Date: 28th February 2014 at 5:46pm
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imageThe first of what I hope will be many blogs from @PaterAmore one of the lovliest and most passionate Chelsea supporters I know, and with whom I shared an eventful evening in the Southern Cross watching Chelsea win the Europa Cup. Enjoy…

One of the truly great pleasures in life is bringing your son or daughter into the world. Teaching them how to do the practical things like walk, talk and shoot.  Then there’s the emotional and moral side of things you try to instil in them. You want them to be strong, resilient, tough, yet kind, respectful, compassionate and make good decisions. You try to teach them to shield themselves against the world’s evils and know when to not get caught out.

Everyone has their own way of approaching these tasks, usually shaped by their own childhood – either to try the opposite approach or copy the same way their parents bought them up. I’d like to think I try a mixture and use the things in my childhood I respected and thought taught me right from wrong. This has often led to leaning towards my Dad’s stricter approach, especially around discipline. Mum was the facilitator; she allowed us to make our decisions and helped us learn from them. Dad was my older brother’s football manager and was the opposite of biased towards his eldest son. He would rule with an iron fist but stick up for his own fiercely. This is where I’ve got a phrase I’ve said to mine a couple of times, especially when I’m in discipline mode. ‘I’m their Dad, not their friend. If we’re friends too then I’m more than happy.’

One of the things growing up that Dad instilled in us from the start is football. And we supported Chelsea. It helped that 99% of both sides of the family are Chelsea. Mum was even bought up in Chelsea, Ixworth Place (one of my auntie’s babysat Nigella Lawson). The only non-Chelsea were John’s, one either side of the family and both glory boys who supported Liverpool, from a far. With the odd game attended. For us, we were local in West London and very much match going fans, when Sandgate or Brook House weren’t playing anyway. We were the quintessential football household. Father & 2 boys played football, watched football, talked football and collected the stickers. Mum washed the kits.

A part of parenthood for football fans is that of teaching them about loyalty, passion, unswerving love and support for their team. More and more frequently nowadays, parents are letting their children choose who they support. Part of this is due to parents not being fans but with football becoming more popular with every generation (don’t get me started on the majority of foreign fans of English clubs – I don’t get that unless they’re ex-pats, but all welcome as it is what it is, some are amazing fans such as some famous CFC in Sweden & the States) they’ve got to start somewhere. If they (English based fans that haven’t’ got football parents) think like I believe I would have in their situation, they’d go for their closest geographical club, perhaps swayed by mates that they’d actually go to the games with. I’d say this trend of supporting for non-geographical reasons started in the 80s when I first saw examples of people choosing teams they had no obvious connection with. But I suspect it’s always happened. This practice is dangerous as it promotes glory hunters. Sometimes they will stay with their team and thus lose the glory hunter tag in my eyes (mate from school still supports Everton since the 80s, and I’m pretty sure he’s not a scouser) but more often than not they will change like the wind (another school mate went from Liverpool to Arsenal and ended up with United from the age of 6 through to 12).

For me, I didn’t understand having a choice like that. I supported Chelsea because I was bought up that way. I thought you’re born with 2 things – your surname and football team, everything else is a choice. I believe this is without a shadow of doubt the correct way to bring your child into the glorious unpredictable world of football. When I used to feed my gorgeous baby twins Megan & Hannah in their high chairs, I’d have Chelsea TV on in the background. Back then it only ran for a few hours in the evening, so we would have ‘Blue Day’ on repeat the whole time. Chelsea songs have always played a big part in the kids’ lives when they’re with me. When they sulk, they get ‘Always the victim, it’s never your fault’. They knew they were Chelsea fans before they knew what football was. I could ask them, ‘Who do you support?’ and they’d say, ‘Chelsea’ without hesitation. I’d then ask them, ‘Why do you support them?’ and they’d reply, ‘Because Daddy does’ every time in unison. Job done. I didn’t care if they were into football or liked it as they grew up, as long as they knew they were Chelsea fans.

image2Fast forward to October of our double winning season under Ancelotti, my old man passed away, 4 days after his 51st birthday. I often think Dad even looked like Carlo. His birthday was the last time I saw him and had spent the night with him at the Brook House in Hayes, and I guarantee 90% of the talk would have been football. It’s a bond, one of the best in the world. A month later I met my girlfriend Katie (AKA ‘the one’) and later her beautiful daughter Ellie.  In my eyes Ellie was confused when it came to football. Katie didn’t like football but followed United an unlucky child and her brother is a Spurs fan. Luckily for Ellie, her dad supports Chelsea. After a little mishap with Katie’s only childhood United top & the Rabbit hutch (yes I openly admit it was me & I’d do it again) we’re all now Chelsea in our house hold. Unfortunately Ellie’s uncle insists in staying lilywhite (ssh but I’ve seen a pic of him in QPR top as a kid, this is the danger of not having a strong guiding hand from your parents!). Ellie’s Auntie is a United fan, but quiet recently. She followed her old man so it’s allowable to not have a Manc accent. Even Katie’s Mum only seems to come round ours when the football’s on and she pretends to hate football!

And now Katie & I our expecting our latest Chelsea fan in September. So after the success with the twins, Katie, Ellie and Nanny Tina, I’ve got the enjoyable task all over again, I can’t wait!!

All of the old plans and thoughts come flooding back. We don’t know if it’ll be a girl or a boy yet but ‘Chelsea’ as a girl’s name is out of the window – I talk about football and Chelsea far too much to do that, it’ll be obvious. Then I’m thinking about great Chelsea stalwarts that deserve naming rights, none of them are really doing well so far. As no one uses their middle name anyway, and we’d keep it to ourselves, I’d love to include the starting XI from that night in Stockholm in 1998. Dad & I were there and was the first final I remember being at. It was a no brainer when Dad asked if I wanted to miss my year 12 May Ball for the game.

