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Home , Bruce Grobbelaar, Graham Taylor, John Barnes, Mark Lawrenson, Peter Beardsley, Terry McDermott

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Everything had gone to plan up until of a club that won League titles and ran out for the match did not seem to that point. We had got to Sheffield on the European Cups as a matter of course, a be coming from our section behind train, been put on a bus at the station club that attracted out-of-towners like us the goal. At 10 to three, it was hot enough and were now standing outside a paper with its quiet, consistent brilliance and to feel lightheaded, and my view of the shop near the Leppings Lane entrance large, ebullient following, ’s pitch had narrowed to a slit between of Hillsborough, home of Sheffield side was something special. the hair, the skin and the hats in front of Wednesday FC. Phil lit a cigarette. It was The West Stand at the Leppings Lane me. The sounds now concerning me were a clear spring day, warm enough for me to end was the smaller of the two ends at not those coming from the other three question the wisdom of wearing my beige, Hillsborough, with a shallow bank of sides of the ground, but the breathing zip-up bomber jacket. terracing split into pens located below a and groaning and rising voices in my We shouldn’t have been there, really; single tier of covered seats. To our left was immediate vicinity — and the banging a pair of 18-year-old middle class boys the North Stand, also slowly filling with of my heartbeat in my ears. from , seeing out their last months fans. Nottingham Forest had We were bending forwards, legs, arms of sixth form. We couldn’t believe we were. been given the old-fashioned South Stand and necks at strange angles. As the pressure All we needed to do now was to swap and vast at the other end, one kept coming from behind us, I was finding our tickets. The bar manager at the sports of the biggest roofed terraces in Britain, it hard to maintain a firm footing. My coat club where I worked at weekends had despite the fact their average home was being taken off me by the crowd and come through, wangling me a pair of seats attendance was far smaller than I can remember keeping a tight grip on one through a contact, but they were seats in Liverpool’s. The ground had been divided cuff. There was nowhere to go; we were the South Stand, which had been allocated the same way the year before when hemmed in by fences on three sides and to Nottingham Forest. As Liverpool fans, Liverpool had beaten Forest 2-1 at the the concrete wall behind us. People were there was only one place to be, and that corresponding stage of the competition. shouting, trying to hold each other up. A was standing behind the goal at the Maybe it was a lucky omen. man to our right had fainted and was being Liverpool end. Our pen continued to fill up, but supported by two lads who, like the rest “Leppings Lane Standing — Liverpool I noticed there was plenty of space on the of us, had no means to support themselves. Area.” No row, no seat, £6. Swap made, terracing to each side of us. In the corners, Someone near the front managed to we were through the turnstile by 2pm, the crash barriers and concrete of the climb up above the crowd, and was heading into a concrete concourse area steps were still visible — unusual given shouting at the police on the other side of and then, without thinking, down the only that Liverpool’s allocation of tickets could the perimeter fence. The game was now access point that presented itself: the have been sold twice over. underway, but something was clearly and tunnel, under a big sign on the back of the By the time the teams came out to seriously wrong. We were being squeezed stand that said “Standing”. After a few warm up it was uncomfortably hot where tighter and tighter, and people were dozen quick strides, we emerged into the we were. Phil and I had been standing by now going over the fence at the front. light and the cigarette smoke and smells side by side, but the force of the crowd There seemed to be dozens, and then of men packed together. Levering was making it difficult to stay together. hundreds of fans in the narrow space ourselves into a decent “spec”, to the right Sweat was starting to seep through my between the front of the terrace and of the radial fence that divided the steps shirt so I motioned to Phil to suggest that the touchline at ’s goal. behind the goal into two small pens, we People were passing out, but the police were far enough back to be able to see over officers at the fence still did nothing. the inverted, mesh fence at the front. At the other end of the pitch, Peter It was busy in our enclosure, but we Beardsley’s effort came back off the bar. were in and that was the main thing. The We were so tightly A second later, as the noise in the stand THOSE WHO atmosphere was up and there was time to above us rose, the heaving mass seemed to packed that rib cages drink in the occasion. Even at the tail end spasm. We were being bent forwards of a decade that had seen English football were denied the space further, so tightly packed