Aidan Smith: Time for junior to get with the programme? Soon, son, soon . . .

Published on Sunday 6 November 2011 02:42

PHEW, that was close. I almost took my son to his first game yesterday. His obsession has been developing nicely.

Admittedly, football is getting mixed up with rugby following the latter’s World Cup, but as the sole participant in titanic New Zealand vs Hibs matches on the lounge carpet he’s also providing a commentary, just like I did.

At only four, however, I’ve decided Archie is still too young.

I was a fairly ancient ten at the time of my debut, and fortunate enough to glimpse some likely lads called Pat Stanton, Peter Cormack and Colin Stein. I’d prefer Archie’s introduction to coincide with a similarly gilded era but I won’t be able to put it off for much longer, and I’m not really trying to. I mean, the part of me that isn’t worried he’ll turn out exactly like his father is intrigued to see how far the obsession might stretch. For instance, will there be games where he’s more obsessed with the match programme, and not having a copy, than anything happening on the pitch?

Flashback to Broomfield, 1972, League Cup quarter-final – Airdrie 2 Hibs 6. Squeezed inside that atmospheric little ground, with its detached villa of a clubhouse, I should have been thrilled. But as each goal went in I kept thinking: “I don’t have a programme. Dad took a wrong turning and we missed kick-off. I DON’T HAVE A PROGRAMME!” The next day, desperate, I found out the name of Airdrie’s secretary and wrote a letter pretending to be an exiled Diamonds fan living in Edinburgh and – rotten result, eh? – asking if he could send me one for my lovingly leatherette-bound collection (or some such guff), enclosing a postal order to cover the cost.

Programmes can tell stories. Dave Roberts know this. He’s written a lovely book called 32 Programmes (Bantam Press), this being the paltry number from a mountain of 1,134 that his wife allowed him to take to the US when they emigrated there. By reproducing their front covers and remembering who he was at each juncture – he’s hand-in-hand with his father, 90 minutes and a whole future not yet determined, then he’s a punk rock fan being invited back to the home of a girl described as “chubby, in a good way” – he’s still managed to tell the story of his odd little life.

I say odd but before the programme habit I used to collect bus tickets like him. Never stamps, though. “As a serious stamp collector,” writes Roberts in one especially exciting chapter, “I felt I understood the value of misprints. The 1918 American 24c stamp, printed with an upside-down biplane, is worth thousands of pounds.” He’s just purchased a Swansea City programme which contains a hideous – but potentially lucrative – error. For safe keeping he slips it inside his copy of Richard Allen’s bootboy classic Skinhead. Eventually he writes to Brian Moore, c/o The Big Match, asking if he knows what it might be worth. I won’t spoil what happens next.

This is Roberts later in 32 Programmes, nominated for the William Hill Sports Book of the Year: “I gaped, open-mouthed in astonishment, at what I was seeing.” What could this be? A duvet being pulled back, an invite to stay the night? Tragically no, just Chelsea offering up a programme printed before their FA Cup opponents were known and featuring both teams on the cover. “It broke all the rules. I bought a further five copies.”

Fascinating, too, to read his memories of Leeds Utd vs Universitatea Craiova in 1979’s UEFA Cup when the Elland Road announcer interrupted proceedings to play a police tape beginning: “I’m Jack. I see you are still having no luck catching me... ” To emphasise this, the chant went up: “There’s only one Yorkshire Ripper.”

Roberts is obsessed, in a good way. But I must be even more obsessed if the programme extracts in his book aren’t quite enough for me (I want the reserve team snippets, the adverts for the best discotheques, everything). The other day in my study Archie said: “Dad, how come you’ve got so much stuff?” But he was only talking about the CDs. Indeed, he may have meant just the Jethro Tull remasters. The real stuff, the story of my life, is in the attic, and I know he’s going to love my programme collection. Well, he’d bloody better.

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