Come On You Wands!

Once upon a time, when I was a young boy, if the Wands were drawn to play an Isthmian League club in one of the various cup competitions, it brought an air of anticipated excitement to our supporters, players and club officials. In fact, it brought a sense of awe to everyone associated with our club. At the time, it has been said, Cray Wanderers were punching above their weight in the Metropolitan League and were competing alongside such teams as Arsenal, West Ham and Tottenham Hotspur XIs, which included former first-teamers and soon-to-be stars alike. Players like Clyde Best and Peter Grotier, who were to know some fame with the Hammers in the Football League during the 1970s, plus former Spurs double-winning player and England cap Ron Henry, graced the Grassmeade pitch, such was the standard of that league. Yet the very mention of an Isthmian League side arriving for a cup match for Cray to take on was an absolute thrill in itself. Teams like Barking, Leytonstone and St Alban's ...

We should all by now know about the date that the Football Association was formed in England. We should all by now know what date the F A Cup was first introduced. And we should all by now know when the English Football League was first formed. I have written about all three of these events but now I am writing about the football club that time forgot; about one of the football clubs that were turned down for admittance to the Football League back in 1888. If you are thinking here about Nottingham Forest, Darwen or Newton Heath then you would be wrong. Yes, each of those clubs was turned down for the inaugural season of the Football League, but there were two other prominent sides at the time that were rejected... and it all stemmed from the fact that the organisers didn't want to risk a fixtures clog up, even though the accepted clubs totalled just twelve. This post is about one of those other two clubs; I will hopefully write about the other unfortunately rejected club in due cou...

Quite recently, I was reading an article written by Jerry Dowlen in which he highlighted the strange pronunciation of a place quite near to where I live. The article was printed in Issue 3 of 'The Jocelyn Brooke Journal', a newsletter-style booklet created and published by Phil Babbs every quarter about the author Jocelyn Brooke.  The place in question that Jerry mentions is Elham. I can agree with Jerry's recollection for Elham being pronounced as Eel-ham, as it is still said this way today, and his article did get me thinking. There are many towns and villages throughout the UK where the spelling does not match the pronunciation. We have a fair few of them here in Kent. In fact, including Elham, I have rounded up thirty such places, all of which I have listed below with their actual spelling and how they are commonly pronounced. The hyphens within the words are included to break up the syllables of each name. They are not listed in alphabetical order, as I think that woul...

It seems that it is not just the loss of interest in Cray Wanderers' history by the club's present and recent influx of new supporters since moving into Flamingo Park that has come to the fore. I watch a programme on the U & Yesterday cable TV channel called 'Bangers and Cash', in which a family-run vintage cars auction house set in Yorkshire is followed each week by the channel's camera crew. I have a keenness for old cars, hence why I watch this programme. So, what has that TV programme got to do with Cray Wanderers' supporters? Well, here's the thing. There are similarities between the latest crop of Wands supporters and those potential buyers of pre-World War II vehicles, insomuch as neither group now want to know about 'the old days'. Mathewsons, the auction house in the TV series, have noticed a huge drop-off in would-be bidders on the much older vehicles, in much the same way that the older and much longer-in-the-tooth of us Wands supporte...

I have now lived here at the seaside in Kent for 40 years, give or take a month or two. I first came to Folkestone in 1986, primarily for work purposes and, I never really left even though I took early retirement from my salaried job in 2009. But there's always been one set of residents in this town that I have never been able to get on with. Seagulls. Yes, you are correct in assuming that they are part and parcel of living on the coast and yes, they were here long before me or my cars were. I learnt pretty much early on in my adopted town that, you do not eat while out in the open, nor do you wash and wax your car while the shitehawks are gathered on nearby rooftops and are watching your every move and poised to attack. Seagulls are vermin, the scavenging rats of the sky. They will swoop down without a moment's grace and pinch your sausage or chips from the very bag or newspaper that you are eating them from. They repaint your car, caravan or transit van a shade of mixed white...

