Looking ahead to The Final Day at Goodison Park

I've seen plenty of evidence of what the 1878 Group have done, but has anything else happened?

I was expecting to players of yesteryear paraded to the crowd (and other sentimental stuff). Have I missed anything?

I hope you are right. It would seem fitting to see a selection of the older players grace the pitch again…

Colin Harvey, Bob Latchford, Big Nev – and if Graeme Sharp can be forgiven, then it's time my late father's favourite Everton player, Tony Kay, was invited to join them.

What about the guys who are under 100?

Hallelujah Mike: I would love to see Dave Abrahams and the others who hold Tony Kay dear to their hearts see him walk out on that pitch for maybe the last time. He's 87 for fuck's sake. He deserves this moment, as does Dave A et al.

Dave Abrahams, my father and many others have spoken in high regard of Tony Kay for me to have a view on a player I never watched.

Some say he would have played in the England 1966 World Cup winning team. I think it might have been Dave, but the only question was who would have made way had he been allowed to carry on his career. Kendall, Ball or Harvey?

I hope the club includes him. Today, he would have got a 10 match ban and a hefty fine. Not a lifetime footballing sentence.

I think Dave A et al might shed a tear if Tony Kay 87 walked on that pitch after our last game in what will always be our spiritual home.

According to one of the fellas who has to travel with me, he reckons that the pub at the side of the pier, that plays live music every day, belongs to Tony Kay.

I'd be interested to know what other 'old farts' think. Sometime after his suspension, I believe he graced the pitches of Huyton playing for a pub team - I think the Oak or Wheatsheaf?!

'Tony Kay was once again present on the pitch at Goodison Park among a group of 100 Everton Legends, as the club celebrated a record 100 seasons of top flight football at the start of the 2002–03 campaign. He received a standing ovation from the crowd'.

I bet Tony Kay will be there at the last farewell.

He understands the supporters better than most and the club could learn a lot off him.

I read recently that the big man had been on a drip in hospital. I'm not sure how true it was, but if so, I hope he is recovering.

A very modest man, kind with his advice to my grandsons, who has no bitterness about the huge injustice that befell him.

The arguments are getting stronger in my house between my twins, because me being an old fashioned dad, means I only got my boy a season ticket, but it's definitely my daughter, who has got that blue blood, running through her veins.

They are constantly fighting over that last game, and it's usually started by my daughter, because her brother hasn't conceded yet, and it's probably making her nervous!

I wonder how many people will turn up around the streets of Goodison Park?

Thousands, Tony.

In my opinion, big screens in Stanley Park is a sensible approach.

My fear is how they steward and police a potential surge when they open the gates to let people out. Surely they must be aware that people, with good intentions, will try to get in??

I went to the Roger the Dodger's testimonial in the early 70s and playing under 'A. N. Other' Tony Kay was MotM.

If we go all Harry Turtledove, imagine a universe where Catterick doesn't get rid of Collins in 1962...who was Footballer of the year in 1965.
Where Tony Kay is not banned.
Colin Harvey is in the mix along with Gabriel and Denis Stevens.
In 1966/67 Ball and Kendall are added.
The mind boggles.

The whole of the 1963 Inter Milan game is on the GOT site somewhere... maybe via Pathe?

Watch Kay playing in the Gana / Carsley role...only better...Alex Parker was pretty tasty too.
Turn off Wolstenholme's patronising/ damning us with faint praise commentary though.

They have done their best to possibly try and limit the numbers with a 12 o'clock kick-off… but it's Everton, and the last ever game we are talking about, so it wouldn't surprise me if there are over 100,000 on the streets of Walton a week on Sunday.

Is it too late to arrange a march from Bramley-Moore Dock to Goodison Park, I wonder? Do us a favour, Danny, e-mail your mates in the 1878 fan group and ask them, please, mate, because it would be lovely to see a few thousand people making their final pilgrimage to Goodison Park from our new home!

Tony, I can only ask, but that is a great idea.

I lived in Shaw Street off Islington when I first got married and Tony Kay had a place almost opposite my house and a big van with “Kay's Kardboards” right across it, how sad to see such a fabulous footballer scrapping for a living.

Tony later received a short jail sentence for something trivial and he was well looked after by people I knew doing his time, Reds and Blues. He kept that friendship up when he came out — they came out a lot longer than Tony!

Derek, I went to that Roger Hunt benefit game, had to jib in there was that many at the game and it was pissing down, sorry raining very heavily, that night but didn't know Tony played in that game.

We plan on getting down to the stadium around 9:00 am but I bet even then everywhere will be packed. I've heard the Winslow will be opening at 8:30 am, the Taxi Club on Cherry Lane at 9:00 am, and The Brick probably won't shut on Saturday night!

We went to The Winslow last Saturday and I wish we hadn't bothered. If you've no patience, standing in a queue in a pub waiting to be served, then I think none of the pubs around the stadium will be to your liking!

Having them on pitch at half-time often gets lost as many have gone downstairs for a cold sausage roll, drink or call of nature.