that rib cages sink to its lowest ebb, blighted by crowd were denied the space to expand as well as violence, mismanagement and neglect, to expand contract. With our arms either linked, or XEVER an FA Cup semi-final on a neutral ground grabbing on to clothes or hands, it was as was an occasion to savour. It is generally if we were being crucified. More and more a match that only those who have season people were climbing on the fence. Those tickets, attend regular home matches or we try to move nearer the front of the who had got out were trying to kick it have friends in the right places can be at. terrace. The view wouldn’t be as good down. After a few minutes, a fan ran on CAME HOMW I had managed one previous semi- — the fences would obscure the pitch and the pitch, then a policeman, and the Twenty years after being pulled from the fatal final, in 1986, spending my savings to there would be less perspective of the play referee decided to take the players off. answer a tout’s ad in a London evening — but at least we’d be out of a mass that “Open the fucking gate!” “Fucking do crush at Hillsborough, Dan Davies recalls paper. Phil and I had both been at was beginning to move through no choice something, will yer?” “Can’t you see? the day the worst disaster in British football led Wembley in May 1988 though, to watch of its own. There were no obvious There are people dying in here!” to the brutal death of 96 of his fellow fans the best Liverpool team in years lose 1-0 openings and, in any case, there was no to Wimbledon in the biggest upset in the prospect of ducking down because we had I met phil in my first week at secondary history of the FA Cup final. It was a team by now lost our independence in the crush. school. We bonded over a shared love ™ that included , Twenty increasingly tense minutes of Liverpool FC; a pair of 11-year-old boys and . Even by the standards later, the uplift in noise when the teams in ridiculous red blazers reciting games

002 | esquire | may 2009 may 2009 | esquire | 003 feature | hillsborough feature | hillsborough and line-ups and scorers while we figured than me, seemed to be fine in the crush; advertising hoardings that had been confirming a death toll that was now in each other out. Phil supported Liverpool I spent most of the game facing the ripped from the stands; six, sometimes its teens and rising. Long queues formed because his big brother did. I didn’t have electronic scoreboard behind us, having eight men to a hoarding, running through at phone boxes. People were quick to tell a big brother. I had Huw, the Welsh Men were bent over been turned by the force of the crowd. the chaos to the corner between the their friends and loved ones they were kid who lived next door when I was five. the balcony, furiously Not that I minded — being packed in North Stand and the Spion Kop. Applause alive before passing on to the next in line. He supported Liverpool, and that was together behind the goal, being part of rang out above the stricken din. Local residents opened their doors to good enough for me. dragging fans up from something bigger, was what it had become People had died. The whispers strangers with fear on their faces, offering At primary school I had wanted to for us. Classic glory-hunters, I suppose. confirmed what we were seeing and them cups of tea and the chance to be Terry McDermott. I loved his goals. the terrace below spread through the seats. Panic seemed call home. I loved the way he fixed his shin pads in I cannot clearly recall how I managed to be rippling around Hillsborough. My mother wept when she answered place with white tape. I loved his bouncing to get up into the seats above, though The emergency gate in the fence was now the phone. She had watched the whole perm and his magnificent moustache. I do have a clear sense of the vice of the open and an anguished collective thing on Grandstand, having been told by My first match at was in February Liverpool arrived for the last game of the crowd easing and there being a bit of space inhalation of breath met the sight of the one of our friends that we were planning 1980. I was nine years old and mesmerised season already crowned as champions, to move at last. I remember being slapped lifeless body of a child being handed over to swap our tickets for the Liverpool end. by the Kop terrace that sprawled and accompanied by thousands of supporters and looked at in the eyes by a couple of heads and on to the pitch. People were She cried again when she met us from surged away to my right — the noise, the who had travelled to sing their goodbyes older fans. They gave me a leg up and still trying to pull the fence down while St Pancras station later that night, two deep growl of “Dalglish” and the bank of to manager . After nearly 50 I grabbed hold of the hands of a big man others were extricating themselves traumatised 18-year-old Londoners who clapping hands that greeted the team’s years of service to the club, this was to be with light-coloured hair who was leaning — over the fence, into the pens to the side, shouldn’t have been there. I didn’t know legendary number seven. Terry Paisley’s last match in