Fever pitch | 28 July 2016

It cost just £4/10s for 19-year-old Alan Dryland to buy a season ticket that would take him inside the stadium for all ten of the World Cup matches held in London in that magical summer of 1966. The pound was falling, the Vietnam war raging, but England made it through to the final and the Beatles and Rolling Stones were battling it out to top the charts. If nothing else, 66: We Were There, Radio 5 Live’s affectionate look back at that tremendous victory, proved that Sixties music was brilliant. The producer’s choice on Saturday was pitch-perfect, from the Lovin’ Spoonful’s ‘Summer in the City’ to Chris Farlowe’s ‘Out of Time’.

I was there. Well, not at Wembley, but a choirgirl in white ruff and surplice delegated to rush across to the vicarage between weddings to check on the score on our tiny black-and-white TV. We were all caught up in football fever. Not that this meant I was particularly keen to listen to a week-load of anniversary programmes on 5 Live, until I found out that Tom Courtenay was presenting and that it would be a straightforward compilation of memories from those who were really there. I didn’t expect to stay long but I was hooked from the off, by the music, by Courtenay’s distinctive, compelling voice, and the clever way the programme was put together by the producer, Garth Brameld. It was such a contrast to BBC4’s overblown attempt to capture the spirit of ’66 in an Arena documentary, also at the weekend.

No attempt was made at sociological analysis, what football might mean, the impact on our island story. This was simply people talking, interspersed with a gradual unfolding of the match, goal by heart-stopping goal. From the ballboy who was the first Englishman to touch the ball after it was kicked offside by the West German side, to James Mossop, a fledgling sportswriter, who spent the night afterwards celebrating with Jack Charlton.