Budgie - The Autobiography Page 8

  I had met Silky on holiday in Morocco and we had kept in touch. While I was at Southend, I would head across to London and together with the wives we would go to the pictures and have meals. One night, Silky – who has become a successful football agent now – dropped into the conversation that Palace might be looking for a keeper, and that he’d see what the lie of the land was. The wheels for a move to Palace were in motion.

  Southend usually played on a Friday night to help swell their crowds, because a lot of local folk used to go off and watch one of the London teams on a Saturday. So I took advantage of one free Saturday and I went along to watch a Palace game. I liked the feel of Selhurst Park the moment I set foot inside. They were a huge club, and it took me a bit by surprise. The biggest draw though was their young up-and-coming manager Terry Venables. He was a breath of fresh air after Ron Saunders’ bully boy tactics. An official approach was made to Villa, and though I felt bad about disappointing Dave Smith at Southend, it was no contest.

  My short roller-coaster ride at Villa was at an end, but I couldn’t resist one naughty parting shot at Saunders and his coaching team.

  We all had club cars in those days. I had an Alfa Romeo, a neat little sporty number, and I was told it would be going to Roy McLaren, our trainer. It was a lovely car and I had kept it immaculate, but I didn’t like the way I was told gruffly to return it pronto – or else – so I thought I would leave them a little surprise. I was due to take the car back on a Monday morning, but before dropping it off at the stadium I took a detour to the local farm near my house, had a word with my farmer pal, chucked 10 chickens inside the car and let them do their worst! Can you imagine all the chicken shit 10 of them could make in an enclosed space? It wasn’t a pretty sight…or smell.

  I put a towel down on the driving seat to cover up the mess my feathered friends had made, and took it down to Villa and handed back the keys. Roy McLaren went striding outside thinking he was about to get himself a beautiful car, but when he looked inside all he saw was chicken shit and feathers. The look on his face was perfect – he was absolutely devastated. I was pissing myself laughing. I went inside and told all the lads and they came out to see it. It was Budgie 1, Authority Figures 0!

  So, it was farewell to Villa, and when they went on to conquer Europe not long after I left, with Jimmy Rimmer an absolute hero for them in goal, it was a strange feeling. Did I have any regrets and a sense of what might have been? Hell yes! I would have loved to have stuck around in that team that won the European Cup two years later, but I did the right thing at the time.

  It worked out well for Villa too because they bought the perfect replacement for me. They were wise enough to go for someone like Jimmy Rimmer, who was a good bit older than me and had experience that money can’t buy after his time at Manchester United and Arsenal. To be brutally honest, and I like to think I’m man enough to admit it, if I had stayed and not asked for a transfer I don’t think Aston Villa would have won the European Cup with me in goal. It’s a long and arduous road to win a European trophy, there’s an awful lot of mental pressure involved, and the way I was at that time I’m not sure I could have handled it. Jimmy did a great job of it, but he had the experience I was lacking, and dealt with whatever was thrown his way. The following year, my new club Crystal Palace drew Villa in the League Cup. It was a 0-0 draw at Selhurst Park and we went back to Villa for the replay. When you’ve left a club you are always a bit wary because sometimes it can be a bit of a grudge game, but in the replay the Villa fans were brilliant towards me. I played an absolute stormer, and we battled to a 1-1 draw. They were even more charitable towards me in the second replay, because they beat us 3-0!

  CHAPTER 10

  CLOWN PRINCE OF THE PALACE

  ‘Terry Venables taught me more in six months than anyone else had taught me in 16 years.’

  It’s safe to say that Terry Venables created a very favourable impression on me from the first time we met. We concluded the signing talks in the Royal Lancaster Hotel, next to Hyde Park, and I warmed to his personality immediately. There was something about his Cockney accent that had me mesmerised. He knew how to make me feel at ease, laughing all the time but at the same time passionate and deadly serious about his football.

