Steak Diana Ross II: Further Diaries of a Football Nobody by David McVay (Reid Publishing 2017)

 

During my first two years as a sports journalist for the Nottingham Evening Post I managed to do something for Notts County that not even six years of blood, sweat and toil as a player could achieve. I guided them to two successive relegations.

It was not entirely my own fault. The players and management did their bit to transform Notts from a tabletopping First Division side (two games into the 1983-84 season) into a team humbled 4-0 by Brentford in front of 3,857 fans at Meadow Lane in the Football League's third tier (March 4, 1986).

In that respect, I have always been indebted to Larry Lloyd during his brief but unsuccessful tenure at Meadow Lane. It was a time when many of my former team-mates were still active in the pro game, for Notts or elsewhere, so it was not uncommon for people to inquire about my current status as a journalist and why any semblance of a playing career was now at an end so relatively soon.

If Larry was in earshot, and strangely enough he seemed almost ubiquitous when that question was posed, before I could even muster a mumble of a lamentable excuse the answer would be provided by the current Notts manager: "Lack of ability. That's right isn't it David?"

Well, given Larry's glittering prizes gained primarily with Nottingham Forest, it was difficult to argue, and given his expanding girth and frame back then, it was also unwise.

It's probably one of the reasons for Steak Diana Ross II, some sort of purgative endeavour to remind myself that I could at least kick a football in a straight line. Now and again.

Oddly and sad to report, the more I re-read some of the notes I made during my last two seasons with the Magpies, the more I could see that Larry's pithy barb contained more than an element of truth.

Steak . . . Diana Ross: Diary of a Football Nobody by David McVay (The Parrs Wood Press 2003)

Trouble is, it can have a negative effect. I have got to the point that the ball is not my friend, I don’t want to see it or receive it for fear of another rollicking. There are hiding places, in the hole or channel cunningly lurking between a marker and your own man. You can spend a quiet half hour failing to show for a colleague if you know what you are doing. It even happens on match days, not for so long but there have been occasions when even one or two of the senior pros are taking too much stick from the crowd and grab the invisible cloak for some respite. It is not spotted by the average fan but for the reserve lads sitting in the stand, it is noticed and pointed out gleefully among the throng. 

Cold in Hand by John Harvey (Harcourt Books 2008)

For the first time in a long while, Resnick's heart failed to lift as he neared the ground, Graham Millington and himself part of the small crowd turning off London Road and crossing the canal, a bright sky but the air suddenly cold enough to catch their breath. Once inside, Millington, more a creature of habit even than Resnick himself, stood in line for cups of Bovril and a brace of meat-and-potato pies. Their seats were close to the halfway line, some ten or twelve rows back, the grass an almost luminous green promising something special, something magical.

The first fifteen minutes of mistimed tackles and misplaced passes soon gave lie to that, the crowd saving most of their invective - officials aside - for the perceived shortcomings of their own team. Never bad enough to occasion a chorus of "You're Not Fit to Wear the Shirt," but close. Not that the visitors were a whole lot better, a mixture of superannuated cloggers and earnest youngsters, none of them showing much wit or ambition, until, the interval not far off, they went close with a twenty-five yard volley which the Notts goalkeeper did well to tip over the bar.

"Bloody hell!" Millington said. "That was a near thing." And then, glancing sideways, "Come on, Charlie, they're not playing that badly."

Resnick was sitting there, shoulders hunched, tears running soundlessly down his face.

Steak . . . Diana Ross: Diary of a Football Nobody by David McVay (The Parrs Wood Press 2003)

Sunday, 3rd March, 1974
The game, though, falls into the Twilight Zone. Eric Probert, Arthur Mann shut down the supply route to the front men. John Robertson and Ian Bowyer aren't getting time to exert their considerable talents on the game. For a quarter of an hour, nothing happens, literally. The crowd is silent, not baying or taunting, more dozing off after a good Sunday lunch.
"For Christ's sake David, get a fucking tackle in on him." It is Don Masson; Masson the Miserable, Masson the Merciless, our leader. He's right, of course. Despite being a most obnoxious piece of work and about as popular as a turd arising in the communal bath, he's absolutely effing right.
Must clobber the flash bastard. Supposed to man-to-man mark him and haven't even seen his backside yet. The game's just passing me by. Come on, get a grip. Here's the ball, there's McKenzie - whack. That was easy.
"Well done Davie. Well fucking done son. That's fucking better, eh." Masson the Merciless has passed judgement. I have pleased our leader. I feel 10ft tall. McKenzie looks hurt as if to say: "Who the hell are you to kick me you fat bastard?"
I don't care. Today, the Notts County shirt seems a liitle loose and baggy.

Jimmy Sirrel

Shame that.

Always had a soft spot for Notts County, and I'm sure it's because of Sirrel.

Nice post on Jimmy Sirrel over here that I stumbled across via google.

Notts Thoughts

Remembering Jimmy Sirrel's nose . . . Chiedozie scoring with a looping shot whilst running at speed from the right flank against Luton at Kenilworth Road . . . "that story" concerning the old ladies of Turin . . . perplexed that for the life of me I couldn't remember (or know of) Rachid Harkouk. He's the sort of footballing character* that When Saturday Comes would have devoted a special pull-out section to in its glory days . . . County fans insistance that there is only one team from the city of Nottingham . . . Everton's Andy Gray at Meadow Lane not trusting either of his feet in the penalty box and opting instead for what can best be described as a sliding header . . . surprised to think that both Deans and Lawton played at Meadow Lane in the black and white . . . less surprised to know that Draper and Johnson played for them many decades later . . . buying 'The Pie' in Sportspages on Charing Cross Road . . . thinking that if Charlie Resnick wasn't from the black and white side of the Trent, he should have been . . . wondering what sort of surname McSwegan is, and where it came from . . . certain that the only reason Fat Sam decamped to St James Park was because he misses the glory days of managing a team playing in black and white vertical stripes, and because Michael Owen reminds him of Sean Farrell . . . setting your heart on really, REALLY liking Shane Meadows' Twenty-Four Seven but feeling let down by it all - yeah, the soundtrack's overrated as well - when you saw it in the theatre on its release, and it's one saving grace being that laugh out loud joke at the end of the film by one of the minor characters about replica Notts County shirts being sold at Tescos . . . wondering why you have a soft spot for the Magpies despite the fact that their best known managers since the Sirrel era have included such kick and punt merchants as Fat Sam, Neil Warnock and Howard Wilkinson . . . designated driver - and former Notts County player - Jermaine Pennant only scoring one more goal for Liverpool than he did during his time at Notts County . . . and that final thought; yeah, I know, the same question that's been pondered a million times before but if Notts County are considered to be the first football club to be founded in the modern era, who the hell did the play against? Did they play five a side practice games amongst themselves for 12 months until Stoke City foundered were founded in 1863?

*Despite the fact that he's best known as a Notts County, I could only find colourful quotes from his time at Crystal Palace.