Soulboy

I am being a trifle hypocritical when it comes to Donkey Jackets- A lot of my early match going was funded by a milk round- managed to chore an old one with Unigate plastered stylishly all across its back- I only ever wore it in the pub after the round cause it made me look older than my tender years and marginally more likely to get served alcohol. Donkey bleeding Jackets. I've seen more class in a Pollards Hill launderette

Does anyone remember any coats associated with casuals? The ski jackets came slighty later, but if memory serves me even on the coldest day we only wore jumpers with roll necks underneath- maybe Burberry fly-macs but they weren't exactly warm. We must have been either Geordie or just plain stupid

I've always been a bit of a clothes nut, and to this day love getting dressed up for football. During my time going I've seen a multitude of fashions on display, here's some that spring to mind. Scarves- I loved the silk ones that faded purple , one of which I plucked out of my mums loft a while back- used to look the nuts worn with a crombie. Unfortunately mine recently bit the dust- too much beer spilt over it, handwashed the thing but it now longer has the rampant lions visible. Late 70s the chunky cardigans were popular, often combined with a pin badge and either a Londsdale sweatshirt or similar with Chelsea London replacing the Londdale motif. Green Flight Jackets- were everywhere in the pre- casual era, as were fiorucci jeans, and the Bermondsey bank robber haircuts- short side parting. Casual- wildly popular from about 81 to 84. Deerstalker hats, Stan Smiths or Diadoras, Louis jeans, tracksuits take your pick from Tachini, Ellesse, or my personal fave the Fila BJ- Arsenal fans, who I think we're slightly more casual mad than us went for the red ones. I don't ever remember wearing a coat back then. It would be jumpers if it was cold- slazenger was probably the first and not too prestigious, followed by Pringle, Lyle and Scott, Lacoste, Sangan, Robe de Cappa etc. After casual it got a bit Chippie, Chevignon etc, then a bit ravey- lots of lads with ponytails and dungarees, then were I to the nineties where Ill end my take on it. The best for me would be casual- I didn't hear the word casual till about 82- we were soul boys which was pretty much the same thing. The worse would be donkey jackets. Stand in the shed circa 78 and you'd see a multitude of them, with things like Express Dairy or London Borough of Kingston on their backs. Any memories?

Looks like they've nicked their shorts from the Harlem Globetrotters- not that Terry Venables often gets mistaken for Meadowlark Lemmon

Newspaper coverage. If a player signs a new contract, they'll have a headline proclaiming- Hazard has committed himself to Chelsea until 2019 for instance. Next year that have another headline saying he might be off to PSG. Hold up you can't have 2 headlines that contradict each other. Players being interviewed. It's all PR trained, no one ever says anything worth listening to...we're all giving it 110 per cent, chewing gum for the ears bollox.- why anyone even bothers trying to interview Wayne, head like potato, Rooney is beyond me. He's got complete contempt for for the bloke with the mike and the fans. Gerrard when he's being interviewed with that whining voice. In fact any having to listen to any scouse footballers being interviewed is like having your teeth pulled out. Goal celebrations when the scorers stand there with their mouths wide open like they're about to catch flies. JT, bless his heart, was an early proponent of this. Have a look at your average Sunday football photos in the papers and see how many players do this. Bit like big gob Andy Murray does when he wins an important point. I see his Mum on strictlys also got an enormous mouth. You'd get your b....cks the lot in there!

Remember that Barnsley game. They had an open air karzi I remember- even by standards of the day is was horrible. Reckon that was Nov 82. Went up there on my 17th Birthday, wearing me new diamond pringle Id picked up from a golf shop in South Croydon. Happy days indeed

Re the team photos and others I've seen, I assume they took team photos not just at the start of the season as is the case in recent years. Theyres no leaves on the trees in that shot, and not a lot of grass on the training pitch either

PS the funniest thing I ever saw I ever saw at football involved a female spectator. It was Boxing Day, Millwall v Oxford. Me and half a dozen mates were in the main stand, complimentary tickets, to watch our mate play for Oxford. One of ours starts digging out the Oxford centre half- MOODY. YOUR FAT AND SLOW. YOU'VE HAD TOO MUCH XMAS PUDDING. With that this head spun round about 6 seats in front us- Excuse me she said. That's my husband your talking about and he hasn't had any Xmas pudding. Me mate thought about it for a few seconds before remarking- what you mean he's that crap without Xmas pudding? All was said with smiles on faces, no offence taken, and boy did we laugh