charge. Liverpool over from the seats above. He and others up into the stand. Thousands of people what to feel until I saw the news that McDermott missed a penalty in front of played in an unfamiliar kit and lost 2-1. were bent over the balcony and the were now on the pitch. Limp limbs, night. The middle two pens behind the the Kop that day, and I remember feeling A few months later, we went to advertising hoardings, furiously dragging tear-streaked faces, pale incomprehension. goal looked like nothing I had ever seen that my world would never be the same Brentford away in the Milk Cup, fans up, out and away from the terrace An ambulance finally made it onto the at a football match. It was the colour that again. A year later, in my first match at memorable still for a sublime back pass below. I was OK, so they sent me to the grass, then another. A voice came on the hit me — no clothes, no scarves, just an Wembley, he conceded the penalty that from , hit with the back of the stand. public address system, asking us to stay ochre smudge of humanity being crushed gave West Ham their equaliser in the outside of his boot to arc along wet, Phil wasn’t with me and the minutes where we were so more ambulances could to death while the police looked on. dying moments of the 1981 League Cup evening grass. Then we went to both we remained apart were some of the worst gain access to the ground. I scanned the When I saw what I thought was me, a thin final, punching a goal-bound header over games under floodlights at Fulham, a tie of my life. The gravity of the situation hit chaos for Phil, trying to remember what he teenager trailing a beige jacket being the bar with his fist. that went to a second replay before Graeme home in small scenes unfolding in the had been wearing, trying not to think pulled up into the stand, the shock flushed In September 1982, McDermott was Souness settled it in extra time. crowd now swamping the pitch. Near the about what I was going to have to tell his through me and I sobbed and sobbed. on his way out of the Liverpool starting In time, I met other another Liverpool goal line, a man was lying awkwardly, his dad and his brother. Phil’s mum had died The death toll continued to rise in XI and Phil was one of only two boys fan at school. His name was Jake and his trousers half down. People were bent over a few years earlier. the days afterwards, finally stopping at 95. in our year capable of growing a dad was from . Jake was tall him and his chest was being pounded. The As the central pens emptied below us, Thirty-eight were in their twenties; 37 moustache like the Scouse ’s. and goofy and had floppy copper-brown urgency of actions and the expressions on we could make out a pile of bodies. The were in their teens. The youngest victim In physical terms, Phil was practically a hair. Phil and John had become “casuals” the faces near the fence at the front of the pile was four or five deep, and at the front was just 10 years old. Liverpool folded in man. His best friend, John, had also joined by this time, and while they were taking an terrace spoke of something truly terrible. of a patch of concrete that we had been on itself in grief. One evening, two fans the school. He was a Liverpool fan too. adolescent time-out from football to Young men were wandering, running, standing on just minutes before. Then asked to be let in to Anfield to pay their They had grown up on the same street on explore pot and Pink Floyd, Jake became hugging, pleading with strangers or came a tap on the shoulder and an embrace respects. They did so by tying a pair a housing estate in East Molesey. John my regular match-going companion. We pointing angrily at the police, many of like none before or since. of scarves to the goal at the Kop end; one didn’t seem to have the same train-spotter watched Liverpool whenever they were whom did not seem to know what to do. We hardly spoke for the rest of the day. Liverpool, one Everton. This simple act streak when it came to football. He said near enough or we could get tickets. Others slumped on the turf, heads between When we were finally let out of the ground sparked an outpouring and the stadium he also supported Aberdeen. In 1986, we were among 10,000 on the knees and hair matted with sweat. nearly an hour later we had seen enough to became the focal point for a community’s Towards the end of our first year at crumbling open terrace at one end of Lifeless bodies with coats or shirts be numbed into silence. The traffic on the mourning. The pitch and terrace were school together, my dad took the three of Stamford Bridge to see Kenny Dalglish pulled over their heads began to appear, streets leading away from Hillsborough from top the tunnel beneath the west concealed under a spreading carpet of us to , the home of , score the goal that delivered the first half still figures amid the bedlam. Make-do was at a standstill, windows were wound stand leading to the fatal crush. fans flowers, scarves, shirts and cards. This in the seats above struggle to save then managed by and of what would be a League and FA Cup stretcher parties formed, ferrying prone down and the only sound seemed to be supporters below. a young fan is overcome was Liverpool’s tragedy, but the trinkets looking to finish second in the table. double. Jake, who was a good foot taller figures diagonally across the pitch on news reports coming from car radios, by the horror of what he has seen of condolence and respect came from all

