Excellent to see that in the Charlton TV box for Wednesday’s night’s game at Crewe, alongside Scott Minto and Steve Brown, will be Eddie Youds. Really looking forward to that. My favourite story about Eddie came from a friend of mine who sometimes drank alongside him, involving some guy in the pub mouthing off about how can footballers be unable to hit a target, a bet struck, a rendezvous on Blackheath the next morning, and the guy leaving with his tail between his legs and a few quid lighter.
Now I’m sure there will be a good deal of discussion about the Wembley play-off win, and rightly so. But please Scott, if you get the chance, ask Eddie about a subsequent game we played against Arsenal, I believe in December 1998, at The Valley, one in which Steve Brown was an unused substitute. My question is simple: ‘This is how I remember the game/incident, is it an accurate account?’.
“In our first season back in our rightful position dining at the top table, with us having already been held to a 0-0 draw at Highbury, on a cold December evening under floodlights, Arsene Wenger brought his south-east London rejects to The Valley. Now his team included Viera (now shaming himself somewhere else in London), Petit, Overmars, for some reason Boa Morte, and leading the line a certain Bergkamp. And to be fair, in the first 30 minutes or so they gave us a runaround, with the Dutch maestro pulling the strings.
Eddie was let’s say struggling to get a grip on Bergkamp, so when the ball was played up to him, back to our goal, around the half-way line, it was time for some corrective action. A small reminder that football isn’t all about airs and graces. The tackle from behind was, ahem, crunching. And it seemed that after that every time the ball was played up to Bergkamp there was greater urgency in his desire to get rid of it. There was no surprise that after 40 minutes he decided enough was enough and was replaced.
Now thanks to a dreadful ref’s decision to award Arsenal a second-half penalty we were to narrowly lose the game. Without Eddie’s ‘intervention’ it would have been a lot worse.”
Oh Eddie Youds, Eddie, Eddie, Eddie Youds ….
Good luck BA in your new permanent home. Always enjoy reading your blogs. Blogs may seem "old school" next to Twitter but some of us of a more "mature" age still prefer the considered opinion of a well written blog so - in between a glass of red -keep on blogging !
ReplyDeleteI can be your witness for that incident, Berkamp was on the centre spot and landed outside the circle.
ReplyDelete