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Cromer Blue

Forums New posts
Hawkwell Blue said:
That’s great, thank you. I managed to get Ray’s details via the club today too.
Click to expand...
I didn't know your brother but RH was telling me how the two of them had a stall in Southend High Street petioning for Friday night football at Roots Hall when we were first relegated in 65/6.Impressive.
 
Last edited:
Hawkwell Blue said:
It is with a heavy and broken heart that I have to tell you that my brother, Cromer Blue, passed away this morning after a short illness following a third cancer diagnosis.

He took me to my first home and away games, bought me my first half, aged about 14 in the Spread Eagle one Boxing Day, and we travelled all over following the Blues.

Although he moved around a lot his love for Southend never wavered. When he knew of his prognosis he intended to travel down to the Rochdale game but sadly was too ill to travel. He was able to watch it from his home surrounded by friends and family though. His last Blues game was the memorable home win v Chesterfield.

He was always so ridiculously positive about his beloved Blues.we could be 5-0 down in injury time and he’d believe we could snatch a draw. He wrote candidly in the latest AAS and writing was his passion and indeed his job. His various passwords normally included references to Billy Best.

Back in the day he would hitch hike to away games and he liked the fact he could see Roots Hall’s floodlights while at school at Southend High (he had the brains in our family!).

Against Grimsby in a pivotal promotion game at home in 1990. we had a corner just before half time. He uttered the immortal words “ a good time to score” and we did. This meant from then on almost every time we attacked he’d say the same. Don’t think it ever worked again.

He and I went to Fiorentina together, both trips to Wembley and the three Millennium Stadium visits. We were at Peterborough and Stockport and also the disappointment of Grimsby and Morecambe. He always had this amazing talent of bringing, let’s call them “different” people to away games. Living in Cambridge he had a ready supply so you’d be at Halifax and an Italian language student would wander in wearing a Blues’ scarf.

Last weekend I saw him for what we both knew would be the last time. My missus and sister were struggling for words as we left. He and I looked at each other and I said “Up the Blues” to which he replied “that’s all there is to say”.

He was my best mate and my hero.

RIP Graham.

Utbs!
Click to expand...
Sorry to hear this, hope you are doing alright Hawkwell Blue.
 
johnlattimerssponge said:
Cancer is such a cruel disease and I hope in time the happy memories you shared together will be more prominent in your mind than those of his suffering.

I am in true admiration that you can write such a well written post at such a difficult time.

RIP
Click to expand...
Absolutely this, perfectly put.
 
So sorry for your loss, Nick and we're honoured that Graham wanted to write for us during this time.

Here's Graham's article for AAS 88 - I hope it's OK with you that I post it here.

