Bernard Azulay - Arsenal on the Double: Overdrawn, Under The Weather, Overslept, Underpants, Over The Moon, Under The Table - A Terrace Take On The Season

To my old man, Mervyn, for making sure it was McLintock, not Mullery. While resting in peace I wonder if he continues to give Ray Parlour a hard time?

My sister, Debbie Taffler without whom I would have still been procrastinating about putting this book together. Bill Campbell, Will Mackie, Kirsteen Wright and all at Mainstream Publishing for their patience in putting up with my pedantic behaviour. Everyone at Pentagram, especially Sharon Hwang for all her artistic efforts, above and beyond the call of duty, and Angus Hyland for his inspiration. Despite the costly fact that I may never again use my abstinence from alcohol as an excuse for not buying a round! My gratitude also for the assistance of Nick Turner and Steven Bateman. Not forgetting Douglas for my deliverance from the dangers of the dreaded parking ticket.

Tony Leen and everyone at The Examiner in Ireland who have laboured over the editing of my persistently late and all too lengthy diary pieces for four years. Special thanks to Brian Murphy, who goes to so much trouble posting me the paper without fail from Dublin each week, enabling me to get wound up over whats been edited out (not to mention the small matter of my being warmly welcomed into his family). And of course Con Murphy, without whose encouragement, none of this might have come to pass. Not forgetting my good pal Peter Denholm, since without his help we would have lost our seats in the West Upper years back.

Gooners Jonathan Nell Moser, a patently useful pal, if only for the fact that he always carries on his person the Arsenals previous five years fixture lists/results. Brian Dawes and his match reports, bulging with blow-by-blow details. Chris Parry for his constant efforts maintaining www.arsenal-world.net. The hard work of Kevin Whitcher and Mike Francis which ensures The Gooner remains one of the countrys foremost fanzines.

For their photographic contributions, Mark Hakansson and the Internet mailing list Gooners, George and Rex Kaldre, Daniel and Ben Godfrey, Richard Palmer, Paul Matz and IASA, Tommi Peuhkurinen, Karl Sinfield (WeLoveYouFreddie.com), Laurie, Billy & Sara Buchsbaum, Clockend Jen, Joe Wise and all those others who were kind enough to send me the photos which would have filled another book, but at least left us spending the summer poring over sunny memories.

The best publicist a son could wish for in my ma, Eunice Azulay. Doubtless I would miss out on far more fixtures during the worst of our British winters, if it wasnt for her part in my healthy constitution, permitted as a result of her chicken soup. My missus, Rna, and her long suffering during all those lonely hours, either widowed by my writing, or my wandering on the www. The majority of my most memorable Gooner moments wouldnt have been nearly so magical without her by my side to share them.

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As such an avid Arsenal fan, some might find it strange that my most precious piece of sporting memorabilia is a scruffy old Spurs programme that has seen better days. With a horrific hoarding problem, I have accrued an enormous collection of sporting knick-knacks over the past 30 years. It is a constant source of contention between myself and my Dublin-born missus, Rna. I am particularly proud of a sizable selection of scarves souvenirs Ive amassed from almost every European game since the Gunners return to continental competition back in 1991. Stuffed in a drawer amidst our ever-decreasing storage space, these hardly ever see the light of day. Similarly I dont dare get R started on what amounts to almost an anthology of the Arsenal amongst my massive T-shirt collection. The many and varied memories associated with each individual Gooner garment, even those that laud dead-loss departures from our team, leave me loath to dispose of any of them. Consequently, with our overcrowded cupboards, I can no longer wander past the stalls around Highbury buying whatever takes my fancy, willy-nilly, every other week. I might slip the odd one past R when her defences are down, but generally I adhere to a strict one-in, one-out agreement. Meanwhile I still find it difficult to downgrade a memento of the likes of Paul Merson to a mere duster.

I dread the day when she finally adopts my mas method of dumping anything I havent cast an eye over for donkeys years. When my old man passed away and Mum decided to move from the house which held all my childhood memories, it was about a year before it suddenly struck me to query the whereabouts of a whole heap of teenage tat. I understood Mums motives. Doubtless, left to my own devices, Id be lugging all that stuff around in the back of the motor for the duration, unable even to get rid of my Soccer Stars swaps. There was no point crying over what was little more than a cupboard full of clutter, especially when I couldnt get much past the cuddly toy on my imaginary conveyor belt, in a Generation Game-type test of my limited powers of recollection. Mores the point, I could have kissed my ma for having the presence of mind to set aside all my most precious pieces of football ephemera. I cant see my 1970 Esso World Cup coin collection and assorted Soccer Stars albums fetching a fortune at Sothebys (at least not for a few generations). Nevertheless the substantial sentimental value of these items, along with some of my most prized match programmes from the same period, just cannot be measured in mundane monetary terms.

Like most of my age, I was introduced to the magic of the match-day experience thanks to my dear departed old man. It was a different era, long before the advent of all-ticket matches. Affordable prices and unreserved seating meant a young dad could wake up on any Saturday morning and make a spur-of-the-moment decision to open his offsprings eyes to a love of football. By contrast these days, unless you are one of the privileged few with a season ticket to top-class football in this country, it takes months of military planning, not to mention a mountain of cash, to take ones kids to a Premiership match. In an age when buzz words like quality time and bonding get bandied about so much, it is a crying shame that the vast majority of kids miss out on this enriching experience. Many only get to go to the odd game, if they are lucky, perhaps as an annual birthday treat. Football may have benefited from the fact that there is more of a family atmosphere at our modern stadia than existed at the frightening grounds of yesteryear, which were full of foreboding. Still our sport is increasingly priced beyond the means of your average parent. Especially when mum and daughter might be equally as keen as father and son nowadays.

Rna tells me that her dad used to take her brothers off to see Shamrock Rovers on a Sunday in Dublin. In those dark days one wouldnt have wanted to inflict the swearing and the none too salubrious surroundings on members of the fairer sex. Whereas, with the ubiquitous nature of the modern game, my contagious enthusiasm for the Arsenal has infected virtually all my out-laws in Ireland (as I am wont to label a family relationship of choice, as opposed to a contractual one!). Fixture lists are studied at the earliest opportunity and plans are laid months in advance for the annual pilgrimages of two of Rnas sisters, Clionna and Grainne, to The Home of Football. Religion may be the opiate of the masses, but the Arsenal can rapidly become ones religion and apparently Grainne now often lights a candle on the Arsenals behalf, before our more important matches. Similarly, the solidarity of all our nephews has been cemented, counterbalancing the domination of the Red Devils in their classrooms across the Irish Sea. Their fervent interest has been fostered by means of occasional autographs, T-shirts and the birthday cards theyve received as members of the Junior Gunners. Although with a phlegmatic father, who prefers fishing to football, none of us could comprehend the possibility that the four-year-old son of another sibling, Aisling, might be lost to Liverpool. Thank goodness with Rnas help, his mother seems to have set him straight. By pandering to his penchant for Freddie Ljungberg, the charismatic Swede with the go-faster red stripe, Jake appears to have been successfully initiated into the Arsenal tribe, sporting his favourite Freddies Gonna Get Ya top.