timeline The came at the Yet, precedents existed for the tragedy extensive experience of match days at Nottingham Forest. This decision was Still, the South Yorkshire Police’s how it end of a decade in which football fans had at Hillsborough. In 1946, 33 fans were Hillsborough wrote to a superior warning based not on crowd size — Liverpool’s Operational Order for the game in 1989 become pariahs. Hooliganism, labelled crushed to death at Burnden Park, home of of the serious problem of “access to the average home gate was nearly twice that of contained no contingency for a build-up happened “the English disease”, reached a nadir in Bolton Wanderers; and in 1971, 66 Rangers ground, particularly at the Leppings Lane Forest — but on road access to the stadium. of people outside the ground. By 2.30pm, 1985 when Liverpool supporters went on fans lost their lives when barriers collapsed end”, where just seven turnstiles serviced The 1988 match passed off without half an hour before kick-off, a larger than The reasons why 96 football the rampage before the European Cup final on a stairway at Ibrox Stadium. Hillsborough a terrace holding 10,100 people. incident, other than congestion outside the normal crowd was forming in the fans never made it home alive at the Heysel Stadium in Brussels, causing came close in 1981, when a near-fatal crush For both the 1988 and 1989 FA Cup Leppings Lane end before kick-off. A series bottleneck leading to turnstiles at the the deaths of 39 Juventus fans. Even though developed on the terracing at the Leppings semi-finals at Hillsborough, Liverpool were of police checkpoints slowed the crowd’s Leppings Lane end. Heavy traffic on routes from Hillsborough hooligans were in the minority of fans, Lane end before an FA Cup semi-final. given the North and West Stands, both approach to the turnstiles and access from the northwest had contributed to the policing major football matches in Then, gates in the perimeter fencing were accessed via the Leppings Lane turnstiles. to the tunnel beneath the West Stand was situation, as had the lack of filtering and prioritised containment and security ahead opened to avert loss of life. The club received 24,256 tickets, as restricted once the two central pens organised queuing. Men, women and of the care and safety of spectators. In 1986, a police inspector with x opposed to the 29,800 allocated to behind the goal were full. children were packed into a confined area, | repa

004 | esquire | may 2009 may 2009 | esquire | 005 feature | hillsborough feature | hillsborough corners of the country. The 95 people who There was no need for segregation at included followers of Leeds United, I’d tell them that the death toll from the league now means they stand on died at Hillsborough were predominantly Wembley on 20 May. The opponents were Chelsea, Wimbledon and Crystal Palace. Hillsborough rose to 96; Tony Bland, who the brink of matching the club’s once from the city and its surrounding areas, but Everton and, before kick off, the massed Phil had secured a place to read history at suffered brain damage during the crush at impregnable record of 18 top-flight title there were plenty of others from beyond. chorus of “You’ll Never Walk Alone”, Cambridge. Jake and Chris were going to the Leppings Lane end, and was kept alive wins. That league title win in 1990, one They came from Wiltshire, Wrexham, Liverpool’s anthem, will live forever with Oxford. They were bright lads with big on a life-support machine, was allowed to I hoped Phil and Jake had read about in an Stoke and Derbyshire, and some, like me those who were there. They had removed ideas. From their sporadic correspondence “die with dignity” in March 1993. English paper before they died, was the and Phil, came from the South. Eighteen the fences for the match, and Everton’s late it transpired the three of them had gone to In 2000, the trial — a private last that Liverpool won. of them never made it home. equaliser sparked a pitch invasion, as did Guatemala and then Nicaragua to do prosecution brought by relatives of the Of course, there have been cup wins I wanted to go to Anfield to pay my each subsequent goal in extra time. There voluntary work for the revolutionary victims — took place against former Chief to sweeten the pill, as well as many respects, but as the funerals began and was no malice. This was not hooliganism, Sandinista government. Superintendent David Duckenfield, the memorable European away trips. I like to allegations raged in the media, I felt more an expression by the people of At home, our minds were occupied by man with overall responsibility for the think Phil and Jake would have made it divorced from what was happening. I was Merseyside that football involved more Crystal Palace’s unlikely run to the FA Cup police operation at Hillsborough, and along