ISSUE 5 SEASON 2015/16 WEST BROMWICH ALBION LONDON SUPPOERTERs CLUB Baggie Shorts CONTENTS FROM THE EDITORS From the editorial board, Dick creative players is not a matter Garlick tells it like it is.... of dispute. However it made galling reading to see our Travelling to West Ham I reputation as a footballing team 03 10 bumped into a particularly withering away. Match Report: Sunder- dour Albion fan who told me From the Editors land by Toby Grainger he always looked forward to Younger generations won’t the games. He added that he remember the Astle or Cunning- 04 12 would rather be in our place ham days let alone the Team of than where the Villa are. It’s the Century. They won’t recall Match Report: Aston Villa My Boy Tchoyi difficult to disagree with that but the awful eighties and nineties by Paul Monney is it that binary? and think that Boing Boing refers to our bouncing from the Albion fans have pride in know- Premier League to the Cham- 06 15 ing that the club’s heritage is pionship and back. Now our widely acknowledged. Opposi- reputation is that of a team that Quizball: Quiz question Celebrating Laurie Cun- tion supporters regularly men- parks the bus, plays long ball update ningham tion Jeff Astle and 1968 and the with a manager that will keep team of 1978-79 which, for just us up. Palace and particular- a few short weeks, was probably ly Leicester show that smaller 08 16 the best team in the world. clubs can punch well above their respective weights, excite, London Baggie, Nick Match Report: Arsenal by Grant, reflects upon a life Anoushka Probyn In December we played well and command respect by play- in football and drumming against Spurs. An unusually ing entertaining football. Albion good match report in a Sunday must reflect their heritage to broadsheet described Spurs’ regain the football community’s long ball goal exploiting a respect and more importantly defensive mixup as a “kind of our love for the club. goal often associated with West Brom” and Albion’s equaliser Oh! and good riddance to that as “a Spurs type of goal”. That awful away supporters section at Spurs have tradition of play- the Boleyn. ing good football with great 2 3 MATCH REPORT ASTON VILLA 0 – 1 WEST BROM Paul Monney Reports: Rondon, who along with Fletch- There wasn’t a lot of optimism er and McLean put in his best amongst the London Baggies Albion performance to date, heading to Birmingham for the almost opened the scoring in most recent Villa derby. Perhaps the first minute with a powerful it was due to the last season’s header from a Chris Brunt cross. week from hell suffered at Villa Fletcher swerved a shot that possession and it felt as though Jonny Evans who was constantly Park but there was also a lot of was narrowly turned around the we could have held the lead directing his teammates and talk of the negative anti-football post. There were near misses all day if we had to. Villa were was never shy to let them know being served up in the new sea- from a number of set pieces unbelievably lightweight in mid- if they weren’t doing what was son - you can’t argue with the that had Villa constantly under field - our trio of Fletcher, Mor- expected of them. results (by the end of the day we the hammer and we had energy rison and Yacob won’t have an will not have conceded a goal and width that we hadn’t seen easier afternoon all season. We So in the glorious sunshine we in any of our three away games for a long time. Then in the 39th continued to look the most like- celebrated just our 2nd win at and kept a clean sheet in four of minute McLean tackled aggres- ly to score and several times we Villa in the last 36 years. Tony our first six league games) but sively to win the ball, crossed to broke with pace and purpose and his squad came over to cel- neither could you argue that it Rondon who (with his back to that, again, had been missing in ebrate with us and it was nice to was much fun to watch. goal) laid it off for Morrison to our previous games. see Saido so happy with his con- shoot. Guzan had it covered but tribution. He was well-supported How refreshing, then, to see our up popped Berahino to deli- Myhill didn’t have a difficult save throughout the game, celebrat- boys straight at Villa from the cately redirect it in. Thankfully to make all day although we ed his goal with some boinging opening whistle and dominating Undercover Agent Lescott had persist in giving away unneces- in