It's a heatwave.

 It's a heatwave.

Yes folks it's a heatwave and that's official. It is, undoubtedly gorgeous out there, a stunning profusion of loveliness, beauty, art, a throwback to those luscious, heavily perfumed days of high summer, where the yellow and red rose beds are now blooming, blossoming, strikingly attractive, England enjoying the kind of heat and sunshine that we normally associate with the Mediterranean. But then there are those for whom this exceptionally warm spell may find barely tolerable. It's too sticky and humid, they cry plaintively.

It's far too hot and, besides, we do need rain because the farmers of Britain will be begging for the wet stuff. The rain is vitally important for the healthy growth of their lands and the fertile crops that proliferate with some regularity in the more moderate temperatures of an English summer. But we woke up this morning and once again there was a glorious and royal grandeur about the day, radiant rays of warm sunshine beaming down on suburbia, the urban landscape, town, city, garden, park and fields of gold. 

It is hard to find a happy medium because in some ways this was, essentially, the summer we must have been privately wishing for and then pondered again since, in Britain, none of us know what our preferred climate would be. By May and early June, we had the first indications of a good summer, full of happy vibes, warmth and sunshine. But then the dark clouds gathered and we grumbled albeit briefly because we knew that once the winds began to strengthen and the rain showers increased fairly rapidly, we knew we were in trouble. This summer though, didn't quite conform to that traditional pattern. 

So by the end of June and the beginning of July, Wimbledon tennis had come and gone and we declared a dry, pleasant fortnight at Wimbledon. There were no real disturbances and rain interruptions with every hope that once the sun poked its head over the horizon in the morning over SW19, there were optimistic weather forecasts just around the corner. It was time for the sun to put its hat and relax in the languorous, relaxing heat. It shimmered across Centre Court and Courts One and Two almost constantly and was therefore accepted as quite the hottest fortnight of tennis ever experienced. 

Now we took to our seaside beaches and esplanades and covered every acre of yellow sand with hundreds of sun umbrellas, those quaint looking parasols that keep us in welcome shade if the sun does prove too much for some. Here in Britain, we dig out our industrial fans in our stuffy offices, gazing fondly at the cloudless, flawless blue sky and wondering if perhaps we were imagining it. And yet it is here and it just feels that, in early August, as if the climate change advocates were absolutely right. Yes, they say quite categorically, we knew that our summers were definitely warming up with a delightful consistency. 

A couple of weeks ago we were shocked when the temperatures plummeted by several degrees and although never cold or freezing, things had cooled down quite noticeably. But then it occurred to us that maybe we needed a break from the sweltering sun, a chance to put our weather into some kind of sober perspective. We could never challenge Spain, Italy and Greece for wall to wall sunshine because in the Med, they turn on the central heating system at the beginning of May and never turn it off. 

So here we are slowly wending our way towards the end of high summer and the last crack of red ball against willow cricket bat can be heard faintly on some peaceful village green where the gulls are now making steady progress away from the English countryside. They remind you of summer's final grace notes, the final, delicious chords of England's orchestral flourish. 

There is a timeless and joyous feel about those final weeks of summer, a wonderfully gratifying sensation about a season that promised so much and then delivered accordingly. In the cornfields and lush meadows of Middle England, they'll be taking their combine harvesters out for one last journey into a world of gently waving productivity. The strawberries have always been at their sweetest and those salads simply irresistible. 

But we'll look back on the summer of 2025 as a hearty and wholesome one, impressively warm and for those who ventured onto Hampstead Heath for the first time, it just felt very satisfying. We were hoping to read our football poetry on some sun kissed field in the middle of nowhere and we almost got there. And yet, we didn't care in hindsight because the day itself was warm and just blissfully perfect. We might have got lost in the labyrinth of winding pathways and deep forests that you seemed to get lost in temporarily but didn't care. You knew you'd emerge from the canopy of tree branches and thick bushlands and then back home, not quite the destination you were hoping to reach. But never mind, hey. Life is indeed beautiful. 

Jim Lovell dies at 97.

 Jim Lovell dies at 97.

It was 1970 and we knew that our rental TV black and white DER set was about to disappear into obscurity, never to appear again quite literally. Our hitherto trustworthy TV had had enough. It needed to wind down and rest. It had lived in our dining room for so many years that we'd quite forgotten how long we'd been watching it for. Our black and white TV was in its last cathode ray, ready to conk out at any minute, about to witness its Last Supper. It had been a good friend to us for many years, faithfully flickering onto the screen with fuzzy images and lines at times but then flourishing when there was something good to see. 

Jim Lovell, one of the last all conquering Apollo 13 astronauts, had travelled to the Moon and back but never got the chance to take those first steps on the Moon. You were still a child at the time but the now vague memories are barely discernible images in your consciousness. Lovell was live and black and white and in our family home, a source of immense fascination. Planet Earth was still the place you wanted to remain but here was a man whose remarkable sense of adventure, enduring curiosity and scientific mind had most of us spellbound. 

