I've been a West Ham United supporter for as long as I can remember and my first real football recollection was sitting in the living room with the curtains drawn when I was 7 watching the hammers take on Fulham in the 1975 FA Cup Final.
For those of you who don't remember it West Ham won 2-0 with two goals from Alan Taylor against a Fulham team that included Alan Mullery and Hammers legend Bobby Moore.
Incidentally there was only one non-English player in either team and that was Irishman Jim Conway (Fulham). How times have changed. I look at Premier League team sheets now and struggle to pronounce half of the names.
So this was the start of my love affair with the boys from Upton Park.
As soon as I was earning a wage I attended as many home games as I could (which was difficult as I was working 5 saturdays out of 6)
This was in the days when Tony Cottee and Frank McAvennie were scoring goals for fun.
In 1990 I got married and had better uses for the gate money (so my wife told me) so that was the end of attending live matches with the boys in Claret & Blue.
In 2010 the most unlikely thing happened, Dagenham & Redbridge (my dad's home town) were promoted to League 1 and he decided he wanted to go back to support the team he watched as a child, mostly by squeezing through gaps in the fence in the 1940's and early 50's.
Not having anyone to go with, and there not being any large enough holes to squeeze through, he asked if I wanted to accompany him to home games. Why not I thought and over the course of the season we attended most of the games at Victoria Road which unfortunately ended with the Daggers being relegated to League 2. By this time I was hooked, and at the start of the next season we purchased season tickets which we maintained for the next 2 seasons until eventually my dad was finding it difficult to travel to games and reluctantly we let our tickets lapse.
I'm still an avid follower of both the Hammers and the Daggers but now didn't have the funds to finance a regular attendance or anyone willing to come with me.
Then a few years later my son Sam, who by now was taking an avid interest in both teams results, asked if we could go to a live game. Absolutely I said and we then started to attend 3-4 games a season. Now Sam has an autistic spectrum condition (Aspergers) and isn't always comfortable in crowded situations so taking him to Upton Park was a definite no-no, but Dagenham was lot calmer situation and we enjoyed out semi-regular outings.
Again we struggled to justify the expense of the match tickets and the petrol so we stopped going apart from, where possible, the last home match of the season.
Then, in 2017, some building work began on part of Belhus Park just about a mile from our house.
"What's that" asked Sam one afternoon when we were driving past.
"It's the new stadium for Aveley FC" I replied
"Do Aveley have a football team?" enquired Sam
"Yes" I said, "they play at the rundown looking place at the top of the bypass"
"Why have we never been to watch them then" he asked
"I don't know, I never gave it a thought"
And that was that - I promised to take him to the first home game of the 2017/18 season and then promply forgot about it....until July 2017 when Sam reminded me of my promise and we then wandered over to Parkside to watch Aveley FC kick off their first cmpaign in the new stadium.
Firstly we were very impressed with the ground and the facilities. Being fairly shy and retiring folk we found a couple of seats as far away from the assorted supporters and stayed there for the entire duration.
I can't remember anything about the game other than Sam had a great afternoon and asked me when the next game would be taking place.
We then attended all of the home games (apart from the Norwich Utd one due to illness) for the rest of the season and purchased half-season tickets once I knew that Sam wasn't going to get bored.
To be honest Aveley were dire and 2 months into the season the manager was sacked and replaced with James Webster who slowly rebuilt the squad and the standard of football got better and better.
As with West Ham and D&R years before I was again hooked on watching the live action game. Over the second half of the season we swallowed our nervousness and got involved with some of the fans sitting in 'our' part of the stand. Rather than loud shouty football fanatics they turned out to be the nicest collection of people you could hope to meet.
I'd like to say at this point that everyone at the club that season was fantastic and made us feel welcome even though we just used to arrive 5 mins before kick-off and fled as soon as the final whistle went.
Sam insisted on dragging me to the Q&A session in the clubhouse one evening where the management tean and senior players were available to field fans questions. Because of this we met Richard who in the course of conversation offered to put on a special event for the parents, carers and kids from the local autistic society so they could get cheap entry, meet the mascot and have photos taken with the players.
Aveley's improved form meant we finished nicely in mid-table rather than the relegation dog-fight we all expected earlier in the season.
With our new found confidence we purchased early-bird season tickets for the 2018/19 season and attended as many of the pre-season friendlies as we could.
Richard and Craig (CEO) agreed that the season opener against Dereham Town would be the best time to invite the autistic group and between us we managed to bring 60 people from NAS Thurrock to enjoy the 6-0 drubbing of Dereham in the sunshine which was so successful we intend to do it again this season when the weather gets a little warmer.
Through this event we met Graham Gennings (the club chairman) who offered Sam the chance to travel on the team coach to the away fixture against Dereham later in the season.
When I asked Sam if this was something he would like to do he answered "Does that mean we're allowed to go to away games then?"
"Of course" I replied.
"Anyone can go to an away game"
I then realised from the look on his face exactly what I'd done. So, we're no longer just home fans, Sam wants to attend as many of the away games as he possibly can and because two men can't possibly be capable of organising a trip to and then attending an away game the wife is insisting on coming along as a chaperone. She is now coming to home games too so I think she is secretly enjoying it.
We are now attending 1st team games at Home and Away plus the reserves, U18, U14 and now Veterans games at home plus friendlies
I said it earlier but in just a short period of time we have become accepted into the 'Aveley Family' and really enjoy not only the football but the interaction with the staff, fans and players.
At West Ham you are just a statistic, at Aveley you are a part of a warm friendly club that realy appreciates the support from the fans
Sam and I will be Millers forever and we hope we can put something back into the club over the coming seasons
Thanks Aveley FC for making Parkside a fun place to go and all your efforts to be all inclusive of fans with special needs
Come On You Millers!
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