Celebrating Chesham United’s FA Amateur Cup run to Wembley in 1967/1968

Wembley 40 years onA collection of articles originally written for the Chesham United matchday programme 2007/2008

Foreword by Tony WhiteOn a murky November afternoonin 1967 I heard a shout from thenewsroom: “Where the bloodyhell’s Soham?” A few momentssilence, then: “I’ve got it. It’s nearPeterborough, but it’s only avillage.” That village team, whichplayed in one of thePeterborough localleagues, was the nexthurdle for CheshamUnited in a footballstory that will foreverlive in the memories ofthose involved, in how-ever small a way, a runin the FA Amateur Cupthat has been describedby a leading footballwriter, Tony Williams,as “one of the finest anon-league knockoutcompetition has seen”.

Chesham, then playing inthe Athenian League Divi-sion One, had entered thecompetition in the prelimi-nary round and, 16 matcheslater, and against all theodds, found themselves in aWembley final, the dream ofevery footballer.

The significance of theSoham game for me? I hadjust joined the Bucks Exam-iner as editor, my onlyencounter with CheshamUnited coming when travel-ling to the Meadow severalyears earlier to cover agame for one of the Ayles-bury newspapers. On theway to the Soham encoun-ter United had beatenHemel Hempstead, Didcot,Hazells and Marlow in reaching thefourth qualifying round. These hadbeen straight victories, the last until thesemi-final in March.

Held to a draw at Soham, Cheshambrought them back to the Meadow anda Les Burgess goal secured victory.Then came three games against Maid-enhead before victory in a secondreplay at Loakes Park, then away draws

followed by replay victories at homeagainst some of the non-league giantsof the day – Dulwich Hamlet, Corin-thian Casuals, and Oxford City. Morethan 4,000 were at the Meadow for theOxford replay – and United were inthe Craven Cottage semi-final onMarch 16th, against Wealdstone,another of the non-league legends.

My wife and I spent the weekend at mymother’s home in Hampshire. I re-member falling asleep on the Saturdayafternoon with sport on television andbeing woken by my wife: “Look.Chesham have done it.” Throughbleary eyes I saw the score, CheshamUnited 2 Wealdstone 0.

Preparations then had to be made atthe Examiner prior to the final against

Leytonstone. A colour supplement wasplanned and press credentials arrangedfor our new young sports editor. Weengaged the services of two photogra-phers for the day, one of them a younglady with long blonde hair whoseappearance in the stadium caused quitea stir among the press pack.

Day by day in the town shopafter shop announced theywould be closed on SaturdayApril 20th to allow staff toattend the final. Well over20,000 tickets were soldthrough Chesham United, amarathon effort for club secre-tary Sid MacDonnell. Practicallyevery coach in Buckinghamshirewas hired to take fans to Wem-bley, more than 60 in all, andUnderground trains leaving thestation were decorated in claretand blue.

The game itself has been welldocumented. Suffice to say thatthe agony of seeing Kenny Kentmiss a penalty and for Cheshamto lose 1-0 could have de-stroyed the day. But it didn’t.Chesham United, their fans, andthousands who became fans forthe day, had experienced some-thing special, something whichput them on a par with support-ers of the Liverpools and Man-chester Uniteds, Arsenals andTottenhams.

When the team returned totown that evening, thousandscrammed The Broadway, whichearlier in the day had beendeserted, to give a huge wel-come back to their heroes,even though they had lost.Captain Les Burgess said, to a

huge cheer: “We will be back nextseason.”

But they were empty words. Many ofthat team left for pastures new and, thefinal act, manager John Reardon, whohad built a team of winners and takenthem to Wembley, left to join the staffof Wycombe Wanderers, where heremained for many years.

Wembley 40 Years On

“This is the most worrying startto a season we have had for manyyears”. That was chairman AlanMoore’s pre-season assessment inAugust 1967 as Chesham Unitedprepared for the opening Athe-nian League fixtures.

The previous year a host of top playershad been attracted to play under highprofile manager Sid Prosser and, de-spite winning the Berks & Bucks Cup, adisappointing league season sawChesham remaining in the 1st Divisionof the Athenian League. A subsequentexodus saw just three first team play-ers remaining at The Meadow (keeperAlan Binfield, full-back Mick McCaffreyand midfielder Paul Savina) as new bossJohn Reardon stepped up from reservemanager to begin his re-building exer-cise. Reardon had been with Unitedsince making his debut as a player in1961.

As the season got under way Cheshamwas, well, Chesham. Forty years agothe fear was that the population of19,000 was threatening to escalateuncontrollably with new house-building(we are currently around 23,000) andChristopher Rowland Estate Agentsannounced that a new development of3-bedroom homes complete withgarages and gardens within a mile ofthe station was on the market for aprincely £5,950 each.

The main arguments in the town wereabout whether a new supermarketshould be built on the High Street andwhat could be done to solve the traffic

problem. The supermarket eventuallyopened as Waitrose in what is now theM&Co / Track Records site and thetraffic argument finally led to pedes-trianisation and the town centre by-pass.

Today’s lawyers would have a field daywith the job advertising in the Exam-iner at the time. The RadiochemicalCentre (subsequently to becomeAmersham International and GEHealthcare, the area’s largest em-ployer) was looking for Scientific Assis-tants and invited “Applications forvaried and interesting work on thedevelopment and production of radio-active chemicals for use throughout theworld. The posts are open to marriedand single women aged between 25 and50. Adequate training will be given”.Anyone else feel slightly disturbed byseeing the phrases “radioactive chemi-cals” and “adequate training” in thesame job specification?

After 4 league games Chesham wereundefeated—opening draws againstHarlow (1-1) and Eastbourne United (2-2) were followed by a 3-1 victory atWare and a1-0 home defeat of Wok-ingham. In the meantime new playerscontinued to arrive. Brian Caterer,signed from Southall, was to form astrong defensive partnership with clubcaptain Les Burgess, and new forwardsDavid Black and Ron Fruen came fromWokingham and Walton & Hershamrespectively.

Before the Amateur Cup run even gotunder way there was a glimpse of our

eventual final opponents as, on the16th September, Leytonstone came toThe Meadow in the 1st QualifyingRound of the FA Cup. There was littlesign then that the clubs would meetagain in a Wembley final as the visitorsran out comfortable 3-0 winners.

The following week an estimatedcrowd of 500 gathered at CrabtreeLane, Hemel Hempstead for the Pre-liminary Round of the Amateur Cup.At this stage Chesham were quoted as1000-1 outsiders for the competitionbut with Fruen scoring after just 7minutes, and Black adding a second on67 minutes, the new pairing led theway as Chesham easily saw off theirlocal rivals. Even so, it would havetaken a brave pundit to predict thatthis would be the first game of a 17match cup run leading to a Wembleyappearance.