Shortly before, Lovell, Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong were gripped by a sense of wild experimentation. What would happen if you wanted to really go to the Moon and actually walk on it? But, Armstrong bravely ventured where none had gone before by actually stepping onto the Moon's surface. And then it happened. Armstrong climbed out of his rocket and capsule and started jumping up and down on the Moon's surface before seemingly dancing with sheer delirium, relieved to have created an epic moment in history for mankind. 

But Lovell, who yesterday died at the age of 97, was more than just a fascinated visitor to outer space. He was commander of Apollo 13, a ground breaker, pioneer, general genius and huge intellect. He knew he was doing something that most of us could have only dreamt of achieving in our wildest fantasies. But Lovell went up to the Moon before floating around, observing the spectacular and barely able to take in the vast scope of his achievements. 

Lovell never actually stepped on the Moon. That was after Armstrong took those giant steps for mankind and played golf, broke into song and then began spinning around delightedly in his NASA suit, laughing as if somebody had just cracked the funniest joke and then just enjoying that iconic moment. They'd always maintained that man would never step onto the surface of the Moon because it was physically impossible but, 55 years ago, you sat down right in front of your TV and were transported to another world. 

You crossed your legs literally with your eyes riveted to the screen and ignored your mum's warning to the effect that, sitting so close to the TV,  your eyes would be severely damaged and you'd need glasses in later life. Of course mum was right and the glasses came later on in adult life. But then the Apollo space missions were scheduled to appear on two of the TV channels and this was compulsive watching. So it was that ITV or Thames Television and the BBC joined forces and devoted saturation coverage to the Apollo missions. 

You can still remember the professorial and science teacher extraordinaire Patrick Moore, pince nez or glass in one eye, engaging with his enraptured TV audience and talking about the planets around the solar system quite naturally. There was the Sun, Mercury, Venus, Jupiter, Mars and Pluto and Moore left us with enormous wisdom and was the ultimate authority on all matters relating to space and some far distant corner of the universe. Moore was intriguing, admirably knowledgeable and a man with an insatiable thirst for more information. 

But Jim Lovell was just one of many boldest astronauts, a man possessed of lifelong ambitions and whose inquisitive nature would take him to places that most of us would never see or experience. To this day, the likes of Lovell were taking calculated risks, regarded as mad by the cynics but then revered by millions of TV viewers. And yesterday was his final journey into the unknown, exploring areas of far away constellations and craters that none of us could possibly imagine. 

These days our modern imaginations are taken to different dimensions. Now, we watch those science fiction TV classics as Star Trek and will tell our children and grandchildren about the make believe exploits of Spock and Captain Kirk of the Starship Enterprise. We'll tell them about the immense contribution made to the film industry where Star Wars and then the Empire Strikes Back left us breathless and richly entertained. It was space but not as we would know it. 

Jim Lovell, who sadly passed yesterday, would have been proud to know that the generational baton was in safe and capable hands. Hollywood legend Tom Hanks did wonderful justice to the role of astronaut and, more recently, William Shatner, Captain Kirk, who just fancied a whirlwind visit into outer space. It did seem a quite logical development and perhaps we should have known that Shatner would do something like it. Lovell and the great Apollo missions will always be synonymous with some of the greatest moments in our childhood. 

National Finish Your Degree Day

 National Finish Your Degree Day.

This is normally the day when school children across Britain jump out of bed, wait excitedly at the front door for the post to arrive and then discover all of those very extreme and contrasting emotions. They will just bite their fingernails, hoping against hope that all of those industrious and dedicated weeks, months and years will bear fruition. Put simply, they just want to know how they've done in their GSCEs and, in a week or so, their A Levels. 

It's one of those crucial, life changing and defining moments in their young life when kids get all hot and bothered in case their exams have gone disastrously wrong. It may not be the end of the world if things have gone belly up for them because they can always re-take the aforementioned exams but, if they have failed quite emphatically, then the gnawing doubts and mental anxieties will inevitably set in. They've been a terrible disappointment to mum and dad and how on earth are they going to rectify what would appear to be insoluble problems. 

But today is what happens if you were fortunate enough to pass these exams and go to university because you may want to know how you've done with your degree. University studies were sadly beyond your academic aptitude for learning about subjects you could never quite grasp. So you became resigned to your fate and you knuckled down life at a secondary school unaware that some of your classmates may have been clever enough to study what seemed demanding subjects as physics, chemistry, biology, maths, economics and art. 

And yet today is National Finish Your Degree Day and even that sentence somehow seems so far removed from everything you had experienced at school that even the mere mention of this day seems like wishful thinking on your part. The truth is that one exam and one exam only determined your educational journey and shaped your future career plans or lack of any in my case. If you passed your 11 plus and went to a high or grammar school, you were considered brainy, erudite, quick on the uptake, bright and capable of becoming a working or middle class individual, climbing the ladder of management and one day becoming a company director. 

