Next thing he’s over the barriers and onto the pitch, to have his moment with Vinnie Jones | OneFootball

February 1994 and it’s a trip to Selhurst Park, not to watch Newcastle United play Crystal Palace, but Vinnie Jones and crazy gang Wimbledon.

So it’s the 6am train down to King’s Cross and Monty had planned to meet his London supporting toon fan mate from the gig scene ‘Funky Si’… except it is now five to six and no sign of Monty.

So I decide to head over to the platform and get the train myself, when I hear at the top of his voice “Tone, wait for me.” I turn around to see Monty legging it into the station.

But wait, what’s this?

Oh no, turns out he’s only went and gone double denim for the day!! The fact that it was Emporio Armani didn’t let him off this 1970s fashion faux pas.

Anyway, we get to King’s Cross and Monty has arranged to meet Funky Si in Brixton for our pre-match sherry.

Gets off at Brixton tube and no sign of Funky Si, so with no mobiles, we decide just to head to the nearest boozer and hopefully he will find us, especillay as Funky Si had got us some corporate lounge tickets for the game. Which meant you could drink alcohol inside of the ground, when your average joe was still banned from having a beverage on the concourse.

It’s still well before 11am opening but we find this boozer go in and there’s a couple of punters in having a pint, champion.

Walk to the bar and OMG, they have the Jamaican ale Red Stripe on draft. Now I’d only ever seen this once before, in a boozer in Luton pre-game back in the 80s. You used to be able to get it in the toon but only in cans and it was £1.80 a pop back then and considered a bit of a poseurs drink.

So I go to the bar and ask for two pints of your Red Stripe please kind sir, to which the barman replies in his deep West Indian tone, “I don’t think this is the bar for you sir”, whilst motioning his head around the establishment.

“Look mate, we’re not from round here and supposed to be meeting a friend who hasn’t showed. Please just a couple of pints of Red Stripe till we get our bearings and we will bid you farewell.”

The barman then turns around to a Marsellus Wallace mountain lookalike sitting at the end of the bar, who nods with the inference that it’s one round only.

Ahhh that’s one fine pint of lager I say to Monty. “Any chance of another mate???”

To which the barman nods at Marsellus who takes one foot off his stool and me and Monty are offski, where we practically bump into Funky Si as we come hurtling out of the boozer.

Funky Si “Alright lads, sorry I’m late, the bus stop is just over there”, me and Monty both just look at each other and shout “TAXI!” ”

So we get over to Crystal Palace high street (Norwood junction, if you want to get technical) and few more/ dozen light ales are partaked in, then it’s up to the ground for our lounge/match. Unfortunately, at the time Canadian lager seemed to be in vogue (Rolling Rock).

Anyway, the match starts and after a skinful, Monty is becoming quite squiffy and as we’re now 4-1 down, this is only going to end two ways.

Option one, he has a kebab and goes to kip.

Option two, it kicks off.

Considering these corporate tickets are in the home end, William Hill seemed to have closed the book on Option two.

As Monty goes to the toilets I have my lightbulb moment.

We get a penalty and new boy Peter makes it 2-4. Monty’s back “Aargh, I’ve missed wor goal.”

“Worse than that Monty, whilst you were having a p.ss, Vinnie Jones came over and said ‘You see your pal in the double denim. Thinks he’s a hard lad. Well tell him I could chin him any day’.”

Monty falls for it hook, line and sinker (well we did have a lot to drink).

Next thing he’s over the barriers, past the stewards and onto the pitch, to have his moment with Vinnie Jones.

Unfortunately, it being a February afternoon and a cut up pitch, he made it about 12 steps onto the pitch before double denim became green sodden Armani. With a class rugby tackle from one of the stewards, cheered on enthusiastically by me and Funky Si.

A couple hours of sobering up for Monty and we even managed to make the 10pm train home, via Crystal Kebabs in King’s Cross.