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Trial for Aston Villa – July 1984

I  had played for Wells City FC since joining them in the U12s.  We were now U14s.  As U12s we had won the League and Cup and had been a really good side.  As U14s we were declining slightly, but still had some very good players and were run by a man called John Cook.

John Cook had found himself a job as scout for Aston Villa.  He arranged for myself, Steve Wilkinson from Wells, and a lad from Bridgewater Tigers called Neil Smart, to go to Villa for a 3-day trial.

I once overheard my Dad telling someone that he had definitely been more enthusiastic about receiving the letter of invitation than me.  Which was, truly, about the size of it.  I was proud and pleased to be asked, but deep down (in fact, not even that deep down at all, more shallow down), I knew I wasn’t good enough, and I was scared about going away and being with strange boys who I knew would be more confident than me.

This was in the summer of 1981, immediately after Villa had won the Championship.  I went to Villa in August and the experience was something that I will always remember.  Should I be lucky to live long enough to see any of my grandchildren I will undoubtedly recount the story to them.  ‘See, grandad really was quite a handy footballer back in the day!’  I remember that my shyness meant that it really wasn’t easy though.

Some of the details are slightly blurred.  I think I was there for 3 nights, but it may have been four.  Did we have a day of training between the two games we played, or not?   Timetabling aside however, many of the memories remain crystal clear.

I took a train from Bristol Temple Meads to Birmingham New Street.  I was met there by someone whose name, and indeed everything else about them, escapes me.  I was taken to a house in Sutton Coldfield where I would stay.  Less a luxury hotel and more a basic terraced house in which the basement had been converted into a couple of dormitories.

There were a couple of apprentices staying, plus four or five of trialists, of which I was one. Neil from Bridgewater Tigers was one of the others and Steve Wilkinson from Wells had gone the week before.  On that first evening, no-one said too much, I guess all the trialists were nervous and I was in a room with about 4 others.  A couple of other lads, apprentices rather than trialists and therefore several steps up the pecking order, had the luxury of their own rooms. There were also some older apprentices – maybe 16 or 17 years old – who stayed the odd night that week I was there.

On the first morning we were woken up early and given breakfast, before a minibus came to pick us up and take us to the training ground.  We had to get into this bus each day.  On the way we stopped to pick up some other lads and the bus was absolutely crammed by the time we were at the ground.  I remember one lad in particular coming on board; he looked about 17 and just seemed so self-confident, he was quite cocky and resolutely chirpy.  He was self-confident with good reason as it turned out – this was the winger Mark Walters who went on to have a long career at Villa, Liverpool and Rangers amongst others.

At that time, apprentices could be signed on from the age of 14 and that is what we, the trialists, were aiming for. At the ground we met up with some other young apprentices, so we ended up with a group of about 12 boys. On the first morning we did some skills training and some running. The standard was high and I just tried to do enough not to look like a total idiot.  In some simple ‘keepy uppy’ sessions I remember how impressed I was with the standard of the other boys.

On that first afternoon we had a game against Worcester City.  The moment when I was handed a real Villa shirt to wear for the game was both thrilling and absolutely terrifying.  Me in a real Villa shirt! As worn by the team that had, only months previously, become Champions of England!  I was all too aware of the privilege of this and felt brilliant, but there was also the feeling that I was nowhere near good enough to be afforded this honour; did they not know the mistake they were making?  Were they really sure about this?

We played the game on the Villa training ground.  I know that the game was close, and we might even have won, although I can’t actually remember.  For most of the game, I think I did OK, concentrating on doing the simple things, and passing to one of our better players if I got the ball.  In the second half I made a mistake that I think cost us a goal; our goalkeeper had passed the ball to me and after dallying around with it, I tried to pass it inside to a centre half.  A schoolboy error.  A Worcester player intercepted my weak pass and went on to score.

