Nigel Pearce
I was brought up in Stapleford and went to Sawston Village College. My first United game was the 1970 friendly vs Chelsea, aged 10. I attended four or five games a season thereafter, whenever my Godfather offered to take me (my dad was an Arsenal fan and had zero interest in the Us). I started supporting United for real after Ron Atkinson arrived and I got my own transport (a Vesper 90)! I moved to London in 1978 where I worked for 38 years for Customs & Excise in a wide range of different roles, including latterly in Whitehall. London positioned me perfectly to follow John Docherty’s wonderful United team all over the country, as part of the “Inter City Trickle”. We went behind enemy lines at places like Bolton, Derby, Burnley, Leicester, Newcastle, Leeds, Sunderland and Chelsea, often man-marked by the local Police (for our own safety). Every now and again we won away, too! Tom Finney remains my all time United legend, with Tommy O’Neill my unsung hero. The more I look back on those amazing few years, the more I think how under-appreciated The Doc was at the time, and what he, and his teams, achieved.
In 1987 I co-founded the Abbey Rabbit fanzine, one of the first dozen fanzines in the UK. United, and English football in general, were in the doldrums at the time. The game needed freshening up and we all needed cheering up. I think The Rabbit played a small part to that end, although suspicious officials at the Club had us down as Public Enemy No.1 for a while. The glorious Beck years followed. The greatest impact of The General and his fearless brand of attacking football was, in my view, the huge increase in United’s away following, the legacy of which remains today. In the Nineties I helped set up the Cambridge United Supporters Association, a (less organised and less democratic) forerunner to Cambridge Fans United. CUSA had it moments, though: We successfully fought the Club’s plans to give Peterborough fans the whole of the Habbin Stand one year, and led a campaign to allow the Club to buy a small piece of allotment land in order to re-build the away end. In 2005, following relegation to the Conference and administration, I organised a solidarity march from the town centre to the Abbey that attracted over 1,000 fans before the last game of that season.
I’ve been a member of CFU since its inception and, when I recently retired, decided the time was right to get more involved in the good work of the Trust. I was delighted to be invited to join the Trust Board in 2018. I am now a part-time gardener and help to keep the Abbey looking its best by planting flowers around the ground.
If you’d like to talk to me on match days I can be found in Block D, Row F of the Main Stand - bang on the halfway line. Please come and say hello!
In 1987 I co-founded the Abbey Rabbit fanzine, one of the first dozen fanzines in the UK. United, and English football in general, were in the doldrums at the time. The game needed freshening up and we all needed cheering up. I think The Rabbit played a small part to that end, although suspicious officials at the Club had us down as Public Enemy No.1 for a while. The glorious Beck years followed. The greatest impact of The General and his fearless brand of attacking football was, in my view, the huge increase in United’s away following, the legacy of which remains today. In the Nineties I helped set up the Cambridge United Supporters Association, a (less organised and less democratic) forerunner to Cambridge Fans United. CUSA had it moments, though: We successfully fought the Club’s plans to give Peterborough fans the whole of the Habbin Stand one year, and led a campaign to allow the Club to buy a small piece of allotment land in order to re-build the away end. In 2005, following relegation to the Conference and administration, I organised a solidarity march from the town centre to the Abbey that attracted over 1,000 fans before the last game of that season.
I’ve been a member of CFU since its inception and, when I recently retired, decided the time was right to get more involved in the good work of the Trust. I was delighted to be invited to join the Trust Board in 2018. I am now a part-time gardener and help to keep the Abbey looking its best by planting flowers around the ground.
If you’d like to talk to me on match days I can be found in Block D, Row F of the Main Stand - bang on the halfway line. Please come and say hello!