Elsewhere at the club the youngsterswere progressing in the FA Youth Cuphaving beaten Carlton from St Albansat St Albans City’s Clarence Park. Inthose days Pioneer Scouts, who wereto become stalwarts of the CheshamSunday League, provided the CheshamUnited Youth Team. The first teamwere bolstered by the signing of DaveEllis from Ilford, having trained withChesham in pre-season then signing forSouthall but subsequently joining Ilfordwithout playing a game for the westLondon team. It was a return home toChesham for the Kings Langley basedplayer who had left The Meadow acouple of years previously after 18months with United.

Next out of the hat in the AmateurCup was a home tie against DidcotTown from the Hellenic League on7th October in the 1st QualifyingRound. After warming up with a 2-2league draw against Grays, Cheshamended up with a straightforward vic-tory against the Oxfordshire club. DaveEllis went straight into the team andcelebrated his return with goals in the76th and 84th minutes to wrap upvictory after Ron Fruen had givenChesham a first half lead. The margincould have been greater if it were notfor a fine performance by the Didcotgoalkeeper, including a heavily disputed“save” where the camera caught theball on the line with many of theChesham fans in the 700 strong crowdconvinced it then went just over for a4th goal.

Ron Fruen, heading goalward at Hemel’s old Crabtree Lane ground,joined Chesham for the ‘67-68 season

Celebrating Chesham United’s FA Amateur Cup run to Wembley in 1967/1968

Meanwhile, back in the world outsidefootball, those adequately trainedradioactive married and single womenbetween 25 and 50 must have beendoing something right as the Radio-chemical Centre won a Queens Awardfor Industry after reaching £2.5Mturnover.

Amersham joined the swinging sixtiesas the Examiner reported , “The exitsign was not the only thing that was‘way out’ about Amersham’s firstdiscotheque, Twang, which opened thisweek.” Chesham still had the marvel-ous Embassy cinema, if only it hadmanaged to survive a few more years itwould be a goldmine now, which wasplaying host to films like Zulu and YouOnly Live Twice.

If watching Chesham put three goalspast Didcot was not entertainmentenough, on the evening of the game theCo-op Hall played host to a Hipsters &Miniskirts Unite Two Band Specialfeaturing Ebony Keys supported by“The recording group that’s mistakenfor The Beach Boys” Candy Bus.

Victory over Didcot was rewarded by avisit to another Hellenic League side,the Hazells factory-based club fromAylesbury, in the 2nd Qualifying Round.A trip to coast at Worthing to take

the points in a 3-0 league win was theperfect preparation as they went toAylesbury on 21st October for whatwas billed as an easy game forChesham. 500 fans saw that it provedanything but easy as both teams re-sorted to a spoiling game with foulsleaving the entertainment to a mini-mum.

Hazells frustrated the Chesham team inthe opening period and it was only

after half time that Fruenblocked a failed clearance fromthe home keeper allowing DaveEllis to give United the lead.Despite this Hazells continuedto hold out and it was only inthe dying seconds that GeorgeGoode added another goal tomake the result look easier thanit was.

In more local news, it wasannounced in the week of theHazells game that a certain MrAnthony White was to takeover as editor of the BucksExaminer. Tony of course is stillto be seen supporting us everyweek and has played crucialroles in helping the club overthe years. Fascinating to readthat that he joined the Exam-iner shortly after covering theGreat Train Robbery story.

So, onto our final round for thisepisode of the cup run story.Another local derby was set forthe 3rd Qualifying Round on

4th November as Marlow were drawnto visit Chesham. In the interveningweek Hertford Town visited in theleague and, despite scoring their firstever goal at The Meadow, left with nopoints after a 2-1 defeat. That gaveChesham a league position of 4th with11 points from 8 games (only 2 pointsfor a win back then for any youngerreaders). 750 fans saw Mick McCaffreyput Chesham ahead after only 4 min-utes and a Ron Fruen header doubledthe lead by half time. Ten minutes intothe second half Chesham’s defence losttrack of the Marlow attack to let themback into the game. However, thecomeback lasted just 3 minutes asMcCaffrey stepped up from midfield toadd his 2nd and seal a 3-1 win.

So four rounds down, seven roundsand thirteen matches (replays, replays,replays!) still to go.

Having already seen off Hemel inthe Preliminary round, then Did-cot, Hazells of Aylesbury andMarlow, hopes were high thatChesham would pull an attractivefixture out of the hat for the 4thand final Qualifying round tie ofthe FA Amateur Cup in Decem-ber 1967.

They were to be disappointed. As theExaminer reported, “Far from theirexpectations they have been drawnaway to play a ‘village green’ teamsomewhere in the wild fenlands be-tween Newmarket and Ely - Soham

Didcot’s keeper saves on the line but reports say the ball subsequentlycrossed - 3-0 to Chesham anyway!

Chesham are kept out by Marlow but RonFruen scored the 2nd moments later

Wembley 40 Years On

United.” Even the sports reporter fromthe local Cambridge News admitted hehad never really known they existed:“The only description I can give you isthat it’s miles from anywhere and you’llneed a compass to find it” before goingon to describe their ground as “a field.”

Rather hopefully the report finishes:“Chesham may apply for the venue tobe switched.” That hope was to bedashed a couple of weeks later—notsurprisingly Soham felt they would havean advantage playing the game at homedespite the loss of income that wouldmost likely have been gained by playingthe tie at The Meadow—so the gamewas all set for an early 2pm kick off on9th December due to the lack offloodlights at the Cambridgeshireground.

Floodlighting was to prove contentiouslater on in this round and Chesham’sown Boxing Day fixture at home toWembley had already been in doubtfor what seems now to be the ratherunusual reason that the club were notsure they could guarantee an electricitysupply during the holiday period.Thankfully they were able to announcethat all was well on that front by theend of November.

It seems some things never change andthe lead story in the run up to thisgame was the effect that Britain’s worstever outbreak of foot and mouthdisease was having on the farmingcommunity in Bucks. Livestock marketsin Aylesbury, Tring and Thame all had

to be closed leading up to Christmas.Meanwhile Nashleigh Nurseries wereselling two feet tall Christmas Trees forthe princely sum of five shillings (25p)or a more extravagant six feet tree for20 shillings. Headlining the bill at TheEmbassy cinema was Clint Eastwood inFor A Few Dollars More.

On the 9th December the Supporters’Club had arranged coach travel toSoham at a cost of 8 shillings perperson. The journey was to be in vainas the Examiner reported “It wasSnowham not Soham” following a mid-morning blizzard. The referee had nochoice but to call the game off, despite

apparent attempts at gentlepersuasion by Cheshamcaptain Les Burgess and hisfather, and “Both teams hadto be content with throw-ing snowballs at eachother.”