After the game we were driven back to our hostel, where we were given tea immediately, even though it was only about 4pm.  I forget what the main course was, but for pudding I remember we had tinned peaches with ice cream.  This was the pudding for all three evenings at the hostel.  It was lovely, and I thought, ‘if this is good enough for potential pro-footballers, it’s good enough for me,’ and so was born a lifelong love of tinned peaches, with ice cream or custard as optional extras if I’m feeling really decadent.. 

The following day was spent at the training ground and the coach talked about the game we had played the previous day.  He calmly pointed out my mistake.  He didn’t bollock me, which was what I had been expecting, he just explained at quite normal volume what I might have done better.  It was a long day at the ground, with two sessions interrupted by lunch break, though sadly without tinned peaches.  I remember one drill, that I have subsequently used as a youth coach though: it is to practice finishing inside the penalty area. There is one striker and a goalkeeper; on each of the four corners of the penalty box a player or coach stands, with a supply of balls. They take it in turns to feed a ball into the striker who, either first time, or after one touch, must try to score. The ‘passers’ fed in must vary in height and speed so that the strike is challenged.  This was hard but fun.

On that day the First team were also training at the ground.  From our changing room you could see into the changing room being used by the first teamers.  In the morning as we were getting changed Mark Walters popped in and asked whether anyone would wear a new pair of boots that he had just bought in order to ‘break them in.’  He joked with some of the apprentices in our group who knew him.  As we were waiting to go out to train, just milling around outside the changing rooms, we were joined by a young first teamer called Andy Blair.  He had just joined Villa from Coventry City and started chatting to the lads, asking how we were, wishing us luck.  He did some keepy-upppies with us.  He only stayed a few minutes, but in that time he was a God to me.  The environment was daunting and competitive, but here was this first team player going out of his way to make us feel better.

 Andy Blair was mainly a squad player for Villa, playing 33 games during the period 1981-1984. Wikipedia tells me that the highlight of his time at Villa (with the exception presumably of speaking to a shy, small, awestruck me), was playing in the side that beat Barcelona 3-0 in the European Super Cup.  I don’t remember that game, although I tried to follow his career, and on the odd occasion that I saw him on TV, he looked like a tidy, ball playing midfielder.

During the lunch-break, I could see into the first team dressing room. The first teamers had finished for the day and were getting changed.  The manager, Ron Saunders, had his back to me, and was talking to the players.  Tony Morley, the winger, was facing me and I also recognized Des Bremner and Dennis Mortimer.  When Ron Saunders turned to leave the dressing room, I was surprised to see Tony Morley making quite a dismissive gesture with his hands towards his manager.  I kind of idolized Tony Morley as he was a skilful, mercurial winger who, incidentally, had just had a great season.  I naively wondered why one of Ron Saunders’ players was being so disrespectful to him, clearly unaware at 14 of the realities of most dressing rooms.  Ron Saunders of course had a reputation for being a difficult, truculent sod, as well as being a successful football manager.

There was one member of our group, a lad called Phillip Robinson, who was starting to stand out. He was already signed on as an apprentice, and was staying in the hostel with us. At the hostel, whilst most of us shared one dorm, he had his own room. I figured that he had somehow earned this privilege, although I wondered why he didn’t want to be in amongst the other lads.  At the same time, he seemed quietly self-confident, able to join in any banter, to hold his own, without ever starting anything. At night, he would take himself off to bed early. In terms of ability, there were one or two other lads in the group who looked good but no one played with the same intensity as Phillip Robinson, he did every single thing with the utmost seriousness and to the highest possible standard.  His commitment to becoming a professional footballer was evident and he did indeed make the grade. He subsequently turned fully professional at Villa and played 3 games for them, before moving to Wolves and starting a long career in which he played over 550 games.  Several years later I saw him play for Notts County against Bristol City at Ashton Gate.

By contrast, by the end of that second day I was finding the whole thing quite tough; I was out of my depth both as a footballer and as a young man, and was looking forward to the end of the trial and to being back home, firmly within my comfort zone.

