By Michael Casey

BACK in 1974, I played for a not very good football team called Meadow Athletic. We had our medals presentation evening at Victoria Hall in Old Harlow. The MP Stan Newens came along to present the medals.

Stan, who was a history teacher, made a speech in which he stressed the importance of education as well as football.

Stan said: “I used to teach a young man called Keith Weller. You all may know him from Millwall, Leicester and England. He wasn’t academic but he had his football and he has done well.

“I just want to tell you that enjoy your football, treasure your medals but make sure you stick at your studies. It is very important”.

There must have been something that stuck with the twelve-year-old me because I did stick with my studies. I just felt there was something significant in what Mr Newens had said. I never shone academically but I showed a certain persistence. I got my O Level History, A Level History and an honours degree in History from the University of Stirling.

Thirty nine years later, having just launched YourHarlow, I interviewed Stan as he had just published his autobiography.

As he showed me his vast collection of books, he pulled one out that had been signed by a man whom he knew as a fellow MEP, Otto Von Hapsburg. Better known as the grandson of the Archduke Ferdinand, whose assassination triggered the first world war.

As chance would have it, I had met Otto Von Hapsburg a few years previously and, you know I told Stan, not so much as the fifty-something journalist but as a not very good twelve-year-old footballer.

Of course, perhaps he had popped down to Chippingfield and seen me score two own goals in a game and thought……..

Happy 90th birthday Stan.