So here you are this morning, privately optimistic about your degree swotting, all of those diligent mornings, afternoons and evenings locked away in your Halls of Learning and whole heartedly memorising the finer points of your degree and leafing through thousands of reference books, thick and weighty tomes with mind blowing information about bloodthirsty wars, battles, dates, places, detailed descriptions about chemical terminology, complicated logarithms and cosine maths tables. 

Controversially, todays university students will be required to pay monumental sums of hard cash for their further education. And in recent times, we've all heard about the outraged reactions of students who have to cough up thousands of pounds on a degree course for any of the subjects just mentioned. Subsequently, all of today's young teenagers may be burdened with a hellish debt they may never be able to pay off. So they take out these troublesome loans with no prospect of meeting these daunting financial requirements.  

But you do have unwavering admiration for those who have forsaken everything just to get to this point. It's hard to know how much importance society still attaches to school qualifications since the great economists, bankers, scientists, doctors, commercial artists, laboratory technicians, engineers and politicians would still attribute their successes in life to a good university education. The professional classes who go to such eminent public schools such as Eton and Harrow may well be born with a silver spoon in their mouths but a privileged background doesn't necessarily mean that a streetwise intelligence is guaranteed. 

The arguments rage over huge tuition fees and then there are the extraordinary financial demands placed upon youngsters which continue to be a major source of discussion in the polished lobbies and corridors of Westminster. And once again the class system in England, always the oldest bone of contention among social commentators, rears its ugly head. How is it the super wealthy invariably prosper and inevitably end up in strikingly impressive four pillared homes with several Rolls Royce cars in their crunching gravelled driveways? Perhaps these are the gated communities who sneer disdainfully on the rest of Britain. But maybe this is completely wrong and this is some distorted perspective of the way we live today.

And yet today is National Finish Your Degree Day. It's time to assess your molecular biology degree and wonder exactly what it is you want to do with it. You could become a well respected hospital surgeon, a leading medical commentator who knows all about their field of expertise or maybe you could be the next distinguished professor familiar with all the latest experiments and potential cures for all diseases. This is your day for sober reflection and breathing a sigh of relief. After all, you've worked yourself into the ground and deserve your moment in the sun. Well done and congratulations. 

The new football season

 The new football season.

There used to be a time when the new football season in both England and Scotland was warmly anticipated rather like a picnic in the countryside or a day at the seaside or some luxurious holiday  around a hotel swimming pool. Perhaps a lazy beachside retreat next to a turquoise coloured sea would set you up very nicely for the new football season in August. It was timed to perfection rather like a stopwatch. 

For fans who supported teams in the lower divisions, there would be an ever present dread and foreboding, a sense that there was no point in hoping for anything apart perhaps from a decent League or FA Cup run. In the Premier League, though, the algorithms and statistical data would mean something entirely different. You somehow knew that the season would be accompanied by loftier standards and expectations. There remained a real possibility that you might but probably not win any conceivable silverware but there was nothing new about that.

So here we are at the beginning of August and the new club kits are being prepared, washed and cleaned thoroughly. Both the home and away shirts look in pristine condition, preparations are under way for the great pilgrimage to every Premier League, Championship, League One and Two club and dad will iron out the creases of those retro shirts that occasionally date back to when Kevin Keegan or Clyde Best were but teenagers.

But every season, football becomes more and more trapped in a dizzying merry go round of financial madness and rampant materialism, a billion pound operation that becomes so money crazed, greedy and acquisitive with every passing year that you can hardly bear witness to this moral abomination. For year on and year we look aghast at a transfer window so obsessed with its million pound addiction that you somehow wish a rational speaking figure would just get hold of the game and shake it to its senses. 

And therein lies the enduring dilemma. In the old days when football was played against a sensible backdrop of pounds, shillings, tanners and old sixpences, football was pure, unblemished and grounded. It was a game, above all, free from corruption, endless vanity projects and players who were only worried by the size of their next country mansion and those gravelled driveways groaning with the latest Jaguar or Ferrari model. 

Of course, the traditionalists can vividly recall the decade which completely lost its wherewithal, its ability to look no further than the price of footballers, their marketable potential and maybe their capacity to perform in some outlandish reality TV show. They long for the days when Tom Finney, the Preston plumber, simply played football for fun and pleasure rather than the extra digit on his wage packet  which became as much an anachronism as the tram, trolley bus or the rationing of butter after the Second World War.

Still, although there's only a fortnight to go before the much reviled and despised referee blows his first kick off whistle of the season, there is much to look forward to despite the crass expenditure of wildly inflated footballers who still believe that they're genuinely misunderstood. But then you look at the game's outside influences, the dubious chairmen and those spivs whose only objective is to make a quick buck and then make as much money out of the deal as seems humanly possible. It is hard to look beyond football's darker boundaries since this seems so disreputable and unpleasant. 

