Goodbye To Boleyn West Hams Final Season At Upton Park And The Big Kickoff At Stratford Pete May by Pete May 9781785901980, 1785901982 instant download after payment.

THIS ISN’T A BOOK ABOUT THE ECONOMICS OF STADIUM moves. Instead, what it hopefully captures is a sense of what it was like to be a fan at the Boleyn Ground for that final season and also at the first games at the sparkling new Olympic Stadium. Some chapters look back at my memories of attending games since the 1970s, while in the diary sections on 2015–16 I’ve tried to acknowledge the seasonal rhythms of the football fan, the minutiae of football trivia, the banter, the lucky shirts, the cafés and pubs, the chants, and the unforgettable atmosphere of the final home game against Manchester United.

For West Ham fans, the Boleyn Ground was the only home they had ever known. When West Ham first bid in 2012 to move from the Boleyn to the Olympic Stadium in Stratford, it all seemed aeons away. The fans continued to visit Ken’s Café, the Boleyn pub, the Central, the Ercan chip shop and myriad other pre- and post-match institutions.