GFTU BGCM 2019 Minutes

Republic of Ireland where at the time they could leave school at 15, so they

were coming into this particular industry really still as very, very young

immature children and being asked to compete in quite a brutal world.

Every now and then the Chairman (I am not using any names in this to protect

the innocent) would drive into the ground in his huge Rolls Royce and order the

first apprentice he saw to wash his car. I remember the inner rage I felt

whenever he tossed the car keys to me and said, “Give her a clean, me and

the wife are going to a function tonight”. I cannot really tell you the number of

times I genuinely felt like getting in the car and driving it straight into the

nearest brick wall and I was this close at times, but I just simmered with

youthful resentment and anger. There was very little adherence to health and

safety with myself and my fellow apprentices ordered to clamber on to the roof

of the stands to retrieve footballs or to go to the top of the floodlights with a

cloth and a bucket of water to clean them before the next match. I also recall

on one occasion having to clean the tiled area of the treatment room with

cotton wool and a big bottle of methylated spirits. Ha ha, everybody was

laughing afterwards, but an hour later when I was training I felt so sick that I

vomited several times during training and was only able to train the next day.

The club had six apprentices and that was the average number they signed

every year, no more. You were classified as ground staff. After two years, on my 18 th birthday, they told me they were not offering me a fulltime professional

contract and off I went to look for a job. However, the next job happened to be

the offer of a contract from one of the most famous clubs in the world,

Manchester United – joy, happy days – and I did spend a wonderful year there

learning a great deal about both football and about myself, as it was the first

time that I lived away from home. But at the end of the season, the manager,

and again he shall remain nameless, told me I was surplus to requirements.

He did not actually say that. His exact words are unrepeatable in this particular

environment, but to paraphrase it was something like, “Sod off back to Stockton

and dig roads”. So off I went again to find a job, but there were not many

options around in 1977 for a young black man living in Stockton-on-Tees in the

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