The game finally got underway the following Saturdayin front of 234 spectatorsand it took a Ron Fruenheader just five minutesfrom time to secure a 1-1draw and avoid a humiliat-ing defeat. Maybe Cheshamhad taken them toolightly—certainly there issomething rather patronis-ing in the contemporarydescriptions of Sohambeing only the second bestside in a village of 5,000

people and, having conceded 21 goalsin their previous 4 matches, Cheshamwould certainly have expected to makeeasier work of the task. The localsseemed to have enjoyed their daythough, jeering the Chesham team as“rubbish” at the final whistle. Appar-ently Mick McCaffrey didn’t find anytakers though when he offered “£5 tosay you’ll be rubbish next week” as heleft the field.

With a replay now due Soham refusedto play the game under floodlights atThe Meadow as their players had nevercompeted in night games. This enragedthe Chesham committee who hadalready had an abortive trip and felttheir crowd was likely to reduced withan earlier kick off to see the matchcompleted in daylight. But Sohamwould not move and the game wasscheduled for 2pm the following Satur-day 16th December. It was an explo-sive affair, even if not necessarily awonderful advert for the beautifulgame.

Once again Chesham failed to maketheir seniority in League positionscount and only a solitary goal fromcentre half Les Burgess after 75 min-utes enabled the home side to finallyprogress. Whether there was any badfeeling remaining from the first encoun-ter or the disagreement over thestaging of the match is not clear but thegame was reported as being, “litteredwith fouls, arguments and blunderingtackles.” Finally everything boiled over

Chesham skipper Les Burgess (left) and his father (right) with matchreferee Mr Squirrell at the postponed Soham game

Dave Ellis fires in a cross at Soham asChesham force an equaliser

Celebrating Chesham United’s FA Amateur Cup run to Wembley in 1967/1968

completely as in the aftermath of thegoal the visiting keeper was felt to havekicked out. Ron Fruen ended up bun-dled into the back of the net and with aboth teams squaring one of the 786fans present rushed onto the pitch toberate the keeper. Thankfully he foundhimself forced aside by the players butthe ill feeling continued at the end ofthe game with the Examiner reportingfighting among fans and the police sadlybeing called to the ground.

Chesham fans were no doubt inter-ested to hear at this time that formerMeadow favourite Stewart Scullion wasbeing placed on the transfer market byWatford for £30,000 having joined viaCharlton. As the year came to an endthe crowds were flocking to Cheshamin response to their cup run and excel-lent league form. By the turn of theyear the generals had lost just 4 of the25 matches played and the Boxing Dayfixture with Wembley, complete withsuccessfully powered floodlights, at-tracted over 1,100 to The Meadow.Meanwhile the draw for the FirstRound Proper had paired Cheshamwith local rivals Maidenhead United,then playing a division above us in theAthenian League.

Early in January 1968 Chesham signedwinger Kenny Kent from Slough Town.A former Maidenhead player, Kent hadbeen left on the sidelines so far thisseason as an FA enquiry found Sloughhad made an illegal approach andbanned him from turning out for theRebels in addition to fining them fiveguineas. He was to play a crucial role inlater stages of the competition but hissigning was too late to make himeligible for the forthcoming match withhis old club.

With a harsh winter still causing games

to be lost to the weather Cheshamwere thankful for the new drainagesystem installed at the ground theprevious summer, at a cost of some£300. This was tested to the full whena full foot of snow cover the pitch onlyto thaw and be followed by 48 hours ofrain immediately before a match whichwas successfully staged.

Around Chesham the January saleswere in full swing with Brandons in theBroadway offering a three piece loungesuite (attractively in green moquettewhatever that may be) reduced from£66 and 18 shillings to £39 and 19shillings. Number One in the chartswere The Beatles with Hello Goodbyeand cinema-goers were being treatedto Those Magnificent Men In TheirFlying Machines at the Embassy.

The Maidenhead tie commenced at TheMeadow on 20th January, and it was tobe the first of three matches needed tofind a winner. After 20 minutesChesham went ahead as MickMcCaffrey fought off two challenges topick out Harper for the first. On 43minutes Maidenhead were level with aheader from a free kick near theChesham box. Ten minutes into thesecond half Fruen made it 2-1 to thehome side after Thackrayy had brokendown the right flank before crossingfor the striker to head home. How-ever, almost immediately anotherMaidenhead free kick around thepenalty area was finished off at closerange to bring the game level. Cheshamstill almost sneaked the win as substi-tute Frost came on to see his shotcome cross bounce off the bar with tenminutes left, much to the disappoint-ment of the bulk of the 820 strongcrowd.

A week later the sides met again at

Maidenhead’s ground. That week it wasalso announced that Chesham’s Kent,Ellis and Thackray had been selectedfor the Bucks FA representative side toface Surrey. In the charts The Beatleshad been replaced by Love Affair withEverlasting Love—incidentally foranyone who doesn’t know the bandresponsible for the Bringing on Backthe Good Times song frequently heardat The Meadow (that got to Number10 in July 1969 for the anoraksamongst you).

In the replay the first advantage wentto Maidenhead who went a goal upafter 27 minutes. On the stroke of halftime Fruen bundled home a Thackraycross and with the home players ap-pealing vigorously for a foul on thekeeper the referee awarded Chesham’sequaliser. Just three into the secondhalf Chesham went ahead as Dave Ellisset up Harper. Just as it looked likethey would hold out for victory a

Scenes at The Meadow as a foot deep snow drift covers the pitch and old wooden stand before the thaw

Wembley 40 Years On

dramatic late penalty on 87 minutesdashed their hopes. With no furthergoals in extra time a second replay wasrequired, don’t you miss the delights ofextra replays instead of the penaltyshoot out?

So, the following Wednesday 31stJanuary fans from Chesham and Maid-enhead descended on the neutralvenue of Wycombe Wanderers’Loakes Park for what proved to be thedeciding match. A bumper crowd of1,624 made the trip for what proved atense and close fought battle oncemore.

Harper was to open the scoring forChesham in only the 8th minute but anequaliser after 30 minutes broughtMaidenhead back into the game. Itlooked like another half hour of extratime and potentially yet another replaywas certain as the game went into itsfinal seconds. Then, just as the refereeappeared preparing toBlow the final whistle David Blacksmashed a rare opportunity pastkeeper Ray Smith to send Cheshamthrough to a Second Round tie away atDulwich Hamlet.

By the end of January 1968Chesham United had alreadyplayed nine FA Amateur Cupmatches just to get to the secondround. The three match mara-thon with Maidenhead United hadfinally been won with a last gasp

David Black goal at Wycombe’sLoakes Park to set up a visit toDulwich Hamlet. In theory thatleft four games until any possibleWembley trip - but Cheshamwere not ready to make thingsthat easy for themselves.

