By Chris Harris
Do you go to watch non league football for a party, a good booze up and a bit of fun. I did. Ever what happens when you get older and grow up? I’ll tell you my experience in this article. For most people an away game is the simple process of travelling to follow a football club you love wherever they go or maybe just following them occasionally when it suits. Lots of brilliant fans follow Lewes FC everywhere. For a minority of others however Lewes FC are a conduit, an excuse even, for a big piss up! I am the latter. In this article I will describe an attempt to move from the latter to the former. Can I become normal and go to an away game and stay sober and watch football? It gets complicated.
During my first ten years following Lewes, even home attendance was rare as I was a season ticket holder at Crystal Palace. I generally drove up and these were sober affairs. But then at the ripe old age of 35 in 2002 I jettisoned the ritual of driving to Selhurst to watch the Palace get beaten, to stroll to the Pan with my mate Big Dave Tanner, paying £6, drinking loads of beer with pre and after beers at the Kings Head.
Football had moved from an obsession with the Palace to a drinking session at the Pan. For seven or eight years these home games were interspersed with a few away games a season with the King’s Head regulars. Simple affairs where we’d simply get dragged from the pub to a relatively close rival venue and get dropped off outside the pub again after the game. I remember one particular game when the club owner Martin came in to see Den, one of our cronies who did contract work for him, gave him an envelope stuffed with cash and we set off up the M23 with the players wages. ‘They’ll play better when they get this’. The group we went with dissipated as the Head became a gastro pub, a sin it has never recovered from, and Dave started following his local club, Burgess Hill.
At this time, we started the fanzine and a new drinking set of buddies emerged at the back of the Philcox. The away games became more extreme drinking experiences as the participants were much younger. After a few years people drifted away. Chris FM and I stoically kept the flag flying for another couple years. But by now totally hacked off with the stupid running and direction of the club, Chris finding other interests and myself moving to Eastbourne, away days ended.
There was one last hurrah, a trip to watch us play Dorking at the Dripping Pan. It seemed a good idea catching up with some friends I had not seen for thirty-five years. Meeting in the Lansdown we quaffed like we did in our late teens as the strong continental lagers went effortlessly down. In high spirits, as we defied the aging process, we shipped off to the Pan. As the game went on the drinking slowed and the banter dried up as middle age drinking limitation kicked in and by the end of the game our 2.45 resolve to do an all-dayer ended up with fond goodbyes at Lewes station at a disappointing 5.15.
My friend Paul cracked his head open in the toilets and I caught the train to Eastbourne, fell asleep on it, did not get off and the train headed back up to London. Waking up I got off at Haywards Heath somewhat pissed still and discombobulated, got on the wrong train and got off at Dorking having dozed off again. I eventually got home at 11.30pm instead of 6!
Now, finally being in my fifties, the self-preservation factor kicked in and the realisation it was actually not fun to get like that anymore. It’s stupid and dangerous, especially near trains, and that was my last big session. Away days became going over to Burgess Hill to meet Big Dave for a few beers. By now, as I was in a serious relationship and Dave a part time carer, I would be safely on the train home by 5.15.
So I am twenty years on from the start of away day beer hedonism and I contact Dave to go over and watch a game. ‘I’ll be on the hot chocolates.’ He joked. But he wasn’t. He’d given up drinking. It was a defining moment, when the penny dropped, I surprisingly didn’t try and make my excuses. I thought ‘Great, I don’t need to drink!”
Out of nowhere I realised I’d sooner not drink. No faffing around with long drinking rituals and trains, just hopping in the motor in the drive for the 20 minute journey to watch the Hillians. How things had changed.
I remember 20 years previously Dave and I went to Redbridge and got ourselves slaughtered and the manager Steve King coming up to us at the end of the game and said, ‘What did you think of that lads?’ ‘Yeah, fab Stevie’, we lied. We’d just sat at the bar the whole game. I know some of you reading this will think well that’s just mental going all the way out there and not watching the game. Maybe you’re right but it was what we did and we really enjoyed ourselves, which is just part of drinking culture I guess.
