Letter from Goodison

Julie Brominicks

Four hours before kick-off and already the reverence. Already, supporters browsing kiosks festooned with ‘Goodbye Goodison’ scarves, taking photos of the Dixie Dean statue or trooping as if in church, around the stadium.

The outside walls of Goodison Park are a wrap-around Everton gallery. 1886; Football League founders. 1958; The first stadium to install undersoil heating. (We need it tonight with ice and grit underfoot.) 1981; Neville Southall makes his Everton debut. Legendary goalkeeper Big Nev, also played 92 times for Cymru.

Connections

Thousands of Welsh people found work in industrial-era Liverpool. Connections abound. The Evertonian is sold in Llangollen, a grizzled man oft seen from the bus in Blaenau Ffestiniog tops off his suit with a Toffees cap, while in his Machynlleth Council days, our Richie swapped out the town-clock’s red Christmas-tree bulbs for blue ones.

Meanwhile, bang up against the Howard Kendall end of the stadium, where three hours before kick-off people are shrugging on coats and getting dogs walked before the crowds come, are the terraced houses of Gwladys Street.

An open door reveals Mr and Mrs Edwards prepping the chips they sell with big smiles. And here on his doorstep, is Jimmy. ‘The man who built this terrace was Welsh’ he tells me.

Will Jimmy miss it, all this? ‘I will’ he says soberly, ‘and I’m a Liverpool fan. We don’t know what’s coming next. They say luxury apartments, a cinema,’ he brightens briefly ‘a medical centre – but I’ll believe that when I see it.’

Everton are moving to a new stadium at Bramley Moore Dock. We saw it from the ferry, an enormous shining foil pie-dish. It’s taken years to build. I’ve lost count of my ‘last trips’ to Goodison.

This time it’s real.

A Sky Sports pundit is being interviewed outside St Luke’s Church where later we’ll join the slow parade of pilgrims up the stairs and around the stalls to trace wondering fingers over old programmes and shirts. For fans like me who come rarely, a Goodison visit is hallowed.

‘Sean Dyche’s future is uncertain going into the game’ says the man from Sky Sports. Everton are wallowing near the bottom of the Premier League; the manager takes the flack.

Nearby is The Harlech Castle. ‘I assume it’s because there’s a lot of things around here named after, you know, Welsh stuff’ explains the barwoman.

On the screens, Breaking News. Dyche has been sacked. The men watch glumly. ‘They left it late’ says one. ‘It was time, but not two hours before the game.’ Rob’s phone pings. My brother, speculating on who the next manager might be. ‘You’ll end up with Rooney’ he texts. I recognise this pub, we’ve been here before, post-match and raucous.

All day I’ve been nudged by memories of previous visits. The taxi-drivers’ garage-caff where we ate fried eggs. The time we shared tinnies with a stranger. That fight. Trying to buy cider. ‘What’s that?’ confused bar staff would say, groping for possible Strongbow cans under the till.

The Salutation, closed now, where the barman said we were lucky there’d been a funeral, ‘tuck into the sandwiches.’ He was a Liverpool fan named Dixie after the Everton striker; the stick he was getting. Liverpool is like that; red and blue.

Scousers

My sister’s blue. My brother and nephews are red. Our heritage came through my Dad (blue) whose parents were Scousers. My Gran ran to the docks for news of the Titanic. Grandpa was a rope-maker’s son, Great-Uncle Harry made a vinyl of Mersey foghorns.

We move to The Spellow. ‘I wouldn’t drink the water, seriously I wouldn’t’ says the barwoman. Stephen from Formby says ‘I supported Dyche a long time, but he’s not really blue. He never said one wrong word but he didn’t lose any sleep either.’

‘This is like a Welsh place, it’s just mental’ offers his nephew Chris fondly, ‘have you seen the hot tub back there? All smashed up? It’s a dystopian mess.’ What do they think about leaving all this for the new Merseyside stadium? ‘I want to live long enough to see it’ jokes Stephen. ‘When the tide comes in the referee blows his whistle!’

Goodison. Here I have watched Leighton Baines ripple down the wing and Jordan Pickford, as wired as Big Nev was calm, involved in every beating heart of every game.

You can’t know that from TV because cameras follow the ball. Still it’s more than football. It’s bobble-hats and pies. It’s a grand old team to play for… played before each match. Sublime moments when the Goodison grumble swells into song.

Tonight we’ll watch from plastic seats, other times they’ve been wooden. I’ve had vertigo looking down from Top Balcony, and gaped up from pitch-side to a floodlit stage; the Goodison pitch is so high, the stewards recline on it like supermodels so as not to block anyone’s view.

Other stadiums are lined with waiting coaches. Everton fans walk home.

Bramley Moore Stadium will probably weather in. For now it seems plonked. Not like Goodison, rising blue from blue streets. Blue doors, blue brick, blue bins.

Nostalgia’s not for me. The time to be happy is now. Nevertheless, some losses I feel like a punch. Given my environmentalism, weirdly it’s the dirty old things I miss.

That diesel stink-hole that was Digbeth Coach Station. When the night train to Lisboa was replaced by a sleek efficient one, I actually cried.

One hour to go. Crowds surge, breath condensing. Blue scarves, blue brick. The Blue Dragon Chinese Takeaway. Food Supper Bar; blue. Goodison Convenience Store; blue.

On Gwladys Street people are queuing for chip barms and tea at the backdoor from which light illuminates billowing steam and the wall-top coils of razor-wire.

‘What will you do?’ I ask Mrs Edwards when it’s my turn. ‘What will you do when it’s gone?’ ‘We think it will be time to hang up our pinnies’ she replies sadly, but smiling. Still smiling.