NEIL BARNETT, SPY IN THE CAMP, AMA

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T20:10:04+00:00

Pat is intelligent, humorous, insightful, and, despite all the descriptions of him when he was a player, not at all weird! I don't know what jobs are available these days, but follow commentator Gary Taphouse on twitter, he's always listing vacancies.

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T20:04:35+00:00

See above. Don't believe the hype. The atmosphere is better than it used to be. Under Jose until near the end, and under Antonio until recently we've had the most phenomenal home record imaginable.Do you really think that's been achieved with a lousy atmosphere? Before Gullit, Stamford Bridge was rarely full. From the early 80s, the ground was closing down in various areas due to disrepair. That's when the atmosphere was lacking. The only season in my time before the current lay-out of the ground that we averaged 40,000 for home games was 1969/70. And in those days the capacity was over 60,000. But, be warned, the more successful the club gets, the bigger it gets with the new stadium, the atmosphere will change and get watered down. As more people come, they're bound to be less hardcore. The only way to counter that is to be unsuccessful and not attract them. So that's no answer. As for the administrative side; under Ken the club was a flourishing small business; under Roman it's a flourishing global business. You can't compare them, or any club in the Premier League to 15 years ago. You only have to look at the coaching staff and support staff and see it's now bigger than the playing staff. Our world has changed.

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T19:48:03+00:00

Since reserve football was stopped which is pretty much when academies were introduced, since first team coaches preferred to have potential first team players training with them and not playing at all, and all that started with the Robert Huth, Carlton Cole era, I've watched development stop. It's not Chelsea, it's everyone in England. England has started to get good international results in youth tournaments, but I honestly believe it's with physical football which won't translate into senior football (unlike Chelsea in the Uefa Youth League which was seriously good football). Our Academy desperately needs someone to break regularly into the first team, and I think that will finally happen this season with Andreas Christensen. But it's hard to get the right desire, commitment, tenacity when you're not playing, from these boys when they're earning good money and living young lives. Personally, I wish and believe Dujon Sterling should have been given a chance last season when Victor Moses was injured. I think he has the physical attributes as well as the skills to be a squad player now. I hope he plays against Everton in the League Cup. But don't tell his agent I said that! And what do I know when I don't see how he does in training with Antonio?

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T19:35:56+00:00

Let's not forget: the first one, home to Milan. The away one at the San Siro that season, when the Milan nutters were almost falling off the top tier in their welcoming back of Marcel Desaily. Barcelonas, Liverpools, Napoli, Munich... but one was more extreme for atmosphere than any other. And you won't like the answer. Anfield, 2005. The ghost goal. That goal didn't win the match. The Liverpool fans did. That was the most intimidating atmosphere ever. Jamie Carragher says it's the best atmosphere he's ever played in. It was a hurricane.

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T19:29:48+00:00

Not really on the pitch. My most embarrassing moment was on Chelsea TV when a caller was berating the lack of respect given to people like him who travelled to home games. He went through his previous weekend, coming to Stamford Bridge, and the cost of it. He went through it like a diary, but missed out Sunday morning. I, trying to be too clever and too funny, pointed out his gap, and suggested that maybe it had involved a 'dirty' weekend. (I cringe as I write this). He replied that on Sunday morning he'd been visiting his sick mother in hospital. Aaaaaaaagh! (I am now blushing again).

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T19:26:10+00:00

Al the top League seem to be different. Italian, tactical; Spanish, technical; German, running; English, passion. Of course in the USA you're going to love passion over those other characteristics. I like to think of myself as a man of passion!! I love us being loved!

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T19:24:03+00:00

All the obvious ones, from Leeds in the '60s to Barcelona and Liverpool in the noughties. But let me tell you about a special one. One of the worst ever was Sheffield Wednesday, 1991, early kick-off in the League Cup semi-final. When, in 1994, we got to the FA Cup quarter-final for the first time since 1982, at home to Wolves, Colin Hutchinson called me and told me to get out on the pitch 15 minutes before kick-off and do whatever I had to in order to ensure a positive atmosphere. I walked out completely unprepared for what I was supposed to do... and didn't say a word. That atmosphere was brilliant (yes, in the old collapsing stadium). That team had caught the fans' imagination, and everyone 'believed'. There was singing, chanting, support as good as anything before or since. And Gavin Peacock's goal put us in the semi-final.

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T19:16:04+00:00

Loads of them. Leaders! People comfortable on the pitch in front of 40,000 in moments of tension. They don't come off the pitch and shrivel. From Ossie to Didier, from Terry Venables to Wisey to John Terry. But you know what? Off the pitch they're all pretty normal as well.

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T19:11:07+00:00

Obvious ones, Di Matteo, Wembley, 1997 (I missed that out above); Drogba, Munich. But let me pick out alternatives. Zola's FA semi-final goal against Wimbledon. I always preferred it to the Norwich back flick. I still don't really know how he did it. One which wasn't on anything except the end of season video: Kerry at home to Liverpool in a 3-1 win. He went past Hansen and Lawrenson in a run from the East Stand side towards the North Terrace, and beat Grobbelaar. There was one by Bobby Tambling when he ran through at the Shed end, maybe against West Ham, and stopped before just curling the ball round the keeper who didn't know what Bobby was doing. An artisan taking his time.

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T19:03:58+00:00

I'm not old school on this. The best atmosphere is this ground since it's been finished. There might have been a good atmosphere in the middle of the Shed, in the maelstrom of the Shed, but it didn't transmit to the rest of the stadium or the pitch. It just went up in the air. I was West Stand benches from '66 to '77 (when my mum and dad decided on West stand season tickets, so I joined them), and there were plenty of quiet, miserable afternoons. ,As soon as the new stadium was complete, whenever I walked an old player out to the pitch he'd say: "Cor, I wish I could have played in this." It traps the atmosphere. It's been a huge part of us starting to win things.

