January 27 – The Birth of the Pools Panel

TODAY we’re looking at the birth of an institution that’s quintessentially English. If you’re making a top five list of English traits then football, the weather and gambling aren’t going to be too far away, so it’s no wonder that the Pools Panel were formed today in 1963.

Last week we brought you a couple of tales from the infamous 1962/63 season (http://www.onthisfootballday.com/2008_01_22/january-22-twisted-firestarters.php), where the weather was causing all sorts of havoc with the fixture list. One FA Cup third round tie was even postponed 22 times, leaving the nations pools players in limbo. This was long before the National Lottery gave England’s gambling fans their weekly fix, so the main football pools companies, Littlewoods, Vernons and Zetters decided to do something about it.

The first ever panel met at the Connaught Rooms in central London and consisted of Chairman Gerald Nabarro (MP), George Young, Ted Drake, Tommy Lawton, Tom Finney and former referee Arthur Ellis. They were locked in a room until they could agree who would’ve won all that weekends postponed games and make or break coupons across the land. The BBC then televised the panel’s findings live to the nation. Unlike the aforementioned National Lottery though, the programme didn’t involve a rubbish quiz show hosted by Dale Winton thankfully.

These days the panel consists of England legends Gordon Banks and Roger Hunt and also the former Newcastle and Scottish midfielder Tony Green, who now meet in the rather ordinary setting of a solicitors office in Liverpool. Every Saturday they turn up at 2pm and are sealed off for two hours while they make their decisions on the weekends weather victims, armed only with their footballing brains and a mountain full of stats.

In recent years they have expanded their portfolio to Australia, where they enjoy some all expenses paid trips down under during the English summer. To be honest, we can’t think of many better jobs out there than being paid to make up football results, so we’re getting our application forms in right now. On the off-chance we can’t blag ourselves the job we’ll be back here tomorrow to let you know which England international gave up on the gritty weather and hot-footed it to Spain.