The Damned Utd by David Peace (easy readers txt) 📕

you’ll do for me,’ you tell him. ‘If you do as you’re bloody told.’

‘I’d rather play for fucking Leeds,’ he tells you.

‘You’d fucking fit right in and all,’ you laugh. ‘But they don’t bloody want you, do they, Willie?’

‘They bloody might,’ he says. ‘You don’t fucking know that.’

‘Well, I don’t see Don fucking Revie sat here, do you?’

‘I don’t know what I see.’

‘Well, I know what I see,’ you tell him. ‘I see a five-foot-four dirty little bastard who spends half the fucking match arguing with the referee and who’s been booked eighteen bloody times and sent off another three fucking times for his trouble. Now that won’t do for me because you’re no good to me suspended. But if you behave yourself and keep that great big bloody Scouse gob of yours shut, I’ll get you a bloody Championship medal to go with all your fucking bookings and sendings-off.’

‘And what if I can’t behave myself? What if I don’t fucking want to?’

‘You will,’ you laugh. ‘Because I’m not asking you, I’m fucking telling you.’

* * *

I’m down in the dug-out for this game. This testimonial. This centenary game at Villa Park. Jimmy and me with Stewart, Cherry and Johnny fucking Giles for company –

My one and only plan before the game to make sure Johnny bloody Giles doesn’t get a fucking kick, but then Madeley has to come off and so on goes John –

Thank fuck for Allan Clarke, two great goals; one with his head from a Reaney cross, the other sliding into a low centre from the Irishman. The rest of the match is the same old dirty Leeds; McQueen gets booked, then Cooper gives away a penalty – saved by Harvey – then Hunter gives away another, but the Villa lad misses. Half-time I tell Jimmy to take off Harvey and Hunter and stick on Stewart and Cherry while I go for a drink and a chat in the top of the stands with Jimmy Bloomfield, the Leicester manager –

We talk about Shilton, swaps and trades. We talk about money –

‘Not bad that one you’ve got,’ says Jimmy Bloomfield.

‘Harvey? You’re bloody joking?’ I ask him. ‘He’s fucking shit.’

‘He saved that penalty well enough.’

‘You can have him,’ I tell Jimmy. ‘If you like him so much, him and two hundred grand, and I’ll take Peter Shilton off your hands.’

‘He’ll get you the bloody sack, will Shilton,’ says Jimmy. ‘He’s trouble.’

‘Then he’s my kind of fucking trouble,’ I tell him.

Dirty Leeds concede a goal but still win 2–1 –

Not a bad start; two games, two wins –

‘Not a bad bloody start at all,’ says Jimmy Bloomfield as we shake our hands and say our goodbyes and head down the stairs, round the corners and down the corridors.

* * *

There is always one game in every season, one moment in that game, that one moment in that one game in the season when everything can change, when things can either come together or fall apart for the rest of the season, that one moment when you know you will win this game and then the next and the next, when you know you will have a season to remember, a season never to forget –

The Football League Cup, third round replay; Wednesday 2 October 1968 –

Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby –

This is one of those nights you will never forget. This is one of those nights when everything comes together and stays together, one of those nights when everything changes, everything turns –

Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby –

You went down to Stamford Bridge last week where Chelsea were unbeaten in twenty home games. You went down to Stamford Bridge and you took everything Chelsea could throw at you and you held them 0–0, held the likes of Bonetti, Hollins and Osgood –

Now you’ve brought them back here, here to the Baseball Ground, here where there’s no running track around the pitch, here where you hear every cheer and every jeer from the 34,000 crowd, here where there’s no place to hide –

Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby –

‘No fucking hiding place,’ you tell the Derby dressing room. ‘Not tonight; tonight we’re going to see who’s fucking who out there.’

Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby –

Green. Webster. Robson. Durban. McFarland. Mackay. Walker. Carlin. O’Hare. Hinton. Hector –

Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby –

That one moment when everything can change, when things either come together or fall apart for the rest of the season, that one moment comes in the twenty-sixth minute of the first half, comes when Houseman jumps a Carlin tackle and slips the ball across to Birchenall, who shoots into the top corner of the net from thirty yards out and puts you a goal down –

Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby –

This is that one moment, that one moment when you look into the eyes of the players out on that pitch, you look into their eyes and down into their hearts and you listen to the noise of the crowd, the thundering noise of 34,000 hearts up in those stands and you listen for the eleven hearts out on that pitch, and you hear those hearts beating as one, and you know that this is the moment you have been waiting for, that one moment when everything changes, when no one gives up, when no one goes home, when no one hides –

Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby. Derby –

From the twenty-sixth minute to half-time, from half-time to the seventy- seventh minute, no one hides, no one goes home