No point bringing them on at the end. Many are getting on a bit and the pitch is going to be invaded, so it will be dangerous for them. It's one thing showing Jake O'Brien in the air, but doing it to an 80-year-old would put his health in danger as much as he'd probably love it!!!

This is going to be massive. We could potentially match the dreaded events of 26 May here and there will be an outpouring of emotion to match it.

He was a celebrity referee for a game at Jubilee Park in Huyton. I can't remember the details of the game, it was early '60s, before the betting scandal.

Danny, I think he would have played instead of Kendall, which begs the question, if Kay had not been banned, would Howard Kendall have signed, and later become our most successful manager???

Everton's Plans To Mark End Of An Era At Goodison Park

To repeat, I just wouldn't bring them on after the final whistle. Try as they may, right or wrong, I doubt it will be possible to stop a pitch invasion.

As for advising ticketless supporters not to travel. Good luck with that.

They should have been thinking about this months ago and setting up Stanley Park or even the new stadium. Not waiting until just over a week before to advise people not to travel. They should have foreseen this and made contingency plans for those who can't attend, but want to be there.

Will have to be a change of plan with regard to the usual gate openings at 3/4 time too!

I very much doubt overseas broadcasts will cover the whole lot.

I can't see why they wouldn't.

I guess they want to be part of the party!

Premier League rules state it must be 3,000 to away supporters if the capacity is over 30,000.

I think ours is just below that, but only by a few, due to segregation arrangements.

The only way it happens is if the opposition club declare they can't sell their allocation. At Goodison, that has often resulted in the Upper Bullens away section being released to home supporters.

Many away supporters I travel with also want their last visit to Goodison.

I'll be hope. In the ground or not, I've got nearly half a century of memories that will never leave me.

To try and prevent tickets being sold on, 1,000 ticket holders, to be decided randomly, will need to collect their tickets at Goodison before the game.

Now 85 years of age, according to Wiki.

Could get messy if they do.

I ran a Sunday League team and we played a friendly against I believe it was Crawfords. At that time, it was a rumour that Tony Kay was playing in some teams, so it was a bit of a surprise when he played against us.

If anyone wonders if he just played for fun, they could talk to our winger who I imagine is still carrying the bruises today!

The sadness of his suspension was Kay was supposed to be voted as Man of the Match for the game that was part of the investigation.

I understand that he, and other players at Sheffield Wednesday, earned a basic salary with a match bonus, the amount of which was based on whether the team drew or won.

3 players, including Tony, had a bet on their opponents to win, the winnings would merely cover the loss of the win bonus if Wednesday were unexpectedly beaten.

A mistake, of course. But not the daftest thing a young man has ever done, and certainly not worthy of the draconian punishment meted out.

It was uncovered by a sting from a Sunday newspaper, which milked it.

I saw my first game there in May 1966 (Man Utd, 0-0).

It was a night game which, to the 7-year-old me, was pure magic and from that moment, I was hooked... forever.

As a kid, from about 1967 to 1971, I couldn't eat, sleep, think, breathe unless it was Alan Ball – I was truly obsessed with him.

I was 12 when he was sold to Arsenal and it was probably my first real experience of discovering how shitty and cruel life could be (more than 50 years later,, I can still remember how hard I cried when I finally grasped what had happened).

A few years later (1974?), it felt like a big deal when I stopped going to games with my (late) pater and started going with ‘the lads' ("The Everton boys are in town, na-na-naaah...")

I should add my dad was more than happy to stop going as, a couple of years earlier, he'd decided the 1970s Everton side were “a shower of puddins” and “not fit to lace the boots of..” - insert name of various 1940s/1950s Everton players (or see Rigsby talking about Tommy Lawton).

Btw, my dad's idea of a date, when he started courting my mother, was to take her to Goodison for games.

Living in rural Ireland (as she had before arriving in Liverpool) I don't know if she'd even heard of Everton, but she loved Irish players Peter Farrell and Tommy Eglington and she eventually became a genuinely bitter blue who had NO time at all for anything to do with (spit!) them across the park.

Everton weren't much to watch for most of the 1970s but for me it didn't really matter.

Being with all my (blue) mates, starting to go to pubs, away games, off the leash, personally it was a wonderful period.

From 1966 to 2025, I was only ever on the pitch once at Goodison - 29th April 1978, last game of the season, Latchford's 30th goal.

Then in the 1980s, out of nowhere, Howard Kendall suddenly produced the most successful side in the history of the club.

In 1985 we were going to Goodison not just thinking we'd win games, but knowing we'd score 3/4 goals and batter the opposition.

Two titles, an FA Cup, the European Cup Winners Cup in just 3/4 years, plus regular Wembley trips, charity shields, players of the year, oh yes Everton WERE magic.

I imagine Sunday will be a strange, moving, possibly surreal day.

I will (in two small plazzie bottles) be sneaking in a few nips of Calvados for the final whistle.

Non, je ne regrette rien.

Thanks for the memories, up the Toffees! and on to the new Everton Stadium at Bramley-Moore Dock in August.