Big and Clever (7 page)

You've Never Won Fuck All
from Castleton.

You Dirty Northern Bastards
from our lot.

There's real vitriol in some of the stuff that's being bandied about, but we're right in there, belting out each of the songs like our lives depend on it. Things get cranked up another notch when the Castleton fans start bringing up the history between the two clubs.

Did You Cry In Ninety-One?
they're goading over and over again.

At first there's just booing from our section but then a chant of
Wankers
,
Wankers
,
Wankers
breaks out. It's not the wittiest response, but it's having the desired effect, drowning out any sound that's coming from the Castleton lot.

By the next time I look at the timer, it's showing 87:00. The chanting is dying down. Over to the left I notice something going on in the technical area. John Whyman, the Letchford manager, is waving his arms around like a windmill, trying to get a message across, and the fourth official is heading towards the touchline flashing up the numbers 16 and 22 on his digital board. Leroy Lewton is being substituted.

“Oh shit,” Ryan says, as Leroy starts trudging off.

I turn towards him.

“What's up?” I ask.

“Have you seen who's coming on?”

I look across to the dugouts just in time to see Leroy shaking hands with his replacement. Blond hair. Blue boots. Danny Holmes. As the details of the substitution come over the PA system, the response from the Letchford fans is roughly fifty-fifty cheers and boos. The Castleton fans are a lot more certain about how they feel, launching into
Rent Boy
,
Rent Boy
.

Danny doesn't have much impact on the game. In fact for the first three minutes he's on, he doesn't even touch the ball. The scoreboard is showing 90:00, yellow digits glowing in the gloom. I didn't see how much stoppage-time the fourth official put up, but the tannoy announcer has just given it as two minutes.

Carl Butterworth has got the ball midway inside our half. The Castleton players are backing off, looking to run the clock down, and they're letting Butterworth advance towards the centre circle. All of a sudden there's movement in front of him. Danny Holmes spins away from his marker and hurtles into the Castleton box just as Butterworth launches a long ball over the top. Garry Puncheon, the Castleton goalkeeper, sensing the danger, comes flying off his line, then stops. He's stranded. The ball arcs through the air, skims off Danny Holmes's head, sails over Puncheon and nestles in the back of the net.

There's a moment of stunned silence, then pandemonium breaks out. A huge roar erupts as a tidal wave of bodies crashes down the terracing towards where Danny Holmes is standing, back to the crowd, thumbs pointing to the name on his shirt. In a split second I'm lifted off my feet and carried over to the left, then the right, then finally back to where I started. I'm vaguely aware that I've cracked my kneecap against the crush barrier but it doesn't matter. We're 1-0 up in stoppage time. As the roar dies down I look around for Raks and Ryan. Ryan's on my right, but Raks has been carried further down to the left. He's making his way back up, eyes wide.

“Danny Fucking Holmes!” he laughs.

I start laughing too, but Ryan looks serious.

“Don't count your chickens,” he says.

The game kicks off again. Castleton are attacking in desperation now, raining balls into our box, everyone apart from their keeper in our half, blue shirts everywhere. Worryingly, Letchford are defending deep rather than trying to keep things up at the Castleton end. It's a dodgy strategy, but it looks like it's going to work. The ref has checked his watch a couple of times.

One last ball is hoofed into our penalty area and Tommy Sharp rises to nod it clear. He's misjudged his jump and he heads it straight up in the air.

“Razor, you daft bastard,” someone moans.

The ball drops in slow motion. As it lands, spinning in the mud, a huge melee breaks out in our six-yard box. For some reason we just can't get it away. Paul Hood tries, but his clearance cannons off Tony O'Neill's backside and skids across the goalmouth. Jimmy Knapper dives to his right but it's too late. Mark Young, the Castleton number 18, stabs it home.

1-1.

A deafening cheer goes up from the away support. Some of them were already heading for the exits, but now they're spilling back down towards the front of the stand, dancing around, chanting
Going Up
,
Going Up
,
Going Up
.

