.
Saturday/Sunday July 30th/31st 1966
As we emerged from the stadium, we were greeted by a throng of people who had decided they needed to be at Wembley to share in this moment and they were all applauding us, the supporters.
Well done, well done,’ the people all around us were saying.
‘Thanks very much, it’s great, isn’t it?’ I responded, feeling they were all obviously directing their compliments at me personally.
The crowd won it for them, observed Len as we strode home. They were ready to give up when the Gerry’s scored that last-minute equaliser, he stated, but it was the crowd that got them going again
My brother and I decided not to queue at Wembley Park for a train as it would be more fun to walk home. It is about three and half miles from Wembley to our house in Kenton and would normally take about an hour and a half to walk the entire journey and every car that we passed was waving flags and honking their horns – ‘bee- beep, beep- beep- beep, beep- beep- beep- beep, – England’, everyone shouted the last word even if in mid conversation. There was something surreal about the journey as we were carried along in a wave of euphoria, unaware of the steps we were taking or our surroundings. In recollection, all I can remember is a sea of red, white and blue and a constant, joyous, background noise.
There was an impromptu Batchelor house party as my family welcomed us home as conquerors. Like many households, we had stuck ‘GOOD LUCK ENGLAND’ newspaper headlines in our front room window, and we went into the street to share our joy with our neighbours as bottles of light ale and Stingo were swapped and greetings exchanged. Dad had brought a few of his kin back from the pub, with my Uncle Bob on the piano and my Auntie Bab singing, her ample chest testifying to the power of her voice, and a true old-fashioned house party was enjoyed by all. After all the shouting I had done at the match my own singing was more Satchmo than Sinatra but nobody cared.
That night, central London was packed with exuberant England supporters keeping every pub busy with their joy spilling into the surrounding streets, the TV news reported wild celebrations everywhere in Britain, including parts of Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, as the Union flag was emblazoned everywhere.
The following morning, despite being allowed to drink several pints of beer the night before, I was awake early and went out to buy the Sunday papers. I bought several different newspapers, and they all seemed to have ‘special edition World Cup souvenir issue’ labelled across them and, over a cheerful Batchelor breakfast table, we all read avidly of our team’s performances and religiously scanned all the crowd scene photographs for a glimpse of my brother and myself.
‘There you are.’ said Mum, excitedly pointing at a picture which showed a hundred different faces about the size of a pinhead. ‘That could be anybody.’ said Dad sensibly but then declared that Len should be easy to spot as he was head and shoulders taller than anybody else. We never managed to find our picture anywhere and didn’t really care as we spent the rest of the morning trying to snatch highlights of the match on the TV newsreels.
‘Let’s all go to the pub,’ said Dad at lunchtime and we all piled into his treasured Ford Anglia for the mile-long journey to the Beehive pub in Honeypot Lane. The pub was awash with people decked out in red, white and blue and a piano bashed out patriotic songs that everyone was shouting along to. ‘It’s a long way to Tipperary,’ was reaching its noisy climax as we entered and we filed hopefully in behind Dad as he sent Len to the bar to get the drinks in. When the pianist played ‘When the saints go marching in’ the whole pub joined in, even the bar staff, and the pub felt like the happiest place on earth. I even had to decline several drinks from well-wishers who I didn’t know, but who had offered to buy me a drink as soon as they heard that ‘I was there!
Richard and I, being under eighteen, were restricted to half of shandies, but I didn’t really mind as I was still feeling the effects of the previous night and I felt a bit drunk just on the atmosphere.
Mum was worried about dinner spoiling and stated emphatically that we couldn’t stay long as the joint was in the oven and, as always, mother knows best so after an hour we came home in time for Dad to carve the meat.
After gorging myself on another delicious Sunday roast – I was fit for nothing but sleep, and it was not long before I was dreaming of the day when England would once again be playing in a World Cup final.