Dulwich Hamlet were one of the bignames in non-league football. Four timewinners of the Amateur Cup and with

frequent Isthmian League champion-ships from the 1920s to 1960s (whenthis represented the top flight of thenon-professional game), they had evenprovided two full England internationalsduring the inter-war years. AsChesham prepared to visit ChampionHill on 3rd February the local area wasits usual hive of activity. CouncillorWoodstock made it onto the frontpage of the Examiner by giving his 50th

pint of blood in a donor session at theCo-Op Hall, which must have horrifiedTony Hancock (sorry kids, it’s an oldTV reference). The newly appointeddistrict scout commissioner was claim-ing that if you weren’t a boy scout thenyou had may as well give up all hope ofa meaningful life as, “The IQ of localscouts was higher than most” resultingin most proceeding to executive posi-tions in industry due to their superiorleadership skills. Clearly, these super-hero tendencies didn’t extend to thefootballing talents of Pioneer Scouts asthey went down 2-3 to CheshamNorth End and lost 3-0 to ChalfontWasps in the Wycombe CombinationPremier Division.

Over in Dulwich it was the 4th AmateurCup game in a fortnight for Cheshamand, maybe to no-one’s surprise, itended in another away draw, in frontof 1,100 spectators. Ron Fruen hadgiven United a first half lead before the

Casuals’ keeper beats Ron Fruen to the ball in the 3rd round drawat Champion Hill

Ron Fruen heading home a Dave Ellis cross for the 15th minute 3rdround replay winner against Corinthian Casuals

Celebrating Chesham United’s FA Amateur Cup run to Wembley in 1967/1968

Hamlet captain, Ted Shepherd, forced areplay with a penalty just three minutesbefore the end. Final score 1-1 and thereplay was set for the following Satur-day back at The Meadow.

Supporters returning to Buckingham-shire could have made a trip over toWycombe Town Hall to celebrate as apre-Tiger Feet band made an appear-ance with the marvellous advertisingstrapline, “Their name is MUD buttheir sound is sensational!” Or youcould have turned up the record playerwith your new purchase from Cheshamrecord shop and decide if you agreedthat “some of the most avant gardepop entertainment today undoubtedlycomes from The Who”.

The 2nd round replay was set for TheMeadow on the following Saturday,10th February. With interest growingin the town the game brought a crowdof 1,200 for what was seen as one ofthe best Chesham performances formany years. Frost opened the scoring

for the home side as “the Hamletkeeper grabbed like a drowning manfor the ball but missed the straw”according to one contemporary matchreport! After half an hour it was 2-0 asHarper lashed home from near thepenalty spot before Dulwich got a goalback three minutes before half time.After 52 minutes Kenny Kent set upJoe Harper who scored his secondfrom the edge of the area. A fewminutes later, with Chesham nowcompletely on top against their higherdivision visitors, Harper turned pro-vider for Fruen who “pounded it forthe top left of the goal. The Cheshamterraces erupted.” Despite pulling agoal back from a 70th minute penaltyHamlet never looked like getting backinto the game and it finished as a com-prehensive 4-2 win for United.

The Amateur Cup was now completelydominating the fixture list and the thirdround tie was already scheduled for thefollowing week against another thenwell known side - Corinthian Casuals- again away from home. (As an aside,the stature of Corinthian Casuals isbeing celebrated on Sunday 13th Aprilthis year with a match commemoratingthe 125th anniversary of their twofounding clubs, the Corinthians and theCasuals, with a game at the new Wem-bley Stadium against AFC Wimbledon).

Corinthian Casuals coincidentally also

played their games at Dulwich’s Cham-pion Hill ground and six coaches werebooked for the journey on 17th Febru-ary. Things did not look too promisingwhen Wimbledon came to Chesham afew days before the match and left witha 1-0 victory against a full strengthUnited in the Premier Floodlit League.However, the Chesham managementclaimed they were using the game as awarm up and that they were confidentgoing into the Amateur Cup game.

The game turned out to be a disap-pointment for the 1,250 strong crowd,turning out into a goal-less draw. So, itwas time for what by now was becom-ing the regular prospect of anotherreplay at The Meadow and this wasduly set up for the following Saturday.

With Chesham expecting a crowd ofup to 2,000 for the game it was an-nounced that prices were to be 2shillings 6 pence or 3 and 6 for thestand, an increase on usual prices tobring them in line with what Corin-thians charged. In the intervening weekanother Premier Floodlit game was lostto St Albans City and one local taxifirm was getting quite irate as the

interest in the game led to a hugeincrease in phone calls as the Clubtelephone number had been printedincorrectly in their entry in the localphone directory.

It was already known that the winnersof this tie would face another huge taskwith a visit to Oxford City in theQuarter Final but this seemed to act asan incentive for the Chesham team. Bynow The Meadow had become afortress for teams being forced backhere for replays and the return matchwith Casuals was no exception.

An excellent crowd of 1,400 was alittle below the ambitious expectationsof officials and they were rewarded asearly as the 15th minute as Dave Elliswent down the right wing beforesending over a perfect cross for RonFruen to head home. Hundreds ofyoung fans invaded the pitch to con-gratulate the scorer and, once orderwas restored, that proved to be theonly goal of the game so it was all setup for the big trip to Oxford.

As we’re celebrating a 40th anniversaryI’m sure that somewhere a certain

Chesham’s Fruen and Harper challenge the Oxford goal during the4th round replay victory at The Meadow

Wembley 40 Years On

Francis Rossi and Rick Parfitt haverecently been remembering that on the19th February 1968 Status Quo playedChesham Co-Op Hall, no doubt gettinga rapturous response to “their currenttop 20 single Pictures of MatchstickMen”. Further up the chart ManfredMann’s Mighty Quinn was number onein Chesham thus providing a fan’ssoundtrack to serenade Jimmy, Mickey,Niall or any other player called Quinnfor the next four decades and beyond.

Oxford had beaten St Albans City,Tow Law Town and Prestwich instraight wins to reach this stage so hadplayed just three games to get to theQuarter Final compared to Chesham’stwelve. As another big side they wereable to say that were not expecting alarge crowd for the visit of Chesham -maybe as little as 3,000! - becauseOxford United were also at home thatday. Meanwhile United’s Joe Harperwas the subject of transfer speculationas it was known that Brighton had beenregular visitors to watch him in recentweeks.

The actual attendance at Oxford on2nd March was 3,482, boosted by ahuge Chesham travelling support, withthe Isthmian League hosts expected tosee off their Athenian visitors. How-ever, in a tense cup tie Chesham cre-ated just as many scoring chancesbefore the game finished 0-0. City hadthe best opportunity to reach the semifinal after half an hour when KennyKent punched the ball out of his ownpenalty area only for Oxford captain,Bob Jackson, to blast the resulting

penalty well wide of Dennis Wells’goal.

