MATCH 6: Being Here is Everything: Leatherhead vs. Horsham

 Leatherhead 1 Horsham 1 (Isthmian League Premier Division)
Fetcham Grove, 19 September 2020

In usual times, live football provides me with two important things: a sense of structure, and guaranteed sociality. Usually, I don't have to think much about either, as a season has such a cast-iron routine. But when Norwich announced that 1,000 fans would be allowed into Carrow Road for their Championship match against Preston North End - surprisingly, given that they'd suspended the planned return last week following new government advice - I didn't consider for a moment the possibility of applying to be part of this trial run. Only one in 25 season ticket holders would be allowed to enter the stadium, and the prospect of sitting there, surrounded by empty seats with little atmosphere, being shepherded around a one-way system by people in masks, inspired nothing but sadness. Really, I'd rather wait until it's closer to normal.

I decided instead to press on with my non-League odyssey, despite finding no-one to join me this Saturday. I wondered if going solo would make me feel unbearably lonely, as I've felt so much since lockdown began in March - and paradoxically more so since things have begun to open up but people have been reluctant to meet in large groups or go anywhere indoors, with most cultural life on hold. But I decided that going to a game might be preferable to watching the Norwich-Preston stream on iFollow, and having no company would be liberating in terms of which I chose to visit, without having to worry about what might work for someone else.

Lately, I've developed a two-tier answer to "How are you?". On the surface, I'm fine - getting washed and dressed every day, going to my studio and writing a lot, finding ways of seeing friends, playing and watching football. Underneath, I'm anxious and depressed, convinced I've lost plenty of work and worried about the short and long-term future, mourning the political project that died in December and horrified at how forty years of neoliberalism and austerity have led the UK to one of the world's worst Covid-19 death tolls, and almost certainly to more lockdowns, with normal life not returning any time soon. I returned to the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, designed to measure your feelings in the past week. One question struck me: 'I look forward with enjoyment to things:' with the options 'As much as I ever did', 'Rather less than I used to', 'Definitely less than I used to' and 'Not at all'.

 

Choosing 'Definitely less', I thought about football. I don't always look forward to Norwich games by any means - Rotherham at home on a Tuesday night in January in a season that's already petering out, for example, sparks little enthusiasm but I'll still go. Even then, after all, I'll get to see friends I've shared my experiences with for years, standing in the spot at Carrow Road that I've made my own, singing the songs I've learned over decades of devotion to the club. Being able to go to non-League football is nice, and gives me something to do in a life that currently feels like playing a computer game on demo mode, but of course I look forward to going alone to an unfamiliar team less than I do going to Norwich, with the incredible highs and lows that come with following a fairly competitive team for thirty years.

Looking at potential fixtures on The London Football Guide, helpfully sent by people reading this blog, I wondered which might provide the most interesting new experience. I decided on Leatherhead vs. Horsham for several reasons. Firstly, I went to sixth form college in Horsham in the late 1990s, but never joined my friends to watch the local club. Looking back, I wonder if that was my depression speaking: something told me I wouldn't enjoy it, despite me laughing at the chants that my classmates relayed to me from Queen Street. Secondly, I knew a little of Leatherhead's history, or at least their most famous match - their FA Cup fourth round match in January 1975, when they went 2-0 up at Leicester thanks to goals by Peter McGillicuddy and Chris Kelly, known as "the Leatherhead Lip" for his tendency to talk up the team, but tired in the second half and lost 3-2. Thirdly, it would allow another thing that I like about football in usual times, and that was the opportunity to see a new part of the country - I realised I could combine the match with a trip to Box Hill, feeling that spending time alone with nature would be a better way to spend my morning than alone at home, killing time before a game.

I took a train out of London for the first time since March (besides my recent trip to Horley), and was soon glad I had. It was a perfect day for a hike up the hill, and I was rewarded with a beautiful view from the summit, as well as the relaxing sights of the River Mole and the forest. As I stared out over Surrey, I wondered if my preference for old football - and especially that of the 1970s - over the contemporary was itself a symptom of depression. Some of my feelings are nostalgic, for sure: I love the rough tackles and the ramshackle terraces, but it's probably better for players and supporters that football is safer now. My aesthetic preference for muddy pitches runs counter to the fact that the standard is far higher now than fifty years ago, partly because of improvements to groundkeeping, but this is one example of how factors that made football more unpredictable have been weeded out in the quest to make it presentable and profitable.

