Sock it to 'em Barnet (From Times Series)
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Dennis Signy OBE was a former wartime cub reporter on the Hendon and Finchley Times at £4-a-week and became group editor for 17 years in the late Sixties. He was a national press football writer for five decades, is author of several football books and director of Barnet FC. |
Sock it to 'em Barnet
4:14pm Wednesday 28th October 2009
Modesty has always precluded me having a personalised car number plate. Believe that and you'll believe anything.
Dave Wilding, my travelling companion on away trips with Barnet FC, has "Big Dav" on his number plate ... and I sat alongside him on the M1 en route to Chesterfield last season as an industrious copper pulled him over and inflicted a £60 fine on him.
Don't laugh, but my current pride and joy are a pair of personalised dark blue socks. They are inscribed "Dennis" across the ankles and underneath, along the feet, the words "Charming, Interesting, Stimulating, Sensuous".
Before you can get out the words "Big Head", let me assure you that the socks were a gift... I didn't write the script.
I'm certainly not looking a gift sock in the mouth... I unearthed the gift pair and wore them for the first time the day Barnet FC played Darlington in a League 2 game at Underhill.
At half time, with the score at 0-0 and bottom club Darlington having missed a few good chances, I considered sitting bare footed in the second half. Barnet finally won 3-0 and the realisation came that the socks are the key to Ian Hendon's team reaching the third round of the FA Cup in January en route to a Wembley glory day.
I know a good omen when I wear one. Years ago, when I was writing books about West Ham United and I was a disciple of manager Ron Greenwood and his No 2, John Lyall, was a good friend, the Hammers drew West Bromwich Albion away in the third round of the Cup.
I asked the Sunday Mirror, who were paying me £100 a time for match reports, if I could cover the game at The Hawthorns.
I carefully selected my gear and told Mrs S I would wear the red roll-neck sweater that daughter Julie had brought me for Christmas. I decided against having a haircut until the Hammers were knocked out and set off for the game resplendent in red sweater, dogtooth check jacket and black slacks. The score was 1-1, with a Wednesday replay in prospect.
Arriving home, I instructed Mrs S to lay out the same "lucky" gear for the replay. "You can't wear that sweater", she said ... and pointed out that, instead of Julie's present, I was wearing an old red sweater with a cigarette burn hole in a central position.
Notwithstanding, I wore the same sweater for the replay and at the fourth, fifth and sixth round victories for the Hammers.
The semi-final was at Leeds United's Elland Road ground and I took younger son Richard with me. I put extra grease on my by now shaggy hair.
Well, you guessed it. West Ham won and in the lounge at Elland Road afterwards I exchanged embraces with Jack Petchey, at that stage a West Ham director but later to be chairman of Watford.
The next day John Lyall was on the phone relaying the following conversation in the West Ham coach as they left Elland Road.
Jack Petchey: "Did you see Dennis at the game?"
John Lyall: "No".
Jack: "Looking at him, I think he must have fallen on hard times".
Don't laugh. West Ham won the Cup and I've got a picture of Mrs S and I cuddling it at the reception at Quaglino's afterwards.
You don't believe in omens? Tough. I'm sticking with the lucky socks. Perhaps, if we progress, they'll stick to me.
Oh, I nearly forgot the punchline. Guess who Barnet play in the Cup next week?It's Darlington again.
It's writ in the stars. Sock it to 'em Barnet.