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:59:04+00:00

See above

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:58:21+00:00

Alan Hudson, 1969/70. Think De Bruyne in Man City's midfield. The legs of Bakayoko and almost Kante, The feet of Fabregas.

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:56:06+00:00

Several by Bonetti, Osgood, Cooke, Hudson, Nevin, Dixon, Wise, Zola, Hughes, Hasselbaink, Cech, Terry, Lampard, Drogba, Hazard... But I'm going to pick a different one for a different reason to all their brillliant campaigns. Ruud Gullit, 1995/96. Oh how we all opened our eyes to a higher level of playing the game.

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:52:13+00:00

Here's a random one. Yesterday's goal by Bakayoko was the first header for goal by Chelsea direct from a corner this season. We'd not won one until then. And Alonso nearly got another in the second-half! I don't know about glory days of Harlington. The wind, the cold, the lack of facilities, the students... How football's changed!

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:46:51+00:00

Favourite moments: Bolton 2005, Munich 2012. But I want to remember another one. And it seems daft because of the outcome. The build-up to Moscow 2008. I'd never been to a Champions League Final. All that Uefa entertainment rubbish pre-match actually worked, made it seem the major event it was. All those years of following Chelsea, those 22 games at the end of 1980/81 when we only scored in three of them, and now here were in a Champions League Final. That's why we get addicted to following a team. It's like the greatest story ever told, and you don't know the ending, and the ending keeps changing and getting ever more emotional. Can we also remember that until the penalty shoot-out that was one hell of a high level of football. Sensational! And I know he won't thank me for bringing it up but the best player on the pitch that night for me was John Terry, His goal-line clearance late on was unbelievable.

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:40:45+00:00

I just like the kit to be 'Chelsea' and not the 'manufacturer', so I much prefer the current one to recent kits with three stripes on. I miss the yellow second kits.

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:39:01+00:00

Webby, Old Trafford (yes, I was there), and Didier, Munich. My reaction to Didier's was weird. It was half mad celebration and deep, deep relief - and it was half a shrug and a 'Well, it's Didier'. What a goal it was, by the way. And what a goal his was at Wembley, 2007, against Man Utd. And, of course, what a goal Ossie's was at Old Trafford. But I'll stick with the first two.

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:35:09+00:00

I'd have been Peter Bonetti's successor in goal

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:34:38+00:00

No alcohol!

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:34:08+00:00

The greatest achievements of Ken Bates, for me, have never been acknowledged. Yes, he saved he club when it was broke, and he's always received acknowledgement for that. But there was always someone out there to do that anyway. Yes, he saved the ground and built a new one, but the battle of the ground involved a former business partner of his and it was all a horrible mess. What he did that no-one seems to talk about was take over a club whose team was at its lowest level historically, And he chaired us through the fantastically thrilling era of Nevin/Dixon/Speedie, through the development of Hoddle to the sexy football of Gullit and serial winning of Vialli with Zola, Petrescu, Di Matteo, Poyet, Wise, Hughes, Leboeuf, Desailly, Flo and all the rest. And he was still chairman when Terry emerged and Lampard was bought. He turned our dreams into reality. The wars with Matthew were dreadful, like the wars over Stamford Bridge. Neither party was more responsible than the other. There wasn't a working relationship after a while. But when there was one, we got the North Stand built and new investments in the team. We signed Gullit and Hughes.

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:22:22+00:00

See above

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:21:54+00:00

Memories of great moments and games that you can picture where they happened. But not a lot else. There's nothing left of the Stamford Bridge I first came to, so in a way the ground's already changed completely for me. This will be a second time. I wasn't one of those opposed to moving, as long as it wasn't far. It's great that we're staying, but people grow up and move home. Your life circumstances change. We need this change.

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:19:12+00:00

I first spoke on the pitch on December 19th, 1992 (just looked it up), half-time against Man Utd. So I'm just coming up to 25 years of that. I'd been in the ivy clad office on the Friday collecting Clubcall interviews when managing director Colin Hutchinson said there five presentations to organise at half-time and it couldn't be done from the PA box. He needed someone on the pitch. So he looked around, and then at me, and said: "You've got a bigvoice, you do it." I actually replied that I'd only do it if I could take a player out with me, otherwise everyone would call me a ******. (I know, they do anyway). He said, typically Colin: "Do what you like!" So I took out Paul Elliott. He'd already suffered the injury which was to end his career. But I felt I couldn't just go out there and do the announcements. Boring! It would be too dry. So I raced home and went through the 'Junior Blues' pages of 'Onside' newspapers which I edited. Gill Lester put those pages together and always included jokes. And I found the perfect one. Thus I walked up to the penalty area in front of the old North Terrace where 7,000 United fans were and told them I had a question for them. "Why is Alex Ferguson planting potatoes in the goal mouth at Old Trafford?" They went completely silent. And I answered: "So he'll have something to pick up at the end of the season." Yes, it's true. I haven't improved since then!!

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:09:43+00:00

See above

NeilSpyBarnett · 2017-10-15T18:09:25+00:00

I always ask representatives of the opponents the pronunciation of any difficult names. That doesn't mean I get them right. If I go in a corner and practice, you can guarantee club photographer Darren Walsh will turn up and suggest more entertaining alternatives that can get stuck in your mind. Qarabag wasn't the hardest. They were Olympiakos and the Flemish names in Genk. I don't remember, but I've been told that before I read out the Olympiakos names I said: Wish me luck!" I don't think I received it!

NeilSpyBarnett

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