Where it all started
Growing up in Leeds, West Yorkshire, within walking distance of the iconic Elland Road, football was always going to be a big part of my life.
I went to St Michael’s College in Headingley, a stone’s throw from the famous cricket ground and the Leeds Rhinos. School, to be honest, was very much a secondary interest. Sport was what mattered.
Cricket in the summer, football in the winter. I was fortunate enough to play cricket to a good standard for Morley in the Central Yorkshire League, but football was always the real passion. I played for Leeds United Juniors at Harrison Field — a name that will bring back memories for anyone from the area and of that era.
As I got older my love of the game took me further afield. I developed a real sense of wanderlust, lived and worked in a number of football-loving countries, played to a decent standard, and on one or two occasions even got paid to play.
Through all of it one thing stayed constant: collecting.
Fifty years of collecting
That started very young. Through the 1970s I would make the short journey to Elland Road with friends to watch Leeds United, and on matchdays and school holidays I would go and watch the team train as well. I went armed with an autograph book, collecting signatures from the players and photographs from the football publications of the time — Shoot especially, along with pictures cut carefully out of the local papers.
Most of those photographs and cuttings, collected more than forty-five years ago, were eventually given away or lost. The autograph book survived. It is around fifty years old now, and inside are the signatures of the legendary names who wore the shirt in that era: Jack Charlton, Norman Hunter, Billy Bremner, Johnny Giles, Eddie Gray, Allan Clarke and many more.
There were other moments too. Elland Road was standing room only in those days. On the final whistle I would get as close to the pitch as possible and make my way onto the field after my favourite players. My prize was their sock tags — Leeds were unique in using them — and between 1972 and 1978 I got hold of tags belonging to Tony Currie and Brian Flynn. Those have disappeared over the years. The memories have not.
Over the decades the collecting spread well beyond football: memorabilia from the music industry, from rugby, cricket and golf, along with signed shirts, official prints and team photographs. Many of those collections have since been sold or given away. The passion for football memorabilia never disappeared.
And that brings me to Matchday Vault
Today that passion has become something much more focused: authentic football shirts. I am particularly interested in shirts that have been worn, used, collected and preserved — shirts that carry a story and represent a particular player, team, season or moment in football history. Where possible I also look for new and unworn originals, but authenticity is always the starting point.
No replicas. No fakes. Just genuine football shirts with a genuine story.
What started as a childhood obsession at Elland Road more than fifty years ago has grown into something I can share with fellow supporters and collectors around the world.
Welcome to Matchday Vault.
The personal touch from Billy Bremner
I have always had a bit of wanderlust in me, so in January 1986 I set off for Australia on a one-way ticket and a work visa. Before arriving I spent five months travelling around Asia, before eventually landing at Tullamarine Airport in Melbourne.
I managed to land what I thought was a pretty plum job, delivering chickens to butchers throughout Melbourne and the surrounding suburbs. After a while I decided to move on and headed for Sydney, where I found a house share in Bondi Junction.
Although I was enjoying the adventure, I was missing home — and, of course, I was missing the football. So I decided to write a letter to the Leeds United manager, wishing him all the best for the coming season. At the time, the manager was none other than our captain, legend and all-round hero, Billy Bremner.
I never really expected to receive a reply.
Then, one morning towards the end of September, a letter came through the letterbox in Sydney that immediately caught my attention. It had arrived in a Leeds United club-embossed envelope from Elland Road. Billy Bremner had taken the time to write back to me. Incredible.
To think that, thousands of miles away from home, I had written to my footballing hero — and he had personally taken the time to reply — is something that has stayed with me ever since. His personal response is still my prize possession, and I have kept it all these years.
It is not just a letter from Billy Bremner. It is a little piece of Leeds United history, and a wonderful reminder of the personal touch that made him such a special man.
The reply, dated 6 September 1986 and signed by Bremner as manager, is below.
