“In the 1958/59 season Arsenal finished 3rd in the league, reached the 5th round of the cup and overall played some exciting, flowing football. It was early in that season that I saw my first professional football match. My uncle, who was a season ticket holder, took me to see Arsenal. He “”bunged”" the turnstile operator 10 bob (10 shillings or in today’s parlance 50p), I hopped over the turnstile and found myself sat next to my uncle in an unused seat in the Upper West Stand. This was September 1958 and at age 11, I wasn’t even particularly interested in football, much less Arsenal. Or so I thought! The cigar smoke was floating around the stand, the pitch was perfect and the place was abuzz with football chatter – there was much to talk about because the night before, Arsenal had signed for a record fee of GBP 40,000 Scottish international left winger Jackie Henderson from Wolves. The atmosphere was electric with anticipation and after about 3 seconds I was sucked in completely, an Arsenal fanatic for life. If this reminds you of the young kid in the movie of Nick Hornby’s book “”Fever Pitch”", too right. Nick has it spot on – this is the incomparable feeling of initiation to the devotion of a lifetime, of every young football fan (although I could not have known it at the time). The game? Arsenal beat West Bromwich Albion 4-3, Jackie Henderson scored twice, Arsenal were world-beaters that day in a game in which it seemed every time a team attacked the opposition’s goal they scored. Arsenal must have attacked last! My uncle had a lasting impression on me of another kind that day too, by teaching me to applaud the opposition’s good play. All in all, one of the best days of my life. The fact that it was followed by 13 years of abject Arsenal misery is another matter. The misery ended when Arsenal beat Anderlecht 3-0 at Highbury to win the 1970 Inter Cities Fairs Cup, and I was there to see it – but that’s a story for another day. — Thanks for writing David. Sometimes we get so wrapped up in today’s team we forget about the time before satellite TV and the Internet and what seeing a football pitch for the first time live is like.”