Author John Williams discusses how fan culture has evolved in Liverpool in the Post-War era

MISTY-EYED romantics who wax lyrical about the good old days when Merseyside supposedly enjoyed a ‘friendly derby’ will be shocked to hear about hooliganism at a Liverpool-Everton game way back in 1950.

Far removed from the traditional image of attending matches in football’s ‘golden age’ of Brylcreem, enormous shorts, rattles and Bovril, author John Williams has discovered reports of trouble involving supporters of the two clubs when they clashed in the FA Cup semi-final 59 years ago.

Although he stresses that fans were generally well-behaved at this time, football in the city was not immune to trouble.

Williams said: “In the main, football supporters cared more about each other in the post-war era. In the country as a whole there was an attitude of sharing and rebuilding.

“Considering the huge crowds attending many matches in grounds that were none too impressive it’s perhaps surprising there were relatively few football stadium disasters at the time.

“People knew how to behave in the ground as they realised everybody had to get home and that’s something we lost a bit in later years.

“There are numerous examples of people leaving games at Liverpool before the match had even started. They realised that the terrace was already packed and concerned about the level of crushing.

“This anxiety came mostly from the fans not the clubs but it wasn’t an isolated problem and happened both at Anfield and other grounds.”

Despite this kind of ‘self-policing’ by supporters at large, Williams has unearthed evidence of various pockets of trouble involving Merseyside fans in the 1950s.

He said: “There are reports of both Liverpool and Everton supporters causing problems before the 1950 FA Cup semi-final between them at Maine Road.

“This was at a time long before hooliganism was reported nationally but there are accounts of rival fans fighting outside the ground and a Mancunian bus conductor being beaten up.”

Immediately before Bill Shankly arrived at Anfield to transform Liverpool into an all-conquering powerhouse, the club endured an eight-year spell in the Second Division between 1954-62 and Williams reveals that there were various accounts of fan trouble during this period.

He said: “There is something of a hidden history of hooliganism much earlier than you might expect, particularly with Liverpool during their Second Division days when as a big club they’d be visiting some smaller grounds and there were some quite serious incidents.”

The advent of pop/youth culture in 1960s Britain was of course driven from Liverpool by The Beatles and other Merseybeat groups and this had a dramatic effect inside football grounds.

Williams said: “There was a rise in the phenomenon of ‘home ends’ like the Kop and Gwladys Street where the younger people stood separetly to their older counterparts for the first time.

“While there had been chanting at grounds for many years – Anfield had chants for Elisha Scott in the 1920s – co-ordinating singing was really coming in for the first time.

“This meant that there was a more carnival-like atmosphere at matches but also led to less self-policing, particularly at away matches where there was a rising concern about the groups of young men travelling together away from their elders.

“However, there was a more glamorised image of the game through the media in the 60s and Liverpool was at the very centre of that.

“Bill Shankly was a very charismatic figure who behaved like something of a celebrity within a football context while the players of both Everton and Liverpool enjoyed the glamour of being seen with the city’s pop stars.”

Darker days lay ahead though in the 1970s & 80s as economic decline coincided with the rise of football hooliganism.

Williams said: “As times became harder, supporting your club in Europe became an ‘alternative career’ for many young men from Merseyside.

“Lots of bright, sharp, lads felt that the city offered no prospects for them but following their club in Europe – particularly Liverpool who were successful during this period – shaped a certain identity for them.

“They didn’t have to work as such but could lay their hands on rail tickets and ‘live off the land’ as it were.”