The return at The Meadow was set forthe following Saturday with Cheshamoptimistic once more of a decentcrowd - again some 2,000 fans wereexpected. The reward was to be a visitto Fulham’s Craven Cottage for a tiewith non-league giants Wealdstone andjust a possible 90 minutes away from avisit to Wembley. For Chesham thiswas almost unimaginable. 1000-1 out-siders at the start of the competitionthey were about to embark on their15th game in the cup run. Prices wereagain raised, this time to 3 shillings, tomatch those charged by City, but thishad no effect on the crowd as pre-match estimates proved wildly cau-tious. On the day a 4,150 crowd gath-ered at The Meadow - the biggest

seen at the ground since 1936 for thevisit of defunct Tunbridge Wells Rang-ers.

City made the crucial mistake of under-estimating Chesham. The previousweek United played a containing gamebut on their own pitch forced moremen forward and were rewarded in the9th minute when Fruen crossed fromthe left and, with keeper Shippeystranded on his six yard line, Dave Ellisdrove home from the edge of the box.With Mick McCaffrey and Joe Harperputting in blistering tackles in midfield,whilst Les Burgess and Brian Catererheld the defence firm, Chesham pre-vented Oxford producing threats ongoal. In the 80th minute a memorablewin was confirmed. Peter Frost hadreplaced Harper just 5 minutes earlierand when Shippey failed to hold a

Some of the 4,150 who crowded into The Meadow to cheer Cheshamonto a famous 2-0 Quarter Final replay win over Oxford City

Oxford’s keeper Shippey can do nothing to stop Dave Ellis’ opening goal as a packed Popular Standenjoys the 2-0 replay victory over Oxford City

Celebrating Chesham United’s FA Amateur Cup run to Wembley in 1967/1968

Fruen volley he hooked the ball highinto the net.

Cue scenes of delirium according topress reports. Dozens of toilet rollsthrown on to the pitch produced astern warning from the club’s loud-speaker system and the pitch wasswamped with supporters running onto congratulate the men in claret inblue The team had to run a gauntlet ofbackslapping fans as they made theirway to the waiting champagne in thechanging room. Now Wealdstone wereall that stood between CheshamUnited and a unique visit to WembleyStadium.

With the Quarter Final tie againstOxford City having gone to areplay before Chesham wentthrough, there was only one weekto prepare for the next FA Ama-teur Cup game and a visit to FirstDivision Fulham’s Craven Cottageground on the banks of theThames in West London.

Such was the rush that tickets hadalready been printed indicating a tiebetween either Oxford or Chesham

and Wealdstone and the supporters’committee wasted no time in distribut-ing them to the eager hoards expectedto travel on Saturday 16th March 1968.Special offers were announced for traintravel into London on the day withtickets for departures between11.33am and 1.29pm priced at nineshillings and sixpence. A dedicatedFootball Special was laid on for fansleaving at 12.40pm and a fleet of 23coaches was organised to pick up afurther thousand supporters at TheMeadow for the road journey.

In the days leading up to the tieChesham were hit with injury andillness worries. Surely this would bethe last time when the front page mainheadline of the paper was “CheshamSkipper down with flu” but although

missing training Les Burgess was ex-pected to recover for the big game.Meanwhile, goalkeeper Dennis Wellswas hospitalised after “studding” him-self in the foot during the win overOxford but was also expected to makethe trip to Fulham. By contrast Weald-stone had no fitness problems andwere fully expected to field theirstrongest line up for what was theclub’s second Amateur Cup semi-finalappearance in three years. The trio ofCharlie Townsend, Hugh Lindsay andBernie Bremer had all played in their1966 Cup winning side whilst a fourthplayer, David Swain, had joined themfrom the Hendon side beaten in thatgame. Chesham boss John Reardon wasupbeat though, “This is the hardestgame we will have played - but I thinkwe can do it”.

Football special trains ran from Chesham to London to get fans toCraven Cottage whilst at The Meadow 23 coaches prepared to carry

1,000 of the 3,000 plus United fans at the game

Dave Ellis wheels triumphantly away after making it 2-0 at Craven Cottage

Wembley 40 Years On

Whereas Chesham had played a record-breaking fifteen matches in their runto this stage, involving twenty threehours of football, Wealdstone’s pro-gress had been comparatively straight-forward. Chesham, as an AthenianLeague side had entered the competi-tion at the Preliminary round stage andthen gone through four additionalQualifying rounds to reach the FirstRound Proper. The Isthmian Leaguers,by contrast, only entered the Cup atthis stage and had come through justfour ties to reach the Semi-Final. Inround one Torpoint were beaten 4-2and Eastwood also went out 4-2 in asecond replay after the first game hadbeen drawn 1-1. The third round sawKingstonian beaten 2-0 whilst in theQuarter Final Wealdstone saw offBarking 3-1. All told then just sevenand a half hours of football - around athird of the time it had taken Chesham.In the event of a draw in the Semi-Finalthe replay was set up for Luton Town’sKenilworth Road ground the followingweek and, with Chesham alreadyhaving fought their way through sixreplays, the likelihood seemed quitehigh.

As the Bucks Examiner said in their

front page editorial, “The eyes of thesoccer world will be on them”, andwith ITV’s World of Sport and the BBCcovering the pre-match preparationand planning to have cameras at Fulhamthat was certainly true. The nationalpress had also started to take an inter-est in “little Chesham” though nonehonestly seemed to expect their jour-ney to last any further than a nobledefeat on their big day out. The Lon-don Evening Standard produced adouble page spread Semi-Final preview.Unfortunately, having tried to trackdown the TV footage from the broad-casters’ archives, it appears that it nolonger exists - if anyone reading thisknows differently please let me know.

Whilst many were understandablyobsessed with the football, life did goon. Chesham and Amersham were toget a dozen more primary schools andit was announced that the Queenwould be visiting the Joint Services StaffCollege at Latimer. Kenton’s recordshop was just receiving new releasesfrom The Beatles (Lady Madonna localpaper review: “It’s Paul McCartneysinging and sounding like Ringo” whichmust have cheered young Paul up),Cilla Black with Step Inside Love and

Simon & Garfunkle’s Scarborough Fair.But at number one was CinderellaRockefella, and so the tradition ofdodgy night club names was born.

On the social side the mighty CheshamCo-Op Hall had come up trumps again.Starting at 8pm on the night of thegame was a certain “Jeff Beck and hisgroup with Rod Stewart”, admissionten shillings. So, just enough time to getto the game and back to Chesham intime to join in with the chart-toppingHi Ho Silver Lining before it becamethe backing track for a million embar-rassing Dad wedding performancesover the next four decades.

