ONE present I received during my most recent birthday was a football history of my team Aston Villa told in newspaper headlines since 1905.

I have no idea why the publishers of this history started in 1905 when Villa was founded in 1874 but it’s still a great gift.

One of the headlines provides the exact date that I was chosen as a Villa fan. It is a report from the Sunday Mirror on February 28, 1971 of the previous day’s League Cup Final at Wembley between Villa and Tottenham Hotspur. 

Two goals from centre forward Martin Chivers were enough for the Division One team to beat the then third division Villa.

Villa could only manage fourth in the third division that year although the following season stormed the league to win promotion to the second division with a then record 70 points at a time when it was two points for a win.

I watched the highlights on that Sunday — I think where we lived it was called Star Soccer — and from then on I was hooked. We lost the game but from then on I was a Villa fan and the brilliant Ian (Chico) Hamilton was my favourite player.

I was taken by how a team from the third tier of football had managed to reach the final (having defeated Manchester United in the semi-final over two legs) and, from what I could see and most newspapers of the time confirmed, had thoroughly outplayed Spurs and its team full of internationals.

Even though I was still a primary school child I was already hooked on football as my game. I was allowed to stay up on Saturday nights to watch Match of the Day and, if there wasn’t a film showing on the TV that my mom wanted to watch, I was able to watch Star Soccer on a Sunday.

The year before this game I had been completely captivated by perhaps the greatest football team to ever take the field — the Brazilian team that won the World Cup in Mexico. The great Pele, Jairzinho, Rivellino and that wonderful goal by Carlos Alberto to put the icing on the already assured victory over Italy in the final, had captured my heart and mind.

In our house it was always football in the winter but — we are West Indians after all — cricket in the summer.

As much as I loved cricket — or rather West Indian cricket — even during the summer football dominated my — well — everything.

I remember even as a kid walking several miles during the summer holidays from Walsall with my best mates Dale and Lee just to go touch the walls of Villa Park. We missed Villa so much and didn’t have the bus fare so we walked it. You seemed to feel safe enough — or were stupid enough — to be able to do such a thing in those days.

Whatever opportunity we had to put our coats down as goal posts and play football we took it.

The street we lived on became our own Villa Park when we couldn’t or didn’t want, for whatever reason, to go to the choice of two nearby playing fields.

When we were old enough — and to be truthful before we were — we travelled on the Saturday “special” trains to watch Villa play away from home if we were able to scrape the often very reasonable fare and ticket money together.

The spirit of football grabs you and the team you support is always for life. Or at least it should be. I have never understood this alien concept that I have come across where people claim to support more than one team. Just completely bizarre in my opinion.

I could no more think of supporting another team than I could — well I can’t even think of anything else to compare it with. It’s just a non-starter.

Being a Villa fan — as I dare say it is for most other teams that don’t win something every year — is often frustrating and sometimes even heartbreaking.

I have been at Wembley when we lost a play-off final and when we won one.

I have been at Villa Park to see us hammer Small Heath (Birmingham City) and when we were slaughtered in the freezing cold by Liverpool.

I have watched amazing games with unbelievable atmospheres and joined demonstrations calling for our club back when the money men — and it was always men — did their best to ruin our club.

I remember walking back to my car for the long, lonely drive back from Brum to Oxford after that game and begging a police officer to go to the ground and arrest our then coach for impersonating someone in the role and for robbing the fans.

My serious request, joined by other fans, was politely declined by the amused officer.

The long walks with my mate Tracy up the hill so I could drop her off in Brum for her train home will long live in my memory both after wins and defeats. The inherent optimism of football fans was summed up in what almost became our motto: “We go again!”

Those long drives home during the years when we were really struggling were horrible. I remember after that Liverpool game reaching home and the leader Kate immediately appearing at the door with a very large glass of rum for consolation.

This past season, even though we are now doing much better as a team under the extraordinary Unai Emery, I have been so happy to discover Oxfordshire Lions — the local Villa supporters’ club. They put on transport to every home game and the camaraderie is brilliant. 

Even though they do have an unsettling habit of forgetting to take my turnoff to the bit of Oxford I live in (I have decided that this is because they value my company so much that they can’t bare to let me go) it really is a life changer for me and is something I look forward to.

So why am I writing this article? The football season is about to end with the final matches taking place on Sunday to decide who gets to play in which European competition.

I wanted to write this beforehand as, I fear, what little bit of subjectivity I have about football will go out the window if we don’t get to play in next season’s Champions League.

I will miss the domestic football season. I don’t watch international football — I can’t stand the petty nationalism that seems to go with it. Also the Brazilian team — and most other teams with the possible exception of the current youthful Spanish team — fail to play with the sort of joy that attracted me to the game.

Whatever competitions we are in next year, as I have done since we were in the third division, I will continue to follow the mighty Villa and search for that spirit that makes this beautiful game become part of your existence.

So here’s to the spirit of football. Up the Villa!