Back in 1980 or 81, a West Ham mate from Benfleet showed me a photo of SS squaring up to BG outside the White Hart pub before a Spuds v Spammers night game. Alas, he did'nt know what happened next!.
I went to school with a bloke who took a black friend down to the bridge (in the 70's) telling him he would be ok, and the first thing that happened to him when they got in there was a skinhead trying to give him a leaflet with save a job deport a w## on it!. My first game was in 82 and though I've no idea when it started it was still rife, so it sh#ts me when people who know better try and airbrush history. So what if there were a few black hooloigans around back then, the amount of people I personally saw doing monkey chants (and various other comments) at our own players let alone the opposition will never be forgotten by me,and anyone who was there and says it wasn't so is a LIAR!
I'm halfcaste and started going to Chelsea from the mid 70's and never really had any trouble, although I once was nearly handed a NF handout untill the skindhead looked didn't say anything and quickly took his hand back. I was in the middle of the shed on one occasion and saw a guy shouting out chop the black $astard and Kojak tapped him on the shoulder!! you should have seen the guys face went red as a beetroot and couldn't apologise as much!!! From what i kinda of saw it was part and parcel of the times as London was very rascist in the mid 70's, If you were let's say a slightly darker shade of white then going over to places like East london was almost a no no funny thing is you rarely ever sore one rascist skin head there was always half a mob of em that would want to beat the sh*t out of you!!
spot on mate, how quickly some people forget
Agreed I think it was more of a pack mentality that sometimes reared it's head, Most London and Northern clubs had their fair share of porblems in the 70's. Westham certainly had it's fair share,Everton and leeds also come to mind,Minorities always get it in the neck and i'm not just talking about colour of skin.Lest not forget the Irish copped it as well at one stage.Being halfcaste and young and seeing a Skinhead with tats on neck and face and big Doctor martins was very intimidating I can tell you,especially if you were out of you manor, and as mentioned you tended to see them 30 or 40 handed as well. Being brought up on the Dog kennel Hill Estate in South London, I never really experienced any problems, Mid 70's East london was the place which always had me on edge!!
Speaking only for myself I never said that it was everybody, and I certainly never suggested all the people that did it (and yes there were quite a few) were skinheads. As for how rife it was,I guess that's down to your interpretation of the word. I know what I saw and heard,and at that particular time I was going regularly to matches, so I stand by my earlier post.
Totally agree mike,We can discuss it as much as we want, Chelsea were at one stage fairly racist as were a lot of other clubs, and when I've mentioned skinheads well that was the time frame that I use to go IE 1973-1980 and as mentioned never had a problem myself but yes heard people scream things directed towards the pitch.DH and that to me were the original skins and have seen a clip somewhere of him bowling up to a reggae gig.not sure where or what time period the skinhead turned for the worse but have heard the NF lot were called boneheads by the original skinheads but only hearsay for me, I know we have gone right off topic here but as you no Skinheads were a very important part of working class England in the 70's and on as were the rudeboys and that ska era as well..