On the day of the game the exodusfrom Chesham began as fans madetheir way to Fulham by train, coach andcar. The crowd at Craven Cottage wasa slightly disappointing 8,500 but theChesham support was impressive.Initial estimates had suggested thataround 2,000 would make the tripfrom Bucks but in the end it is thoughtthere were nearer 3,500 - not badfrom a town with only 19,000 residentsback in 1968. As the game kicked offsome were still struggling to get there- several of the 23 coaches were held

Back: Brian Caterer, Brian Thackeray, Ron Fruen, Dennis Wells, Les Burgess, Kenny Kent, Peter FrostFront: Derek Smith, Joe Harper, David Black, Mick McCaffrey, Dave Ellis

Celebrating Chesham United’s FA Amateur Cup run to Wembley in 1967/1968

up by traffic problems in Hammersmithand some fans did not get there untilhalf time. Chesham were in goodcompany visiting Craven Cottage atthat time. Visiting the following weekto play Fulham in the First Divisionwere Arsenal with Manchester Uniteddue to play on the same stage as theGenerals on April 12th.

Losing the toss, Chesham kicked offinto a fierce wind and Wealdstonedominated the early exchanges butfailed to create a serious threat ongoal. Weathering the storm in everysense United’s defence held firm withthe favourite’s only real chance in thewhole game coming when DennisWells in the Chesham goal had toscramble backwards to clear a droppedcross a few inches from his line. Wellshad performed heroically during thecup run and he was to keep anotherclean-sheet in this most importantgame. Coincidentally, both Wells andWealdstone’s Charlie Townsend wereboth working together on the sameFinchley building site at the time of thefixture.

Having contained the Stones for half anhour, Chesham then proceeded to ripout of defence and, much against theexpectation of the football pundits,started to dominate play. Before thematch, in addition to the ‘littleChesham’ goodwill there had beensome rather more barbed commentsabout the team of ‘rejects’ from Buck-inghamshire would be humbled by theirfar-superior opponents.It is to be hoped that most of the latearrivals had managed to get through

the Hammersmith traffic chaosby the 41st minute. Dave Ellisswung over a corner that waspunched clear by Andy Williamsin the Wealdstone goal only forEllis to immediately regainpossession. His chip to the farpost was perfect for Ron Fruenwho headed home off the post.Against the odds (and thoseodds had been a staggeringly1000 to 1 at the start of theCup run) Chesham were ahead.Only 45 minutes to hold outbut they were expecting afightback and needed the sup-port of all those 3,000 travellingfans.

As one contemporary reportsays, “A stranger to Fulhammight be excused for thinkingCraven Cottage was Chesham’shome ground. The almost non-stop roar of ‘Chesham’ fromthe terraces spurred them on”.

The fightback never happened becauseChesham did not allow it happen. HughLindsay, thought to be Wealdstone’smost threatening player, was markedout of the game by Brian Thackeray inthe second half. On 65 minutes thegame was sewn up. A long Wealdstoneback pass to Williams was chaseddown by Dave Ellis. He took control ofthe ball and was able to slot it homeinto an empty net for United’s secondgoal to seal a shock victory. As hadbecome usual, Peter Frost came on assubstitute after 75 minutes to helpChesham see out time with Joe Harperleaving the field to a standing ovation.

Frost still had time to skim the opposi-tion bar in the final minutes but as thewhistle blew the travelling claret andblue draped fans rushed onto the pitchin their hundreds to mob the team ontheir way back to the changing roomswhere captain Les Burgess received arousing rendition of “For He’s A JollyGood Fellow” from his team.

It was cups of tea rather than cham-pagne in the Chesham changing roombut that did nothing to lessen thesatisfaction. The players left Fulham tostart the celebrations proper with ameal at Hampton Court before going

Ron Fruen in white makes his presence feltat Craven Cottage

Two angles on the opening goal at Craven Cottage - on the right, Ron Fruen in white raises his arm tocelebrate as his header loops past the helpless Wealdstone keeper

Wembley 40 Years On

on to a party in Ron Fruen’s homevillage of Englefield Green, but withoutmanager John Reardon who went to bewith his wife who was expecting ababy.

Man of the match, Dave Ellis, explainedhis winning goal, “I followed up theback pass as part of the procedure andwhen I saw the keeper muff the pass Inipped in and scored. It was a wonder-ful feeling scoring and I am lookingforward to Wembley”. Captain LesBurgess summed up the feelings of thewhole team, “It’s hard to believe weare going to Wembley. Wembley! Itsounds marvellous”.

Club officials were equally satisfied.Secretary Sid McDonnell said, “It’smarvellous, just to think we have wonour way to Wembley” whilst ClubChairman, Alan Moore, commented,“Our performance was fantastic. But Istill can’t believe it, I’m overwhelmed”.

When the players had left the field atCraven Cottage their first questionwas, “Who have we got in the Final?”.The answer to that one would have towait for a while as the other Semi-Finalbetween Sutton United and Leyton-stone had ended in a draw with a

replay scheduled for Brentford’s GriffinPark.

The following week the tributes forChesham’s achievement started topour in. A writer from Dewsbury inYorkshire congratulated the team on,“...a marvelous achievement. Cheersand congratulations to all down in thesouth from one up here isolated in themiddle of lots of Rugby League enthusi-asts”.

A local, un-named, woman was re-ported as making a £100 donation tothe team with a request that they visither home “for sherry”. More innocenttimes perhaps but I do hope that’s nota euphemism.

Somehow the Queen’s visit to Latimermanaged to get on the front page butthe Fulham win got equal billing withthe news that the Chesham team wereto be honoured with a civic receptionwhatever the outcome of their day outat Wembley though there was disap-pointment that the game itself was notgoing to be televised. Local businesseswere quick off the mark with Brandonsdepartment store straight in with therather tortuous, “Good Luck Cheshamfor the Amateur Cup. But it doesn’tneed luck to find the Bargains in Uphol-

Good luck messages floodedin from exiled Chesham

people and football fans fromaround the country. The

following came into the BucksExaminer from England andSpurs star Jimmy Greaves

who was also a Vice Presidentof Chesham United:

“Well done Chesham United!And good luck tomorrow. I havelong been a fan of Chesham’sfootball club and as a vice –president of the club I would

like to join in with everyone elsein the congratulations to them

for their cup run this year.

I can’t help feeling that Unitedhave a tremendous chance of

winning tomorrow and I will beas happy as anyone else in the

town if they do.

Unfortunately, although Iplanned to be at Wembley Sta-dium to cheer them on, I mustplay for the Spurs tomorrow

against Coventry City. You canall be sure I will be thinking ofthem when the time comes forthe team to run out on to the

pitch.

