West Dean FC Legend

I don't bet, darn it.

Will Downs touch the ball? Odds please?

McCarthy - don't pass the ball around in our penalty area when we are under pressure or even if you aren't sure we are. Just don't do it. Never do it again okay. Bazuna - can you stand in the right position when the opposition are attacking and be in the right position in relation to what is happening in front of you - oh yeah try and push any saves you do make wide towards the corner flags rather than the middle of penalty area. Oh yeah can you have a bit more presence in the box too, you know with crosses and stuff. Cheers. Sports Republic - just buy at least one average goalkeeper in January please?

Another forum I am on appears to be mainly his fan club. I mean some people getting fairly niggly that people aren't impressed with him, all of the goals he lets in apparently are not his fault - ever. On here I am onside with most of the posters. I used to play in goal, not at any level, Commercial Houses League, Salisbury and District, Southampton Junior and Senior, and Swindon Sunday League and a bit of Hampshire and Wiltshire - but I soon got found out in that standard. Some of you older posters might have played against me - you probably scored loads of goals too. Anyway I did play from 13 to 45, then I retired. I can tell you this. I watched games, watched highlights, and more than once, the first thing that came into my mind was, 'Why is he standing there?' The goalie's starting position is more than 50% the beginning of a save; some goals he conceded it looked like he wasn't even watching what was going on in front of him. The ones I saw had nothing to do with playing around at the back or anything like that. It's fundamentals. He has no commanding presence, this was my problem, I am the same size as him so big fellas battered the crap out of me with crosses and corners - but I wasn't a professional. He has no presence in the box, for me he doesn't even look like a goalie when he's stood there in his kit. His reactions are 50/50 at the best, the save against Wrexham was good, mind you the way he celebrated embarrassed me. I know it seems mean to say this about a human being who plays for the club I support, but in all honesty, just judging him as a professional goalkeeper only, I really, really cannot see how he made it to this level. It makes my head spin. I hope I am talking poo-poo. If it is any consolation, I do about 90% of the time.

I went to Stockbridge Secondary School (later Test Valley Comprehensive) deep in Hampshire, 80% of the kids sounded like 'Farmer Giles' but in the 70s nearly every 'sports bag' was Leeds United, I remember lads wearing Leeds football kits as their PE gear, including at least two lads, who are old men now, who support Saints and have for years. My mate Bob and I were the weirdos, we used to go and watch Saints!

I had to check, my first game was April 24th 1971, so 54 years ago, I was 9 and my late brother who was about 16 at the time, took me along with my parents' permission. I had never been to a professional football game in my life and wasn't that interested. It was Mick Jones' birthday, he scored two goals but we missed the last one as I had to go to the toilet and my brother then walked us back to the coach stop. We were from East Dean (Hants/Wilts border) so like away supporters we caught a coach to watch games every week (Buddens' two-bob coach). After that I never really went regularly until Saints were in Division Two and then I went every weekend with my mates. I was so jammy, I kept all the vouchers you got in the programmes (most people threw them away), so I saw the FA Cup semi-final and the Final. My brother couldn't get tickets and was fuming! I didn't go so regularly when I finally started playing football, playing on Saturdays and Sundays, I only went to midweek games or when we didn't have a game. I was crap and never won anything or played a good standard. Later on my mates all started getting serious with girls so stopped going so much and I didn't enjoy going on my own, saw a few games for free as one of my friend's late dad was a doorman on the players' entrance! Then when I met a woman whose judgment was as bad as her eyesight I moved to Swindon and really stopped going at all by then. When we moved to the Scottish Highlands three years ago that was it. So it's just telly for me - but at least I can turn it off and forget about some of the stuff you see.

I'm sure I posted this before but Ted MacDougall owned one of our local pubs, The Mill Arms in Dunbridge, he even played for the team on Sunday mornings and scored 8 goals in a 9-1 win, the lad that wrote the report for the paper went on about the other goal for the entire report! He was okay, a bit pro' footballery but okay, his mum and dad were really nice. Loads of Saints players used to come in every now and then. Alan Ball, Mick Channon, Peter Wells, Kevin Keegan, you name them they turned up. Most were alright to be fair, a few 'look at mes' but we did leave them alone too, rather than bother them from the minute they walked in. David Peach used to serve behind the bar, he was a nice bloke. Alan Ball tried to smarmily chat my mate's girlfriend up, she was 20 years younger than him at least, and when we told her who he was she literally had no idea who he was. My mate and her have been married for 40 years, so it didn't work anyway. Due to the Ted MacDougall connection I played in goal for The Mill Arms against Peter Osgood and Ian Hutchinson against their pub The Union Inn, we lost 7-1 if I remember correctly but I saved a penalty from someone who's brother played for Aston Villa, I can't remember his name, and Peter Osgood properly kicked the ball out of my hands on the ground after I had the ball under full control, it hurt too, but he did apologise after scoring. In years further back Mick Channon and few other players from the 70s Saints teams, as very young men, tried to chat my late mum up in Brashfield Club more than once, she was a bit glamorous to be fair.

I suppose he could say 'I've been to games but I'm not a supporter/fan' but I thought that at the time 'How is he reffing Saints games?'

Always thought the EPL was one step too far for him to be fair. Every game he seemed to be involved in some 'controversy' even my missus noticed on the TV when they said the ref had made a contentious decision, she'd say 'Is that Roger East again?'

I know for a fact Roger East supported Saints and his family did too. I've been to the Dell with him and played on a same football team as him. In his ref's bio he says he doesn't support a team, and he was 'useless as a player'. Both of which aren't true. He definitely went to the Dell with us lads and his uncles and he wasn't a bad footballer either, just a local league defender, but he wasn't bad, I was his goalkeeper. The very first game he refereed was at Whiteparish and my team, with many of the local villagers and team mates turned up to watch the game after our match was postponed. He walked on the pitch and just about everybody he knew from football was stood on the touchline to watch!

Thanks for doing this - my head was spinning, I'm not even a tech-idiot either, having started with computers and the like very early on. I'm just getting old I guess.

I have some concept designs but no matter what method I try I cannot insert the image, so you'll have to guess which ones you liked. Shirts

Despite my naff name that can't change on here I was born in the front bedroom of 8 Glebe Meadow, East Dean (61 years ago July 17), which is in Hampshire but West Dean just down the road is half in Wiltshire and half in Hampshire, both places about 12 miles from Salisbury and about 20 miles from Southampton. Buddens used to run the 'Two-Bob' coach through the villages to go the Dell every home game. It was called the 'Two-Bob' coach because from the days of my late-brother using it when he was about 8 until we moved to Lockerley 10 years later when asked how much it was, the old boy collecting the money always said 'Two-Bob'. Only problem was the coach used to park up near the away supporters coaches near the bowling green so we had to walk back that way - Chelsea in Division Two prevented that so my mate and I, the most non-hooligans you could ever met, somehow ended up running away from Chelsea fans in places in Southampton I'd never been too, we just managed to catch the coach as it was leaving. We were about 13 at the time. Another one was stopping next to the Plymouth Argyle coaches in traffic after a Friday night 1-0 win, they went utterly mental and tried to get off their coaches to get on ours and smash the windows. Again a bus almost exclusively full of young boys and old men from the villages. How tough were they?

Here's all of mine - I normally post under my real name 'David Strover' but when I went to log in the user name field kept asking for a @ symbol even though it has always been my name so it locked me out and I can't get back in - if any admins know why this is it might be helpful. This is an old account I didn't even remember having until I tried my e-mail address to log in 😂 I neither play football anymore and I was certainly not a legend for West Dean 🤨