Yes, I know that this topic is going to court criticism from the righteously-led sex equalities brigade but, it is an argument that is never, ever now going to go away. It is also a point of view from someone (namely me) who was brought up during the time of the 50 years' ban on women's football in the UK when only men and boys were officially permitted to play the game. I also believe that this article will fully explain the reasoning behind my logic that 'it is still okay to say Man of the Match'. As many of us now know and, if we didn't know before, we keep getting reminded about it here in the 21st century, women's football was officially banned by the Football Association between the years of 1921 and 1971. During that period, only men played the senior game, while boys and girls were not permitted to 'mix' to play the sport in schools. Eventually, but not until 1971, the Football Association released the women's version of the game from its lo...

It happens throughout football. Men's, women's, grassroots and everywhere in the football pyramids. Also in England, Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, Europe, South America, Asia, wherever football is played. Referees still seem to have this fixation about producing yellow cards when goalkeepers take a goal kick or even outfield players take a free kick and they dawdle about while doing so. But, why do referees still do that? Added time of several minutes on the end of both halves of each match was introduced to the game to take into account players getting injured and attended to on the pitch by the 'sponge men and ladies', substitutions and... to counteract time-wasting . So it does seem to be a double-whammy when the referees not only add on 6, 8 or even 10 minutes at the end of each half to include time-wasting but then penalise the offending players by brandishing a yellow card. Anybody would think that referees are on a 'bonus' by seeing how many times du...

On every listing and every posting page on this site you will now find this icon (pictured left) in the top right corner. But, what does it actually mean? Well, put simply, it is an icon that represents 'sharing' and you can click on it if you wish to share the article on social media (and I hope that you do!). For reasons I have given on the FAQ page, I don't 'do' social media but, I know that a lot of the visitors to this website do. It will only take you a few seconds to click on the icon and, either grab the URL of the article you are reading or, just click on each link in turn and be transported to the login page for Facebook, X, Pinterest or even email your pals. I don't expect every post to be shared but I would like to think that you would kindly share the links to the posts that you have read that interest you the most. This, I believe, is a much quicker way than copying the link in the browser address bar, going to the chosen social media site, logging...

Here's a fictional scenario. You have just moved to a new area and you are a football lover. You are suddenly 'a stranger in these parts' and, after researching how the land lies around your new home, you find that you have three different football clubs to choose from in the immediate vicinity. They are all within easy travelling distance of your new home if you drive to them . Let us assume that your adopted town or village is near somewhere like a fictitious place called Sidcup. Now let us assume that each of the three imaginary clubs that are almost on your doorstep are called Cray Valley Paper Mills, Chislehurst Glebe and Cray Wanderers. Let us further assume that, you do not like the idea of driving your car to football matches because (a) you don't like the idea of the paintwork getting 'door-banged' in the car park and (b) you like a bit of a tipple in the bar after the game, win or lose. You continue with your research and find that (a) the oldest of th...

The Kevin Costner film, Field of Dreams , is probably one of the most unique and iconic works to cover the sport of baseball. It features a story about a farmer in Iowa who cuts down his crop of sweetcorn cobs in order to build a baseball diamond, complete with floodlights - the field of dreams in the title - after he hears a voice whispering "build it and he will come" to him.  The film continues with the arrival of the ghost of "Shoeless" Joe Jackson (Ray Liotta) , a disgraced Chicago White Sox player who, along with seven other White Sox players, was involved in the 'throwing' (deliberately losing) of the 1919 World Series. The film pans out when Jackson brings along the spirits of the other seven disgraced players plus a rookie player called Doc Archie 'Moonlight' Graham (played by Burt Lancaster as the older figure) after Costner's character, Ray Kinsella, talks Terence Mann (James Earl Jones) into a cross-USA road trip in an old VW Kombi...

