Posted by mb on 27/6/2001, 8:02 pm
The trips down to London are usually eventful, especially when we stay at Kenny's in Penge. One night after a game, we went down to Crystal Palace Supporters Club.
It was quiet to start with, but the disco fired up and it improved. It was a bit up-market, with candles on each table. Unfortunately, Danny and Grego started flicking candle wax
across at Kekky. Little did they realise that it was also going across in other directions.
On the next table was a gent in a tuxedo, and it was later when he discovered the wax
splattered all over his lapels. The others were too pissed to apologise, so I went up to him
told him to get it dry-cleaned, and to give me the bill when I would be down a gain in a few weeks. Sorry to say, we never went there again!!! That evening back at Kenny's, it started to get out of hand between Kekky and the other younger lads - all handbags at ten paces, but still out of hand. In the morning when I awoke and went into the living room, the TV
was off its stand, the rubber plant was out opf its pot slung across the floor, and one bracket from the bookshelf was off the wall, with the books toppled over. I told the younger lads that if they didn't get it sorted before Kenny awoke, then it would be unlikely that we could stay there again. They got it sorted just before he woke up. I think it was the match against Portsmouth in the Semi-Final at Highbury. Must tell you here that Kekky had previously been to Highbury twice before, and never seen the full game. The first time was in the sixties, when he went down with his girlfriend Joan. He went to the bog at half-time, which was chocca, and so he went into a turnstile, where he was spotted by a copper, and promptly evicted. He did get back in for the last ten minutes of the game. Many years later, he came down with us for a League Cup tie. We were in the stand on the touchline and he was behind the clock-end goal. We told him to get back to the car handy so that we could get out of London handy. After the game, the police blocked off the street with barriers, and we thought Kekky will never get out quickly. Much to our surprise, he was waiting for us at the barriers. He had been thrown out just after half-time, and had watched the remainder of the match on a TV inside a hamburger-van.
Anyway, this was Kekky's third visit to Highbury. The day was really hot, and we had enough to drink. The game hadn't been going too long when Kenny collapsed in the heat. Nobody volunteered to go with Ken to the first-aid post, so it was left to Kekky. Once there, the first-aider said that Kenny was dehydrated, and asked Kekky to give him a bottle of water. Kekky was thirsty himself, and so drunk the lot, withourt giving a second thought for Kenny.....so much for friends. So this was another game when he didn't see the full ninety minutes. Wimbledon trips are usually eventful too. We once went down by National Express on a Friday night, after an early breakfast and a few pints in central London, we headed out to Plough Lane, only to find that the game had been postponed due to a waterlogged pitch. We went to a pub, had a few more pints and a scan at a local paper, before deciding to go back down the line to watch Fulham vs York. After the game
we went back to Victoria, hoping to get an earlier coach back to Liverpool. We were put on the 8 o'clock bus. Several more LFC supporters arrived to catch the bus, but for some reason the driver wouldn't let them on because they were carrying cans of ale. They agreed to put the ale in the boot, but the driver refused to relent and wouldn't let them on the coach. However, they all had valid tickets, and so pushed passed and sat down. The driver refused to move the coach. The coach-station manager was called, then the police, and they all agreed that there was nothing that they could do. After two hours deliberations, the station-manger said that a coach had come in from Portsmouth, and that the driver just had enough hours to get to Liverpool, and that he would put on this coach to take the football supporters back to Liverpool. Nobody believed him at first.
We all thought that it was a ploy, just to get the LFC lads off the bus. However, he did promisee that it wasn't a under-handed trick, that the bus would go straight back to Liverpool, without any stops. Coming down, the journey had been really slow, with stops at Birkenhead, Stoke, Luton, and I think a few other stops, and so we couldn't believe our luck........neither could the rest of the coach, and nearly everybody moved across to the replacement coach. We got back to Liverpool in record time for a coach.
The Wimbledon Cup debacle also comes to mind. We were staying in London until
Monday afternoon, and in the morning we went round to Lancaster Gate to the FA headquarters. Kekky insisted in going inside to protest about the pathetic Brian Hill, who had disallowed us a goal. We stood behind him, as he was talking to the receptionist.
She took it in good heart, and promised to ring thru to Ted Croker who would come down
to speak to us. Kekky didn't see her put her finger on the button when she pretended to phone thru. After waiting ten minutes, we persuaded him that we had waited long enough and that we should go for a pint. On returning to Skem, we designed a computerised letter-heading from the FA, compiled a letter from Ted Croker saying that he too was disappointed with the refereee, and that plans were underfoot for the match to be declared null-and -void, and to be replayed. We sent the letter down to Kenny, so that he could readdress it and send it back with a London postmark to make it more legitimate. Kekky got the letter several days later, and was overjoyed that his complaint to the highest authority had been noticed. It was several days before he accepted the wind-up.
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