And yet in two weeks time Premier League champions Liverpool will open their defence of their title with hopes shining in abundance and the usual suspects such as Arsenal, Aston Villa, Manchester City and Chelsea snapping at Liverpool's heels. Next week, FA Cup winners Crystal Palace meet Premier League champions Liverpool in the Community Shield in the customary curtain raiser to the football season.

Even now you can visualise the yearly build up to the start of the season. Groundsmen and women will be painting fresh coats of white onto new touchlines, goal-lines, nets will be lovingly installed on opposite sides of the ground and vast terraces swept and cleaned rigorously. Behind the scenes, legions of fans will be dusting down their cashless cards and phones where tickets of the day will be sold via a QR code or the yearly guarantee of the conventional season ticket. 

It all seems a far cry from the days when you marched confidently into the South Bank at West Ham United and then passed what seemed like a full paddock of horses with stern looking policemen gripping tightly onto their reins. The opening day of a new football season was like the beginning of a school term since in many ways you didn't quite know what to expect. You were familiar with old acquaintances but hadn't a clue how your team would fare throughout the season. 

You then squeezed your way through creaking, rusting and decaying turnstiles and then wandered out onto the hugely populated terraces and seats. At first you were awe stricken at the sheer size and volume of the ground even though it was still empty. Still, you stood there stoically on that famous day in the middle of August surrounded by vocal and vociferous kids with scarves amusingly tied around their waist. Some were still wearing the Adidas T-shirts of 1970s vintage while others were weighed down with several burgers and hotdogs dripping profusely with tomato ketchup.

You now took out the much cherished footballing literature of the match programme. Way back in the distant past, football match programmes consisted of a couple of A4 size pieces of paper with just a couple of notices for future matches and the obligatory advertising of local timber merchants or tyre companies. But your programme was your passport into a world of fantasy and imagination. Perhaps 90 minutes of sheer escapism would provide the most delightful of all distractions and, quite possibly, a victory for your team if they were in the right mood on the day. 

From late summer and right through winter, your feet would be constantly subjected to the ever changing climates. Through sun, rain, wind and snow, you simply didn't care because it was just good to be alive and still is of course. You were watching your team and who cared if they were thrashed 5-0 on a Saturday afternoon since this was the rich tapestry of life. You could read your team's body language from the kick off. Of course every team who visited West Ham's old Upton Park ground would lick their lips and salivate at the home's team's reckless and cavalier attacking style. West Ham were simply easy to beat, fallible and gullible, vulnerable and fragile when their defence was frequently broken into with consummate ease. 

But here we are at the beginning of August and the summertime revelries will soon be replaced by an autumnal cavalcade of brown leaved colours, the endless family picnics in parks now a distant memory, the outdoor pop concerts a barely audible guitar and family parties joyous gatherings that once gravitated into the garden before going back into the kitchen for a while. The ducks and geese will fly back over well cultivated fields and thousands of residential rooftops before soaring over beautifully medieval churches and peacefully idyllic panoramas. It is still very much  a microcosm of your life because it only occupies a small place in your weekly itinerary.  

Football will always have its natural place in the grander scheme of things and will always have the most important value and currency. It is of course obscenely expensive and unbearably repetitive at times since the Beautiful Game is virtually a seven day sporting event. Premier League games are now spread out over an entire weekend and the rest of the fixture schedule is a random manifestation, matches taking place on both Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays and, now ludicrously on Thursdays.

Still, football fans really wouldn't have it any other way because it's in their bloodstream, their natural conditioning, their lifestyle and mentality, the way they organise their lives throughout the weeks. So, come on everybody, let's celebrate life and usher in the new football season. We would never have it any other way. Step aboard the fluctuating roller coaster of ups and downs that is the football season. It's football and we'll be there for them at every possible moment. You may be sure we will.    

It was 59 years ago today.

 It was 59 years ago today.

It happened 59 years ago today but it almost feels as though it happened yesterday which is clearly not the case but it is a date now firmly buried in the past, drifting hauntingly into the mists of time. There is a sense here that, for one day only, time literally stood still, that the entire population of England had joined together in one mass celebration of one event that has yet to be emulated  at any time since. Maybe we will get it right one day and quite, cynically, pigs will fly and the Loch Ness monster will be spotted at some completely unexpected moment.

Sadly, the truth is we are still here, patiently waiting, overcome with disillusionment at the Beautiful Game, beating ourselves up over something that had nothing to do with us and yet consumed with frustration and humiliation. Football has always played havoc with our innermost emotions, toyed with our delicate sensitivities, taken us on the most difficult and uncomfortable journey into nowhere. But, 59 years ago England achieved its most definitive of all achievements. The England men's football team won the World Cup in dear old Blighty. Yes, 1966 was the year and, of course, you were there to witness it. 