My head is spinning. Ninety minutes of garbage and then two goals in thirty seconds.

“Bastards,” Raks whispers.

I look at Ryan. His eyes are closed and he's shaking his head.

Right next to where we're standing, a Castleton fan in his twenties starts hurling insults at us. He's gripping the wire fencing so hard his knuckles are going white. As he pulls the wire mesh backwards and forwards, his eyeballs are bulging and his neck tendons are sticking out.

“You wankers,” he's screaming. “You fucking wankers.”

There's a blur of movement as three lads from our side of the barrier charge across aiming kicks at the wire and sending the bloke back a couple of paces. I'm shocked, but before I have a chance to do or say anything, another group of Letchford lads barges past me, squaring up to the mob that's rapidly forming on the other side of the fence. I'm about to say something to Ryan when I notice that he's not there. He's jostled his way through the crowd until he's standing virtually nose-to-nose with the Castleton fans, shouting and gesticulating.

All hell is breaking loose. A phalanx of stewards is arrowing up the slope towards us. Some of the Castleton lads are trying to climb over the barrier into our section, while fans from both sides are tearing at the wire, trying to pull it down. The ordinary punters, the old blokes and the young kids, are taking evasive action now, backing away across to the left hand edge of the terracing. Out on the pitch the final few seconds of the match are being played out, but nobody's watching.

I'm just turning towards Raks when there's a sudden jolt of pain at the side of my head, just above my ear.

“Fucking hell,” I shout, hunching over, clutching my hand to where a lump is already forming on my scalp.

“What's going on?” Raks says.

There's a jingling noise and something lands on the concrete in front of me. A two pence piece. Things start to make sense.

“Bastards are coining us,” I say, rubbing my head, checking my fingertips for blood.

“You OK?”

I nod. Adrenalin is surging through me now. My heart is pounding and there's a strange metallic taste in my mouth. I feel dizzy and out of breath. The pain in my head is fading away and being replaced by something else. Anger. Raw anger. Looking past the scrum of bodies on our side of the fence and into the Castleton fans I swear I can see a bloke pointing directly at me, coin poised between his thumb and forefinger, laughing.

As another penny whistles past my ear, some sort of primeval instinct takes over. Before I can think of the implications, I've vaulted over the crush barrier and charged towards the fence. I'm down past Ryan, kicking out, aiming at the hands of the Castleton fans still gripping the wire mesh. I'm completely out of control.

Somewhere, through the chanting and the swearing, I hear the sound of the referee blowing the final whistle. Shooting a glance towards the pitch I see the players heading for the tunnel. The other three stands are already almost empty. It's just the Kop that's still heaving with bodies.

As I swing another kick towards the barrier I feel a hand on my shoulder. I spin round. It's Ryan. Raks is right behind him.

“Come on,” Ryan says, yanking at my arm. “Got to get a move on.”

The tannoy announcer is thanking us for coming and telling us that the attendance has been 5,988. He's wishing us a safe journey home. We're not interested. We've got other things to think about. We sprint back up the terracing and bundle down the stairs. All around us the gangs of Letchford lads are spontaneously joining together now, like regiments forming themselves into an army. As he pushes his way to the front, it becomes pretty clear that Ryan's one of the generals. The exit gates are open and we charge straight out, heading left towards where the away fans are starting to spill into the car park.

The battered old supporters' coaches we saw on our way in are standing over to the right, doors open and engines revving, but there's a no-man's land of about fifty yards between the exits and the buses. Some of the Castleton fans are making a run for the coaches, but fifty or sixty are standing their ground as we advance towards them. Stewards are starting to appear, but there's nothing they can do. The two sets of fans are twenty yards apart and closing. Everything seems to be happening at about a million miles an hour. Ryan's up ahead and Raks is next to me.

“Fuck,” he says. “What are we doing?”

