Whatever Happened to Our Working Class Ballet?

OLAS 434 MARCH 1st 2008

Don’t even think about it. It’s not big and it’s not clever. So if any of you were planning to dress as a big tub of lard in a blue shirt with “Frank” on the back today, just put it away and forget it because...

“It is illegal to impersonate a Chelsea Pensioner”

Apparently, in the 19th century it was a capital offence.

Seeing as we’re welcoming the Chelsea pensioners to Upton Park today and knowing what the law says about them I thought I ought to check up some other bizarre laws. You’ll be surprised how many of them relate to coppers. For instance: a pregnant woman can legally relieve herself anywhere she wants – even, if she so requests, in a policeman’s helmet, while 
in France, it is forbidden to call a pig Napoleon. In Kingsville, Texas, USA, it is against the law for pigs to have sex on airport property. And pigs may fly before anyone gets round to sorting out that strange bit of legislation.

But my favourite bizarre law comes from Zion, Illinois, USA, where it is still illegal to offer cigars to your pets. (My cats prefer a pint and a packet of nuts, as it happens). I don’t know whether out in Illinois they have any of those institutions like we have here, where beagles are mistreated, but you could imagine the conversation, couldn’t you?
American: “Now, howdy there doggy, can I git you anything to put in you mouth?”
Beagle: “No thanks, buddy, I’ve got another 50 fags to smoke this morning. Woof.”
American: “Have you ever tried smoking a nice big cigaaaah?”
Beagle: “Hey buddy, have you ever tried hangin’ out in a state penitentiary?”

So the Chelsea Flower Show is here today. Who’s going to come up smelling of roses and who’s going to end up in the Eartha Kitt? The Universal Laws of West Ham Attitude point to a close contest. We play absolute shite against teams who are absolute shite (of which Wigan and Birmingham are only the end of a long string of examples) but raise our game against top class opponents, as Manure and the Arse discovered at home and away last year, and as Manure and Liverpool have both found to their cost at what can hardly be called “Fortress Upton Park” this year. You cannot mess with the Universal Laws of West Ham Attitude.

We don’t seem to beat Chelsea that often so I hope you won’t mind if I indulge in a bit of nostalgia from the season we all want to forget. And in case you’ve forgotten, that was 2002-3, when we managed to take a set of outstanding players into the fizzy pop league and sell them off one by one until we had almost no one left.

There weren’t too many highlights that year but the games against Chelsea stood out. I rarely get to away games, but that year I had two kids in the class that I was teaching at school whose dads were regulars at Chelsea. Which makes a sort of pleasant change from all the Gooners in Islington where I work. Anyway they kindly took me along as their guest to the first encounter at the end of September. They were laughing over drinks before the game and must have thought they were on to a winner. Chelsea were riding high and West Ham were propping up the table having gained just two points from their first 6 games.

You would never have guessed that we were the underdogs though. West Ham took the game to Chelsea from the kick-off, hardly even distracted by having to replace the injured Freddie Kanoute, very early on, with that eager beaver/mercenary bastard, Jermaine Defoe. Chelsea had their goalie to thank for keeping them in the game before they went ahead against the run of play with a penalty, given against one of our crappiest defenders ever, Scott Minto. Despite that setback, West Ham continued to dominate and Defoe had made it 1-1 before the break.

Three minutes after half time came a completely unforgettable moment. All the Chelsea faithful, the Queen and David Mellor among them no doubt, were still picking at their prawn sandwiches when West Ham won a throw-in about thirty yards out on the right touchline. It was directly in line with where I was sitting with my Chelsea hosts just a few rows back. Paulo di Canio received the ball from the throw, juggled it from one foot to the other and back again, and then unleashed an unstoppable dipping volley past Cudicini. Pandemonium along the West Ham side of the ground. Gasps of horror and “f*** me!” from the Chelsea fans. Deep-inner pandemonium for me sitting amongst a swathe of the blue tossers.

Being West Ham, we let Chelsea have another crack when Zola got a neat goal, but di Canio, the hero of the day, grabbed the points with a careful shot from an acute angle with 6 minutes to go. A well-deserved win at what is not usually one of our happy hunting grounds.

