At West Ham in 1994 we had two
pre-season friendlies on the same night. One team went to Billericay and
I took a group to play my old club, Oxford City.
The
minute the match started, this bloke next to the dug-out started giving
me earache. He wasn’t nasty. There was no foul language, but he did
look a picture. He had a T-shirt on and shorts and every spare inch of
him was covered in West Ham tattoos. He didn’t fancy Lee Chapman, our
striker, one bit.
‘We ain’t got him up front again, have we Harry? Please don’t pick him, he’s a donkey. He’s useless.’
Better or worse? Harry Redknapp played a West
Ham supporter against Oxford City after the fan criticised Hammers
frontman Lee Chapman (pictured above)
Back in the day: Redknapp couldn't believe the fan's contribution during the friendly against Oxford City
On it went, he wouldn’t leave me
alone. I made two substitutions at half-time and one early in the second
half and now we just had the bare XI. With that, we got an injury. I
had no other option. I turned round to big mouth.
‘You’ve got some old bunny,’ I said. ‘Can you play as good as you talk?’
‘I’m
better than Chapman,’ he said. ‘Right,’ I said. ‘Get your gear on.’ He
thought I was joking. ‘What do you mean?’ he said. ‘You’re playing for
West Ham,’ I told him.
He came back, kitted up and stood on the touchline. ‘Where do you play?’ I asked. ‘Up front,’ he said.
‘Right,’
I said, ‘we’ll soon see if you’re better than Chapman.’ And on he went.
Oxford’s announcer came down and wanted to know who the sub was.
‘Didn’t you watch the World Cup?’ I asked. ‘That’s Tittishev of
Bulgaria. He scored three goals.’
‘Oh yes,’ he said, nodding wisely. ‘I thought it was him.’
Anyway,
he scored. We couldn’t believe it. He ran round the field like he’d won
the World Cup — we were killing ourselves on the touchline.
The
lads all signed his shirt and he was in the paper the next day with the
biggest grin you’ve seen. And he was right. That night, he was better
than bloody Lee Chapman.
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