There's no time to answer. The first punches are being thrown and Ryan's throwing them. A couple of the lads in front of me are hesitating, holding back, but I'm on autopilot. I barge my way through and run straight into a kick in the stomach. The funny thing is, I feel the impact but it doesn't actually hurt. I double over slightly and then look up at the bloke who kicked me. He's a bit older than I am, about the same height, chubby with short blond hair. Nothing special. He grins at me then swings his left fist into my cheek. There's a thud and the taste of blood in my mouth, but again, it doesn't hurt. In an odd sort of way I quite enjoy the feeling.

I'm grinning now, and the bloke who's been hitting me has an uncertain look in his eyes. I take a step forward, swinging my right fist towards him, but he puts his arms up and I hit his elbow. Straight away I launch another right and this time I connect with the tip of his nose. There's a squishing sound and blood spurts, black under the orange car park lighting. It looks unreal, like a bad special effect. I shift my weight across to the other side, driving a left uppercut into the bloke's face as he lurches forwards, trying to fend off the punches. One more whack to the back of his head and he's on the deck. It's an almost indescribable sensation. I suppose deep down every lad wants to know if he could handle himself in a fight. Well now I know. I can.

I'm about to aim a kick at the blond kid but I'm knocked sideways by a big bloke in a denim jacket, flailing backwards, trying to keep his balance. Fists and feet are flying everywhere. The air is filled with the sound of trainers scuffling on wet tarmac. In that split second I don't know if the big lad is Castleton or Letchford. Just to be on the safe side, I hit him in the side of the head. Another body comes flying past me, and this time there's no mistaking the identity. It's a Castleton fan in a replica shirt, ducking and diving, trying to avoid a volley of haymakers from a skinny Asian lad. Raks.

The whole area is in complete chaos. Trying to take it all in is like watching random frames from a film projected at five times the normal speed. I whirl round on the spot, dodging under a left hook from a gangly kid with black gelled hair, swinging my elbow at him as he stumbles to one side. I miss and nearly touch down as someone falls against the back of my legs. Spinning to my left I catch sight of a tall red-haired lad, a lad I've seen on the Parkway bus, landing a forearm smash into the face of a big bald-headed bloke. It's the chap who gave me the finger at half time. As the bald bloke staggers away, the Letchford lad sees me and winks.

The fighting is over in seconds. The Castleton lot are outnumbered and coming off worst. One by one they're breaking away and scattering towards the coaches and we're chasing after them, raining punches and kicks on anything that moves. I'm just starting to think that we're actually going to follow the Castleton fans onto the buses when a police riot van screams around the corner from the back of the Main Stand. The back doors fly open and a team of coppers in helmets and visors and body armour starts charging towards us.

Now we're the ones running. Back along the North Stand, round the corner and along the side of the Family Stand, zigzagging through the lads and dads and the family groups, our army breaking up, trying to get lost in the crowd. As I run I look around, hoping to catch sight of Raks and Ryan, and sure enough there they are, keeping pace as we sprint across the final few yards of the car park and head towards the Letchford Industrial Estate.

By the time we're a hundred yards up the road, there's no need to run any more. The coppers gave up the chase long ago. Raks bounds across towards me, gasping, out of breath, laughing like a hyena. He jumps up and puts me in a headlock.

“Tommy Boy,” he says, ruffling my hair and letting me go.

Ryan steps in between us, throwing his arms round our shoulders and squeezing, like a father with his two favourite sons.

“What did you think of that then lads?” he says.

Raks shakes his head.

“Fucking amazing,” he says. His eyes are sparkling. He looks completely off his head, high on violence.

Ryan looks at me.

“What about you Tom?”

My lips move but no sound comes out. The lining of my throat is ripped and sore from all the chanting, but that's not the reason why I'm saying nothing. I'm completely lost for words. All sorts of thoughts are swirling through my mind. I think of Zoe's text before the game. Have fun. Take care. I think of my dad this morning, telling me to keep out of trouble. I think about what's just happened. The sights. The sounds. The feelings. It's just mad. I've never experienced anything like it.

Twenty minutes ago, ten minutes even, I was a completely different person. But now everything's changed. And I just don't know how I could possibly describe what I'm feeling. One thing I do know though. I'm hooked.