CHAPTER 2
The Road to Wembley
‘Yessss! Brilliant!’ said Rory. ‘I got Gordon Banks!’
Rory, Amy and the Doctor were being swept along Olympic Way by the tide of people heading for Wembley. As they walked, Rory was investigating his packet of World Cup bubblegum. He had unwrapped the gum, popped it in his mouth, and was now admiring the sticker that had come with it. It showed a dark-haired man in a yellow goalkeeper’s shirt. The badge over his heart bore the three lions of England.
Back home in his own era, Rory was a keen collector of Match Attax footballer cards. He knew they were really meant for kids, but Amy had once bought him a pack as a joke, and that was it – he had caught the collecting bug. He now owned an impressive set of twenty-first century Premier League stars, and the chance to get his hands on an original Bazooka player sticker from the ’66 World Cup had been too good to miss. He examined the sticker happily, then looked up at Amy.
‘Who did you get?’
‘The lovely Norbert “Nobby” Stiles,’ replied Amy, holding up her sticker to show him. ‘Has a one-in-a-million smile, doesn’t he?’
The sticker showed a cheery-looking player in a white England shirt, who was missing most of his front teeth.
Rory laughed. ‘He might need a little dental work, but he’s a fantastic player. Toughest tackler we have – or had, I mean. How about you, Doctor?’
‘Hmm? What’s that?’ As he loped along, the Doctor was browsing the newspaper he had just bought. He looked up distractedly.
Rory waved his sticker. ‘Which player did you get?’
‘Ah! Right!’ said the Doctor. He rolled up his newspaper and slipped it into the left-hand pocket of his tweed jacket. Then he delved into his other jacket pocket for his own penny gum. He unwrapped it, examined the enclosed sticker and pulled a face. ‘Some chap called Geoff Hurst. Likely-looking fellow. Anyone know if he’s any good?’
Rory looked at the Doctor as though he had just asked if the South Pole was at all chilly.
‘Not bad, yeah,’ he said enviously. ‘Just the only player ever to get a hat-trick in a World Cup Final, that’s all!’
‘Really?’ said the Doctor. ‘A hat-trick, eh? In the final? Excellent!’ He regarded the sticker cheerfully for a few seconds, then looked enquiringly at Rory once more. ‘And what exactly is a hat-trick, again?’
Rory was about to reply when he noticed the twinkle in the Doctor’s eye – he was having Rory on.
The Doctor grinned. ‘I might not have your encyclopedic knowledge of football trivia, Rory, but I do know a bit about the beautiful game,’ he said. ‘Even played a match or two myself, would you believe. I remember one in particular, when I was standing in for my flatmate –’
‘Nuh-uh!’ interrupted Amy, shaking her head. ‘Hold it right there, boys! No footballing stories allowed,’ she said firmly. ‘None. Of any kind. It’s bad enough that I let Rory talk me into this trip. I’m about to spend ninety minutes watching a bunch of men in frankly very unflattering shorts run about after a pig’s bladder. I really don’t need to put up with any macho sports chat from you two on top of that.’
‘It’ll be a hundred and twenty minutes, actually,’ muttered Rory timidly. ‘It goes to extra time.’
Amy let out a weary groan.
‘Though I think they’ll have slightly more advanced equipment than you give them credit for, Pond,’ added the Doctor. ‘Pig’s-bladder balls were more your nineteenth century. Anyway, I thought you quite liked football.’
‘I quite like footballers,’ Amy corrected him. ‘Young, handsome, super-fit, twenty-first-century ones. Not middle-aged ones with comb-over hairstyles.’ She looked at her picture-card again. ‘I mean, Nobby here isn’t exactly David Beckham, is he?’
Rory gave her a despairing look.
‘It’s how you play that matters, Amy, not what you look like.’
‘Not if you want to win the coveted “Pond Man of the Match” award, it isn’t,’ replied Amy.
Rory looked a little hurt. Amy looped her arm through his.
‘Don’t fret, petal,’ she said, grinning. ‘I’m not really the WAG type. Much happier with a nice ordinary fella than some fathead with a Ferrari and too much hair gel.’
