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My day of two halves – from Bristol City to Balliol College

My day of two halves – from Bristol City to Balliol College. I had to wear my dinner suit under my big West Brom coat at the match, and Oxford was equally uncomfortable – until talk turned to football

I had a funny old day on Saturday. It began with a melee at a football ground in Bristol, and ended at a dinner at Balliol College, Oxford where I tried to hold my own in conversation with an economist, a cardiologist and an endocrinologist. There wasn’t a lot of time between these two engagements, so I had to wear my dinner suit beneath my big West Brom coat. As we won 3-0, I suppose I will now have to wear this formal outfit for every game henceforth. Seeing our third goal go in was a highlight. The lowlight was the appalling sight of two of our fans fighting in the away end just in front of me. They were both extremely large and wild-eyed, and knocked bells out of each other with great enthusiasm. No idea what they were fighting about; we were playing really well.

In the blink of an eye, feeling no less stressed, I was walking into Balliol College. I wasn’t in my comfort zone. I never applied for Oxbridge, not least because none of my teachers suggested I should. Furthermore, ahead of my O-levels a reading list was issued of the kind of books we should have read if we were aiming for Oxford or Cambridge. The first on that list was Lady Antonia Fraser’s life of Cromwell. I borrowed it from the school library, started reading, failed to make head or tail of it, returned it to the library, and that was the end of that.

When I meet an Oxbridge graduate, I have one of two reactions. If they got there from private school, I am scornful; if they came from state school, I feel great admiration. But apart from that there really is a lot to be annoyed with about these people if you don’t happen to be one of them. There is the way they slip the words Oxford or Cambridge into conversation within minutes of first meeting you. Also, they speak of what they “read” rather than what they studied. And then there is the way they talk about which actual college they were at, as if anyone else knows or cares what the difference is between any of them.

And here I was shuffling around uncertainly amid the begowned throng. The master of Balliol, Dame Helen Ghosh, was pointed out to me. Before I knew it, she was striding in my direction, smiling at someone I assumed was standing behind me. But no, it was me she was after. She shook my hand vigorously and, to my astonishment, said: “Great result today! 3-0! You’ve got 66 points now; got to be certainties for promotion.” Huh? Ye gods, I knew you had to be clever in these parts but this was something special. Respect.

Call me shallow but a lifetime’s cynicism about the dreaming spires now flowed out of me. The wine was quite marvellous, and these people deserve every glass of it in my view. And soon I was not only warm towards Oxford, I had even developed a fierce loyalty to this particular college. I was told about Balliol’s fierce rivalry with Trinity. Pah, Trinity? They’re not fit to lace our boots at Balliol.

At the end of the night, I took my place-card home. On it are a wine-stain, my name and the college crest. And that surely makes me a Balliol man.