front of the home fans and from the front foot for the entire dropped back toward the goal sary fouls around the penalty was mobbed by his teammates first half. TP would say after the line to play him onside - 1-0 box - the only chances they after the whistle, having sent his game that the players were des- Albion. ‘created’. They look like they’ve shirt into the singing away fans – perate to do it for the fans they wasted their transfer income almost all is forgiven. had let down the previous sea- Inevitably we retreated into our and our defence comfortably son - it certainly felt like it with shells a bit in the second half dealt with the misguided tac- A day to remember - more of our boys being first to every ball and invited pressure onto us. tic of lumping it into our box this, please! and simply looking better all Villa didn’t have the quality to in the air. Special mention to over the park. do anything with their increased 4 5 In our feedback on the quiz in the phrase of ‘Route One’ to a the third edition last season we big striker. The final was won overextended ourselves and left at around the time of our three our comfort zone when elab- (yes, three!) FA cup sixth round QUIZBALL: orating on the Quiz Ball ques- matches with Liverpool. tion. So, basically we could not manage a quiz question about When we defended the Quiz a quiz. Luckily, London Baggie Ball cup the following year, Ray Keith Hallam came to the res- Wilson had replaced Doug quiz cue. Fraser in the quiz team; I know it was the season we defended The BBC quiz that ran from 1966 the FA cup that Ray replaced to 1972 gave us our second Graham Williams in the first most recent top tier trophy. It eleven. The club captain being was hosted by referee David out of the team resulted in a fly- question Vine and later, err, Stuart Hall. ing left wing performance from We appeared in the first series Graham Williams (only one sub when our celebrity fan was the in those days), so when Astle legend that was Percy Throw- was injured at home to Arsenal er. Keith tells us that the West Graham, ‘Willie’ was on as ‘the Bromwich team that won Quiz sub’ to play on the left wing, Asa update Ball, in the Spring of 1968, was: Hartford moved from left wing Manager, Alan Ashman; star to midfield, and Lyndon Hughes player (‘route four please’) John (a big midfielder) went up front Aidan Rose (our resident Quiz Maestro), Osborne; Doug Fraser; and to play centre forward. Still won Moto Cross World Champion, 1-0, a late Tony Brown rocket, with the indispensable assistance of Keith Geoff Smith. direct from a free kick. Hallam, gives us the definitive low down on Albion and Quiz Ball “John specialised in choosing Back to Quiz Ball - the following the four easy questions to goal, year there was a bit of a fiddle, which saw him get three correct, to stop John Osborne, the third and force the opposition in to a of the ‘route four’ questions was tackle question. A tackle ques- always harder than a normal tion was hard, I believe 50/50. rout four question. We lost to The only harder question was the eventual winners, Celtic, in ‘route one’, which was very hard, the semi-final. Celtic went on but allowed no tackle by the to hold the trophy the following defending team, and gave us year.” 6 7 on TV, never dreaming that one rooms after hours I developed BEATING TIME day I would end up living right the skills and confidence to play beside Wembley stadium. I was gigs with mates. Have done plen- London Baggie, Nick Grant, reflects actually in hospital on that fa- ty of birthday, wedding, even upon a life in football and drumming mous night when we stuffed Man retirement dos. U 6-3 at home. Cursed to high My now 88 year-old mother We played in the red shirts worn heaven when I saw the result on In retirement now I have finally recalled recently that I played a by England in the previous year’s the single small ward black ‘n had time to devote to getting an small snare drum in my prima- World Cup final – so they told white telly, so wishing I’d been album out with my band Public ry school Xmas play. That must us, but I found that very hard to on the terraces. Sector. We are hoping it will be have been around 1959 aged 8! believe! done by Xmas! That’s Xmas 2015 By 1969 I had also wrecked the !!! As a teenager I beat out rhythms I had also been going to Albion ligaments in my left knee, iron- on an old suitcase in my Kings matches since 1957.