“We had a women’s team called Dimondek in 1980 and 81,” Leigh-Ann said. “In 1982, we changed the name to Gisborne United. Henry Cudd was our coach early on.
“The men’s and women’s teams used to socialise together and quite a few marriages came out of that.”
She and Lloyd reeled off some of them: Gavin and Johanna Wilkes, Lloyd and Leigh-Ann Dickinson, Dean and Shirley McBride, Barry and Susan Braybrook, Alan and Mel Knight, Mickey and Dianne Grant, and Chris and Molly Adams.
Chris and Molly (nee Wrigley) have three sons likely to be integral to the attacking designs of the United first team this year. Midfielder Corey and strikers Josh and Jacob will have last year’s Eastern Premiership top scorer Jimmy Somerton lining up alongside them.
If Molly’s brother Dean Wrigley were 25 years younger, he wouldn’t look out of place in an attack like that. That’s the family link again.
The Braybrooks – Betty on the committee and all the boys playing, at one time or another – are hard to beat in the numbers game, but the Cudd boys and girls give them a run for their money. And the Wilsons – Jimmy, Norman and Willie – had their uncle Peter Seymour making them feel at home.
Then you have the parents who supported their offspring. Right back at the start, Sandy Johnstone broke a long association with Thistle to support his son Barry and his mates; Eddie and Marion Harrison were committee members while son David played; and Peter Goldsbury was on the committee to support son Brian.
Lloyd Dickinson hadn’t played football for two years when he saw an advert in the Gisborne Herald wanting players for a new team.
“I’d been having fun on my motorbike, doing motocross, trials and beach racing, but I thought I’d go along and see about this team,” he said.
“We trained at Childers Road Reserve, on a junior field between the No 1 ground and the YMCA. Some big, old-fashioned lights on the edge of No 1 meant we could see well enough to train.
“We didn’t have clubrooms. We’d meet at a house in Kahutia St. Someone would cook a pot of mince, and Jabbo [Peter Seymour] would spike it with a little whisky.”
One game that stood out from the early days was a Chatham Cup match against Napier City Rovers in Napier in the late 1970s.
“Norman Wilson was in goal and it was 1-1 at halftime,” Dickinson said.
Fellow founding member Fred Robertson provided more detail.
“Ross Braybrook scored in the first half, and they only beat us 2-1.”
Dickinson recalled the Central League road trips with affection.
“I’d be working away on a land survey, come back to the office at 4pm and we’d be on the road at 5pm, maybe stopping overnight at a motorcamp near the EIT in Taradale, or at a Dannevirke pub on our way to Palmerston North.
“We’d travel down in a three-speed Commer minibus, with the driver trying to find the way from third gear to second.”
Often Sandy Johnstone was the driver, which was ideal as that was his occupation.
“Sandy was the glue,” Dickinson said.
“He would drive, sitting on 80 to 85 km/h, and then he’d start singing. We couldn’t understand his Scottish accent when he sang, but he was brilliant.”
Team spirit was evident when players pooled their money to pay the air fares for Dean Stevens to travel back from work in Auckland to play for United one season in the 1980s.
Mike Sharp hadn’t played football before he turned up to play for United in 1977. Rugby had been his game at school, but he didn’t want to play it at the senior level.
His work as an electrician kept him from pursuing a regular place in the Central League team until 1984, when new coach Cameron Gordon brought across a barrow-load of players from Gisborne City seconds.
“I was about 30 then, and I liked playing with the ex-City guys, who were a fair bit younger. I think Graeme Braybrook, Ian Wood and I were the only players in that team who were with United before that season. Some good players came across: Paul Dwight, Brian Cudd, Dean Stevens, Kevin Kirkland, Chris Warwick and Tony Williams were some of them.”
Asked to name players they remembered from those early days, Lloyd Dickinson and Mike Sharp came up with: Willie Watson and his brother Bruce, Mike Herkt, Barry Braybrook, Doug Cooper, Paul White, Glenn Walker, Grant Jones, Barry Johnstone, Russell Blaker, Gavin Wilkes, Terry Knight, Ian Wood, Evan Parkin, Scotty Wilson, Barry Compier, Rob Ritchie, Roger Faber and Andy Finlayson.
Plenty of others have worn the black and yellow strip over the years ... people like Richard Williams, Nigel Higham, Tony Hampson, Kim Perano, Stu Cranswick, Jimmy Holden, Laurence Fleming, Craig Christophers, and Steven and Damon Husband, not to mention the first-team players still plying their trade.
The Gisborne United 50th Jubilee celebrations end with a Saturday night jubilee dinner, which follows an afternoon game at Nelson Park on the ground next to the pool, and a Friday night meet and greet.