Some of us though were probably running around our loving parents garden or jumping into rain puddles or just making the most formative of all discoveries as a two year old child. The fact is we were totally unaware of the magnitude of the day, its iconic importance, its cultural meaning, its mind blowing profundity, its powerful resonance, the sense that something epic had taken place without any knowledge about its far reaching repercussions.

Of course we are now only a year away from the 60th anniversary of England's only ever World Cup victory and that's really painful and deeply embarrassing. It probably wasn't intentional and maybe we had no control over the speed of events that just raced past our childish sensibilities and  got lost in the translation. Maybe, bizarrely, we had no idea what was going on at the time. But for those who have now been suitably enlightened since that wonderful day in July 1966, this is a time for rose tinted nostalgia and reminiscence. 

There are times during our lives when we look back with fondness at the days when things worked out for us like a dream, ambitions were fulfilled and we would never forget where we were when they happened. And so it was Sir Alf Ramsey, that most repressed and phlegmatic of all football mangers who suddenly realised what all the fuss and commotion was about. For it was the late England manager who just sat there on a Wembley bench after the final whistle had gone for the end of the 1966 World Cup Final and just stared morosely into the middle distance, stunned and dumbfounded. 

While Harold Shepherdson, England's likeable and personable trainer, simply exploded off the bench like a Guy Fawkes firework, Ramsey just sat there as if somebody had just told him that he'd been sacked as England manager. The truth is that, while towels were being flown into the air and players were sinking to their knees in both fatigue and disbelief, Ramsey was slowly wrestling with a reaction that should have been so easy to express at the time. 

Perhaps Ramsey could never rationalise with how the day unfolded since everybody else was convinced that England would win the World Cup because we were fated to win it. So England had won the World Cup and, in isolation, it was the most exhilarating day in England's well documented sporting history. Besides, we had won the rugby union World Cup at the beginning of the 21st century so why was a football World Cup so beyond us. We'd won the cricket Ashes, the men had hitherto never won the men's singles title at Wimbledon but that could be rectified. 

So where were you on that spectacular day on the penultimate day of July 59 years ago. Were you discussing the possibility that one day the Beatles would record that celebrated and most innovative of all albums Sergeant Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. We were probably wondering if anything could get any better after Hey Jude, Yesterday, Sergeant Pepper's, Please, Please Me, I am the Walrus, Love Love Me Do, Get Back, Back in the USSR, Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds and a whole art gallery of the great and good in popular music at the time. 

Maybe you were simply washing the car or dusting down your World Cup rosettes or banners, flags of patriotism and finding out much more about your identity and your place in the greater scheme of things. You might have just allowed the whole day to just go over your head, ignore the occasion because you couldn't stand football. But that day we established a relationship with the global game of football that none of us could really understand. 

There was Bobby Moore, the emperor surveying his defensive empire and gloriously inspiring to the rest of his colleagues. There was Jack Charlton, tall and imposing as a lighthouse at sea and just as visible. Bobby Charlton, Jack's brother, was just magnificent, here, there and everywhere, ubiquitous, battling for the ball, gliding across that vital central midfield area like the most graceful of ice skaters. There was Martin Peters, ghosting into positions like a man who we thought we'd seen and then just turned up like the most welcome of visitors at our party. 

Meanwhile, Nobby Stiles was at the back of the English defence, scampering, scurrying, gallivanting, gritting his teeth and tackling as if his life depended on it. Stiles was tough, tenacious, combative, abrasive, no nonsense, energetic and just concentrating on the task at hand. Stiles epitomised Englishness, whole hearted, committed, driven, no holds barred, in your face and ready to spill blood for the cause. Stiles jigged around the Wembley pitch when victory was England's to have and hold and then skipped around the national stadium as if somebody had guaranteed him a place at a university. 

Then there was Roger Hunt, an infuriating pest of a striker who kept running and dragging his persistent German markers all over the divots and green acres of Wembley's slowly deteriorating pitch. Hunt was the man who was convinced that Geoff Hurst- now Sir Geoff Hurst's sharp turn from  Alan Ball's nicely floated ball into Hurst's path did result in a legitimate goal.

 As we all know now, Hurst's shot rapped the bar and came down over the goal line. Or did it? The so called corridor of uncertainty rendered most of us confused and completely baffled. Hunt threw his arms into the air to acknowledge England's third goal but then, after a frantic session of West German arm waving, our friendly referee pointed to the centre circle. It was, officially, England's third goal but only after much remonstrating and objecting from West Germany. 

And then there were those last minutes of the the 1966 World Cup Final, almost a sub plot in itself. As the last minutes ticked down inexorably, two England players seemed to be pleading for the game to finish. When Bobby Moore calmly almost nonchalantly trapped the ball on his chest in his own penalty area, Jack Charlton, launched a cannonade of salty but good natured obscenities and ferocious invective. Charlton was not best pleased with Moore's deliberate attempt to slow down the game.

