WHAT IS THE HATVENT CALENDAR?
This is the third year of PompeyChicken's Hatvent Calendar! It's a bit like an online Advent Calendar.
It's been inspired by the Innocent Drinks company who have been putting little woolen hats on their bottles of smoothies as part of The Big Knit, in aid of the charity Age UK.
You may have seen them on sale in Sainsbury's. PompeyChicken's family has been drinking a lot of smoothies again this year and each hat continues to be a perfect fit!
Two year's ago the Hatvent Calendar made connections between each hat and Pompey.
Last year underneath each hat PompeyChicken unveiled a favourite Pompey video clip.
This year he's been looking through the bookshelves to identify some of his favourite football books. Quite a few have a link to Pompey but not all.
You can read more about the Big Knit, which has been running since 2003, by clicking on the link at the end of this blog.
I hope you enjoy this year's Hatvent Calendar.
POMPEYCHICKEN'S HAT OF THE DAY
TODAY'S BOOK
This book, paperback edition, is 'Tales From The Boot Camps' by Steve Claridge with Ian Ridley originally published in 1997.
Claridge played for Pompey of course and this edition of the the book includes two chapters about his two spells with the Club.
Chapter Two titled 'Pompey Times' provides some interesting insights in to life at Fratton Park as an apprentice.
For example: "...In my second season Alan Ball was brought in...to be youth coach. He was great Bally...he laid on inspired training sessions. He...saw things brilliantly, had such great passion and vision for the game..." (page 56).
Chapter Ten titled 'Back Home' discusses his return to Fratton Park, the sad state the Club was in and one particularly memorable night under the floodlights that has gone down in Pompey folklore, a match I attended!
"...I was delighted to be back playing first-team football again, but Pompey were in a sorry mess. Martin Gregory was in charge as chairman and, despite the best efforts of Terry Brady,...the shambles was reflected on the pitch. In fact, at that time, I think Pompey were probably the most badly organised team I have ever played for..." (page 240).
"...my first goal for my home-town club came against Stockport County...it was a match we had to win if we were to start our climb up from the bottom and, although there were only just over 8,000 in the ground, they never stopped singing...for 90 minutes...It was one of the highlights of my career..." (page 241).
You can read more about this book on Amazon here ==> Tales From The Boot Camps
LAST YEAR'S HAT
Click on the following link to see the hat and video from one year ago ==> Hatvent Calendar 17th December 2011
WHAT IS THE BIG KNIT?
To find out more about Innocent Smoothies and the Big Knit you can click on the following link ==> The Big Knit
BlueThruAndThru
