Today’s ‘On This Day’ goes back to 1998 to feature the programme from West Ham’s match against Aston Villa. Read our review of the Hammers’ matchday issue below and check out the other Premier League issues from 1998/99 here.
Both the cover and inside cover of West Ham’s programme for their fixture against Aston Villa featured Frank Lampard, who had just captained the England under-21s against Bulgaria at Upton Park, scoring the winner from the penalty spot.
One of the best features in the programme was ‘Hammers History’, which went back in time forty years to recall a clash between West Ham and Villa on 30th August 1958. At this point, the Hammers were back in Division One after 26 years outside of the top-flight. They clearly adjusted quickly as they saw off Villa 7-2 at Upton Park, with Vic Keeble and John Dick among the scorers. The article is nicely presented, with pictures of West Ham legends ringing the text, in addition to a newspaper clipping showing Keeble putting away the fifth goal of the game.
The programme had a brief column from manager Harry Redknapp, and two pages of short news snippets from around the club. The issue also included one-page articles on first-teamers Paul Kitson and Julian Dicks, both of whom were returning to the side following injury problems. In addition, there were plenty of pictures from recent games, including coverage of a recent win against Southampton across the two centre-pages. Former Hammers defender Tony Gale also contributes a column.
Coverage of West Ham’s reserve and youth teams was well handled, with match reports and the season’s results and fixtures for each of the teams. Notably the line-ups for the recent under-19 games contained future first-team regular Michael Carrick, who would make 159 appearances for the first team (and win 34 caps for England). The Under-19s had made a positive start to the season, winning their first five league fixtures, and they would end the season winning the FA Youth Cup.
There were three pages on visitors Aston Villa, who arrived at Upton Park having won six and drawn two of their opening eight league games. The section contains profiles of the club’s players, a couple of ‘Did You Know’ snippets, a form guide, and a biography of boss John Gregory. There were also pages showing various stats for the two clubs and comparing the defensive records of West Ham’s Neil Ruddock and Villa’s Gareth Southgate.
West Ham’s programme for the 1998/99 season contained the fewest pages of content in the league, and many of the feature here were noticeably brief and unremarkable. However, certain parts of the programme, such as the historical feature, club coverage, and opponents’ section, help to raise the quality of the issue.