THE first matches I watched at Roots Hall were from the back bedroom of my grandparent’s house in Shakespeare Drive. My grandfather and father would go to the game while I was left with granny. I could only see the North Bank end, and about thirty yards of pitch. But it was enough.
I must have pestered my father who took me to my first game, in August 1960, a 2-1 home defeat to Walsall. The crowd was 10,970 on a Friday night. Such famous names as Harry Threadgold and Sandy Anderson were playing. I’ve been a diehard Shrimper ever since.
Over the decades I have been fortunate to have seen many of the memorable matches, at Cardiff and Wembley, Florence, Swansea, Peterborough (1990), Stockport (1987) and famous home games against Liverpool, Manchester United and Bristol City. Sadly I was at both Grimsby and Morecambe when we failed to win automatic promotion. Big regret? I couldn’t go to Bury.
But, if I reminisce with anybody who will listen (Ray Hems is favourite for this), it is some of the smaller games that I recall most vividly, such as the delight in watching Billy Best destroy Kings Lynn and Brentwood in successive rounds of the FA Cup; he scored eight goals in the two matches. And some away trips. In these, for example, Rochdale looms large.
In 1969 Brian Atherfold, Pete Hornsby and I decided it would be a good idea to leave the Christmas comforts of Southend on Boxing Day to hitchhike to Rochdale for the match on December 27th. Forgetting how cold it could be overnight, and how empty the roads were , we did eventually pitch up in Rochdale. We were just under the sign that says ‘Welcome to Rochdale – Home of the Co-operative Movement’ when an elderly northern gent, in traditional cap and muffler, told us the game was off. In pre-internet days, this was how you found out! Done hitchhiking, Brian paid for us to return home by train – I think I still owe him.
Thirty years later, and Southend are tumbling towards the Conference. We have just sacked Alvin Martin and have an away match at Rochdale. I managed to persuade an old friend Marcus to accompany me to see the Tuesday evening kick-off. There was a small cluster of Blues’ fans behind one goal while the rest of the ground was virtually empty. Marcus and I sat in a stand, totally alone, when a steward strode half way around the ground to tell me to take my feet of the (plastic) seat in front. I thought to tell him what I thought of this instruction but couldn’t bear to miss another Rochdale game. I wish I had. The Blues lost 1-0; we were hopeless. Relegation loomed. Happily the arrival of Alan Little, a 3-0 win on the Saturday at Orient (packed with Blues’ fans) and we survived. Scarborough were eventually relegated; we finished five or six points off the drop and one point behind Brighton!
I remember how cold I was hitchhiking to Rochdale but it was certainly matched in February 1990 when my brother Nick and I went to see us play at Hartlepool. In those days midweek away games were a long slog; the roads and cars were simply not as fast or as comfortable. We stood in a stand at the Victoria Ground (it’s now called something silly) with the cold wind from the North Sea blowing right across us. It was freezing.
The game ended 1-1, in front of 3,578. Ling scored for the Blues; David Crown was playing, as was Paul Sansome. The cold of that night was matched, no, trumped in 2009, by a visit to Stadium MK, with my daughter, to see the Johnstones Paints Second Round (Southern Section) match which we lost 2-0. We were very poor, the atmosphere in that stadium was bleak and the temperature was on an Arctic scale. My daughter and I left when we could no longer feel our hands, feet, legs or arms … I confess, before the end. I mention this game because I recently spoke to an MK fan who, quite unprompted, mentioned that the coldest she had ever been was at a football match when MK played Southend in some odd cup game. It was cold in Milton Keynes that night.
Thinking back to the sixties, and well beyond of course, you knew that at every away game you would see Charlie Benson, on his own, skulking around. Charlie was (is) a legend, making every game no matter the hardship. He cared; if the score was close he often paced up and down behind the stand prior to the final whistle. In season 1968/69 I actually played football with Charlie (and Paul Lucas among others) in the Young Blues Sunday morning team – bizarrely our strip was black and red.
After my ‘career’ with Young Blues I spent three years in Leeds between 1970 and 1973 which meant that I was able to watch Don Revie’s magnificently skilled and aggressively combative team win cups and titles. My head was not completely turned, but I certainly saw more of Leeds than Southend. But, when the boys were ‘up north’ I’d make the effort. We had some poor teams in those days! One such trip was to York where we lost 3-0 on a very foggy day. A couple of friends and I stood behind one goal and actually chatted with the York keeper. None of us could see the other end and he wasn’t doing anything else. Tony Bentley, another Southend legend, played one of his very last games for Southend that day.
There are loads more ‘minor’ games that stick in the memory and all Southend fans will have similar tales. I won’t go on except to mention one fascination I have – for the lone away fan. On my all-too-infrequent trips to the Hall I normally sit with my brother on the right of the East Stand, near to the away fans. I often spot individuals on their own and wonder about their connection with ‘their’ team. What is the story behind their long, loan, trek to Roots Hall to watch a lower league game which, I hope, will end in disappointment? Many of us may have been that fan. I was when I went to Macclesfield in 1999. My wife and I had won a trip to a nearby Da Vere Hotel for a golf weekend and I managed to get it to coincide with the Macclesfield game. We won 2-1 with a late goal from Alan McCormack. I recall the game because I stood on my own and was able to park so close to the ground (the crowd was only 2,010) that I could use my key to lock and unlock my car from where I stood – now you don’t get that at the Ethiad!
Enough … there are numerous other stories to tell, and many more to come I am sure. I hope some of the fantastic support this year turns into a long-term following. I don’t think I have known such committed away fans for many years. On this note I should just add that, after nearly sixty-five years as a fan, I don’t expect to have too many more long-haul away days myself, but I am proud that two of my granddaughters have now been to the Hall, making them the fifth generation of my family to be Shrimpers.

Graham Hart
 
Jai said:
So sorry for your loss, Nick and we're honoured that Graham wanted to write for us during this time.

Here's Graham's article for AAS 88 - I hope it's OK with you that I post it here.

