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Percy's Trip to Bristol

As told to John Snow

As you may have heard, Barnet's reserve game against Bristol City's reserves, due to be played at Underhill last Wednesday, was switched to Bristol City's ground.

This last minute switch was a result of the necessary officials from the club not being available during the afternoon.

There have been a couple of stories about this, one of which appeared in The Sun newspaper. It said that as part of a cost cutting exercise, the club's safety officer had changed to part time hours - and Wednesday afternoons were no longer part of his scheduled duties!

Fortunately the club are not that short sighted. The truth of the matter is that the safety officer was unavailable, as he had to attend an employment tribunal on Wednesday afternoon. It should be stressed that it was nothing to do with any of the players or coaching staff.

You may be aware that the BFCSA chairman - Steve Percy - has not missed a reserve game for twenty five years, including away games. But the message left on his answer machine the evening before the game was too short a notice, even for him to make the necessary arrangements.

Phone Call

That did not stop him phoning one of the club's officials at eleven o'clock at night after he picked up the message to ascertain the reason for the switch. Steve was upset that a problem that was obviously known about for some time had not been resolved sooner, meaning that he was not going to make the game.

Imagine his surprise, when the next morning at work, Tony Kleanthous himself rang Steve at work to say that he had checked out the train timetables and there was a train leaving Paddington Station that would arrive at Bristol in time for the game. As Steve would not be able to get to the station in time he then offered to pick Steve up and drive him to the station.

However, the story does not stop there. By the time Tony met Steve - in his chauffeur driven BMW - it was too late to get to Paddington. "Don't worry Steve." said Tony, "I don't usually go to the away reserve games, but I'll drive you there!"

So, before you could say, "No, it's alright Tony, it's only a game." they were steaming off towards Bristol.

Quiet

When they arrived at the ground it looked suspiciously quiet. "Where's the team bus?" said Tony, possibly wondering if the reserve team really did spend Wednesday afternoons playing football. He phoned his people back at Underhill only to be told that Bristol City had phoned that morning to say that the game had been switched again, to City's training ground. He may be the chairman, but it is not usual that he has to be informed of such matters!

It turned out that the training ground was on the other side of Bristol so off they set, with little more than the address to go by. Soon they were hopelessly lost, and it was half past two. It was nearly half time.

Still

In desperation Tony phoned an old friend who works in Bristol - none other than John Still, now assistant manager at City's local rivals, Bristol Rovers. "Do you know where City's training ground is John?" pleaded Tony.

"I sure do!" came the reply, "That's where I am at the moment, watching your boys. Especially Leon and Robert." (Leon Bell is currently on loan to Bristol Rovers and Robert Still is John's son.)

Guided in by our former manager, the exhausted pair managed to see the last twenty-five minutes of a 2-1 defeat at the hands of City. Afterwards they drove straight back to London as Tony had a board meeting, for which he ended up being an hour late!

Thanks Tony!

Steve exclaimed to us when telling the above story, "What other chairman would do that for one of his fans? I want this on the website to say thanks."

What other chairman indeed? Although I suspect that if Steve was a Chelsea supporter even Ken Bates wouldn't have been able to resist his charm!