Gotta thing about the Blues? Well, last night at the Buxton Festival Fringe you would have had a chance to indulge yourself to the full. The playbill at the United Reformed Church suggested, “ a compelling tale of extreme survival, one man’s journey to the end of the earth and deep inside his own mind”. Ok, that was the play in the other room based on Inuit mythology and Arctic exploration but with just a little poetic licence it could be the strapline for Bill Cronshaw’s latest offering “Maine Road Blues”. It’s a delightful wallow in the deep end of Manchester City nostalgia. The audience was a bit on the thin side; barely sufficient for a five a side team with just 2 Sheffield United fans, 2 young people who were probably at the wrong venue and three old farts with Blue antecedents going back as far as 1946. But undaunted Bill gave us the heart felt recollections of a true Blue, born and bred himself and father to a dynasty of younger blues It’s for Blues of a certain vintage. Those of us who can recall Piccadilly Gardens as a well-manicured flower garden and not the reception area of the United Nations also remember when players got paid £10 a week, pitches were often like paddy fields and heading a casey could leave you with an headache for a week. Five bob might get you to the match, a bag of chips and 5 Woodbines with enough left over to go to the pictures. Bill is at his most lyrical and touching when recounting his own experiences in a series of vignettes which only a City fan could deliver. A lad with a pair of Corporation frame specs, a balaclava and a gabardine mac getting Bert Trautmann’s autograph. Laurie Barnett’s hilarious intervention with Bert’s broken neck in the 1956 Cup Final. A misty eyed roundup of the Mercer/Allison years. A phlegmatically borne summary of the descent of Maine Road from being a majestic venue to a collection of mismatched, ill fitted stands, “the Donald Trump of football grounds”. And then they pulled it down and we were off to relative luxury on the other side of town. The separation was heart rending but the rest is, as they say, history. When City and their fans are on the brink of an era which may see them win silverware on an annual basis it’s good to remember when being brought up a Blue was a bye word for life’s disappointments. In the old score board end there was a urinal which should have borne the legend “IN” but the wag with the stencil had left us with ”NI”. That was life with City; upside down and back to front. The play captures that beautifully and it resonates with this old Blue. Bill Cronshaw’s insights, observations and humour make for a play which every Blue should get to see. It finishes on Sunday so time is limited. Jeff Hill July 2013
Posted on: Thu, 11 Jul 2013 08:33:18 +0000
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