THE first matches I watched at Roots Hall were from the back bedroom of my grandparent’s house in Shakespeare Drive. My grandfather and father would go to the game while I was left with granny. I could only see the North Bank end, and about thirty yards of pitch. But it was enough.
I must have pestered my father who took me to my first game, in August 1960, a 2-1 home defeat to Walsall. The crowd was 10,970 on a Friday night. Such famous names as Harry Threadgold and Sandy Anderson were playing. I’ve been a diehard Shrimper ever since.
Over the decades I have been fortunate to have seen many of the memorable matches, at Cardiff and Wembley, Florence, Swansea, Peterborough (1990), Stockport (1987) and famous home games against Liverpool, Manchester United and Bristol City. Sadly I was at both Grimsby and Morecambe when we failed to win automatic promotion. Big regret? I couldn’t go to Bury.
But, if I reminisce with anybody who will listen (Ray Hems is favourite for this), it is some of the smaller games that I recall most vividly, such as the delight in watching Billy Best destroy Kings Lynn and Brentwood in successive rounds of the FA Cup; he scored eight goals in the two matches. And some away trips. In these, for example, Rochdale looms large.
In 1969 Brian Atherfold, Pete Hornsby and I decided it would be a good idea to leave the Christmas comforts of Southend on Boxing Day to hitchhike to Rochdale for the match on December 27th. Forgetting how cold it could be overnight, and how empty the roads were , we did eventually pitch up in Rochdale. We were just under the sign that says ‘Welcome to Rochdale – Home of the Co-operative Movement’ when an elderly northern gent, in traditional cap and muffler, told us the game was off. In pre-internet days, this was how you found out! Done hitchhiking, Brian paid for us to return home by train – I think I still owe him.
Thirty years later, and Southend are tumbling towards the Conference. We have just sacked Alvin Martin and have an away match at Rochdale. I managed to persuade an old friend Marcus to accompany me to see the Tuesday evening kick-off. There was a small cluster of Blues’ fans behind one goal while the rest of the ground was virtually empty. Marcus and I sat in a stand, totally alone, when a steward strode half way around the ground to tell me to take my feet of the (plastic) seat in front. I thought to tell him what I thought of this instruction but couldn’t bear to miss another Rochdale game. I wish I had. The Blues lost 1-0; we were hopeless. Relegation loomed. Happily the arrival of Alan Little, a 3-0 win on the Saturday at Orient (packed with Blues’ fans) and we survived. Scarborough were eventually relegated; we finished five or six points off the drop and one point behind Brighton!
I remember how cold I was hitchhiking to Rochdale but it was certainly matched in February 1990 when my brother Nick and I went to see us play at Hartlepool. In those days midweek away games were a long slog; the roads and cars were simply not as fast or as comfortable. We stood in a stand at the Victoria Ground (it’s now called something silly) with the cold wind from the North Sea blowing right across us. It was freezing.
The game ended 1-1, in front of 3,578. Ling scored for the Blues; David Crown was playing, as was Paul Sansome. The cold of that night was matched, no, trumped in 2009, by a visit to Stadium MK, with my daughter, to see the Johnstones Paints Second Round (Southern Section) match which we lost 2-0. We were very poor, the atmosphere in that stadium was bleak and the temperature was on an Arctic scale. My daughter and I left when we could no longer feel our hands, feet, legs or arms … I confess, before the end. I mention this game because I recently spoke to an MK fan who, quite unprompted, mentioned that the coldest she had ever been was at a football match when MK played Southend in some odd cup game. It was cold in Milton Keynes that night.
Thinking back to the sixties, and well beyond of course, you knew that at every away game you would see Charlie Benson, on his own, skulking around. Charlie was (is) a legend, making every game no matter the hardship. He cared; if the score was close he often paced up and down behind the stand prior to the final whistle. In season 1968/69 I actually played football with Charlie (and Paul Lucas among others) in the Young Blues Sunday morning team – bizarrely our strip was black and red.
After my ‘career’ with Young Blues I spent three years in Leeds between 1970 and 1973 which meant that I was able to watch Don Revie’s magnificently skilled and aggressively combative team win cups and titles. My head was not completely turned, but I certainly saw more of Leeds than Southend. But, when the boys were ‘up north’ I’d make the effort. We had some poor teams in those days! One such trip was to York where we lost 3-0 on a very foggy day. A couple of friends and I stood behind one goal and actually chatted with the York keeper. None of us could see the other end and he wasn’t doing anything else. Tony Bentley, another Southend legend, played one of his very last games for Southend that day.
There are loads more ‘minor’ games that stick in the memory and all Southend fans will have similar tales. I won’t go on except to mention one fascination I have – for the lone away fan. On my all-too-infrequent trips to the Hall I normally sit with my brother on the right of the East Stand, near to the away fans. I often spot individuals on their own and wonder about their connection with ‘their’ team. What is the story behind their long, loan, trek to Roots Hall to watch a lower league game which, I hope, will end in disappointment? Many of us may have been that fan. I was when I went to Macclesfield in 1999. My wife and I had won a trip to a nearby Da Vere Hotel for a golf weekend and I managed to get it to coincide with the Macclesfield game. We won 2-1 with a late goal from Alan McCormack. I recall the game because I stood on my own and was able to park so close to the ground (the crowd was only 2,010) that I could use my key to lock and unlock my car from where I stood – now you don’t get that at the Ethiad!
Enough … there are numerous other stories to tell, and many more to come I am sure. I hope some of the fantastic support this year turns into a long-term following. I don’t think I have known such committed away fans for many years. On this note I should just add that, after nearly sixty-five years as a fan, I don’t expect to have too many more long-haul away days myself, but I am proud that two of my granddaughters have now been to the Hall, making them the fifth generation of my family to be Shrimpers.

Graham Hart
Click to expand...

Thank you, has now become a very emotional read.
 
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