It’s a ground I know very welland despite the number of times

I have played there I still feelnervous while waiting with therest of the boys in the dressing

room. Heaven only knows whatit will be like for the Chesham

team who haven’t played therebefore!

I know Chesham United will putup a good performance againstLeytonstone and let’s hope theycome away with that fabulous

Amateur Cup.

All the best,

Jimmy Greaves”

3,000 Chesham fans celebrate Fruen’s first goal against Wealdstone

Celebrating Chesham United’s FA Amateur Cup run to Wembley in 1967/1968

stery”! Much more to the point wasChittendens. “Congratulations toChesham United FC. We shall close atnoon on April 20th to support you atWembley”.

As Sid McDonnell set about distributingthe first batch of 6,000 Final ticketsrather aptly “Congratulations” by CliffRichard entered the chart in the sameweek. By the time April 20th camealong that 6,000 would have grown toover 20,000 tickets sold to supportUnited at Wembley, more than thetown itself. And whilst Cliff would onlyreach number 2 in time for Wembleythe song that kept him off the top spotwas just as appropriate. Louis Arm-strong’s “What a Wonderful World”.

If the interest in CheshamUnited’s run in the 1967/68 Ama-teur Cup had seemed high beforethe semi-final with Wealdstone,the victory at Craven Cottagetook it to another level entirely.The club who the national media

now dubbed ‘Little Chesham’prepared to deal with an unprece-dented demand for tickets for atown of just 18,000 people.

Work started straight after the gameon the 16th March and,by the time the Finaltook place at Wembleyon 20th April 1968,over 20,000 tickets hadbeen distributed fromthe club and a networkof Chesham Unitedagents throughout thetown and across theChilterns. An esti-mated 14,000 weresold in Chesham itself.Chesham’s opponentswere Isthmian Leaguehigh-flyers Leyton-stone, another muchhigher ranked club thanUnited. They hadalready won the Ama-teur Cup twice, in1947 at Arsenal’sHighbury and thefollowing year at Chel-sea’s Stamford Bridgestadium. But they weredetermined to win thetrophy for the firsttime at Wembley itself.Entering the competi-tion in the First RoundProper (five roundslater than Chesham)their progress to thefourth round QuarterFinal stage was quitestraightforward. Suc-

cessive victories away to Clapton (2-0),then home to Southall (1-0) and Bish-ops Stortford (7-2) gave them a toughaway fixture against Enfield. Followingtwo goal-less draws they finally wonthe second replay 1-0 at Orient’sBrisbane Road to set up another clashof non-league giants against SuttonUnited at Crystal Palace. Once morethe first meeting ended in a no scorestalemate but Leytonstone went on towin the replay held at Griffin ParkBrentford 3-1 to confirm their place atWembley.

Whereas Chesham had played sixteenmatches involving over 24 hours offootball to get there, despite theirreplays late in the competition it hadtaken Leytonstone just eight games toreach the Final.

Go on, we’d all do it given the chance! StrikerRon Fruen poses with ‘The Cup’ at the top of the

old Wembley’s famous steps.

Chesham manager, John Reardon (left) leads his team out

Wembley 40 Years On

In the weeks leading up the Wembleygame player after player from theChesham team picked up injuries as thebacklog of League and County Cupmatches started to take its toll. Playingat least two games a week. At the endof March both Dave Ellis and JoeHarper were put out for at least twoweeks with leg damage and the localpress started featuring regular leaguematch reports as front page newsstories when the local heroes were indanger of missing the big game. One ofthe main news stories a fortnightbefore the big match was a report ofthe game with Tilbury: “CheshamUnited were very lucky not to receiveany serious injuries in their league clashwith Tilbury for nearly every playerreceived treatment at some stage.”Like most other games at this stage theresult went against Chesham (a 3-0loss). In the meantime Chesham hadfinally got around to playing their muchdelayed Berks & Bucks Cup 3rd roundtie with Slough. Yet another drawngame (0-0) didn’t help the fixture chaosin the least though the sporting natureof the game at this level was exempli-fied as Slough’s team formed a guard ofhonour to welcome their visitors inrecognition of the remarkable AmateurCup run. Slough’s 2-0 replay win atThe Meadow gave them a semi-finalagainst Aylesbury with the prospect ofthe winners facing Wycombe Wander-ers in the final.

Off the field, preparations were in fullflow. The town had already decidedthat a civic reception would be held forthe team on the Monday after the bigmatch. The Chiltern Co-OperativeSociety donated use of the town’s mainvenue, the Co-Op Hall, to stage theevent, Darvells Bakers agreed to pro-vide all the catering free of charge,Climpsons Wine Merchants providedall drink at cost and Chesham Press didall the invitations for nothing. Local

members of the NationalFarmers Union pitched inand announced that theywould provide enoughturkeys to feed all theguests. In amongst all thisboth the BBC and ITVsent camera crews to TheMeadow in the run up tothe Final and Kenny Kentjoined the ranks of thewalking wounded aheadof the game.

An employee of GeorgeTutill flag makers in thetown found himself sur-prisingly having to pay upon a bet placed the yearbefore. With Chesham at1000 to 1 to win the Cuphe had promised to makea flag for the Club if theygot to Wembley. Theyhad and he duly repaid hisbet, presenting a new flagfor the occasion to thesupporters’ club beforethe game. By now thoseodds had tumbled. W.Reading Turf Accountantswas advertising the matchodds as Chesham 6-4,Leytonstone 5-6. Theminimum stake theywould accept was 6d with a £2 maxi-mum bet.

Amateur Cup fever did have it’s draw-backs and there were reports of“enthusiastic Chesham youths” spend-ing their time waiting for the last bushome from Amersham by breaking into“a spot of community singing” at theLondon Transport Garage. This tookthe form of “We’ll be running roundWembley with the Cup” to the tune of“She’ll be coming round the moun-tains” (yep, think we know that one).However, when they stepped on thebus, “it was a few decibels more than

the driver and conductress thoughtproper at 11.30pm and when the songdeteriorated into something morebawdy (yep, think we know that ver-sion too) they acted”. Cue the policecar, three warnings to stop resulting in,according to the report, the classic“You and ’ose mates?” response and itwas the long walk home.

They really should have stayed inChesham and gone to the Embassydouble header - The Pure Hell of StTrinians and Blue Murder at St Trini-ans. Or saved their pennies for the“Cup Final Special, 2 Group, 4 Hour

non-stop Rock ’n’ Roll Show”being put at the mighty Co-OpHall.