Moore promptly lofted a juicy peach of a ball over a now static West German defence straight into the path of his West Ham team mate Hurst. Hurst, shepherding the ball towards his feet, began to run like the clappers, puffing out his now drained cheeks and hurtling towards goal. With only the goalkeeper Hans Tilkowski to beat, Hurst pulled back the trigger and fired the fiercest of shots that could have ended up at Wembley Park Tube station.

But, joyfully, the ball bulged the back of the net and England were football World Champions for the only time in their history. And yet if Alan Ball had had his way, Moore's perfectly threaded pass would have been directed at Ball, whose desperate cries for the ball were rapidly ignored. Hurst wanted his hat-trick and nothing would get in his way. The hat-trick was in his possession and nobody would begrudge Hurst of his crowning moment of glory. 

Finally, England were declared World Cup winners of 1966 and the after match joshing and hilarious stories would proliferate by the many. Jack Charlton sunk to his knees as if barely believing the evidence of his own eyes and then ventured onto the Central Line Tube station. Worse for drink by now, Charlton would confidently head for a random house in Leytonstone, East London and kindly ask the family whether he could spend the night sleeping on their settee. Oh to have been a fly on the wall. 

Then the players, wives and girlfriends would gather at the Royal Kensington Gardens Hotel for a joyous dinner and dance celebration. Now a dilemma made its presence felt. All the wives and girlfriends were immediately separated from each other albeit temporarily. It must have felt like the ultimate insult to the delighted girls but then it was a different era and this was just the accepted norm.

The following day, everybody came down for a bleary eyed breakfast and both Bobby Moore and Geoff Hurst were photographed reading the Sunday papers. Nobby Stiles, by now back out on the road home to Manchester United, decided to stop off at a motorway service station for a hearty plate of egg and chips. You could hardly have blamed the rest of the England players for just a brief period of intoxication because downing a brewery of beer was the least the players deserved. 

Meanwhile in the Geoff Hurst garden all was normal service. That Sunday morning, the West Ham and now victorious World Cup winning England striker, just took everything in his stride and proceeded to mow his lawn with his trusty lawnmower before whitewashing the family fence. It was as if nothing had taken place the day before and the old First Division season had started a couple of weeks before it was due to begin. But you couldn't tell that to Moore, Hurst and Peters.

And now 59 years later, the painstaking wait continues. On Sunday, England's women won their second consecutive Euros tournament with a teeth clenching victory after a nerve jangling penalty shoot out. The men, of course, must have reflected very deeply on their obligations and responsibilities. Next year, they will be expected to bring home their trophy. It'll be World Cup year in the USA, Mexico and Canada and the boys have been ordered to win what would be their second World Cup. So be ready and waiting. If you could only just eliminate those terrifying nerves and conquer stage fright on the big occasion, then it should be plain sailing. No problem what so ever. 

But we are talking about England and, for all their woes and travails during the 1970s, 80s and 90s, England still have that invitation to rock and roll on World Cup Final day. It's another day and yet another opportunity to erase the misery of disappointment after yet another helping of the same old story of defeat and setbacks. Forget the near misses of Euro 96 in England, the World Cup semi final defeats in Italia 90 and Croatia in Russia 2018. This is a clean slate and fresh start and the whole of England will be privately hoping that, 60 years after that momentous day at the end of July, jolly England can do what the girls did with such wondrous aplomb and almost without blinking their eyes. Come on England, you can do it. 

India hold the ace cards against England in the fourth test.

 India hold the ace cards against England in the fourth Test.

By the time stumps had been drawn at Old Trafford to end Saturday's proceedings it looked as if England had grabbed the initiative against India in the fourth Test. But then somebody decided to throw a spanner in the works. India were clearly not finished with England and there was unfinished business to be dealt with. Sometimes Test cricket can be so wildly unpredictable that even the most straightforward of all contests can become very complicated. 

England were stacking up the runs like a hod carrier on a building site who keeps piling on brick after brick before deciding that enough was enough and the load is far too heavy. England had reached a mammoth total of 669 all out and that in itself looked a decisive and match winning margin of victory. So it was that at some point during this most extravagant first innings mountain of runs, that India would have been forgiven for throwing in the towel and were now ready to surrender. 

At Old Trafford, they can still hear the voices of yesteryear echoing through the years. Somewhere in the ether, they can both see and hear the likes of Jack Bond, David Lloyd, Clive Lloyd, Faroukh Engineer and Harry Pilling whispering words of encouragement and support for today's England. It is a fond thought but one that remains just an unspoken fantasy. Still, it was Old Trafford and, deep in the heart of Manchester, they still know a lot about the purities of English cricket. There is a strong emotional attachment to the England side in the fair county of Lancashire and the affection for the game persists.

