News

Day of days

I always remember a photo of two Fulham supporters in a programme around 1966. They were the Pegram brothers carrying a banner in the rain at Nottingham Forest away. The text to the photograph was that to support Fulham was to incur the jibes from supporters of other more successful teams but fans like the Pegrams know no other club. The game was called off, they were drenched, they were Fulham.

Cue forward to last year when Jamie was teased at football training for supporting a cr-p team. He and all of us experienced arguably the happiest and most enjoyable day of our history at Wembley. The club, the team and above all the supporters did us all proud. Here are photos of some of the 1879 ers and their families at Wembley or in the case of Matthew Jacobs at his wedding on our day of days.

David

What a great day, a day I’m sure we all have our own memories, winning has to be the pinacle but what made it even more special was (as David Daly said) being part of the largest collective of Fulham fans ever. Our fans were just outstanding and blows away some of the bad days. For me having 3 generations there.

Graham Brooker

David, Everybody in the photo was part of the Woodall party – mostly family but also including four friends flown in from New Jersey – 23 in all. What a day in every respect. The magnitude of the White Wall was simply overwhelming – where did they all come from?
Possibly the best day ever.

Mick

 

Still buzzing.
What a wonderful day.
The team did us proud.
A few photos of the 3 generations of the Fulham family.
Cheers

Lawrence

Here’s a video at the final whistle of stressed-and-relieved Quinn, Faith, Lily, Maddy and Chris Whitman.

Frankfurt International School student and former Fulham STHer Cyril Preudhomme with Chris Whitman at a track meet in Munich two days before the Wembley final. Cyril had stopped Chris to compliment his hat and talk up the final. Cyril’s father was headed to London for the big day.

The day before the Wembley final, this is Fulham legend Edwin van der Sar already dressed for the Wall of White. Our former ‘keeper is bestowing a gold medal upon young Maddy Whitman (4 x 400 relay, European international schools championship in Munich) and assuring her that our lads would take care of business at Wembley.

Report on Ray Houghton lunch 21/9/17

The feedback on this event as reflected in the comments in the Guest Book and the actual sentiments in the St James Room was excellent. Ray stood up and entertained us for an hour with stories of his career from West Ham to Fulham to Oxford United to Liverpool to Crystal Palace to playing for the Republic of Ireland . The Irish contingent in our club were especially interested to hear tales of their great days under Jack Charlton.

Ray Houghton played 129 games for us in the superb side of Malcolm Macdonald. Ray paid credit to Malcolm but also to coach Ray Harford who said to this Ray that with the system of wide players drawn inside of O’Driscoll and him, Ray Lewington the holding midfielder and Robert Wilson pushing up the pitch we at Fulham were the first to play the diamond system.

Having spoken for an hour and it was now 4 o’clock Ray would be entitled to say his goodbyes and leave which I had to do to catch a train but as I left he was chatting away to guests across the table. It was a memorable occasion and I am sure our new members as well as the older ones appreciate the intimacy, fine food food and wine, exceptional venue in which we can savour the company of a genuine Fulham legend, nice guy and intelligent and humorous observer of the football world.

We welcomed Graham Brooker and Peter Smith as new members.

DR

Report from the lunch on 30th June 2017

One of the things I have found as Chairman is how a guest who may not have legend status is engaging and informative. I found this with Terry Angus and at our last lunch John Fraser. He is not a household Fulham name but he loves our club, is a humble and pleasant man and gave us great insight into George Cohen, Alan Mullery, Johnny Haynes and Bobby Moore. He brought along his 1975 Cup Final medal and gold Asprey cufflinks that each player in the final was given by director Eric Miller. He told us the story of how the shinpads were forgotten on Cup Final day, and how there was a court case over shoe sponsorship on the morning of the Cup Final. For those not present at that final John Fraser gave a typically dogged performance as he shored up the right flank.

After, David Daly gave us a positive take on the club going into the new season. We have acquired the BBC training ground next to Motspur Park; the plans for the new stand are very exciting and the club is anxious for them to happen as soon as possible; and we are in the market for Premiership quality players. Selection of these is determined by the Head Coach, chief scout Brian Talbot and the analytics department.

Finally we welcomed three new members : Christie Browne, Alex Shooter and Keith Graves.

Thanks to Bob Howes for inviting John Fraser and to Alan Smith for conducting the Q&A so well.

DR

Obituary: Trevor Williams

Trevor Williams was knocked over by a car two weeks ago and subsequently died from his severe injuries yesterday morning the 16th February 2017.

Trevor was a very good friend of mine and together we were founder members of the 1879 Club some 15 years ago. Trevor was a devoted and staunch Fulham fan, he was such a funny guy and always had a joke to tell even though he might have told the same joke several times before. During the years supporting Fulham, we had many good times together, where ever he went to watch our wonderful club Trevor always brightened up the day even when we lost.

George Cohen and David Hamilton were very good friends with Trevor, they were very fond of him, they both told me they will miss him dearly especially as he always made them laugh with his wonderful humour.

We have lost a great friend, a dedicated Fulham supporter and most of all he will be missed by all who knew him but he will never be forgotten.

My sincere condolences go to his wife Yvonne and family.

Bob Howes.