I was excruciatingly shy and didn’t say much. Aside from the first evening, when the group were a bit nervous, during the evenings talk would inevitably gravitate towards sex, or at least a 14 year old’s understanding of sex.  A couple of the lads boasted about (possibly quite unlikely) sexual experiences they’d had.  I’d barely had any experiences with girls, let alone sexual ones, so I just squirmed away in silence, hoping to get through these conversations with some credibility intact.  On the second or third evening, a few of the older apprentices, probably 17 year olds, were staying at the hostel. One of them talked in hushed, rapt tones of how, on a club trip to Sweden, he had, during a disco one evening, nibbled the lip of a Swedish girl.  Some of the triallists hung on to his every word, mesmerized, and braved their own comments about their experiences.  I remember that Phillip Robinson appeared to remain coolly indifferent to the whole thing and I just remained silent.

The third evening at the hostel was a long one. We had been back early after a days training, and had finished our tea by late afternoon. There wasn’t really anything to do at the hostel so we went out for a walk around the local streets. We were led by one of the trialists, a floppy fringed striker who was a native of Birmingham, and a Blues fan to boot.

He was a talented footballer and a happy go lucky guy and unlike Phil Robinson, you sensed he would just not make it as a pro.  He was too interested in girls and in being one of the lads.  After a somewhat aimless walk we all returned to the house and went to our dorm and chatted. This was the kind of situation I hated; I was on the end of, what, in hindsight, was some mild banter about being a bit posh, straight laced and quiet.  What was worse was that I had no great footballing talent to distract them with so just sat there and took it.  Quietly.

On the last day of the trial we had a final game, this time against Birmingham City.  We had a short training session in the morning and then played the game in the early afternoon.  I remember travelling in the bus to the ground, which I think was owned by Birmingham City. The floppy fringed striker, who knew everything about the local football scene somehow knew that we would be playing against boys older than us, including some players who were already signed on at Birmingham. To give us a chance we also had a couple of apprentices playing for us.

It had been warm all week, but on this day it was extremely hot. The ground was rock hard and bereft of grass.  Every tackle grazed the skin. I don’t remember too much about the game, except that it hurt when I fell over.  I knew that and I knew that I would be going home later so just did my best to get through it.  One of the Birmingham apprentices was Carl Saunders, who, later in his career became a hero at Bristol Rovers.  Wikipedia tells me that he never played for Birmingham’s first season, instead starting his pro career at Stoke City.  I also note that he was almost two years older than me; on that day he was certainly a man amongst boys, a physical goliath in comparison to my puny 14 year old frame.

Our apprentices and Phillip Robinson manfully kept us in the game and prevented a total drubbing. The floppy haired striker’s Dad came to watch, and strangely, was allowed to hang around the players before the game and at half time. I tried to cadge some Vaseline from him at half time, to protect my knees from being lacerated by the ground, but, in a bizarre example of touchline parenting lunacy he seemed to take offence to this. For some odd reason he was seemingly only interested in helping his own son, not this useless trialist, so the lacerations continued throughout the second half and the Vaseline remained under lock and key in his bag..

By the end of the game I was more exhausted than I had ever felt in my life and I could barely stand.  We left for home after the game.  The coach, whose name I quite unforgivably forget, was helpful and kind and supportive to the end.  He came to see several of us off at New Street station.  I was catching a train with Neil Smart form Bridgewater.  Before the train arrived, coach gave us each a £5 note as a thank you for coming, an action which to this day I still find incredibly touching.

About two weeks after returning I got the rejection letter from Villa, suggesting I needed to work on my basic skills.  I wasn’t disappointed and honestly I had expected it.  Any sort of success with my football meant putting myself out there for the world to see just what I was capable of, or not.  It was easier to accept failure as I didn’t have to step on stage and could stay in the wings.

I did work on my basic skills though – hour upon hour of kicking a football around whenever I had the chance.  In my 20s I was still practising my basic skills so that by the time I was in my late twenties my first touch was as good as anyone’s.  In the words of Marlon Brando, ‘I could have been a contender.’  Perhaps only 15 years too late.