Six years after he passed away, our watfordfc reporter androofrench - who was a friend and former colleague - pays tribute to Graham Taylor
The phrase ‘never meet your heroes’ is often proved correct, but in the case of Graham Taylor it was 100% inaccurate.
Then there was my primary school headmaster, the late Brian Sears, and one of my teachers at Yorke Mead School in Croxley Green, John Hazell, both of whom gave me the courage to write about football and showed me that it could be just as rewarding as playing the game. They were/are both Watford fans too.
I first encountered Graham when I worked at the Watford Observer in the late 90s during his second spell at the club. When Oli Phillips slipped off to Spain each summer for a couple of weeks rest, I would take up the mantle of keeping the WFC news ticking over.I’m not going to lie: the first time I spoke to GT, one-to-one, I was a bag of nerves. And he knew that. So if I recall, we ended up talking about music to start with, and then had a chat about Euro 96.
Once we’d sorted out all the paperwork, I remember shaking hands and he said to me: “Andrew, all I ask of you is that you give of your best…your very best. If you do that, then I can ask for no more. And in return, you will always have my support.” But he also involved you into the conversation and wanted your opinion. I’ll admit it took me a while to feel I had earned my stripes in order to have a voice in those chats, but GT would include me in a way that made me feel comfortable.
When he left Watford I was gutted, but his departure actually helped our friendship grow as we then had to make the effort to stay in touch rather than rely on seeing each other at work.
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