‘Although they do pay footballers rather better …’ Amy teased.
‘Not now, they don’t,’ replied Rory. ‘Players weren’t nearly as spoiled back in the day – even when they got picked for their country. I saw an interview with one of our sixty-six squad once. He said they had to bring their own towels to the final!’
‘And of course whatever pay they do get will be in that old money,’ added the Doctor. ‘Which is utterly baffling.’
Rory smiled at the Doctor. ‘I noticed you had a tough time paying that newspaper guy.’
The Doctor looked worried.
‘Do you think I gave him enough? I’d hate to have swindled him. Seemed very nice. But he said “sixpence”, then asked for a “tanner”. Hadn’t a clue what I was supposed to hand over!’
Amy smirked.
‘What are you saying, Doctor? That your big old Time Lord brain can keep the TARDIS ticking over but can’t cope with pounds, shillings and pence?’
The Doctor blew out his cheeks. ‘Absolutely! Give me a time–space dimensional algorithm any day of the week! All this “half a sovereign, three shillings and sixpence” business is terribly confusing! So many different coins! Guineas and farthings and threepenny bits. Last time I was here, someone asked me for “two bob”. Bob? Does that sound like money to you? It sounds like something you’re supposed to do, or someone you know.’ He shook his head despairingly. ‘Still, it could be worse, I suppose. On Mafooz Minor they use different-sized pellets of swamp-vole dung as currency. That’s complicated and smelly.’
At that moment, a group of young fans jogged past them, clattering their wooden football rattles enthusiastically.
‘Those things make a fair old racket, don’t they?’ said Amy.
Rory’s expression became rather glum again.
‘I could have topped that easily,’ he said sulkily, ‘if it wasn’t for a certain person not far away.’ He cast an accusing look at Amy.
‘Oh, not this again,’ Amy groaned. ‘It was just a plastic trumpet, Rory. It’s gone. Get over it!’
‘It wasn’t just anything,’ grumbled Rory. ‘It was a proper 2010 World Cup vuvuzela. One of the lads brought it back from South Africa. I was going to be the only person in the crowd with one.’
‘Precisely!’ Amy snapped back. ‘Showing yet again how you spectacularly fail to grasp even the basics of time travel, you clot. Rule Number One – try not to stand out.’
‘She has a point, Rory,’ agreed the Doctor. ‘That vuvu-wailer whatsit of yours would have looked very out of place – or time, rather. As Pond says, it’s generally a good idea to avoid drawing attention to ourselves.’
Rory gave a snort. ‘Oh, right. Of course. Like you normally do, you mean?’
The Doctor chose to ignore this. ‘On top of which,’ he continued instead, ‘it was proving very hard to concentrate on locking the TARDIS on to this precise dateline with you making a sound like a flatulent Zarusian Blubberhog.’
‘She still didn’t have to snap it in half,’ said Rory sulkily.
‘Oh, I so did!’ contradicted Amy. ‘It was either that or your neck. The noise was driving me mad.’
‘I was practising,’ protested Rory. ‘They’re really hard to blow.’
‘You were doing my head in,’ Amy corrected him. ‘That’s what you were doing.’
‘Now, now, children,’ smiled the Doctor. ‘Let’s not squabble. After all, Rory, this was your dream destination, remember? And we’re here, aren’t we? Bang on target. Right place, right time. You’re about to get your wish of watching England win the World Cup. I’d have thought you’d be chuffed to bits – toy trumpet or no.’
‘It wasn’t a toy trumpet!’ protested Rory. ‘It was a proper vuvu–’
‘And unless I’m much mistaken,’ continued the Doctor, ‘those are the twin towers of the Empire Stadium just up ahead!’
The domed tops of two white towers had just come into view over the heads of the people in front of them. Moments later, the trio got their first proper look at the impressive frontage of the famous stadium.
Rory’s sulky mood evaporated in an instant. His vuvuzela was forgotten. The Doctor was right. This trip was a dream come true.
‘Wow.’ Rory came to a standstill. He stood and gawped, happily drinking in the scene. ‘Wembley. Real, proper, old-style Wembley.’ His face broke into a massive grin. ‘Wicked!’