We’ve covered this before and we will again because fandom and fanzines cover and covered every little bit of minutiae, every corner of watching football with such aplomb and creativity that there are acres of this “stuff”. So, strap yourself in for a journey from top tier clubs to Michel Platini signing for Aldershot.

Record Breakers

The Chelsea independent fanzine was packed full of great writing and features. Perhaps my favourite was ‘The Top Tier Club’ “dedicated to footballers who, in their services to the art of football, have gone beyond the call of duty – and hoofed the ball into the third tier” .. of the East Stand with the ball. As of Issue 7 in 1988 the running total stood at an impressive total of six but two were goalkeepers who in my mind should have been disqualified if the kick was from hand.

Eddie and his injury travails also featured in issue 6 of TCI with a great littlerecord-breaking stat that only a truly dedicated fan would spot, the use of six (6) keepers in a season. More on Coady and his magical tracksuit and an article entitled “I Dream of Batesie” in the next Great Fanzine Features blog.

Pre Match rituals

Caley FC’s Life Support Machine had a ‘Focus On A Fan’ feature asking fans the usual questions about how and why they followed their team. This is the subject for a future blog (enough Ads – Ed) but I can’t resist this classic answer from LSM issue 6 in 1991. For those of you not familiar with the junior football clubs of northern Scotland, Clachmananshire FC and Inverness Thistle being the bigger walled local highland rivals for Caley prior to the merger of Caley and Inverness.

The Crooked Spireite, an always fantastic Chesterfield fanzine ran a pre match entertainment article with a difference in issue 8 from October 1988.

Involving the Police dog handlers’ display team this did admittedly involve you doing the work and tearing a page out of your 60p fanzine (WHAT?! – Ed)

This was promised as a monthly feature with the RAF skydivers delivering the match ball in the next issue…we’ll be searching for more of these

Art for Arts Sake

Rotherham Fanzine Moulin Rouge ran many brief or one-off features and they were all wonderful. Let’s take a minute to appreciate the beauty of ‘Ticket Stubs of Scottish games’ that appeared in Issue 7 from August 1995 and never again as far as I can see.  What a bank holiday weekend that was, 4 wins, Rotherham, Darlington AND Glasgow, some feat of travel in 1975 and you can’t deny that is a GREAT stub.

Aldershot fanzine Shots in the Dark (ShITD as they called themselves) issue 6 (A4, 60p, absolute bargain) from March 1990 is a typical fanzine, packed full of jokes, silly pieces, rants etc and in the centre spread they manage to get an exclusive interview with chairman Colin Hancock. You probably haven’t heard of Mr Hancock and reading up about him and his career at Aldershot was a typical tenure for the 90s, sometimes liked, put £250k of his own money into the club, had to sell to balance the books etc.

Normal that is until the 19 year old ‘Sports tycoon’ Spencer Trethewy fiasco and the collapse of the club including plans for a ‘pastiche’ art gallery… “Mr Hancock, a Harley Street dental surgeon and chairman of the ailing Aldershot Football Club, walked free from court yesterday after magistrates dropped a charge which alleged he had plotted to pass off fake Picasso and Renoir paintings. He said later his arrest came as a result of an innocent attempt to launch a legitimate arts venture as part of a rescue plan for the fourth division club.”

Mr Hancock said: “There was never any truth in any of these allegations. I was involved in a new venture in the art world and had intended to plough the profits from it into the club. The market was ‘pastiche art’, pieces in the style of famous artists, rather than copies or fakes. Some people own very expensive jewellery, which never sees the light of day because they wear paste copies as a status symbol. The same thing applies to the art world.”^[1]The gallery was to have been on his premises in Harley Street.

Anyway, incredible as all of this is, back to the bit of 1990 before the court case when issue 6 of ShITD appeared. Amongst an article positively brimming with platitudes there is a sensational comment; Colin tried to sign Michel Platini for Aldershot!

Now at this distance there is no way of checking this story, I don’t think the fanzine invented it for fun, maybe Mr Hancock invented it for kudos but details like it being a 6 game £3,000 a game offer with use of a white Rolls Royce and the upcoming court case thrown in give it some semblance of reality. Michel Platini playing out his days in the 3^rd division? Instead of this incredible offer, Platini became the France national team coach, bloody ungrateful if you ask me. 

