Roslyn Dee
My long-standing love affair with Liverpool
People around every corner They seem to smile and say We don’t care what your name is, boy We’ll never turn you away “Ferry Cross the Mersey” (Gerry Marsden)
AS I raised a glass on that night of nights when Liverpool finally claimed the Premiership title after a three-decade drought, the memories came flooding back. Not just of the football club that I have revered all my life, but of the city and its people too. A city that took me to its heart when I lived there as a student for six years from the mid-70s. A city that takes everyone to its heart, that welcomes you in and surrounds you with warmth. So the memories flashed through my head like an ever-changing kaleidoscope as I toasted Jurgen Klopp and his merry men.
There I am at first, a young slip of a thing, strolling back to the university halls of residence along Penny Lane (yes, that one) from the cinema in Aigburth. Now I’m at the summer fair in Sefton Park, being persuaded on to the Big Wheel or thrown around on the Waltzer. Then it’s flashbacks to the parties, some of the most memorable held in the bowels of the Liver Building down on the waterfront at Pier Head, the building’s famous ‘birds’ perched, sentinel-like, then and now, above the city that they so define.
Another twist of the kaleidoscope and it’s early December 1980 and I’m in a mini-market on Smithdown Road. Radio City is playing and on comes a news bulletin; John Lennon is dead. The shop falls silent, customers look disbelievingly at each other and the woman behind the counter starts to cry.
There’s my graduation day too, in the Philharmonic Hall, and afterwards in Abercromby Square, my father in his well-cut suit, my mother resplendent in a bright red dress complete with navy hat and gloves.
And then there’s Anfield, for so many of my Liverpool memories involve the football team and being in the Kop; like the time I fainted from being squashed against a barrier. And as I think back, dredging up snippets from the seabed of my memory, all the famous names, the goals, the triumphs and disasters all wash over me and make me smile.
The first time I went to Liverpool I was nine years old. I remember being excited. I remember having toothache. And I remember the sight of one particular man as I stood in the crowd with my father that day in Goodison Park as Everton (my father’s lifelong passion) went head to head with Liverpool in the final of what was then called the Charity Shield. August 13, 1966. League champions (Liverpool) versus FA Cup winners (Everton). King of the castle stuff.
And despite the spectacle on the pitch, and the World Cup being paraded before kick-off (England had just won the tournament), it was a man stomping up and down the touchline that fascinated me. Shouting, gesticulating, living every minute of the match with his players. Was he happy or was he angry? I had no idea. Who was he?
Bill Shankly. Manager. Scotsman. Socialist. Demigod.
And so began my love affair with Liverpool. First the club, and later the city.
My second visit was almost a decade later when I pitched up at the University of Liverpool in October 1975. Why Liverpool? Well, it had a double-honours course that few other universities offered. That’s what I trotted out when people asked. Which was true. Kind of.
“I know why you’ve chosen Liverpool,” pronounced my mother. “It’s the football. That Bill Shankly.”
I denied it. Anyway, Bill Shankly had already resigned. But my mother knew what she was talking about for she herself had a connection, of sorts, with Shanks.
This is what happened. When I was 14 and an Anfield obsessive I wrote to the great man. When no immediate reply was forthcoming my mother wrote to him herself to tell him how much the club meant to me, telling him about the posters all over my bedroom walls, the notebook I kept with all the results recorded, and the fact that (mortification!) I was mad about the team’s centre-forward, Alun Evans. (Blond and gorgeous, in fairness.)
About 10 days later a letter arrived. The red liver bird crest on the top left-hand corner of the envelope. “Dear Roslyn,” the letter inside began, before thanking me for my support. “Best wishes, Bill Shankly,” it ended. Fairy dust through the letter-box.
So I hot-footed it there in 1975 and I lapped it all up — the city, the freedom, the Scouse wit, the football, the music. George Melly playing in a wine bar on Myrtle Street, Elton John at the Empire, and the Beatles — in spirit — everywhere.
I cried when I left in the summer of 1981. The Toxteth riots were raging and the city had lost its optimism. And I cried again eight years later in Dublin as chaos spiralled into tragedy and the horror of Hillsborough unfolded live on the television screen.
Last year I went back. To visit the old haunts and explore the new.
On that sunny February day I wandered down Penny Lane, had lunch at the regenerated Albert Dock and walked around the now-transformed city centre shopping area. The years fell away and I found myself back in the land of remembrance.
Bill Shankly was famous for his quips. With apologies to my late father, here’s my particular favourite: “When I’ve nothing better to do, I look down the league table to see how Everton are getting along.” Wit and warmth. Like the city itself.
It’s another quote, however, this time from Kenny Dalglish, that I most relate to. “I may have left Liverpool,” said the former player and manager, “but the city and club will always be part of me.”
‘I may have left Liverpool, but the city and club will always be part of me’