Page 42 - 368603 LP250721 AWY AWY AWY Book (238pp A5)

In the build-up to the 1966 tournament there’d been much gnashing of teeth among our rivals when St James Park had been rejected as it failed to meet FIFA standards. With the help of a nice F.A. grant Roker Park had been enhanced before the competition by a roof being built over the Fulwell End and permanent seats being added to the Clock Stand. Temporary seats were also installed in the Fulwell End for the four games and so the normal capacity of over 50,000 was substantially reduced. There was all manner of World Cup merchandise on sale in the town even back then and I still possess, somewhere (okay, I know really), a yellow and black World Cup Willie badge – he was our lion mascot and there was a song about him. There was also a German version ‘Fussball Willy’.
The first match in the group had been staged the night before at Ayresome Park in Middlesborough when the U.S.S.R. had defeated the very dark horses of North Korea 1- 0. There must have been a few nervous officials before the Italy v Chile game that night but as it turned out there wasn’t even a booking and it ended in a 2-0 win for Italy with Sandro Mazzola getting one of the goals. The crowd was 33,000. I remember it was a great time for the landladies of Sunderland and my mate’s mam up the street had a few Italian guys staying with her. She also had popular vocal trio The Ivy League staying there once, which caused a minor sensation among us kids. Apart from their own hits they did the backing vocals on The Who’s mighty ‘I Can’t Explain’.
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