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From Dream to Nightmare - How the Away Day Morons Ruined It for My 13 Year Old Son

Guest Post by Andrew Newman

I am proud to say I have supported West Ham all my life. Since I moved down to Dorset From London 13 years ago I fell in love & happily married my wife and proudly took on her son on who I am now honoured to call my stepson. He was at the time 9 yrs old and sadly supported Chelsea unto the age of 11. But I managed to convince him to support West Ham. He instantly fell in love with our history, mainly Bobby Moore and our famous ‘bubbles’ song. And iconic players from the past like Di Canio, Dicks, Bonds, etc.

He now loves to sing the Payet song in his room and ‘bubbles’ whenever possible all the time. His bedroom is now claret & blue from top to bottom and gone is the Chelsea theme I reluctantly decorated for him. I have taken him to home friendlies before, as sadly I cant get a season ticket. But luckily due to my business relationship with a supplier who has 2 season tickets for Southampton I have been able to take him to the West Ham away matches at St Mary’s for the last two years.

But can you imagine having to sit in the Saints end listening to the conversations running the Hammers down and how great the Saints are? It is torture for me!

But I love him so I can just about tolerate it. But at least it’s always a safe environment. He now has grown into a lovely respectful thirteen year old son.

However, he always wishes he could be in the away end so he can sing ‘bubbles’ the Payet song when we go to Southampton. I always tell him what a great experience away days are and promised him one day we will go to a away day match and sing our hearts out together, win, lose or draw. Nothing would make me prouder seeing him so happy.

At Saturday night’s match against Southampton we were, as usual, sitting in the home end. And as usual we was having to listen to the usual dribble from Saints fans until half time. But then I could see down by the touchline a head steward I know from work.

I grabbed my son’s hand and we went down there and I asked the steward if there was any chance he could get us in the away end with our fellow West Ham fans. He said ‘Sure, come with me’. At this point my son’s eyes lit up and he was so excited. We were kindly shown in to the West Ham end. I have never seen him so happy. Another steward told us there were plenty of seats available near the segregation seats and to choose which ones we would like. As I excitedly thanked him my son and I moved into position.

The mood was defiantly different from the one in the Southampton end we were in. But he was still so happy and couldn’t wait to hear the rendition of ‘bubbles’ start. The second half kicked off and so did ‘bubbles’. He looked at me and I winked at him, and he sang his heart out. I was so happy I had made his dream come true.

Sadly the mood changed again after the sending off and a few morons from West Ham kept charging past us towards the Southampton supporters, clearly not interested in the match, swearing and being abusive in front of my son pushing him out of way so they could scream at the Southampton fans, goading them for a fight.

As I looked at my son’s face it turned in a instant from one of happiness to one full of fear. He was so scared the tears soon followed.This kept on and on. My heart broke i held him close and could feel his body shaking with fear – his dream having turned into a nightmare. As I looked around also a young girl of maybe eight or nine was also sobbing, hugging her Dad close. I then left with my son before the match finished for his safety.

What possesses idiots to behave in front of children like this?! I can never again say to my stepson that West Ham is a family club. And I think emotionally he is scared to want to go to another West Ham match, home or away. The morons who only wanted to go for a fight have ruined his love for our great club.

I’m a very sad Hammer.

UPDATE FROM IAIN: This has a happy ending. If you look through the comments you will see that Graham has offered to take Andrew and his son to a game, as he has seats at the ground where there isn’t any aggression or bad language. I am delighted to say that Andrew and his son will be going to the Sunderland game, and Andrew will write a post for us afterwards. See how brilliant the people on this site can be? I have a warm feeling inside :).

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