Not long afterwards on my first trip to Lowestoft (the second is written up elsewhere in the article) we also missed the entire game in the bar before jump starting the minibus and getting lost in Ipswich!
But this is now 2022, David and I are standing on the decking of woe at Burgess Hill. This isn’t an historic place in the town where Mr Woe was famously decked but the decking outside the clubhouse where older folks congregate and the general theme of banter is one of self-pity and woe based around the decline of the body and general advancing years, aka ‘Woe is me’.
We both agreed it was weird and that it went very well. Driving home I almost felt a palpable sense of relief. This is the new me, I thought to myself. I’m going to start going ground hopping and discover lots of non-league grounds. Happy to go on my own to fill a Saturday afternoon.
So a few weeks later I went down to demystify Whitehawk FC.
Had I found a new way of repurposing enjoying away day football for latter middle age?
Whitehawk v A Team in White
A friend had repeatedly suggested we go down to check out Whitehawk who are something of an enigma, coming from nowhere to the upper echelons of the Conference South and back down again. Now seemingly on the up again we thought we would check it out.
age the reality of Google Maps meant I ended up at some football pitches nowhere near the Whitehawk stadium. After much faffing I eventually found the stadium where there was no parking. Being in the middle of nowhere this meant going back to a built up area and now, running very late, jogging to the stadium. It wasn’t half easier on the away day mayhem trips where the only thing I had to negotiate was lifting the glass or tin to my mouth.
‘It is half price if you are an OAP’ a gentleman on the turnstile quips. I am 57 and pretty fit so this was the first time in my life I was termed an OAP. I spent most of the game considering this new revelation and my mortality.
I met up with my buddy. Whitehawk famously has two large seated stands made of scaffolding behind each goal which are often ridiculed but are actually perfectly fit for purpose and comfortable. We sat under the quirky disco ball with the usual smattering of bored children and even more disinterested parents. I would normally be very slaughtered by now but actually just enjoyed talking to my friend and the gentle art of people watching.
To be honest I didn’t find the football riveting. Two teams a division below Lewes were scrapping it out but it was nice taking in the new surroundings. It is a nice ground. Unlike Lewes drinks and toilets are readily accessible.
My conversion to sober away day travel was confirmed as we sat at half time drinking a very nice cup of black tea.
On my request we’d moved right to the edge of the stand to get away from the annoying children. This is clearly going to be a customary thing of away day travel. Alcohol tends to cut out what is going on around you, a heightened awareness through sobriety means tolerance to other people’s behaviour takes a dive. Yes of course I became shamefully aware of how bloody annoying over the years our behaviour would have been to sober match goers, although I hasten to add we were always well behaved if maybe a little jolly.
For the second-half the stand filled with the Whitehawk Ultras. I have to say they were a very impressive bunch. I’ve never seen such a group of dedicated drinkers at a non-league game ever. They packed out the stand and made an enormous racket, shaking their keys in the air every time there was a corner.
Whitehawk won and we filed out. Being sober I didn’t feel the need to whisper something insulting under my breath to the grinning reaper steward and we walked across the scrubland back to the car, said our goodbyes and I drove back to Lewes.
I enjoyed my trip to Whitehawk but not enough to take up non-league ground hopping. I haven’t gone to another away game since and have none planned.
I think if I was retired I’d maybe enjoy the experience more but I simply have far too many other priorities. Projects that were previously always jettisoned at the prospect of a massive away day drinking session now hold sway. I could still cut it if there were some away day reunions, but equally I think I will probably make my excuses.
Maybe I need to consider whether I actually just do not enjoy non-league football unless I am pissed. Analyse that!
But at the end of the day it’s not that important is it? It was just something we did a few times a season and at the time was great fun. But time marches on and you grow up little by little. And your body declines a little. But hey I’m not an OAP yet!
The Rights of Fans. 