An online petition has been raised by Talia Wilson , Hospitality Officer at Cray Wanderers FC, for the purpose of bringing a much better public transport system for supporters to attend Flamingo Park in Chislehurst, the club's permanent new home. But, it is not just the Wands' men's team who play there. The club has numerous junior teams, consisting of both boys and girls, as well as a senior ladies' team. In addition to all those teams, Flamingo Park is also a hub for community groups and families to use the excellent facilities. It is an oasis, if you like, in a desert of busy roads and far away bus stops and train stations. Yet, how can supporters and users of the facilities on offer get to the place if they have no transport of their own, when the nearest bus stop is 20 or 30 minutes away from the ground and the nearest railway station is even further away? And those anomalies don't even take into account the elderly supporters of our football club, nor of disab...

Based on the overall stats for this blog site since I started it a few months ago, it would appear that many visitors do not go beyond the front page. I don't mean that they suddenly surf away as soon as they land on coyw.co.uk , far from it, because the stats clearly show that visitors stay around long enough to read the articles (or posts, if you prefer) that I have posted. And, new visitors arrive all the time, from around the world. That's very encouraging news and it is positive to know that visitors enjoy reading my mixed blend of topics that range from Cray Wanderers FC to Football In General and Daily Life to Everything Else. Basically, if there's anything to write about, the chances are I'll end up researching and scribbling away. I often add something new to the site, perhaps not every day but, whenever my carer duties allow. But, the front page of listed articles on this site is not the only page to explore. I have recently added a new section entitled 'F...

My wife is sometimes a little bit fascinated by the fact that when an old musical film is shown on one of the cable TV channels, or questions about musical films crop up on TV quiz shows, just how much I know about them. Sometimes I even surprise myself with such knowledge. Many of you reading this posting will either be too young or even maybe your parents were not even born when a radio show called 'Movie-Go-Round' aired on the BBC. I don't mean that unkindly, because I am talking about the early 1960s, although that's when I started listening to it. Not out of choice, mind. Back in the 1960s, we listened to the radio a lot and, I mean a lot . Daytime TV was a long way off from blighting our lives and my parents, like most parents of the time, spent most of each day in the kitchen. Which meant the radio was on all the time. 'Movie-Go-Round' had two or three presenters in its time and ran from 1956 to 1969. Back in those days, before the restructure of BBC Radi...

Every year, around November or December time, I always look out for a sealed envelope dropping onto our front door mat from the Cabinet Office. Known as a 'sounding letter', the contents of that sealed envelope contain a notification of an award or title in the New Year's Honours List, and the recipient's agreement to accept the honour that is to be bestowed upon him or her. Either acceptance or rejection carries with it the proviso that the details of the list must remain confidential and not revealed until after the official announcement around the end of December. A sort of 'Official Secrets Act' order. Considering why some people have been awarded a knighthood, damehood, CBE, OBE or an MBE over the years, I like to think that I have done more than enough in my seven decades of life on this planet to equal or better some of the awarded efforts of those lucky enough to have been picked, proposed and seconded in the first place. Not everyone, mind, just a few. ...

It is with deep sadness that I have to report the passing of my old friend Doug Alexander. I received the sad news via email on Christmas Eve from Doug's grandson, James. I first met Doug way back in the summer of 1972 when Cray were still playing at Grassmeade. Doug was a member of the 279 Chislehurst football club that was swallowed up by a merger with Cray Wanderers. He arrived on the scene just as the Wands were trying to rebuild the team after the mass walkout of the club's previous players and manager earlier in 1972. John Biddle became manager and Doug became a voluntary behind-the-scenes helper. I last met and spoke with Doug and his daughter Jane at the Aveley game in 2009, when Cray had just been promoted to the Isthmian League Premier Division for the first time. We chatted about old times of the 1970s at Oxford Road. Among other things, Doug used to drive Cray's old Bedford coach to away games and, he was a barman in the clubhouse at Grassmeade while we were sti...