My first City game was on a Wednesday night in the 1969/70 season against Athletico Bilbao. I was 8 years old and went with my Dad & his best mate, my Uncle Jimmy. I had just been made goalkeeper for my school team & couldn’t wiat to see Joe Corrigan in action. We were in the Platt Lane End behind the goal – it was floodlit & the pitch looked like a huge theatre. The atmosphere was great & I was passed down over people’s heads & shoulders to the front where I saw Corrigan make some great saves. We won 3-0 & I was passed safely back to my Dad & Uncle Jimmy. We got home in time to watch Match of the Day & I was amazed to see Joe Corrigan making the same saves again on my telly!!

My first match was when i was 9 yrs old and i went to Maine Road with my dad.
I remember i was sat on the wall at the open corner between the Kippax and the Platt Lane stand.
I remember the noise, the crowds and the smell of hot Bovril and hotdogs and onions.
The atmosphere was overwhelming with excitment and fear.

City won 5-1 that day with Neil Young scoring two, Colin Bell, Francis Lee and Mike Summerbee adding to the goals. Fulham played in an all dark strip.
Franny Lee wore the no 7 shirt and Mike Summerbee with the no 9 shirt, we all know now that this changed later on for the rest of the footballers careers to the other way round where Lee wore the no 9 shirt and Summerbee no 7 shirt!

Happy Days

I’ll never forget the impact of the place as Dad and I took our seats in the main stand – the only time I ever sat there. The overwhelming memory is of the smell of tobacco smoke and the incredible greenness of the floodlit pitch. Alan Ball was playing for high flying Everton but City won with a Colin Bell special scored at the Platt lane end if memory serves. Fabulous.

My earliest and greatest memory as a ciy fan was outside main road(by the way i think city’s new stadium should be called new main road.)I was about 9 and in those days you could wander around outside the ground,without the security problems that you get today.I was waiting to go into block H which we always went into as Alan Oakes, mum was a dinner lady at our school and she sold me the tickets that he had been allocated to him.We were outside the ground when i felt someone put their hands on my shoulders i turned and looked up and it was Joe Mercer.I don’t think anyone believes me to this day,but it happened and it happened to me.I wonder what the great (and let’s not forget that’s what he was)Joe Mercer would have made of our great club today.

As a wide eyed 10 year old, I was taken to the game by my dad’s mate, Frank Boardman.

Instant memeories…the scale of the ground…instant aromas for ever associate with maine Road and particularly the Platt Lane…pipe tobacco(Frank smoked a pipe)..so many of the fans smoked, the pies, bovril….a heady mix.

And what a game to start….City ran out winners 8-1….and the only reason Scunthorpe scored wa sbecause Harry Dowd 9who always wanted to be a plumber ) tried to head a goalbound shot around the post.
I think Murray and kevan both scored hat tricks….I was hooked.
Followed them now for 45 years and my Dad still follows them with me at the ripe old age of 98 (99 in August)…as does my son now 17.

Supporting City …pure passion.

Now had scunthorpe won….where would I be now!

City had won the second division title the year before and were promoted. My dad (united fan) said if city got promoted i could go to watch them at home if i went to Old Trafford with him, In the end i went with friends to city only and the season after we won the league. The Burnley game was a my 5th birthday treat. we won 3-2 Photo is of Me,Ian Bunting(brother in law) and Phil Bunting Nephew

I was born into an opposition family – Grandad having been a native of Newton Heath – and started supporting City as a 10 year old as an act of rebellion and becuase my best mate at the time was a City fan and we reached an age where we started going to City home games. My first one was around 1962 or 63 and we were at home to Grimsby town. I remember being admonished by my friend as I cheered the wrong team on to the pitch as Grimsby’s strip was reminiscent of City’s 1956 cup final strip. City won I think on the day and I think Derek Kevan was on the team.

We moved to Manchester in 1964 from Wigan, but I didn’t bother with football much until the 1966 World Cup, after which I was a football daft 10 year old.

My Dad decided to let me choose who we would go and watch and we went to Maine Road courtesy of a Maynes bus leaving from the Quality Shop in Droylsden.

My first impression of the stadium was just its sheer size, and when we finally squeezed through the turnstile and walked up what seemed like 1000’s of steps to reach our seats – those great long benches – in the Platt Lane Stand I was in awe of the place. The smell of fag smoke, burgers and horse manure mingled with the cacophany of sound and I just stared, wide-eyed.
Alan Oakes – what a plyer ! – scored the only goal and City had beaten my home-town team 1-0.

On the bus home the noise was almost as great as the stadium as everyone talked about the great win. Everyone was so friendly and whilst most of my friends were Blues I agreed to go to Old Trafford the folloiwng week.

Same bus, same departure point – totally different atmosphere. United beat Newcastle
3-1 but all I recall is everyone moaning – some things never change. As the sworn rivals of my home town team I should have been delighted that Newcastle got stuffed, but all the carping mystified me. My Dad could not answer the question why.

When he asked me who I wanted to go and support there was no hesitation -”City”. He hadn’t tried to influence me at all, but I remember he said “Good lad” as he was an admirer of the great Joe Mercer.

Never regretted it for a minute and I know nor did my Dad and, like another supporter whose first game was in this era, I too would give the world just to attend another City game with my beloved Dad.

He was City till he died. So will I be.

The match that stood out mostly for me was actually watching City resoundingly beaten by West Ham when a young Joe Corrigan turned to walk back to his goal line as the ball flew over his head. He went on to be one of City’s top keepers, My dad carried a stool to matches and stood on it at the back of the Kipax as I would stand on the spiked railings at the back for a perfect view

As a kid with a brother and several sisters who all were man u fans (sorry for bad language), my dad who had come over from Tiparary to Manchester to work was always trying to get us to follow our local team, City, it was a thing with him, he thought one should always support your local things, shops, sports etc., he had a mate at work who was a true blue, and his mate offered to take me to a game, it was City v Rotheram, we got the train from Central Station at the back of the Midland hotel, now G MEX. What a great day it was, we won 1.0 and that got City promoted, hence the song (in 1963 we fell in division 2 etc ). It was the seed sewn that day that made it a must for me to become a fan of my real local team, CITY, it certainly made my dad happy when I declared I was a blue. On the day Colin Bell scorded the winner but the whole team was fantastic as were the fans, they made me feel so at home what a great bunch of people City fans were and still are. the following season was even better as were the next few. Love to see those glory days again with my local team.