time score board where C equaled Palace v Cardiff, or whoever, or scouring the progamme Football League insert for news of Palace. I even brought a badge at one of afore mentioned stalls, plus always got a newspaper after the game to read the half time report on the Palace game.
Finally got to go with my cousin and her neighbours to see Palace one Boxing day, as we had spent Christmas with my Gran. It was a long old walk from Long Lane to Selhurst but was everything I had hoped. It just seemed so much friendlier than The Valley, and the old stand actually impressed me (as opposed to Charlton’s funny little stand). Palace won 3-1 v Portsmouth, Steve Kember was one of the scorers, and he was now my new hero!
Took a couple more years to find someone to go regularly with, and to be old enough. Went through a couple of different friends over the years, but all in all a good time has been had by all, and I’ve got to see Palace play over 200 times in the four corners of England. It’s my one regret about leaving the country, but some things, believe it or not, are more important than football!
I’ll get my anorak now…….
howard
24-11-2001, 12:36 PM
Hi Hedgehog,just wanted to say thanks for your story.
Despite where ever we are in the world,this internet is great for
bridging the miles,and yes, life is more important than palace but, is'nt it good to know we all have 25,000 or so like minded supporters out there
some where.:p
ad1
Hedgehog
24-11-2001, 07:40 PM
Originally posted by howard
Hi Hedgehog,just wanted to say thanks for your story.
Despite where ever we are in the world,this internet is great for
bridging the miles,and yes, life is more important than palace but, is'nt it good to know we all have 25,000 or so like minded supporters out there
some where.:p
Thanks Howard, glad someone read my ramble!
howard
24-11-2001, 09:37 PM
No probs mate,my story is on page 15.
I'm sorry I got todays result right now,I wished they had proved me wrong.:(
Hedgehog
24-11-2001, 11:16 PM
Originally posted by howard
No probs mate,my story is on page 15.
Just went back and read your story. I do remember reading it a while back, looks like I might have subconsciously plagiarized some of your descriptions. Didn’t do it on purpose, honest! Anyway Howard, great memories.
pete eagle
25-11-2001, 01:56 AM
So many touching stories, brings a tear to my eye :o
c_block_lad
12-12-2001, 09:24 PM
My dad was a palace fan as a young boy and he saw all the greats. Saw my first game August 93 Palace V Tranmere 0-0 sat in arfur wait, Smith first game in charge:eek: Saw a couple of games through the years till the 1999-2000 were I got my first season ticket, I've been hooked ever since:p
eieieio steveb
17-01-2002, 04:05 AM
My dad made me a Palace fan! He has a great collection of programs that I used to nick and read ( I think it was the 1979 season ) and it started going on about the great cup run, and I always used to read the program notes by Malcom Alison and there was a page of drawings by the young fans of the players, so I always new of the club. He first took me to a game agaist Birmingham ( I was about 9 ) and I am certain Andy Gray was sent off, after that I was hooked.
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