  Around the same time as my Palace move, Janet and I had some good news – she was pregnant. It was a hurly-burly time for us in our lives. I had expected Selhurst Park to be small compared to Villa Park, but it was a huge cavern of a ground. Before I signed on the dotted line I was invited down to watch a youth team match against Arsenal. Palace’s youngsters were sensational and won 3-0. I couldn’t believe it when I turned up at training and found that most of the kids I’d been watching in the youth game were also my new first-team team-mates. To emphasise what a good crop of youngsters they had coming through, they won the FA Youth Cup in 1977 and 1978, beating my old club Villa in the second final.

  It was such a young side, but the spirit was fantastic. I was practically the old man of the team at 24, along with the centre-half Jim Cannon and Stevie Kember. There was so much talent in the team: Kenny Sansom, the left-back, was only 17 and absolutely magnificent; then there was Paul Hinshelwood at right-back; Vince Hilaire on the right wing; Jerry Murphy and Peter Nicholas the Irish and Welsh internationals in midfield; and Ian Walsh, another Wales cap, up front.

  I felt at home right away. I loved going in to training, having a bacon sandwich and a laugh with the lads beforehand – Crystal Palace was just one big happy family. I was well looked after. Terry always did everything with a smile on his face. His coaching was incredible. Terry Venables taught me more in six months than anyone else had taught me in 16 years. He knew how to dismantle a team, make it better, then put it back together again. No more running on ploughed fields, like I had done at Villa under Ron Saunders; this was cutting-edge training. Terry was way ahead of his time. He recognised that a footballer will only run 70 yards at one time. Most of the time was spent on technical play – how to defend, when to defend, how to think outside the box, how to make runs from midfield. I really enjoyed the way Terry trained me and the goalkeepers, and how he involved the team in his way of thinking. I think a lot of that team benefited from how Terry involved them that way. At a lot of clubs, you just go out and do what you’re told and you’re none the wiser, but Terry would explain his reasoning behind a certain training drill or exercise, and I think all of us broadened our football knowledge working under him.

  I had arrived towards the end of the 1977/78, initially on a loan agreement before a permanent contract could be signed, and we finished mid-table, but already full of hope and optimism for the following season, 1978/79. After a good pre-season, we started like a steam train, and the crowds were flocking in to see us. We got 30,000 for a 1-1 draw at home to West Ham, but our real arch-rivals at that time were Brighton and Hove Albion, and Selhurst Park was absolutely jammed for that one, there was a huge crowd in. It was starting to dawn on me that this could be a massive club if managed properly – and they certainly had the right manager sitting in the dugout.

  The Brighton match would normally have been the type of game to make even a seasoned pro a little bit nervous, but these kids were oblivious to pressure and were totally fearless. Before the game, we were all sitting around in the players’ lounge, with Kenny Sansom, who was a bit of a betting man, acting as the bookie and taking bets for the lads. It was such a relaxed atmosphere. They were all just sitting around eating Mars bars an hour before one of the biggest games of the season. Terry would come and round up the team about 2.15, and they would then just slip effortlessly into match mode. The dressing room was like a kids’ playroom sometimes. For Palace fans at that time, beating Brighton meant everything, and we didn’t let them down – winning 3-1 thanks to a double from Vince Hilaire and one from Dave Swindlehurst. If the atmosphere had been good in the dressing room beforehand, it was absolutely jumping when we came in at the end of 90 minutes.