to a few. They would have enjoyed an outsider, and though I loved the club than those on the pitch. Liverpool won 3-2. final, achieved at the expense of Liverpool, Deputy Superintendent Bernard Murray, the victory in Rome on the run to the Uefa and had been deeply affected by what we Six days later, a tired, emotionally who they beat 4-3 in a semi-final at Villa his second in charge and the ground Cup final in Dortmund. They would have had experienced, I didn’t want to intrude. spent Liverpool team ran out at Anfield for Park. It was an upset celebrated by all commander. It is unlikely the trial would loved the piss-up in Leverkusen that ended I was not from Liverpool, I did not know the final game of an extraordinary season non-Liverpool fans in the group. The have come about without the Hillsborough in photos taken with Rafa Benitez. any of those who had died and could only against Arsenal. Having made up a gloating didn’t stop, even when Liverpool Justice Campaign (HJC), which was I would tell Phil that I had been best wonder at what happened to the people seemingly impossible points deficit, reclaimed the League title later the same formed in 1998. The two South Yorkshire man at John’s wedding, a job that he would who were standing near me as the clock Liverpool were just 90 minutes from month. But then news came through that police officers faced two specimen charges obviously have done had he been around. ticked past three on that fateful afternoon. securing a memorial double, a feat they Chris was ill in hospital in central Mexico. of manslaughter. Murray was found not On the day after his wedding, his new wife Instead, I wrote angry letters to the were denied with the last kick of the game, Phil and Jake were missing. guilty, but the jury could not reach a got us tickets to watch Liverpool at St editors of papers who had printed pictures and the season. Little did we know then We were worried, of course, but we felt verdict on Duckenfield, who was allowed James’s Park in Newcastle. In 2005, the of fans turning blue as they were squashed that Michael Thomas’s dramatic injury- sure that they would turn up at any time, to retire on a full police pension. two of us travelled from Bulgaria to into the perimeter fencing. I wrote more time goal would mark the end of an era. most probably with an amusing story to The Home Office inquiry into the for the Champions League final, letters to correct the lie that this was a explain away where they’d been. Those disaster was conducted by Lord Justice on a dilapidated coach with 50 random tragedy caused by drunken, ill-behaved Hillsborough was the last time Phil and hopes dwindled when we then heard they Taylor. In August 1989, it published an Reds from Liverpool, its surrounding areas from top Anfield’s pitch is carpeted with Liverpool fans — the same kind of lunacy I went to a match together. I can’t remember were last seen setting off for a beauty spot, interim report which cited the failure of flowers as liverpool mourns. the memorial and beyond. John and I made a huge that had informed the carnage at Heysel what the last one was with Jake, though it a series of waterfalls called Aqua Azul. the South Yorkshire Police as the main to the victims at liverpool’s ground banner, which we trailed across barren just four years before. There had been no could have been Wimbledon at Plough Very quickly afterwards it was confirmed cause of the tragedy (see the panel below). ground to the Atatürk Stadium, itself violence and no drunkenness from what Lane in October 1989. I had gone to that that their bodies had been found. They had They had, after all, refused to delay the other week. It was a period when the club surrounded by a sea of red. They would I’d seen at Hillsborough. The media game hoping to meet the man who pulled drowned some days earlier, pulled under kick-off, they had allowed the began to exhibit the aftereffects of a hear of Kaká’s first-half brilliance and how seemed to be missing the point, which was me into the stand at Hillsborough. My dad by currents too powerful to escape. overcrowding to develop outside the second tragedy in six years. Kenny , our captain, a Scouse lad that the police had just stood and watched. had contacted the Liverpool Echo because Phil and Jake never came home. There ground, they had taken the decision Dalglish resigned, emotionally exhausted who lost his cousin at Hillsborough as The football season was suspended he wanted to thank him, and the paper were no funerals for us to attend, which, in to open the exit gates, they had failed to after Heysel and Hillsborough, the team a kid, inspired the comeback. But what while Kenny Dalglish, the team’s manager, had written a “Find The Hero” story that some ways, has helped to keep them alive. direct fans to the emptier sections of was gradually dismantled and Liverpool I hope I wouldn’t need to say is that during stood like a totem, becoming the ran on the front page. Someone had come I often think about what would happen if the terrace. And what later emerged was FC slid into decline. extra time and penalties on that greatest embodiment of the club that bound us