Two items of interest here both connected with a Boxing Day game. First, Heidi’s photo taken at Stoke in 1988. We travelled down and she took quite a few photos that day but this one was always the special one. It’s been used in a few of my books.
Next, here’s a newspaper cutting from the same day at Christmas 1988. It shows the Boxing Day fancy dress game at Stoke which saw over 12,000 Manchester City fans fill half the stadium. As I mentioned earlier, I was there that day and there were some surreal sights. I won’t mention the score (you can see that from the report!) but this was one of those crazy days when fans injected humour. There was some coverage but not a great deal. My own photos from that day have appeared in a few of my books and when I get chance to dig them out I’ll aim to post some on this site.
Forty years ago today (21 December in 1985) the humour of Manchester City fans was in evidence at Sheffield Wednesday. That day I was stood in the away section behind the goal and Wednesday led 3-1 at half time. City had taken the lead via Mark Lillis in the 13th minute but Wednesday had equalised a minute later (Thompson) then taken the lead (future Blue Gary Megson, 25 mins & Sterland 42 mins). It didn’t look like it was to be City’s day but City fans were in good spirit overall. As the players trudged off the guy running the PA system put on ‘Last Christmas’ by Wham. The song had been released the previous year. A few City fans began moving to the music and there was a bit of laughter. Then the music stopped on the PA as the announcer began reading out the half time scores. City fans immediately began booing.
Then the chant ‘We want Wham!’ started to boom out from the Leppings Lane End and the boos and chanting grew louder and louder. It was one of those surreal football moments. When he’d finished reading out the half times the PA announcer, still drowned out to some extent by our chant of ‘We want Wham!’ said: ‘And now, just for the Man City fans it’s back to Wham and Last Christmas!’
The away section cheered and then what had been a small group of fans bopping along to the song initially was now a significant part of the away section.
I don’t know who the PA announcer was but he certainly ‘got’ the mood of the day and helped create one of those odd, surreal football fan moments that rarely get reported.
The game ended 3-2 to Wednesday after Neil McNab scored City’s second in the 66th minute before a Hillsborough crowd of 23,177. Here’s my programme from the game:
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Back in 1938 Manchester City introduced a letters page in their match programme. The idea was for supporters to write in with suggestions they would like to see the club implement. It took some time before fans started writing in and here was the first letter the club published. It talked of how the club colours of pale blue and white didn’t offer much of a contrast and how the author preferred to see white and black or the 1934 cup final colours of maroon and white.
Over the years there were lots of suggestions of changing City’s traditional colours. In the late 1960s Malcolm Allison wanted to make the club’s red and black away colours their home colours. Imagine anyone making such a suggestion today!
If you’d like to read more on this season, then here’s a 1,500 word article on the 1950-51 season. Enjoy!
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I’ve been sorting out my writing area and have been going through my collection. I’ll post a few odd bits on here over the coming weeks but I spotted this earlier today and thought I’d get this posted straight away. It’s the first issue of King of the Kippax and I remember buying it when it first came out in 1988. I’d previously bought Blueprint, which had included material from Dave and Sue Wallace (the editors of King of the Kippax), and used to eagerly look for any new fanzine back then. This copy remains part of my collection and probably will do for as long as I have a collection.
Dave and Sue created something special with this fanzine and who would have thought that decades later they would still be producing it. I missed the deadline for the last print edition of King of the Kippax sadly, but here’s something I wrote back in 2013 when there was a series of football anniversaries. I hope it gives a feel of how I felt about fanzines and the role of King of the Kippax over the decades.
It’s a season of footballing anniversaries this year (2013). The FA celebrates 150 years, the Football League 125 and King of the Kippax an amazing 25 years. Of these three anniversaries KK is inevitably getting the least focus but in many ways its significance to football, or at least our team, has been greater during its first 25 years than the FA’s first 25.
The FA did little to support football in Manchester for decades and it wasn’t until Manchester’s clubs started to take the FA Cup seriously that the organisation began to matter. But even then the FA did its upmost to prevent our professional clubs from challenging properly. In 1904 when City became Manchester’s first FA Cup winners how did the FA react? They decided we must be doing something illegal and sent auditors to the club to determine if we had ‘bought’ success. Okay, so they found a few irregularities with a transfer from Glossop, but for the following year or so they relentlessly pursued our club (and to be fair did something similar with Newton Heath, who became United, and with Glossop). Ultimately, we received a devastating punishment and the club could have died. I won’t go on about how unjust all of this was – City were no worse than most sides the difference being that the FA was determined to catch us out! – but if you do want to read an account of it dig out my latest book “Manchester The City Years”.
Despite all of this the FA Cup actually gave City our first success and we should ensure we celebrate 23 April 1904 (the date of the final) every year – make St George’s Day City’s day!