Yesterday England attacked and then flung themselves into the game with wild abandon. There was a brutish brutality, an air of swashbuckling confidence about them, a riotously rampant England committed to wanton destruction, a bloodthirsty and bellicose intensity that at times looked unstoppable. In the distance at Old Trafford, you could imagine the fast train flashing past this most traditional of grounds and imploring England never to declare. Keep going England, let your mighty sixes and fours go free. Breathe deeply and just exhale. It's time for fun, freedom and runs, runs, runs, shots, shots, shots.

And indeed classical shots were very much order of the day, lofted to all four corners of the Pennines, over the Peak District and right into the heart of some distant location where the red ball could never be found. This was the currency of the day for England. If a ball was to be hit, then why hang around and retreat into their shell where caution and prudence might have been considered and then dismissed. And then there was Ben Stokes.

Ben Stokes is England's now deeply loved and respected English cricket captain. With ginger beard bristling with menacing intent and heart on his sleeve, Stokes was in no mood for leniency and clemency, an unforgiving figure who was determined to go on the warpath. He was in no mood to show any mercy whatsoever for an India side who were clearly steaming and sweating in the mid summer sunshine. Stokes, at one point, gazed into the warm Lancashire sky and thought he'd found a star in the ascendant. 

Stokes was brave, formidable, inspirational, a bold, cool and calculating figure, ruthless to his fingertips, leading from the front as perhaps you'd expect him to be. In another era, one Ian Botham can still be seen, a man seemingly gripped by the occasion, contorted with ecstasy, bounding down a Headingley pitch, wickets held  high, triumph glistening in his wide eyes as Australia were ripped to shreds in the 1981 Ashes. What a year that was and English cricket will forever be grateful for this pivotal moment in the history of the game.  

But yesterday the cream of England's greatest batsmen unfurled the most colourful of banners with a ruthlessly professional and devastating cutting edge. Joe Root clubbed the most stylish and scintillating of centuries, only departing the crease when he was at 150. It could have been far worse for India since Root pulled, hooked, and reverse swept the ball to all four corners of Old Trafford with just a smattering of sixes. And then Ben Stokes notched up his century for England as if to rub salt into India's festering wounds, eventually ending up with a handsome and gritty 141 much to the delight of the England fans.

India, to their eternal credit, did look threatening at times but after being bowled all out to a seemingly  meagre 358 all out but the contest ebbed and flowed back in England's favour. India were then faced with an uphill battle as captain Shubman Gill threw the strategic dice about, tinkering and tweaking with tactics, scoring a dogged 52. This though was not nearly good enough for an England team who could clearly see the chinks in the vulnerable India armour. 

Sadly though, Jasprit Bumrah, bowling with vivacious swing and seam that nipped back to a number of confused looking batsman, was but a helpless onlooker. Now it was that England's crack unit of bowlers began to assert their dominance. Chris Woakes found movement in the air and a ball that seemed to be behaving too disobediently for India. Woakes took vital Indian wickets at crucial times, while Liam Dawson contributed a healthy 26 before being skitttled out with a straight ball that kept low and was fast enough to send him back into the pavilion.

For England though, this was another yeoman and upstanding performance from Harry Brook again, with Ollie Pope as the consummate player who never disappoints when his country comes calling. Ben Duckett and Zak Crawley were always forceful and fiercely competitive while the backbone of the English attack never looked like cracking. 

By Saturday evening, India were facing the music, trailing by 120 runs but more than capable of a remarkable recovery from nowhere. Somewhere at Old Trafford, the trains were still rattling past the ground as if scenting a miracle. This match will go to the wire, with both England and India playing the most enigmatic game of chess. And Test cricket finished on a Saturday evening, a captivating game of cricket which either side can win and where the men who have followed cricket so hardily in these parts, will remember exactly where they were as the winning stroke is acclaimed by boisterous English throats. Oh to be in England when the last days of July herald the final chapters of the cricket season. It is always sweet. Life is always sweet.  

National Motoring Day.

 Cars from a non motorist perspective.

So there you were this morning, starting up the engine of your car, thoroughly checking how much petrol you've got left in the tank, finding out whether your car is ready for an MOT and then realising that it needs a good run out to the country and seaside. The car has assumed an almost spiritual significance to us throughout the decades because without it, we'd probably wonder why it wasn't there. A car was essential for family excursions and working up in town if you could find adequate parking spaces. Nowadays we'd be lost without a car in a way that would have seemed hardly credible during Victorian times. 

Way back at the beginning of the 20th century, horse and carriages, landaus and cartouches would trot merrily around the streets of London, clattering away melodiously, blissfully unaware of the fact that this would be our only means of transport. At the turn of the 20th century, you'd have been regarded as slightly barmy and a figure of fun had you suggested that the complex mechanics of the family car would dominate our thoughts. Then there was the internal combustion engine followed by these vast jalopies. 