You also think about what traditions you have. Growing up Dad never really was a week in week out regular on the Shed because he’d play every Saturday himself (top goal scorer medals all over Nan’s house). This meant he didn’t overly have his own traditions to pass down to us when it came to Chelsea. He wasn’t a superstitious man either. One thing I got though was respect and the importance of knowledge. I grew up having to know about football, its history and how the game is played today, why it’s evolved to the game we know and respect what’s happened before you. This I feel doesn’t happen as much, the whole respect your elders seems to fade with every dropped pair of jeans around the thigh height.

I however am big on traditions and want to pass them down as much as possible. This is my way of instilling the respect for the past and keeping things going, being handed down through the generations. This is difficult as we can’t afford to take the girls to games but I try with Katie and embedding them now will help in the future. Firstly it started with the football quiz Dad & I would give each other as we sat in traffic to turn right onto the North End Road from Talgarth Road, this could be about rules and regs, Chelsea history or just what team we’d play that day. I win every quiz with Katie now, but I’ll still test her (she’s getting great so I’ll have to up the difficulty soon!) and question the girls throughout the week about songs and players they know about.

Then there’s the constantly telling Katie where Dad & I would park (Gas Board along Imperial Road is we were in his van or the Market on North End Road if in the car), where we’d drink or eat, and when we’d go to the ground. Growing up Dad would be on a private jobs Saturday morning, then we’d be rushing to make kick off. This meant having a burger was only ever a treat if we had time, so now I have it every match day, after picking up a programme (we’d get a programme often to sit on so the seat was warmer, now it’s more collectable to go with the rest I have!) and now I always get my CFCUK.

Back in the day we didn’t have social media or blogs. So I just thought the stall holders were just market traders, now I know better and have been able to get to know, however briefly, some of the guys through CFCUK. This helps traditions in its own way, as there’s now new traditions we can pass down that weren’t available in the 80s. Back then we wouldn’t have a podcast to listen to throughout the week – we’d have a teletext page to wait 20 mins to switch over, only for half the letters to be missing, or a Dixons bar to have a pre-game drink – only a tea bar for a mars bar and coke (with lid still on). It was colder back then too.

image5Growing up a Chelsea fan now compared to when I was young is a world away. It’s so different it might as well be different sports. Now my kids have only ever known Chelsea to win trophies and have a modern stadium. Their first game (MHL, United in the FA Cup 2013 with a Ba winner after he made Rio look like a mug) was a great success. They already knew all the songs (including the beeps but we’d brought them up not to copy – but we’d taken them into that adult environment so nothing to complain about, I hate it when people want others to treat a match day like the cinema just because they’ve taken little Tarquin to the game to rough it for a day!) and they could sing with the crowd. Kids are more confident nowadays! They even watched the game far more than I ever did when I first went. It was warm in the stands, dry and comfortable. We had a drink after in Dixons and then a few pictures in the Upper tier when everyone had gone. Proper tourist but worth it. It was easy for the girls to enjoy the day and fall in love with the event. My concern is that it was an ‘event’, due to the costs these days pricing families out and stopping them from teaching their kids that football isn’t a TV programme. Despite this the girls already had a favourite player. They had a plethora of League, FA Cup and Champions League winners to choose from. They’d adopted the Demba Ba song and knew why we didn’t like Rafa.

This is in stark contrast to my introduction to Chelsea. I had to work hard to love my team. Love the ground. The cold, uncomfortable concrete benches and wooden seats behind them. Yes I knew I was a Chelsea fan already and that wasn’t in doubt, but I was much younger than the girls when I went to my first game. This did mean I was more impressionable so that helped, but the first season I’d just stare at the crowds. The odd nudge from Dad reminding me there’s a game on. But back then it would have been a game in the old 2nd division. Yes we won plenty in those couple of years before the Premiership was formed, but we were playing against players I’d never heard of. My playground bragging rights centred on the Full Members and then fell back on the Makita Cup and later the Umbro Cup. Beating Tottenham 4-0 in the semi of one of those got me a couple of months bragging. Now look at how easy any arguments about how good we are would be!

image4When we were back in the top flight again I could find out about my own players with the help of Panini, but we didn’t have social media, 24 hour sports channels or Pro Evo 1988, so our knowledge as primary school children was limited. I was lucky; Dad taught me enough but also always taught me about the game itself. He got a FA coaching badge and took my brothers team to the title and cup finals more times than Chelsea had ever been to at that point. He even took them to the Gothia Cup in Sweden, coincidently enough, seeing as that’s where we attended the CWC final a few years later! He taught me to watch the players off the ball, the shape and not just those on the ball. How players carried themselves and what players could be relied upon. I fear I won’t be able to pass this down to the girls, as they don’t play football. But that’s fine, as long as they love Chelsea. You really have to prioritise what you’re going to pass down to your kids.

As I said, growing up we were the quintessential football family and I loved it. Now, living with 4 women (with maybe the 5th on the way) I have a struggle, but our dining room is named Drakes (even if I’m the only one that uses it) and my 2000 Cup Final ticket and Wembley panoramic of that day is up on the walls. I still don’t pressure the girls to love football – as long as they love Chelsea I’m happy. They didn’t have to work hard to love the club or team, but that’s not their fault. Kids these days don’t know how lucky they are, they weren’t there when we were shit. But it’s not their fault when they were born, they can be just as loyal and passionate as any of us.

Bringing a child up the right way has many trial and error situations along the path. Football can help with this, teaching them to be determined, never give up in the face of over whelming odds against them. Unless they were born into the Roman era, lucky bastards.

KTBFFH @PaterAmore 

 

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