I was delighted to see the return of grassroots football last week. To coincide, there was a fantastic new short film released on YouTube called Bracknall. You can also find it on Twitter.
If you like football, you’ll love its main character. We all know him or her. They are your local league team, they personify it. Dedicating their life to washing kits and chasing players out of their bedrooms on a Sunday morning to turn out for the local pub or wherever the team are based.
In Bracknall, our hero spends all his time either berating his hapless players or begging them to take it even half as seriously as he does. His long-suffering wife, Niki, has to listen to his long, heartfelt speeches about the state of the game he loves and how that impacts on his beloved team, The Royal Oak.
We all know a Bracknall. I even know the characters in the team. Thereis Winney, the skilful, all-left-foot No 10 who prefers going out to training. Then there is the solid and dependable Housey, the clubman who always turns up but isn’t the best; and finally there is the overweight goal machine Tommy, who knows only one thing and that is hitting the back of the net.
I played for the Dial M for Merthyr fanzine team in my late teens and early twenties. The smell of Ralgex and raw earth was my Sunday morning. Most lads were always more than slightly hungover. A cigarette before the game, for many, was often described as “a good way to get the lungs going” and my favourite moment was always the pre-whistle shouts of “let’s get f**kin’ into these!” with loud aggressive clapping. I honestly can’t remember anyone (from either side) ever saying anything about actually trying to play football.
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One time during a hard-fought Merthyr league game, as a cocky teenager, I (stupidly) put a ball through a local hard man’s legs and I could hear instantly (and soon feel) his howl of outrage as he ran after me and toe-punted me square up the arse. This was still the late 80s and so he received only a yellow card and a stern telling off for his violent outburst, and I was told by our manager to cut out the nonsense. I spent the rest of the game trying to avoid not getting cut in half if I went within four yards of the ball. I have never showered, changed and got out of a dressing room so quickly.
I have a great mate, Alex, who lives for it. He has taken more of a back seat now and just watches the local team, Aberfan, but there was a time when he managed our local pit village pub team CPD Llew Goch (that’s Welsh for Red Lion). One night we were on a Wales trip to Scotland and walking in the early hours to a club when he put his arm around me and said he fancied they could win something that season. He looked up to the heavens and said: “If we do, Jon, I’m gonna get an open-top bus to take us through the village because the boys would have deserved it.” The team would have known he meant it and it is why they loved him.
Those men and women who take on that role become so much more than just a manager. They are the heart of the community. They are friend, therapist, confidant, psychiatrist and, most importantly, the true believers among us. They are forever on the phone organising and fixing. The ones who attended the neverending meetings. The ones who fill out the forms. The ones who arrange training and transport. The kits. The nets. The keys for the council changing rooms. They have to put up with the sulks, the petty arguments when someone is dropped and the constant moaning about collection of subs. I love them.
That is why I love Bracknall and I would have got out of my bed, still half-cut, on a Sunday, waving away any offer of toast to stumble to his car and play. I am so glad they are back. They are football.
Jonny Owen & Friends is on talkSport on Sundays from 9am