By the time Chelsea came for the return fixture, we had climbed all the way to 18th in the table, or like Groucho Marx once said: “I’ve worked my way up from nothing to absolute poverty.” Our manager Glenn Rodent was recovering in hospital from a brain operation/personality transplant or something like that, and our secret weapon was standing on the touch line in a dark suit – or should I say standin’? Because it was Trevor Brookin’ (who never knowin’ly lets his lips pronounce that final “g”, and why should he? I’m only askin’).

The odds against us catching the teams above and staying up were pretty steep. But, in his short spell as caretaker (or very smartly dressed caretaker) Trevor had instilled a bit of pride and belief into a battered team that had been failing miserably and turning against each other. Di Canio, the hero in the game at Chelsea, hadn’t played for two and half months. He had an almighty falling out with the Rodent (telling him that he didn’t know what he was doing – though one of the defences against slander is “telling the truth”). He had also had a niggling injury that had taken him out of the reckoning for a few games, but Trevor gave him some TLC and put him on the bench for the return fixture.

The normally careful, cautious and conservative Trevor had opted to play three up front – Kanoute, Defoe and, blimey, Les f****** Ferdinand! Chelsea needed the points as much as we did as they were chasing a champions League place. But it was one of those dramas where we all knew the script.

West Ham played out of their skins, with Trevor Sinclair in particular, playing an absolute blinder, but they just couldn’t apply that finishing touch. Chelsea were rattled, always second to the ball, but looked dangerous every time they did manage to come forward. Our defence which had been leaking goals like diarrhoea all season, dealt with them magnificently. Brookin’ knew he needed some new legs for the final third of the game. So he brings on Di Canio who scores the winner with twenty minutes to go. Di Canio rips off his shirt and throws it to the sky, heads for the corner flag and shakes his fists. Upton Park erupts in a way as only it can, and in a way that I’m sure that some boring, modern, generic 60,000 seater stadium, on an old Parcel Force site, never ever will.

You can all probably think of so many times when West Ham make you want to scream or cry in frustration, but that day there were real tears of emotion in the final moments, with the crowd singing “One Trveor Brookin’, there’s only one Trevor Brookin’…” – which is true as well as being appropriate. There may be at least two and a half Frankie Lampards, but knock me down with a feather, there is only one Clever Trevor. We were the only team to do the double over Chelsea that year – a great achievement though it wasn’t enough to keep us up with the Big Boys.

That day, our supersub included, we had 12 heroes out there. They battled and battled but also had the vision and creativity to carve out the chances – with stars like di Canio, Defoe, Sinclair running the show and with our outstanding captain with the dopey expression – Joe Cole – threading killer balls through the defence.

But creativity, the watchword at West Ham for decades, has been consigned to the dustbin of history by Alan Curbishley – who is perhaps the only man in the universe who can make Glenn Rodent seem to possess a happy-go-lucky, sparkling, personality in comparison.

No doubt, some people will turn round and say I don’t know my arse form my elbow, but am I not correct in thinking that we beat Fulham with a goal that bounced in off Nobby’s arse? Is that now the “West Ham way”?

Pure football – or “working class ballet”, as the legendary Alf Garnett described it - is dying at Upton Park. We’ve been thoroughly Charltonised and how much more of it can we stand? We should be over the moon that we’ve reached the safety mark of 40 points with 12 games to go, while half of our team have been starring in “Carry on Doctor” all year. We ought to be proud and excited that we have an outside chance of snatching a European place. The trouble is, that in order to make this “progress”, we’ve all but completely abandoned our football traditions. And to be honest I’d rather see us struggling for our premiership lives but playing football that excites my soul. Remember we used to sing, “Always believe in your soul, Joey Cole…” and we sung it for a reason.

The anarchist Emma Goldman didn’t play football as far as I know but she knew the importance of living a life to the full. She said quite rightly, “If I can’t dance it’s not my revolution.” Well, I’m not dancing to the Curbishley Revolution. I’m fast asleep. Wake me up when we stop playing the ball back and forth across the park or pumping a long hopeless ball to our one striker.

Curbishley is like the ultimate footballing contraceptive – 100% safe, not a drop of anything creative oozes out, and anything interesting that happens only seems to last a couple of minutes.

So, can our team of Charltonised sluggers who are boring us witless but have drearily crept up to 9th place, pull it off today? (no, I’m not still talking about contraceptives). We’ll see, but if we do or even if we don’t, let’s show a bit of sparkle, a bit of zest, a bit of flair and let it flow. Come on you Irons!!!