Nowadays everybody has got an Audi Volkswagen, a member of the Ford family, Toyota, Datsun, a Kia Sportage, Fiat and a nice little runner from the Vauxhall Astra clan. Then there's the legendary Robin Reliant, notorious for being perhaps unreliable and laughable at times. Mercedes was always my late and lovely dad's preferred choice of car because it was big, sleek, aerodynamic and well designed. 

Above all though it was National Motoring Day, a day for petrolheads, as some affectionately call them, the motor, four wheels, your status quo, your class statement, your social position in the great hierarchy. If you just happened to have two sports cars, a Rolls Royce, a Daimler and a Bentley, you were rolling in wealth and highly esteemed by those with a considerable amount by those in the know. It is a day for the new registration plate on your car, to flaunt our latest model to our friendly neighbours. 

And then there are those who have in their possession at least ten cars in their gravelled driveway, a couple of vintage cars from the 1930s and some stunning chrome work, spray painted to perfection. If you're a lord of the manor on some opulent country estate, then you're probably spoilt for choice. Then there are the F1 cars, the grand prix Red Bull and the cars that fly around the F1 circuit in both Europe and the rest of the world with a highly valued chassis and carburettor and can do at least 200 mph around winding and thrilling chicanes and hairpin bends. 

But way back then, cars were always luxury fashion statements only affordable to the hoi polloi or the affluent elite. They stood in car showrooms or outside, gleaming radiantly in the sunshine with neither a scratch nor blemish. So you approached your local car salesman with wide eyed anticipation, carefully examining its potential, inquiring about its age, road worthiness and how many miles it does to the gallon. Then the negotiations and discussions would follow before the said salesman told you quite honestly that it was impossibly expensive, criminally extortionate and not quite the car you were looking for. 

But wherever you look nowadays, that huge network of motorways, B roads, roundabouts, junctions, hard shoulders, busy main streets and meandering country lanes provide the familiar backdrop to our everyday lives. And then there were the chronic traffic jams that stretch back for ages. As a non motorist, you find yourself helpless with sympathy for the predicament that is the bottleneck,  that immobile procession of cars, lorries, vans and buses that simply look statuesque. They say patience is a virtue but it does look like an unenviable daily ritual and none that you would be tempted to engage with. 

Still, there are arrivals and destinations and once you've adjusted the Sat Nav or, possibly, the Atlas road map, you slow down to 20 mph and discover yellow grids. Driving on, you're confronted by a forest of those celebrated red and white cones with sandbags draped over the top of the cones. Cars are forever competing against each other in some bizarre race to find out who can go the fastest. They sprint down the M1 or the A1, topping almost 80 or 90 mph before slowing down from time to time just to make sure that they're heading in the right direction.

Then wide lanes of vehicles begin the whole process of darting and weaving from slow to fast, desperate to beat any obstacle that may look insurmountable. So my dad, on our way to Southend or Westcliff, would lean his elbow quite casually on a comfortable spot, flick away the ashes from his faithful cigarette and proceed almost naturally closer to the coast. It may have taken him goodness knows how long but this was just a temporary hindrance and besides there was no point in complaining. 

The fact is motoring has undergone a major revolution and evolution throughout the decades. Of course it has because we might have taken cars and motoring for granted. It does make travelling from A to B so much easier and far more pleasant particularly if you have to be on time or just in a hurry. Cars are extended members of our family, the massive saloon car or the Land Rover more suitable for safaris or treacherous journeys where mud can often be a pain in the neck if you're at the end of your wits. 

Then there are the well air conditioned coaches that take you out into the middle of England, the Lake District or the Cotswolds, historic castles on the hill and museums for all. There are the vans occupied by rock musicians with all the necessary equipment. And we mustn't forget the unmistakable Eddie Stobart lorries loaded with all manner of  paraphernalia such as sofas, chairs, tables, rocking chairs and every imaginable piece of domestic furniture. 

But today is National Motoring Day folks. A vast majority of the global population drive cars for both pleasure and of course work if you happen to live within sight of your office or warehouse. You remember your dad's almost lifelong passion and sigh lovingly and reflectively. How my wonderful dad would wash his grey Ford Cortina as if sluicing bathroom tap water on his face.

So if you've woken up to the morning to the sound of your purring car in your garage, your day will be complete.Then you'll turn on the ignition, look behind you, gradually reversing out into the road, smiling with enormous satisfaction. You'll test the brake, manoeuvring gracefully into the road or street before moving into first gear effortlessly. You may put your foot on the accelerator just to show off to your neighbours again.

Wherever you're going today, whether it be the local supermarket, garden centre or cherished visits to aunties, uncles or cousins, cars are ready and waiting for you. They are remarkable testaments to longevity, sometimes still going after years and years and a mechanical masterpiece into the bargain. They have lived with you throughout your adolescence and never let you down. On second thoughts they may have broken down annoyingly and required the services of the AA. But be sure this is National Motoring Day. So fear not. Your motor is in impeccable condition, so it's time to hit the road.