Hollywood style sets the fashion
Something of Hollywood came to the cup final yesterday. In a sign reflecting the way Wembley has become a fashion event, many of the fans were having the crests of the two teams painted onto their bodies by professional make-up artists.
Some of the female Chelsea supporters wore their blue and white scarves like pashminas. Roman Abramovich, the club’s owner, arrived in a convoy of three people carriers, all with blacked windows. He sported a brown jumper draped over the shoulders of his deep purple shirt. His three burly minders wore suits and sunglasses.
Other Chelsea supporters included Guy Ritchie, Madonna’s film-director husband, and Lord Attenborough, the director and actor, who made his own fashion statement by arriving in a tweed hat.
David Baddiel, the comedian and a Chelsea season-ticket holder, was attending the final with his older brother Ivan. “We have got posh tickets from Wembley, so we are not allowed to wear our colours,” he said. Baddiel confessed, however, that he was sneaking in a T-shirt featuring Peter Osgood.
United fans included James Nesbitt, the actor, and Coleen McLoughlin, the model fiancée of Wayne Rooney.
The neutrals included Sir Mick Jagger, who came with his son James, 20, Sir Richard Branson, the chef Gordon Ramsay, Lord Foster, the architect, and Bob Geldof, who staged the Live Aid concert at the old Wembley stadium in 1985.
Foster’s architectural work includes the 435ft-high arch above the new Wembley stadium, the most expensive stadium ever built at a cost of £757m, a thousand times more than the £750,000 spent on the original stadium, completed in 1923.
Nancy Dell’Olio and Sven-Goran Eriksson, the former England coach, seemed to confirm that their relationship was back on by turning up together in seats provided by the FA.
Sir Henry Cooper, the boxer, revisited the site of one of the highlights of his career. The old stadium was packed in 1963 when “’Enry’s ’ammer”, a devastating left hook, floored the then Cassius Clay. Clay, however, went on to win.
Luckily there was still room for wheelchair-bound Denis Higham, 92, who attended the first cup final at the “old” Wembley in 1923.
Higham, a former bank manager, from Selway on the Sussex coast, remembers how you could tell who supported who by the hats they wore: “Bolton supporters were wearing flat caps and the West Ham fans had trilbies.”
source:http://www.timesonline.co.uk