The Football League was more supportive of City during those early years, but prior to 1892 the League had no involvement from either Manchester side despite the League holding its first meeting in Manchester. Our celebrations of the League should really come in 4 years’ time when it’ll be 125 years since City (as Ardwick) joined the League. Although it’s worth pointing out that Ardwick and Manchester City were two separate organisations – and stressed as such at the time – and even existed alongside each other for a short while (personally though, I see MCFC as a continuation of Ardwick in spirit if not in legal terms). From 1892 to 2002 (when City last competed in the Football League) the Football League was central to City’s life. The competition became City’s lifeblood as far as competition was concerned.
What about KK? Well, unlike the other two KK was significant to City and City fans from the start. It was born in an era when fans had much to say but little opportunity to be heard. Alongside the other fanzines born in the late 1980s KK gave us a voice and a shared understanding of what the issues at City and in football were. Before the fanzines our only real outlet was the Piccadilly Radio phone-in on Saturdays which came in to its own during the time James H Reeve was at the helm. We had no forums, blogs, tweets etc. We didn’t have phone-in shows on national radio or fan columns in newspapers. We didn’t have interaction with the club, other than via supporters clubs meetings which some fans saw as being too weak to challenge the club on key issues (I won’t get into all of that here, but it’s worth noting that some fans did feel the Supporters Club was too close to Peter Swales and, as he was often the cause of fan concerns, that caused some issues).
We did also have the Pink postbag in the Saturday sports paper, sadly no longer with us. Unfortunately, journalists on the paper in the late 80s would contact the club to get their views before publishing a controversial or critical letter (this happened with one from me in 1987 which presented evidence about an issue that mattered to fans but was ultimately swept under the carpet). Censorship and club propaganda was an issue at a time when the game was dying and fans were being treated appallingly.
King of the Kippax helped to give us a voice and helped highlight the issues. Staff at City would be sent out to buy the fanzine in its early days, while others would do all they could to limit the fanzine’s opportunity to question what was going on – proving the significance of the fanzine. I don’t want to get too giddy about what KK and the other fanzines achieved but it is important that we all understand what has been achieved. It’s a bit like the electoral system – people fought hard to get the vote in the face of adversity but today we take it all for granted. We think it’s always been like this. Now with social media it would be easy to forget what KK and the other fanzines have achieved. Many fanzines have stopped being produced, which makes it all the more important to celebrate KK’s 25th anniversary and to congratulate Dave, Sue and all the contributors over the years for what they’ve achieved. I still read KK from cover to cover and find all the regular contributors interesting. I don’t always agree with everything I read but, I guess, that’s always been the point. KK has promoted debate and encouraged fans to think about issues, and that’s how it should be.
I hope King Of The Kippax continues to provide a powerful outlet for fans for years to come. It’s important that we remember that before the fanzines we didn’t have a voice. Thanks Dave & Sue, and the others, for all you’ve done and continue to do for us.
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Spotted this image from 1969 of Manchester City fans at Trafalgar Square for the FA Cup Final. I wonder if there’s anyone reading who is on this photo? Feel free to let me know if you are on it.
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The new series on Manchester City in the 1920s continues today with a 1,300 word subscriber article on the 1929-30 season. If you subscribe (see below) I hope you enjoy it. If you are not currently a subscriber then why not try it for a month (£3 per month or sign up for a year at a discounted £20 per year)?
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This is an interesting cutting from 1935 talking about the possibility of increasing Maine Road to cope with the huge crowds that wanted to watch Manchester City play. It may seem crazy today but wasn’t such an odd idea in the 1930s. You can find out more on the story here:
I’ve included this in some of my books over the years and I think it’s a great crowd shot which leads to the odd question too. Take a close look at it. This is from 1912-13 season and shows a section of the crowd in the Main Stand paddock. There are definitely men, women and children in there, but is there also one of the earliest non-white faces to be seen at a home City game too? It’s difficult to tell but look at the complexion of the man above the word ‘archive’… We’ll never know sadly.
As part if my Maine Rd 100 countdown in 2023 I posted this image of Manchester City fans demonstrating against chairman Peter Swales and his supporting board of directors. It’s always worth remembering those days as a reminder of how things change.
Of course fans still demonstrate and make their feelings known over various issues (as is their right) but these days it tends to be over specific issues. Back then it was about the direction of the full club. This image was from 1983 but protests against Swales and the board began in 1979 and continued until 1993-94. Here’s a photo of John Bond stood in front of the Main Entrance in 1983. The ‘cage’ protecting the entrance would often get locked to prevent fans forcing their way in during demonstrations.
John Bond, 1983
Here’s a 1995 image of Maine Road showing the forecourt in front of the Main Stand where most demonstrations occurred:
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