  I started to really enjoy myself
. Crowds at Selhurst Park kept getting bigger, and we were winning games for fun and keeping clean sheets along the way. Our brand of football was brilliant. Defensively we were tight, we were creative in the middle, and we had the killer instinct up front – all the ingredients of a successful, well-balanced side. Kenny Sansom probably best typified what a confident, swashbuckling team we were. I remember the dying seconds of one game, where I picked the ball up and was getting ready to hoof it upfield to waste some seconds and close out the game. Kenny was having none of it, and was screaming at me to give the ball to him wide on the left. When I looked over and saw he had a marker lurking 10 yards away from him, I told him to get up to the halfway line. I ignored his pleas and punted the ball up the middle of the park, but their centre-half won it and it came right back to me. Again, there was Kenny – bellowing at me like he had before to give him the ball. Reluctantly, this time I did. He controlled the ball in the left-back position, played a one-two with Jerry Murphy, carried it another 30 yards, played another one-two with Dave Swindlehurst, then swung a lovely ball in for Ian Walsh to stick in the back of the net. Kenny wasn’t done though – he ran the length of the pitch, heading straight for me, and shouted: ‘THAT’S why you should give me the fucking ball!’ I just shrugged my shoulders and said ‘Hey, okay son. If you can do that – you can have the ball anytime!’

  It didn’t surprise me in the slightest that Kenny went on to become such a star for Arsenal and England. He just oozed confidence and was built like a brick shithouse. He was tiny, but strong and barrel-chested, and his control, timing and skill were remarkable for a full-back. I hardly ever kicked a ball out from hand after that at Crystal Palace. I would throw it out most of the time to let Kenny and the others do their thing. Terry preferred it that way anyway – building from the back – and he would always encourage slick, passing football.

  There was so much enthusiasm coursing through the side and the fans fed off it. It was November before we lost our first game in the Second Division. We only lost four games out of 42 league matches all season. We lost to Fulham at home 1-0, Bristol Rovers, Burnley and Sheffield United. It was cast-iron promotion form. The football side of my move was going absolutely brilliant, while off the pitch it was working out well too. When we first arrived at Palace, it had all been a bit of a rush trying to find somewhere to stay, so the club had found us a flat in Brixton. It was a bit of a scary street and the smell of weed was overpowering in our stairwell, but I actually liked the cosmopolitan feel of the place. I always embraced new places and new cultures, probably because I came from a mining village and realised that the rest of the world could teach me a lot. But after moving out of our Brixton billet, Janet and I had settled into a lovely townhouse in Surrey and had adapted well to the good life in London. We would go out in the West End, to the pictures or to have a bite to eat. I may have had a few misgivings about London when I was living in the north, but I really enjoyed it there. There were so many things to do to take your mind off football and it felt a privilege to be living there and playing for such a great manager and great club, even if they were Second Division.

  But sometimes, just as you think life is pretty much perfect, it has a habit of kicking you right in the teeth, and our world took a serious jolt when Janet ran into trouble with the baby. I got a call when I was at the training ground saying I had to get home right away as Janet was in terrible pain. I drove there in five minutes flat and was by her side as we rushed to the hospital, gripped with fear. Janet had only been seven months pregnant, and was about to go into premature labour. The doctors warned me that there may be something wrong with the baby. I’m not a deeply religious man by any means, but I got right down on my knees and prayed that Janet and the baby would be okay. The hospital staff did all they possibly could, but we lost our first baby. It was a little boy, and he only weighed 2lbs. He was alive for 20 minutes, but we had lost our first child. We hadn’t named him, but he will always be in our thoughts. I still went in to training the next day, in a complete daze, and when I returned to the hospital to see Janet, she was absolutely devastated with our loss. It was one of the most horrible days of our lives. Her mum and dad came down from Blackpool to be with her, and I tried to take my mind off it the only way I could – training hard and playing football. It never put me off my game, and I shut it away at the back of my mind. Thankfully, with time Janet recovered, and happily we would later go on to have a family. Our son Thomas arrived in September 1979 and our daughter Katie was born in May 1982.

  Palace’s winning run showed no sign of slowing down, and we were sitting proudly on top of the league. But another problem was just round the corner for me – this one physical. We were playing Bristol Rovers at home on Boxing Day at Selhurst Park. I remember a ball being played into the box and as I went in to make a challenge, their striker Bruce Bannister collided with me and knocked my left shoulder out. It was an absolute mess – I had torn ligaments and dislocated it. To rub salt into the wounds, he scored and we lost the game 1-0, only our second League defeat of the season.