Going back to the a u abundance of females that now go to football and the inevitable knock on effect to atmosphere, here's a few thoughts; Why don't clubs restrict the amount of birds allowed in to games? A bit like when you'd be trying to get into a nightclub, and the bouncer would say- Not tonight lads. We've got too many blokes in etc Surely the same should apply with the fairer sex and admittance to SB- Sorry girls, I know you've got tickets but I can't let you in cause theyres too many birds in. Better luck next week etc. Im sure they'd understand. Another option might be to house all the women fans together, lets say at the very top of the East Stand. What would be a fair allocation? 100 seats maybe- make that fifty. No need for matchday programmes. They'd all be up there reading Hello magazine, and offering tactical insights such as COOOOR! LOOK AT THE THIGHS ON HIM. Like all football fans they'd run the risk of falling foul of the steward Gestapo. Unlike us blokes however, they could always blame an outburst of foul abuse aimed at the opposition or the ref on their monthly cycle- and probably get away with it. ONLY KIDDING GIRLS. We love you really x

In my view it used to be much more fun. Success does not equal happiness. Success if your a Chelsea fan means having to compete for seats with glory hunters from across the globe. Laughter seems to be in short supply at football these days; everyone's so bleeding serious- and as for atmosphere the old arguement used to be that you can watch the game on telly but you don't get the atmosphere you'd experience by going- well that doesn't apply anymore. Not only is there more singing and banter in a lot of pubs compared to the Bridge these days, sometimes SB would come second to a funeral parlour on the decibels count. There's too many yuppies, too many foreigners, too many corporate w.nkers, and dare I say it , too many women. I've nothing against the contradictory gender, however we don't go to bingo or tuppleware parties, and they shouldn't go to football. With the exception of Cath that is, and she's never been a proper bird anyway. Bah Humbug

I guess like most people on this forum Im marching on a bit, and if there's one thing us old sods enjoy doing its having a good old moan. Here's what gets me all Victor Meldrew 1- Goal Celebrations; Pointing your forefingers skywards after hitting the onion sack, originally no doubt to honour a deceased family member, now every c...s at it. Power slides onto the knees. They wouldn't try that at Figgs Marsh. A mate of mine did, got dog turd in a cut and was off work for a month 2-TV coverage. Why do the cameras always show you the managers jumping up and down throwing their arms around? I don't give a monkeys what the bench is doing, they could be kicking sh.t out the dugout or kissing the third official, football fans are interested in the football. That's it. 3- Whenever you win anything, all that moronic jumping up and down on the spot the players indulge in- similar to goal celebrations, real braindead stuff- no originality or individuality, plus if you win enough things it will probably shag your calf muscles up 4- Stewards. In the old days they served a purpose ie aiming kicks and punches at Leeds fans trying to scale the North Stand fence, now they've f..k all better to do than hang around the khazis hoping to catch someone lighting up and grassing people for swearing. Load of coppers narks if you ask me 5-Roy Keane. Have I missed anything?

Talking of Chubby, there's a photo of him in last Saturdays Daily Mail- group picture of a load of skinheads, he's the one at the front with the white T-shirt if anyone's got the IT savvy to upload it. Nice bloke as I remember, even if the FFC on his knuckles could be a bit confusing. RIP

Clever man old uncle Ken- one of the few chairman of that era to make money out of football; wouldn't trust him with 50p to go out to buy a newspaper myself. Before he came to us riding on a white horse, he was a serial scammer and comparity speaking a financial small fry. Even though we were in financial lumber when he arrived, there was no way the banks were going to call in the debt- rotten bit of PR for them more than anything. I didn't like the way he immediately upped admission prices, giving it were only a mile and a half from Harrods bit- but that didn't justify us having to she'll out more than anyone else London; not forgetting that the football was that bad back then half the time they should have been paying us to watch it. He wanted every penny connected with the club- got rid of the hot dog stalls outside, and kyboshed the unofficial merchandise shops- I never spent a single penny in the official club shop afterwards as a reaction to this- talking of hot dogs when we played West Ham one year I saw a stall get turned over. One bloke grabbed a bag of buns whilst his mate stuck his hand in boiling brine to nick a rake of hot dogs, and off to Fulham Broadway they run. F..k me they must have been desperate! I wrote a letter to old Greybeard and got one back. It was mostly about the new Shed- what you done to us Ken? It's too small, it's a QPR end etc. He replied with sorry you don't like the new stand, it's all your going to get. Not that he was l bad. He used to generally stick up for Chelsea fans when we misbehaved, or down play it at least. The night game at Pompey when the seats got ripped up he reckons was the work of only half a dozen blokes. Well they must have been busy because I was in the enclosure underneath and it was raining seats for ages. My brother in law won't hear a bad word about him- he wrote blue day, got in touch with fellow Chelsea fan Suggs, and they turned up at the bridge and auditioned it for him, and they've been mates ever since. So that's Batesey. Not all bad, but not all good either

Where was that grafitti CB? Talking of which just remembered you used to see a lot of HAIR BEAR CFC stuff daubed on walls round Tooting in the 70s. Ps Dyou still get over Carshalton Athletic? My mate Masseys manager there; keep meaning to nip over- Id best not hang around because theyres stuff in the fridge with a longer shelf life than their managers

Typical knuckle dragging northerner- the bloke behind hims auditioning for all creatures great and small

The notth stand is alive and well. You just can't argue with that. Got to say I do miss the old grafitti. Call me old fashioned but Finnestone walks on water is streets ahead of that tagging s.hite.

