Jim's column 27.6.2020

Many of us have lost friends and relations in the last few months, some from Coronavirus, some from other causes. The CCFPA lost a valuable committee member David Kite who had been such an important figure in Coventry local football for many years and I also lost a close friend, Geoff Moore, who I'd watched the Sky Blues with for almost 50 years, who passed away just before the lockdown.

City fan Paul Garrood lost his father Thomas on the 30th May and sent me a nice tribute that I promised to publish.

Paul writes: He was an avid Coventry City fan who had a season ticket all his life (he was aged 94!) His first season ticket was in 1937, when he was 12-years-old and basically had one every year since, even in the many times of struggle, minus the war years (he was in Welsh Guards for four years) and last year when the club moved to Birmingham and he couldn’t travel. It’s probably very rare to have a season ticket holder for 80 years!

It’s a family joke that he would be famous for shouting “wake up ref” at the start of every game and would have you believe every referee was against Coventry in every game!
It’s obviously a great shame he’s not here to see them promoted this season, although he really enjoyed the ITV re-run of the 1987 cup final, as did most of the city.

He was a Coventrian, born in Hillfields, and has always had the Coventry Telegraph (and the Pink!) for the sole reason of reading the football reports, football news and your column reminiscing on the history of the club.

My dad's parents both died very early, by the time he had turned 16, so he was in a house with his two sisters and two brothers, a stones throw from Highfield Road, in Grantham Street. He was the “father” of the five, with his sister Joan, acting as “mother”. Her son was actually John Bradbury, the drummer in The Specials, who always told me that my dad was so good to him when he was young, like a second father.

He lived in Coventry all his life and worked at Peugeot (and all its previous names) for 50 years!

My Dad was always late, so much so that at work he was called 7.33 Garrood, as he clocked in everyday at the last minute before you would be docked pay! The funny story from Highfield Road, was that he parked his car outside my house in Stratford Street, and would always be rushing down the road to try (unsuccessfully) to make kick off time. One night game, I’d noticed he was rushing as usual , but I thought it was strange, because it was 45 minutes before kick off! When I asked him later, he had the wrong kick off time and thought he was 15 minutes late, when actually he was very early.

Thinking of the football over the years, he really liked George Curtis and George Hudson from the 1960’s, and super Tommy Hutchison, and loved the Ernie Hunt/Willie Carr donkey kick that was outlawed. More recently he liked Dion Dublin and Oggy. A game that sticks in my mind, for him, me and my brother Carl (who sat with dad at games for the last 40 years) was the 5-4 win v Norwich in 1977, with the Blyth penalty save and a wonder goal from Ian Wallace.

His main affection, more than any player, was for Jimmy Hill, he absolutely loved him and had so much admiration for what he did for “his” club. He even went to the Ricoh to see Jimmy unveil his own Statue.

This is my final column of the season and I hope you have enjoyed our trips down Memory Lane. I have still quite a few unanswered questions but keep them coming over the summer and I will answer them when I return at the end of the summer.