  As soon as I came off the field I knew my shoulder was badly injured and that there would be no quick fix. A few days later we were due to play Leyton Orient at home. I was really struggling to move my shoulder, but Terry was saying: ‘Budgie, we need you, you’ve got to play.’ So from Boxing Day onwards that season, I was basically playing with only one good shoulder. I used to see the club doctor and get cortisone injections before each game to help numb the pain. You are only really meant to get one, but sometimes I would be getting three before the game and three at half-time just to get me through the 90 minutes. For the rest of the week, in between matches, I wouldn’t be able to train properly. I would just do lots of running and some stomach exercises to keep up my basic fitness. I found that incredibly frustrating because I used to love diving about in the mud all week and doing all my weight training, but because of the state my shoulder was in, anything too strenuous was impossible. I was suffering a bit, but I had a bit of good news at home to help me grit my teeth and get through it – Janet was pregnant again, with Thomas on the way.

  I may have been patched up for every game, but I was still playing well. The buzz created by my team-mates was just as good as any injection. The whole place had a feelgood factor, and we had a steely determination to not only win promotion to the First Division but to win the championship and go up in style. Sore shoulder or not, I very much wanted to play and be part of that. A lot of teams would try to shut up shop against us, and although one or two of them succeeded, we never panicked. Even the odd game where we did not play particularly well, Terry was crafty enough and tactically shrewd enough to ensure we took something out of the match. If we kept it tight at the back and had a bad day in front of goal, then a 0-0 draw and a point would be no disaster as they were all adding up to consolidate our place at the top of the table.

  It was a thrilling title race, probably one of the most open and exciting there has ever been in English football, and I think everyone sensed that it was going to go right down to the wire. There were five very good teams in the Second Division, all worthy of making the step up – West Ham, Sunderland, Stoke, us and our big rivals Brighton. We’d wobbled a bit in April, drawing with Oldham and Cambridge and losing up at Newcastle. With six games to go, we were sitting fourth – our lowest league position since August. With just a couple of points separating the big five, we felt we needed to win all six matches to secure the title, and maybe four or five to clinch one of the three promotion spots. First up, we won 1-0 at Bristol Rovers, then we did the same at home to Charlton. The following week, we were losing 1-0 at Leicester but fought back to salvage a point, although that kept us in fourth and just outside the promotion spots. Some wrote off our title chances at that some stage, but it was still incredibly tight at the top, and we felt if we could win our last three games anything was possible. We set about the challenge with relish – we beat Notts County, who were sixth, 2-0, then pipped Orient 1-0
in a tense game to keep our dream alive. The weird thing about that match was that it should have been our last game of the season – but we’d had a match with Burnley postponed during the winter, so while everyone else had played their 42 games, we had one still to play. We would face Burnley the following Friday in a win or bust game at Selhurst Park. West Ham had faded out of the equation, but on the same day that we’d won at Orient, our other three remaining promotion rivals Brighton, Stoke and Sunderland had all won too, so we were still frustratingly in fourth spot – yet a tantalising one win away from snatching the league at the death.

  The top of the table before that final nail-biting game read:

  It was an unbelievable scenario. If we lost, we would stay fourth and miss out on promotion. If we drew, we would sneak into third place. If we won, and took the two points (as it was for a win back then) we would be champions at the expense of our biggest rivals that season – Brighton. A draw or a win for us would deny Sunderland promotion and, even more importantly to the Palace fans, snatch the title away from Brighton. Burnley were comfortably mid-table, but were aware that the rest of the league would be rooting for them to spoil our party, and there was no way on earth they were going to do us any favours and take it easy. Plus, they had been the first team to beat us in the league that season, back in November, so that added to the jitters too because we knew they were an awkward and well-organised side to play against. They certainly wouldn’t have been our choice of opposition for such a crucial match.

  Pld

  W

  D

  L

  F

  A

  PTS

  GD

  1 Brighton

  42

  23

  10

  9

  72

  39

  56

  +33