 

Watching the Leatherhead vs. Leicester City footage, there is no advertising on the players' shirts, with just simple hoardings on the touchlines, rather than the logos for gambling companies or multinational corporations plastered all over today's ludicrously expensive kits that change every summer and the distracting electronic boards that assault the eye from every part of the ground. Shocks like the one Leatherhead so nearly achieved are rarer now, and the FA Cup has been devalued because bigger clubs prioritise the more lucrative Premier League and Champions League, which themselves turn up far fewer surprise winners than in the past due to the concentration of wealth and talent among a smaller number of sides. I don't think it's just depression that makes me feel like football has been hollowed out, and one of the most appealing parts of the Labour manifesto in 2019 was its focus on returning clubs to their communities, partly by dealing with exploitative ticket prices.

Having not visited a new town for a long time - probably not since that desperate December afternoon getting out the vote in Rye - I took a walk through Leatherhead. It was small, but had a few interesting features, notably Kingston House, where John Wesley preached his final sermon,and Cradlers House, dating back to the 14th century. One of the things getting to me most about the current situation is how few surprises it generates, with social circles limited to six people at a time, so with that said, seeing this brilliantly dramatic Brutalist pumping station near the ground was memorably unexpected.

On entering, I sat in the main stand and read the programme. The Tanners' glory days were in the 1970s - they made the FA Cup second round in 1975-76, 1976-77 and 1978-79, and the FA Trophy final in 1978. Fetcham Grove felt old-fashioned in a way I've rarely seen in England since the renovation and replacement of stadia after the Taylor Report, and it appealed to my nostalgic, melancholic side. (You can see the 1970s ground in this Super-8 footage of the FA Trophy semi-final first leg from 1978, shot from the main stand.) The regulars were glad to be back for Leatherhead's first competitive match of the season, making jokes together, and one of the coaching staff greeting two boys on the touchline with a smile. It was nice to be there, and it felt even better just after kick-off, when Tanners midfielder Misha Djemaili smashed in a 30-yard shot that would have graced any stadium.

From there the game settled down, with Leatherhead the better side but creating little. I began to feel distracted, constantly looking at my phone, unsure of what I wanted from it. On Twitter, I saw people fretting about the likelihood of another lockdown, updates from Norwich that provoked no feeling (despite an exciting-sounding 2-2 draw) and the online Labour conference, at which the party signalled their willingness to dump the transformative aspects of the 2019 manifesto in favour of ingratiating themselves with 'forces, family, flag'. (My friends were especially angry that Tom Watson, one of the most egregious wreckers of the Corbyn era and the one I came to despise the most, had taken up an advisory role with Betfair and Paddy Power; that reminded me that this time last year, I missed a Norwich match to go to The World Transformed, now unavoidably being held online when my comrades and I desperately need the joys of physical organising.)

Trying to keep my mind from wandering, I paid attention to the Horsham fans behind the goal. Despite having some prior connection with them, I couldn't feel they were mine as I have with Horley Town: I commuted from Horley to Horsham as a teenager, and still have several close friends from the town, but decided to stay with the home fans and cheer accordingly. I thought back to the jokey Horsham FC website that my friend Robin showed me in the computer room at Collyer's back in 1999, entitled 'Southwater Donkey Sanctuary' with profiles of the players, giving their nicknames and other details. They had a joke at the time that their right-back was schizophrenic, and fans would sing "There's only two Martin Lemprieres"; it's hard to imagine anyone doing that now, and I think it's for the best. The main remnant of the late 1990s was the Hornets' most popular song, "Give me lard in my heart, keep me Horsham", closing with "No surrender to the low fat spread" and hearing it again after twenty years genuinely gave me a cheer.

Horsham came back into the match in the second half, despite Leatherhead bringing on club legend Jerry Nnamani for his 400th appearance and hitting the post through striker Great Evans. Still, my mind drifted, as it often does during my worst depressive episodes; I was looking at my phone again when Horsham put in a cross and midfielder Jack Brivio headed in a well-deserved equaliser, and at full-time, a draw seemed like a fair result. I trundled back to Leatherhead station, satisfied in my solitude, glad that I'd dragged myself out of bed and out of London: I knew it wouldn't fix my problems, let alone those of the wider world, but I felt a good deal better for my jaunt to Box Hill - and to Fetcham Grove.