I wanted to go to the match, then I had to earn it somehow, or steal it. Ossie said it was stealing, but it wasn’t, not really. It was just a bet – a bet I knew I’d win, but a bet just the same. In break-times I’d dribble a tennis ball from one end of the school playground to the other, and there was a farthing in it for anyone who could take the ball off me – one at a time and no fouling – and a farthing to me if they couldn’t. They all knew I was good, but they all fancied their chances. Nine times out of ten I’d manage it. I’d send them one way and go another, or push it through their legs, or just dribble round the outside of them. It was easy pickings, and I always had enough for a ticket at the Shed End on Saturdays – I’d always gone in the Shed End with Dad, right behind the goal. My favourite spot in the whole world – still is.
One morning I was called out of lessons and sent to Ossie’s room. I could see straight away that he was none too pleased with me. He told me I was a gambling good-for-nothing scallywag, that it was as good as taking money out of other kids’ pockets, as good as stealing, he said; and he wouldn’t have stealing in his school. Then he told me to bend over. Three whacks he gave me. Didn’t hurt that much, not really. And afterwards, just as I was going out, he said: “Now that’s over and done with, Billy, there’s something I want to say to you. I’ve been watching you. You’re young, but you’re good, good enough to be in the school team already. More than that, I think one day you could be very good – maybe. But if you want to be the best, you’ve got to be more than a fancy dribbler. I can coach you if you like, help you along a bit.”
And he did. He most certainly did. Ossie took over where my dad had left off. Three, four times a week, in all weathers, we’d be out practising, me and the rest of the school team, and Ossie kept us at it. He’d lay his handkerchief down in front of goal and we’d have to cross the ball from the wing so it landed spot on. And he’d run the legs off us too, tire us out. “Clever isn’t good enough, Billy,” he’d tell me. “You’ve got to be tough with it.” It was Ossie that made me tough, who taught me to think football, to know what was going on around me and on the other side of the pitch; and it was Ossie who went to my mum and paid for my first pair of proper football boots. We hardly ever lost a match. And if I didn’t score in every match he’d want to know why. “You’ve got to be hungry, lad, goal hungry,” he’d say.
Most of the others were eleven and I was still only eight, but I wasn’t too cocky about it – they made sure of that. They’d slap me down good and proper if I got any airs and graces. Besides, they liked having me there because I’d score goals, lots of them; and like me, they liked winning. I was a sort of lucky mascot for them. “Billy the Kid,” they called me. If we won three matches on the trot, Ossie would take us all to see Chelsea, and he’d pay for the lot of us. He may have whacked me from time to time, but Ossie had a heart of gold, a real heart of gold.
That bandy-legged kid out there, he’s got it, he’s really got it. Balance, ball control, grit, he’s got the lot – just like Stanley Matthews, Jimmy Greaves, Georgie Best, and that Michael Owen. Head right over the ball, knows just what he’s doing without even thinking about it. But he needs to look up more, look around him, know what’s going on. He’s not looking.
Sausage rolls. Just how I like them, crisp and flaky. I’ll have one to keep me going. Lovely. Mum used to do sausages on Sundays. Toad in the hole and bubble and squeak and gravy. Loved her sausages. Loved her gravy. Loved her.
My boots have got a bit muddy. I polished them this morning too. That’s the only trouble with the park. Still, who’s looking?
Little Joe always scuffed his shoes at the toes, and tore his trousers out at the knees. Mucky little chap he was, never wiped his nose or washed his face unless Mum made him. But he was always a chirpy sort, big too and healthy. He grew fast. By the time I was fourteen and he was twelve, he was already as big as me. More like a twin he was. Real good chums we were.
Emmy was never well, not really, not after the whooping cough. She nearly died of it. Mum sat up with her night after night till she got better. She lived for us kids. She didn’t spoil us, nothing like that – she could be strict enough if she had to be. She fed us, clothed us, kept us warm – I don’t think she ever had a thought for herself. She only ever had one luxury – lavender. She always smelt of lavender. Once a year we’d all go down to the seaside for a week, at Broadstairs, and stay with her sister, Aunty Mary. We loved it down there – the beach, the boats and the donkey rides. Emmy loved donkeys. She always wanted to bring one home with her and she’d cry buckets when she couldn’t.
Summer of 1935. I was fifteen, and we were just home from Broadstairs when Ossie called at the house. He had something important to discuss, he told us. Mum sat him down and gave him a cup of tea. He’d been talking to Mr Knighton, the manager at Chelsea Football Club. It turned out that Ossie was a Chelsea scout, that he’d recommended me to Mr Knighton and Mr Knighton had seen me play and would I sign forms for Chelsea? Twelve and sixpence a week and all the football I wanted to play. I’d be cleaning the players’ boots, keeping the ground spick and span, but there’d be a place in the Chelsea side in a few years’ time, if it turned out that I was good enough. What did we think? I could have hugged him. Mum took it all very calmly. She sipped her tea and put her cup down slowly. “Well,” she says, “it’ll be up to Billy to decide of course, but I think that sounds most acceptable.” Most acceptable! She always had a way with words did my Mum, bless her. The very next day I kicked my first football at Chelsea Football Club, and cleaned my first pair of boots too.
I was like the cat that had got the cream. I couldn’t believe my luck. None of my school chums had found work – there wasn’t much about, not in those days – and here I was, being paid for what I loved doing best.
There was a whole bunch of us lads who started on the ground staff at Chelsea that September, and all of us lived and breathed football. There was a lot of skivvying; but we didn’t mind, none of us did, because the rest of the time we got to practise, and sometimes with our heroes too – the first team. Best of all was when Burgess or Mills or Sam Weaver – the skipper he was – or Hanson, would come and kick a ball about with us.
I got a bit of a shock in the early days when I found there were others just as fast as me, stronger than me and every bit as determined too. I was used to playing with bigger lads of course, but these lads were good, and the trouble was that as the years passed I didn’t seem to be getting much bigger. “Legs like sticks of celery,” that’s what Mr Knighton the manager said, and he wasn’t far wrong. I knew that if I was to have any hope at all I had to build up my strength and my speed. So Ossie would take me out for training in the park each evening when I got home. Joe would often come along too and practise with me. I could see how proud he was of me and that made me want to practise all the harder. It was thanks to them, as much as anything, that I held my own at Chelsea, despite my size. By the time I was seventeen I was selected for the Chelsea Reserves side – on the right wing, where I belonged, where I was best.
The first match I ever played for Chelsea Reserves was against Arsenal Reserves. There weren’t many there to watch, but Mum came, and Joe and Emmy and Ossie, and they saw me score two goals. One was a simple enough tap-in. The other I really enjoyed: a dribble in towards goal, slipping the ball through the legs of one defender, round another and a little chip over the goalie. I can still see the look on his face as the ball floated over his head and into the goal – horror, disbelief, despair all in one. Lovely.
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