Our club historian shares some reflections of a lifetime following his hometown team…
Few people know the ins and outs of Reading Football Club like our club historian David Downs.
150 years of history… almost half of which he has borne witness to! From his first fixture following the club in the 1940s, through to the present day in 2022, he is a man with an encyclopaedic knowledge of the Royals, the Biscuitmen, our players, records and results.
And ahead of our anniversary-marking match on Saturday, he shared a few of his reflections from over the years…
“I’ve been watching the club for over 70 years, through the highs and lows,” David said. “Over the years, the passion I’ve had for Reading Football Club has shone through without any interruption whatsoever.
“There have been some great highs – promotion to the Premiership on a couple of occasions, an FA Cup semi-final, and best of all was probably winning the Simod Cup at Wembley on the first time we’d played there.
“I can remember going to see Reading in the grim old days of the 1960s and 70s, when a crowd of 4,000 at Elm Park was thought to be something of a triumph!
“I’ve lived through it all, and that has included some relegations as well, but it’s something that has stayed with me throughout a lifetime.
“When I first went to watch Reading in the 1940s, my dear old dad took me – he’d been away with the war for six years so I didn’t really know him – but I went with him to watch Reading in the old Third Division South.
“There would be crowds of 20,000 at a home game, because there was no competition. We didn’t have a television set or anything like that. And it just stayed with me. My first game… five or six minutes in, I didn’t really understand what was going on, but I was hooked. That’s the passion that has stayed with me ever since!”
Watch the interview in full, above – he recounts some of his most memorable moments, including our Wembley win, our record-setting victory against Queens Park Rangers, and one of the lesser-attended fixtures at Blyth Spartans in the 1970s, a large portion of which was played in the dark…