‘Drop ten, turn and Face.’ Quilty’s Football Yarns 2 Turning up Sunday morning

‘Drop ten, turn and Face.’ Quilty’s Football Yarns 2

Turning up Sunday morning

In the early eighties I’d qualified to teach PE and done my coaches badges for football. With this in mind two of my cousins asked me if I’d coach their Sunday League side Queensbridge Trucks. Both were good players but had had a few problems. Glad to see them back playing I agreed. One game in particular game we were away at the Britannia Leisure Centre in Hoxton. Our side were a pretty lively bunch and not a group you would ever want to mix it with. What a shock then when we returned to the dressing room at half time to discover all our valuables had been stolen including watches wallets leather jackets, everything of value. Apparently although the changing room was locked someone had climbed through a ventilation pipe and in through the ceiling. Quickly the message went out in the vicinity. Do you know who you have just robbed? By the end of the match the ‘error’ had been rectified and everything returned safely. That was a big point. I didn’t know who I was dealing with either. I then discovered that our whole squad were all reforming drug addicts, not just my two cousins! For the team being there on a Sunday morning was proof they had gotten through Saturday night. In the season we only lost one player who fell off the recovery wagon.

Just as those youngster thieves had made a miscalculation, I did the same after playing for Old Parmiterian’s one Saturday. As mentioned previously the home side would lay on a meal and a few jugs of beer in the Southern Olympian League where we played. Being a non-drinker I’d usually slip outside the club house just before five o’clock to listen to the football results on Sports Report usually on someone’s car radio. This particular Saturday I’d gotten a lift to the game in a mates MGB sports car. He gave me his key and I went to the car park to listen to the results. After about 20 minutes our team came out of the club house but for some reason all walked past me in the car. With this I wound down the window and shouted “Oi where are you going?” Back came the retort, “What are you doing sitting in there?”. You guessed it I was sat in someone else’s identical MGB. Only it was the wrong one! Thankfully my team had left the club before the owner of the car, it would have taken a lot of explaining. The car keys on those old MGB’s opened every car similar car.