The young Gary Roe is star-struck, but Forest are emerging as potential title challengers…

1966. The year we won the World Cup and, although a staunch Forest supporter, I couldn’t help admiring players in the England team. I also saw the likes of Pele, Eusabio and Torres, Riva and Rivera of Italy, and Lev Yashin of Russia.

I was in full support of England but I couldn’t take the players to my heart like Forest men. Ball, Hurst, Stiles and the Charltons would never take the place of the Forest players and it was back to the football season. By this time I had got my dad interested in it and he made the mistake of taking me down. It was better now as we didn’t have to catch two buses any more because we went in the car. I had also got a red and white woollen hat as well as the scarf, now I was fully kitted out.

After a successful World Cup the visitors had a new attraction. Some matches we were up against World Champions and the like. The first big one of these was Manchester United. Everyone knew about Man Utd but I thought it was because they were at the top of the table at the moment. I didn’t know all about the Munich air disaster then. What I did know was that they had some famous players in the team. Bobby Charlton and Nobby Stiles for starters. Then there was George Best, a great dribbler of the ball and the man everyone was talking about. Also Pat Crerand and Dennis Law and Alex Stepney in goal.

It attracted a large crowd again, I suppose the Manchester players were worth seeing like Matthews was in my granddad’s days. Well I was well clued up on football by now and knew for a fact this was going to be a tough match and for the first time in my life I would settle for a draw. It was also the first time in my life I joined in the Trent End’s chants and songs. This was something new as well. Behind the goal where we stood was known as the Trent End, because it was at the side of the River Trent no doubt. But I was a part of all this. It wasn’t all one sided either, the Manchester supporters did their fair share of shouting and singing. This was some atmosphere now; the better the game got the more we shouted, as the goals went in it was a kind of uproar even my dad seemed to take part in. If this is being a Forest supporter I am sold on it. I got carried away and wanted Joe Baker to play for England again, he was as good as Charlton; and wait a minute; we have a winger who can dribble. Ian Storey-Moore, he matched Best for hairstyle as well.

What a day, we outshouted them lot and beat their team 4-2. Yes beat Manchester United 4-2, we will win the league this year for sure. I wasn’t struck on having to share the Trent End with the Man Utd supporters though. All this in the papers and on TV about Manchester United and we’ve beaten them good and proper.

Even though I couldn’t go to every match I studied the reports and league tables from week to week. We talked about the Trent End and all the songs and chants,

Back to the football, I remember we played Chelsea twice in a week and lost both matches, must have been a good side that Chelsea with Terry Venables, Bobby Tambling and Peter Bonhetti in goals. I had heard that Bonhetti was a close rival to the great Gordon Banks. But what I had seen of Peter Grummitt I would have liked to see him play in goal for England. Bonhetti was nicknamed ‘The Cat’, but I had already likened Grummitt to a cat. Chelsea had pinched my idea.

For some reason my granddad couldn’t make the matches any more and my dad took over the duty, except he was becoming a bit of a Forest fan himself. The 1966/1967 season was underway and we played Chelsea again twice in August and lost down at Stamford Bridge and only made a draw up here. The next couple of matches Baker and Storey-Moore were on the scoresheet and I was promised a trip to the Manchester United match. This will be a good one, them at the top of the table and us not far behind. All the lads who I played football with in Annesley raved about Charlton, Best, Law, Stiles and Stepney. I hated to admit it but behind Banks for the England green jumper was Stepney and Bonhetti, ne’er mind Grummitt. I hated to think there were any better keepers in the land than Peter Grummitt. The song in the Trent End to some Spanish flamenco tune went “Hi hi hi hi, Grummitt is better than Yashin, Joe Baker is better than Eusabio, and Man U are in for a thrashin” and I took it literally as we sang.

On the Saturday there was a big crowd again and there were some Man U fans in the Trent End. It was very crowded and I think they locked the gates at the Trent End well before the kick off. Once in position with my dad a few steps behind there was no moving. I could just about wave my scarf as the players came out and then drape in over the white wall. I was lucky to get a place on the wall, you had to be in the ground very early on. I noticed how the Trent End filled up. First all the places on the wall were took up and then it filled out from the middle, right behind the goals. We always stood to the right of the goals and I would try to draw my dad towards the middle where the singing started but he had his limits and pointed to how far across we would go.

By now I had learned all the songs, but left out the ones like “Shit! Shit! Shit!” as a reply to “Man U-ni-ted”! I daren’t use the swear words being with my dad.

The game was a cracker. Well, at my age any game with Forest goals in was and this one ended up 4-1 to us. Chris Crowe scoring a hat trick – there was me raving about Joe Baker and Storey-Moore and a player who I remember more from last season scores a hat trick against top of the league. We must have one heck of a team here.

Come mid November it became a two horse race for the league. Us and Manchester United. The other teams that caught my eye, and that’s all they did, were Tottenham with Greaves and Gilzean; Liverpool with St John and Roger Hunt; and Leeds United with Billy Bremner and Jack Charlton.

But after thrashing the top side I saw no reason why we couldn’t win the league.

• More Forest Chronicles next week.