Your Loss

A run of “bad luck” for Gillingham caused the superlative Brian Mooore’s Head Looks Uncannily Like London Planetarium fanzine to run a great feature in issue 40 from March 1994. However, the planned commemorative back cover featuring all Gillingham’s 7 away wins in 3 and a half years was already out of date as the fanzine went to the printer due to an unexpected win.

Undaunted our heroes printed a card insert to mark the win at Colchester AND add “fill out yourself” ones for the next 2 fixtures…one of which they’ve already lost before sales commenced. To complete your collection I looked and can reveal that this might be worth a fortune as the Gills won 1-0 at Torquay (Though as a counterpoint, by this time they hadn’t won at home in more than two months)

A classic example of just ploughing on with an idea that really wasn’t working. Quite honestly, I don’t think there is need for an excuse though, it’s what fanzines are all about.

The Half Time Orange

Music featured heavily in fanzines and so did music reviews, by 1997 Brian Mooore’s Head has moved on to CDs…but not Tom Petty, Billy Joel, Sabbath or anyone like that, oh no, issue 65 covered Norwich based band Halftime Oranges. The reason? Well, because the band had written a letter to BMH about Ade Akinbiyi.

Obviously I decided to look them up and discogs tells me they were a “Mid 90s jangle-tastic band. Football obsessed guitar merchants who had links to The Spinning Jennys, The Potting Sheds and Passing Clouds. Released two albums and an EP and appeared on various compilations” which leaves me none the wiser really.

I am glad BMH subverted the norm though because so did the Oranges with songs about Panini, Terry Butcher, The only Halifax supporter, Blues for John, East Fife 4 Forfar 5, Vinny Jones, Billy Dane’s grown up and much much more. There’s not much left of the Oranges online but I did find this fantastic window into the 90s music scene in Norwich “We also used to like to support Prolapse when they played in Norwich, they were a great band”

Cover Stories

Look at these covers. One is simple, straight forward, functional and one is more artistic and aesthetic…One has the issue number, date and price, all there and clear to see and the other…

This has become a bit of a bugbear of mine as I catalogue various fanzine collections. Yes, I know it’s not really that big a deal but…it really is.

This reached what I hope will be its nadir as I was trying to pin down the month and year for issue 8 of Mudhutter Football Express from Wigan. Now OK they had a price and issue number prominently featured with a very dapper Neil Rimmer on the cover but could I find any way of telling the date this was published inside? No Muppets No Colours No Jibbers No Runners NO BLOODY DATE!

Don’t get me wrong it is a great fanzine with 44 pages packed with jokes, cartoons, history, think pieces and op eds. It’s great, but there isn’t even a match report to date the bloody thing. They do like their music as well though and so FINALLY after a few flick throughs this appeared on page 26. Yep, the only way I can date this fanzine is by looking up the death of soul crooner LVd. Actually, perhaps this was the zenith.

There are obvious jokes here about 90s footballers loving popsoul, not fans and the overwhelming preference for indie/shoegaze in fanzines by the noughties but hey, it gave me the date and I’m grateful. (If you weren’t a Luther fan he left us in July 2005)

Pin it on Ron

Badges were and still are a big thing with football fans and collectors and some fanzines even gave them away.

Sheffield Wednesday fanzine Just Another Wednesday sold this classic. It’s a beautiful design but I hope they didn’t buy too many as 3 months after this ad appeared Big Ron would controversially leave for “bigger club” Aston Villa.

The Final Whistle

We’ve wandered through various areas of creativity in fanzines in blogs, art, cartoons, poetry, protest, music and names all covered but fanzines were perhaps at their best when just left to their own devices. An idle conversation on the coach or in the pub about a losing streak, pin badges to help fund a loss making venture, CD reviews because of letters about Ade Akinbiyi, BYO pre match entertainment, mourning the death of Luther Vandross.

There’s more, so much more so watch out for Features blog 3, dreams about Ken Bates notwithstanding.

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[1] From The Times; June 1st, 1990.