I was at Hillsborough to watch Newcastle play Sheff Wed in 1983 and 1987 and I've got to say the ground was an accident waiting to happen. In 1983, the toon were going for promotion so there must have been about 10,000 made the 130 mile journey to Hillsbrough. I can remember standing behind the goal before kick off and feeling uncomfortably hemmed in. There was a possible crush developing as more fans entered the Leppings Lane end and the old bill had us penned in in two sections behind the goal while a third, corner section remained closed. They eventually opened the corner but it left an impression in my mind that South Yorkshire plod were complacent when it came to the security of fans.
We only took about 500 the time I went there but when the disaster happened I did find myself thinking that it was only a matter of time. That bloody cage. Liverpool had also asked to be allowed to have the Kop instead as there had been some problems the year before. And let's be honest, fan saftey was never high on the priority list in those days - they wanted you in and out of the stadium and the city with the minimum amount of agravation and if you stepped out of line you knew about it.
Absolutely, Dan. Thinking back, we must have been mad for going to matches. To start with, you had to go mob-handed to away games because the chances were you'd get a slap if you didn't. And you are bang on about the old bill, I've seen loads of fans nicked for doing absolutely nothing. Compare that with what goes on today inside grounds, fans get away with so much more.
Dunno going to away games in the 70s was pretty scary, especially Glasgow, as a young sheepshagger from the sticks.
Talkshite's been terrible the last two days: yesterday it was crowing scotchmons, today it's scousers. To make matters worse I'm going to the worst curry night in the world later and will miss the last England v South Africa (T20) game of the summer. Still, it'll probably be rained off anyway. Had to put the heating on for the first time in months too.
