THERE'S ONLY ONE MISHI MORATH

Published in the National League South game v Eastbourne Borough on Saturday 4th January 2020 We drew 1-1 in front of 712

Every club has that one person who you can't imagine not being there. For Slough it was Chris Sliski, for Dulwich Hamlet it was Mishi Morath who sadly passed away just before Christmas.

Mishi always said if you cut him he would bleed pink and blue. His support wasn't just for the first team, but for all the teams that put on the Hamlet colours. Reserves, woman’s team, youth. He would be there if he could. He was eccentric, out spoken, a wordsmith who was proud of his Sarf London working class roots and staunchly Labour. He was a former alcoholic who had kicked the bottle a long time ago with many drunken tales of the Dulwich rabble away days. He loved non league football and was well known especially across London lending his support to all levels of football. He loved visiting museums, tweeting out odd nuggets of history, and of course couldn't pass a pie and mash shop. He was a librarian who loved his profession, and didn't enjoy seeing it being taken over by volunteers – 'you wouldn't have a volunteer bin man so why a voluntary librarian?'

Ironically it was Non League football that also saved his life earlier in the year when he was resuscitated by soldiers after having a heart attack while watching a Royal Engineers football match. This meant he finally got to see Dulwich play in the 1^st round of the FA Cup for the only time in his lifetime. Of course he got a starring role on Match of the Day where he even managed to have a dig at arch rivals Tooting and Mitcham. Infact he once produced a fanzine celebrating 100 glory years of Tooting and Mitcham – which was just empty pages!

A few days after his death Dulwich were voted the Football Supporters Association Club of the Year. Some achievement for a club a little over 12 months ago who were locked out of its ground and fighting to stay alive. Dulwich's community manager said “Putting on a community initiative is relatively straightforward. Getting everyone to buy into it and support in their thousands is the challenge. Finally, this award is down to the club’s work for many years. This type of recognition doesn’t happen because of one idea or initiative. This award recognises Dulwich Hamlet’s commitment to their community for many years. My involvement, as part of the community team, has been fairly recent. I inherited a role which has been built up and established by my predecessors. This is testament to their work as much as it is to the current community team. On behalf of the club, I would like to dedicate this award Mr Dulwich himself – Mishi Morath. Without his hard work and dedication over the years, this award would not have been possible.”

What I really liked about Mishi, is that he embraced all the new fans coming to the club. Infact he loved how little old Dulwich who used to struggle to get crowds of 200 now regular packed them in at over 2,000.

The Dulwich management team, celebrating 600^th games in charge, gave a moving tribute to Mishi "We've lost a part of Dulwich. He was one of the main factors I understood what the football club was all about, its traditions, what it meant to local people. Mishi was able to put that into words. What he done for the football club was unbelievable. A lot of the outreach work, the community work was started off from Mishi, the crowds that we see now and the legacy is due to Mishi.

"For a football club to be successful it needs more than players, more than management, it needs everybody and Mishi epitomized that. People often use the word legend loosely, but at this football club, what he did here, 100% an absolute legend.”

Football clubs are nothing without fans and if run properly are so much more than just 90 minutes of football. The Hamlet and Mishi's lives were entwined for so long that it's going to be hard to imagine one without the other.

There will only ever be one Mishi Morath. RIP