forward, though I couldn’t be sure from they walked into a pub today. There would the callous disregard they showed to the The game changed after Hillsborough, of all nights, John and I were looking up at together. He attended funerals, comforted the picture whether it was the right man. be jumping around and hugging, of course, bereaved in the immediate aftermath, and is now almost unrecognisable to the the stars. And we were not the only ones. relatives, and then, when it was decided It didn’t matter, in all honesty. There were but I am confident we’d eventually return and the extent of their attempted cover-up, one they left behind. The fences were For further reading, see Hillsborough: that the football season should restart, many heroes at Hillsborough. I waited to where we left off, bringing nearly 20 which began before the stadium had even taken down, terraces were replaced with The Truth by Phil Scraton and The Day Of inspired his team to play for the memories outside the exit gates to the away end, but years into focus through the universal lens been emptied. For the families, justice has all-seater stands and after the World Cup The Hillsborough Disaster edited by Rogan of those who had died. Liverpool won the he didn’t show. of football. I imagine this is a scenario never been done. of 1990 football became trendy. At Anfield, Taylor, Andrew Ward and Tim Newburn. replayed semi-final against Nottingham In the first days of 1990, Phil and Jake played out in the heads of many people Phil and Jake would be happier to managers came and went, as did legions For information on the Hillsborough Forest at — it was a match set off to Central America with Chris, who lost friends, relatives and loved ones learn that my love affair with Liverpool of sub-standard players. Liverpool Families Support Group (HFSG) and the they could hardly lose — and somebody another friend from school. Chris was an at Hillsborough. continued. I went to study in the city, became a cup side, swapping places with Hillsborough Justice Campaign (HJC), got me a ticket for the FA Cup final. Arsenal fan, and our tight little circle also So, what would I tell Phil and Jake? ostensibly to be able to go to Anfield every Manchester United, whose dominance in visit www.contrast.org/hillsborough

and mounted police officers struggled to would not be delayed, even though this had relieve the pressure. Duckenfield refused, tunnel, most of the 2,000 fans that had tried to force them back onto the terracing. Wednesday FC, entered the police control control the rapidly swelling crowd. happened at an FA Cup semi-final two years fearing that to admit fans without tickets been trapped outside now headed for the Six minutes later, at 3.06pm, hundreds box, where they were told by Chief Superintendent Marshall, one of the earlier and would have eased the pressure. could be a public-order risk. tunnel under the west stand, and the of Liverpool fans were now in the narrow Superintendent Duckenfield that Liverpool senior officers on duty outside the ground, The deteriorating situation outside was At this point, Exit Gate C was opened to most densely packed area of the terrace. area between the goal line and the fence, supporters had forced open the exit gate initially rejected a suggestion to open an exasperated by a radio fault that hindered eject a man and a few fans spilled through. As a result, by 3pm well over 3,000 many trying desperately to free those and caused a rush into the stadium, down exit gate by the turnstiles to ease the communication between officers near The gate was successfully closed, but fans were struggling to breathe in the being crushed. Police officers were the tunnel and into the pens. congestion. In a radio discussion with Chief the turnstile and those in the police control Marshall radioed through his request two central pens, areas with a combined ordered to the pitch to quell a presumed Ninety-six people lost their lives in Superintendent David Duckenfield, who box. At 2.47pm, the crush outside the again. This time, after a considerable pause, capacity of 2,000. Those who could began pitch invasion and the referee ordered the the crush, and 766 were injured. In his was in the police control room in the ground had become so serious — a Duckenfield gave the order to open the gate. climbing over the perimeter fence or players from the field. interim report, published in August 1989, southwest corner of the ground situation that Marshall later described as Without signs directing fans towards escaping through a gate at the front of At around 3.15pm, Graham Kelly, chief Justice Peter Taylor cited the official (overlooking the terrace at the Leppings “unprecedented” — that Marshall the emptier sections of terrace either side, Pen 3 that had sprung open under the executive of , and cause of the Hillsborough Disaster as a Lane end), it was agreed that the kick-off requested that Exit Gate C be opened to or police officers closing off access to the etty force of the crowd. At first, police officers Graham Mackrell, secretary of Sheffield failure of police control. x | g re

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