Along similar lines, are there any sheds near SB where you can lock up space hoppers. I travel from Raynes Park, would love to bounce my way in on match days, but don't know where to stick it. I suppose once I've arrived I could always deflate it and stick it under the seat during the game, but I'd be too lazy to blow it up again after. Any suggestions?

What's happening with BBC television centre in Shepherds Bush, which we were rumoured to be taking an interest in? Trouble is any stadium design would have to incorporate the Blue Peter garden

Or do a swap with with West Brompton boneyard next door. Dig up all the stiffs, re- bury them at SB, and we build a new stadium on their land 50 yards away. Ps you may or may not know that that graveyard is a favourite destination for the, Earls Court cruising community shall we say. Go to the top of the East Stand during night games, and look out that long window, and you can see them going at it on top of the tombstones. Nice

Here's a way to fit more people in Stamford Bridge. Everyone only thinks of housing fans to the side of the pitch ie the stands. Why not utilise the space above the pitch- what you do is have a system of suspended wires, lets say 40 yards up. Hanging upside down from these wires are Chelsea fans, packed shoulder to shoulder, like a load of bats, looking down on the match below. They might find it a pain in the arse getting a beer at half time, and the blood will no doubt rush to their head after 90 minutes of being suspended upside down, but if it means we can squeeze a few more thousand in its a price worth paying

Don't recognise the fella next to Bonetti but he's got really long arms on him. Have a look at the state of those footballs- must have been like heading Robbie Coltrane in a Volkswagon Beetle!

I reckon that platform wasn't built so the OB could keep an eye on the shed; they probably lobbied for it so they could get a better view of the game. My mates Dad used to do Police duty in the shed and he loved it. Money for old rope. Back then I also knew a copper- mate of me Dads, who regularly played for Battersea Ironsides whilst ON DUTY! Nice work if you can get it. Ps what exactly was the point of Police in the shed? Other than the very occasional one on one Chelsea v Chelsea fight, West Ham and Arsenal in the old days, there was nothing to police. Unless you consider knees up mother brown brown a breach of the peace

Just read that the Sweeney and Minder were filmed in Hammersmith- apparantly they didn't want to go traipsing all the way London for outside shots so stayed fairly local- Fulham, Battersea, Shepherds Bush etc. - all Chelsea areas. Might explain why you see so much of our grafitti

Nitro- what do people call you for short? Don't know u well enough to call you N yet don't want to call you a Nit either! Going back to that green grafitti that got up your nostrils, it's a well known fact that were oh 3 good green things to come out the 70s- metallic green fords, especially the Capri, Coleen Nolan.... Coooor! and Green Shield Stamps- it's true to say none of this lot lasted too well. All those green Fords rusted to sh.t in no time, Green Shield Stamps are as dead as disco, and Coleen Nolans as fat as a pig. Sorry to paint a gloomy picture. Ps how many Green Shield Stamps did Alan Mayes cost?

I was watching a repeat of the Sweeney the other night, and noticed a whopping great CFC Shed bit of grafitti sprayed on a wall on some dodgy council estate. Has anyone got any recollections of memorable football grafitti, and has any of it survived I wonder? I personally think the epicentre used to be by the gasworks where the away coaches used to park up- Bagleys Lane, Imperial Rd, Imperial Square etc- talking of Imperial Square when my old man used to watch us in the fifties, he used to cycle from Wandsworth and stick his bike in one of those cottages for safe keeping; an old girl used to charge him tuppence or something similar. Back on track, all those walls around there used be smothered back in the day. The ones that stick in the mind were the ubiquitous Eddie Macs Blue and White Army, and Manchester W... W... W. k In an alleyway in Kingston for donkeys years stood Shed kick to kill. That big church which is now gone on the Merton Road in Southfields had a Jesus Saves poster outside, to which someone sprayed- but Wilkins nets the rebound. Ickys Semi Men by the railway bridge( think we all remember that) The Blue Peter garden when it got vandalised and someone sprayed CFC on the wall. The best ones I think were the ones hand painted in white emulsion, which begs the question to anyone who indulged in a spot of this a) Didn't you used to look a teeny bit suspect eying up a wall with a paint pot and brush in hand? b) Did you have the foresight to take thinners with you to clean the brush after, or did you buy a new brush every time?