By the day of the game CheshamUnited had commandeered practi-cally ever available coach in thecounty - some 68 of them madeup the official travelling fan contin-gent by road - and London Un-derground laid on football specialtrains from Chesham direct toWembley. The day before the

Chesham’s defence is stranded as Ken Gray’s crucial 69th minute goal goes in

Chesham skipper Les Burgess in whiteexchanges pennants before kick off at Wembley

Celebrating Chesham United’s FA Amateur Cup run to Wembley in 1967/1968

game they were clearly a little appre-hensive as an appeal went out for fansto make sure they had advance ticketsas only 300 had so far been sold andchaos was anticipated in the bookinghall. Final training for the United play-ers took place at Ley Hill Golf Club as,apparently, the turf there was remarka-bly similar to that at Wembley Stadium!

By the 20th April all Chesham’s injurydoubts had been resolved but in themeantime the cup exploits had takentheir toll as they went into the Finalwithout a win in 13 games that had tobe squeezed in to the schedule. Theteam at Wembley was that which hadseen United through the later roundsof the competition: Dennis Wells, BrianThackray, Dereck Smith, Brian Caterer,Les Burgess (captain), Mick McCaffrey,Dave Ellis, Dave Black, Ron Fruen, JoeHarper, Kenny Kent and substitutePeter Frost.

The pre-match formalities saw themintroduced, in their change strip of allwhite, to the guest of honour, ViscountMontgomerey, and as the game kickedoff Chesham followers made up aroundhalf the 54,000 crowd inside Wembley,desperately hoping that the expertpredictions of a rout by Leytonstonecould be overturned. For the favour-ites’ 19 year old left back, BobbyHames, the game last just 3 minutes ashe was injured in the opening ex-changes to be replaced by the evenmore unfortunate John Albon. Leyton-stone found themselves reduced to 10men in these days before multiplesubstitutes as Albon brought a hushover Wembley as he broke his legshortly after coming on. AlthoughUnited enjoyed a territorial advantage

for the remainder of the opening halfthey were unable to take advantage.Leytonstone’s ten dropped back into adefensive unit and the counter-actingplay which taken Chesham so farbecame impossible as, despite being onthe attack for most of the time theywere unable to exploit any of the spacethey may have expected to find atWembley had their opponents beenable to be more adventurous.

Half time 0-0, and despite the manadvantage few had realistically expectedthe men from Bucks to be on eventerms at this stage. As the game woreon and Chesham tired the individualtalents of the much higher placedLeytonstone team started to becomemore dominant. But it was not until the69th minute that they managed to take

advantage. A waist-high cross into theChesham box was not claimed cleanlyand when the ball fell to feet of strikerKen Gray he was able to manoeuvreinto position and fire past the defend-ers on the Chesham line.

Although exhausted, United continuedto compete and had a glorious chanceto get back into the game after 75minutes. Stone’s defender Roy Walker“kicked Joe Harper off the ground”according to a contemporary reportleading to a Chesham penalty kick.Kenny Kent was the unfortunateChesham player as Billy Hadlow in theLeytonstone goal dived well to his leftto keep the spot kick out. The chanceto get back into contention was goneand Leytonstone saw out the remainingtime to take the trophy at Wembley

for the first time.

So, the journey had ended forChesham, at least on the field ofplay. They may have lost the gamethat day but for the achievementin getting there at all they werewinners before the Final evenstarted. The crowd at Wembleyseemed to sense this as Leyton-stone collected their fully ex-pected medals to a somewhatrestrained response whilst thecrowd reserved the biggest ap-plause for when Les Burgess ledhis team up to collect their run-ners up medals and then led themon a lap of honour around the oldstadium - something of a rarity

Chesham’s team at the Royal Box collecting medals from Viscount Montgomery

The final chance: it’s all over for Chesham as Kenny Kent’s 75thminute penalty is saved

Wembley 40 Years On

for a defeated team to undertake inthose days.

Whilst the players recovered from thegame the exodus from Wembley backto Chesham got underway. From5.30pm the crowds started to gather inChesham Broadway, boosted as eachreturning train emptied its passengersjust a few yards away. By the time theteam got back to the town some 5,000had gathered in front of what was thenthe Brandon’s store where a ‘WelcomeHome’ platform had been set up on thebalcony. The coach bringing the teamhome struggled to make it’s waythrough the throng of well-wishers.

Finally, after leading his team onto thebalcony, the normally quiet managerJohn Reardon reflected on the day:“After the game I was disappointed,and all the way back we were a littledownhearted, but when I saw all thesepeople . . . I have never seen anythinglike this. We did well to get to Wem-bley and I feel satisfied now I have seenall these marvellous people. . . whenwe didn’t get a goal, I think we felldown there, but don’t forget we gotbeaten by one of the best sides in thecountry. Look at those crowds, andhear them. They are marvellous aren’tthey?”

Club President, Leo Chittenden, spokeof a “wonderful” day and expressed hisimmense pride “for these twelve boyswho have given such a magnificentshow today.” A tearful Les Burgess toldthe crowd: “The players have given oftheir all today and this reception is

something more than we deserve. Wedid our best and we are sorry wecouldn’t bring the cup home for youall.”

With more receptions at the club thatnight and the civic reception the fol-lowing Monday the team’s perform-ances were well recognised at the timeand this continued over the next fewweeks. 1200 Chesham fans voted forthe Cup Final Man of the Match,awarded at the last home game. 25year old midfielder David Black was theclear winner with 493 votes with hisnearest challenger captain Les Burgesson 245 votes.

But the non-league award for that year

surely went to the Chesham squad as awhole. Charles Buchan’s Football YearBook for 1968 featured the cup run:“Chesham began their march to Wem-bley as 1000 to 1 outsiders in Septem-ber 1967. But 16 cup ties later theywere the wonders of the amateurworld, toppling such giants as Maiden-head, Dulwich Hamlet, CorinthianCasuals, Oxford City and Wealdstoneon the way. . . Always the odds wereagainst them but each time but eachtime they were dramatically upset aswhat had seemed no more than an idledream became more and more areality. . .Chesham’s cup glory ended inbitter-sweet disappointment on Wem-bley’s lush green turf. But they hadachieved near miracles.”

This history is a reproduction of a series of five articles writtenfor the Chesham United matchday programme throughout the2007/2008 season. I am indebted to Paul Vockins for providingaccess to the archive maintained by former Club Secretary, SidMacDonnell, throughout the 1967/1968 season and for all thereports in the Bucks Examiner records held by Chesham Library.

Thanks also to Tony White, Chesham fan and former Examinereditor, for providing the Foreword to this piece.

Most of all, thanks to all the players, management and officialsassociated with Chesham United Football Club during that cuprun to the Wembley Final in 1968. With the modern worldinsisting on penalties rather than replays such a tremendousachievement is unlikely to be equalled.

David JeffreyApril 2008

Back in Chesham 5,000 fans pack The Broadway to welcome the team home