What a Save! John Farmer!
When he was a little boy in New Buildings, near Brindley Ford, Stoke-on-Trent, Staffs, in the 1950s, Our John dived around on cushions he’d strategically placed in our front room and dreamt of keeping goal for Spurs. His Tottenham dream never came true, but real life was much, much better; he kept goal for Stoke. Little John also dreamed of saving a penalty on cup final day at Wembley: that dream did come true, well, sort of.
In 1972, when he was understudy to the great Gordon Banks, John got changed in the Wembley dressing room, as kick-off neared in the League Cup Final between Stoke and Chelsea.
He donned Stoke’s green goalkeeper’s top, and white shorts and socks, picked up a ball, and walked out of the tunnel to be greeted by the roar of a 100 000 crowd.
Unfortunately, he didn’t play in the final.
He walked out alongside Chelsea’s reserve goalkeeper, Welsh international John Phillips, who was understudy to Peter Bonetti, with a group of teenagers. The two number twos kept goal in an ITV schoolboy penalty prize competition, which was a prelude to the main event, in a special net set up on a touchline.
John did save quite a few Wembley penalties on live television: unfortunately, a teenager called Raymond Dalzell, from Belfast, also slotted six out of six past him to win the prize. (Another teenager smacked five out of six past Phillips).
He trooped back into the dressing room, after being presented with a souvenir tankard, just as the teams were getting ready to go out.
A few of Stoke’s stars approached him and asked if he’d do them a huge favour: would he look after their false teeth during the final? They didn’t want to arrive in the Royal Box wearing a Nobby Stiles’ smile.
So, John sat in the Wembley dugout, behind manager Tony Waddington — alongside other reserves, and watched Stoke beat Chelsea 2–1 with half a dozen sets of footballers’ false teeth in his coat pockets.
He can’t remember all these years on exactly whose gnashers he guarded. He’s sure one set belonged to former England midfielder George Eastham, who scored Stoke’s winning goal.
John does remember wandering on to the hallowed turf at the end of the final, as Stoke began to celebrate the biggest moment in the 109-year history, so Eastham and co could re-unite teeth with gums.
He also remembers telling his toothless team-mates to pop their dentures back in before they began to climb the steps — just to make sure they’d got the right ones.
In all the excitement of Stoke’s first Wembley triumph, he’d forgotten which set was in which pocket.
