This will soon be appearing as a feature article on the front, but I wanted to post it here to draw out the experiences of our overseas fans who may not have a clue what I am going on about but who will no doubt have some gems to add. For those in that category please read the last paragraph.
Cheers
Homesick
The Ceefax Fan
Draped majestically over the TV, or sadly, depending on your point of view, and the wife’s POV is definitely ‘very sadly’, is an old worn-but-well-loved Liverpool scarf. Strategically placed in the middle of the kitchen table is the crucial thermo frosted plastic Liverpool beer tankard that appeared at Christmas two years ago. And in the fridge, four bottles of Theakston’s Black Sheep Bitter – two for each half - all essential elements for a Ceefax win.
It is approaching three o’clock on a Saturday afternoon. No national or local radio station is providing live commentary on the match. My only link with the Mighty Reds is this clapped out Toshiba with a 14” screen, a dodgy cracked remote control with iffy batteries and Ceefax.
I start watching at a quarter to three because that’s the time when the team selection is still running on page 303 and just before it switches to become the page of latest scores. Five to three and that switch is made. I know the teams are emerging from the tunnel. I know the Kop is in full voice trying to keep up with, overtake and eventually drown out Gerry Marsden and the Pacemaker’s YNWA.
And as I watch the page remain exactly the same for a full five minutes I play out all the build up action taking place at Anfield in my mind. Ceefax fails to report any of this – but we each know our parts in this ritual. Mine is to imagine and Ceefax is to confirm. There is no conflict of interests. Neither can stray into each other’s territory. Ceefax can’t add colour and I have no facts to add to the mix. We are ideal partners.
Apart from the radio, tuned into some London match, I need complete silence when I am watching Liverpool on Ceefax. I have the radio on for the score flashes on Five Live. But then it’s a race between them and Ceefax to find out what’s happened.
Ceefax is clear, honest and unambiguous. Within seconds it’s there Liverpool 1 v Some Other Team 0. The radio is all that Ceefax isn’t. It is confusing, teasing, and bloody annoying.
Alan Green pipes up, “There’s been a goal at Anfield” or “The deadlock has been broken at Anfield” - why the hell can’t he just give the score! And when they go to Anfield they pick up on the final five seconds of commentary before the goal! Ceefax gets straight to the point, it is us or them. But Five Live!! They have to ham it up into some sort of theatrical spectacle which means that the radio commentary starts with either, “and it’s a corner to Liverpool” or “Liverpool are being forced to defend deep”.
And in those two or three seconds of torture your hearts twists and contorts and you gasp for breath and dig your nails deep into the kitchen table. No such fannying around with Ceefax. Straight in there! Liverpool are one up. Sorted! The scarf is snatched from the top of the set, held aloft for five seconds and then placed carefully back where it belongs and out comes the second bottle of Black Sheep.
Five Live returns to West Ham v Charlton or some other totally irrelevant fixture and I am left with Ceefax. And for long periods of time nothing changes apart from the minute hand on the kitchen clock and the time at the top of the Ceefax page. They are not in sync; the kitchen clock is four minutes slow. But that is handy because I use the clock to imagine the true time allowing for injuries and stoppages. Even when it should be full time on Ceefax the kitchen clock tells me how long is actually left.
So even though there is nothing much going on as far as this 14” black screen with white, blue and green pixelated dots is concerned, I know what is going on. I can see wave after wave of Might Reds attack-attack attacking down towards the Anny Road goal. They never lose the toss on Ceefax and always kick into the Kop in the second half. They are never under pressure. All passes go directly to feet and the volleys, downward headers, in swinging corners and precision tackles are pure, total and utter world class.
Today we are on page one of two. And for some reason my tele seems to dwell much longer on two of two, but that’s not a total disaster. Part of the Ceefax match tension is watching whether the other scores are going in our favour and working out on bits of old shopping list with a stubby blue crayon the kids left on the floor where we stand in the league at this particular moment in time.
The final five minutes are the worst. It is a nail-bighting, breath-holding, hair-tugging time when every sense is alert to clues and the Ceefax experience changes very slightly.
I fumble for a button on the remote control that brings up BBC One beneath the Ceefax text. My old mate Ray Stubbs is there in the studio with the latest score flashes and lining up commentators to give their final whistle verdicts.
So now the experience is Ray, Ceefax, the BBC teleprinter and the final bottle of Theakston’s Black Sheep Bitter. And the senses, far from being dulled by the cheeky 4.7% number from the Yorkshire village of Masham, are fully alert flicking from one information source to the other.
And then the final whistle is blown. The little green title at the top of the page turns from ‘Latest Scores’ to ‘Results’. Three small green letters appear at the end of the score ‘RES’ and it is quickly over to page 324 for the updated league standings.
Sometimes I am too fast for the journalists compiling that page. It is important, at this stage to check the line at the bottom. The words, ‘up to and including’, need to have been replaced by today’s date at the top of the page to give an accurate update. And while all this is going on you still have to have Ceefax superimposed on top of the TV in case they go over to Anfield to talk to a hat-trick hero or the manager.
Sometimes it takes ages for the league update but that is one small complaint. Well perhaps there are two. I don’t like the Ceefax journalist’s use of the term ‘missed penalty’ when it could have been a fantastic save. Whether the player misses or it is saved is still termed ‘missed penalty’ and I don’t like ‘OG’ for own goal because it never tells the full story either.
But I am never going to slag off my beloved Ceefax. We have become close pals, even through the bad time Ceefax has done what Ceefax is meant to do – deliver unbiased accurate facts in the fastest possible time. You can keep your Sky digital and Sky Sport Extra with moronic has-beens waffling on with out any passion.
Their offering is not a patch on Ceefax, my love for Liverpool and my imagination.
This will make absolutely no sense to our overseas fans, many of whom will have never experienced the BBC’s form of TV text, but you will have your own match day rituals. It might be sitting on a beach listening to the BBC world service, or getting text messages from a mate at Anfield.
I’d love to know how you keep up to date with the Mighty Reds on match days, about the tensions you go through and what a match day experience is like for those living in the far corners of the globe. Please share them with us. I would like to imagine you lot going through your rituals the next time I sit down for my Ceefax experience.
