A CHAMPION DAY ON THE HILL

Published in the National League South game v Cheshunt Saturday 27th August 2022  We won 3-1 in front of 607

‘Champion Hill Street Blues’ used to be the old Dulwich Hamlet fanzine. A title that perfectly summed up the club at the time.

I remember arriving at their old place where Sainsbury's now is; a fabulous old ground was now an old relic, like a house inhabited by an elderly relative who couldn’t cope anymore. Where thousands had once come to cheer on their team, now it was all crumbling terraces with spectators sparsely dotted about.

Their new ground was never much to shout about but then with crowds of 100 there wasn’t many to shout for them. But that was then. 

Hill Street Blues? Not anymore, with attendances that some Football League clubs would be envious of and street food, beer and portaloos on every corner, it’s feels more like Glastonbury festival. So it seemed apt that Slough fans arrived with a musical ensemble, with Nick the Trumpet managing to play one handed while holding a pint, rattles from the 1950’s and that big flag that really will have someone's eye out one day. Oh and of course we had bagged ourselves a very big wheelie bin.

I took my little ‘un to his first floodlit game on the Tuesday before. 10 is such a great age for dads, they want to hang out with you still and enjoy everything. So I had to persuade him that yes wearing a Slough Town top in Brighton will certainly be different and make you stand out, but let’s get a Brighton one as well just in case.

Football as they say, is a funny old game, and for most of the Chelmsford match we threw the kitchen sink at them but it just wouldn’t go in. At Dulwich it was the reverse and we really should have been dead and buried by half time.

Doing our own market research, we questioned some of the youngsters why they support the team in purple and blue. The main answer: because there were so many fit people at Dulwich games!

Slough is more hip replacement than hipster but really the terrace catwalk belonged to Alan Brown whose Gregg's socks were proudly tucked into his snazzy amber submarine coloured trainers. Let’s just say the crowds parted as he made his way behind the Slough goal. We like to think in admiration.

When the second half came, Slough being Slough managed to find two goals and win the game.

I missed Ben Harris waving the flag on the pitch, and the musical encores that threatened to drown out our managers post match interview. We had to leg it across London to catch the last train home as the national train strike had seriously disrupted services. Which is what strikes are all about. But even without strikes, our railway system is a creaking, expensive mess. Along with it seems all our once publicly owned services. Our water companies had pumped sewage along most beaches on the south coast over the weekend, while billions of gallons is wasted through leaks. But if you stick on a hose, you will get fined. Inflation is rampant, food prices are through the roof and as for electricity bills. Even the Telegraph talks of “the coming collapse of basketcase Britain”.

Ruled by toddlers who dream of a rose tinted past and wrap themselves in Union Jack flags to look all patriotic while ironically selling off our assets to foreign governments and corporations. 

Meanwhile our future prime minister complains of solar panels in fields that should be growing vegetables, even thou no one wants to pick them, while we are staring a climate emergency down the barrel. (and you numpty, you can grow veg or have farm animals and solar panels in the same field at the same time).

What we’ve done in England for the past decades is stopped investing in the future while people at the top have creamed off the profits. To use the water companies as one example. Between 1991 and 2019, shareholders were paid £57 billion in dividends nearly half what the water companies spent on maintaining and improving their infrastructure.

Now its coming home to bite us in the bum. And wallets.

And there’s the rub. Dulwich started imagining a different future for the club a while back. The late great Mishi, who now has a named scarf hung proudly behind the Dulwich bar, would tell anyone who would listen that the hipster label was easy to throw around when the club had spent years working on ways of building up the crowds. And now it had come to pass and we can all learn lessons from them. Well, except of course when it comes to fashion.

Away days like this is what football should be about. You hum it, we’ll hit it, as we handed out instruments to home fans and got them to join in. Clubshop Sue perfectly summed up another Champion Day at Champion Hill “just how football should be......fun.”