The Long, Long Road to Wembley

I remember during the late 1960's when the highlight of the week was going to watch Romford football club hearing older supporters reminiscing about the day in 1949 when the team played at Wembley Stadium in front of 95,000 people in the televised F A Amateur Cup final. Surely I thought that day would be repeated but this time I would be there in person. Fast forward 10 years and the team would be defunct and the magical (to me anyway) town centre ground would be a housing estate. But what fate would await the victors of that final, Bromley? Also at the same time that I was having those dreams of a glorious day out at Wembley, Dave Roberts was staring misty eyed at black and white photographs of his team's triumph hanging on the wall of the tea hut at Hayes Lane wondering too if his local team will ever it make it back there. They would but it would take a long long time.

In this wonderfully authentic and honest account Dave charts the highs and lows (mainly lows) of following his team as well as narrating his own mainly youthful autobiography. All the obsession, quirkiness, disappointment and blind faith associated with supporting a non league football team is here. In experiences that will immediately be recognisable to all such fans we read of after travelling several hours and turning up to a ground only to see the game has been postponed, queuing for that all important half time cup of tea and (for us older fans) standing under the alas departed old oak tree at St Albans.

A whole host of wonderful eccentric characters that seem to be drawn to the non league scene are encountered here. At the heart of it all is I suppose a sense of community and belonging that is often overlooked in the multi billion pound industry that modern football has become. I have not previously read Dave's books or indeed seen the film adaption based on his writing but this book gets to the essence of what it is to be a fan of a less fashionable team and also can be viewed as a coming of age story. This book in my opinion can take its place along side the likes of Fever Pitch as one of the best of the fan genre. Well worth a read.