Allan Townsend – A Tribute
Allan Townsend 1934 -2024
Allan’s service to his Club, Fylde RFC, together with some biographical details, are recorded in programme notes written to mark Allan’s 50 years of service to the Club. They can be found here on the Fylde website and are well worth the read. What follows is a tribute to Allan’s service to the Society, together with some personal recollections of a man who I counted as a good friend for more than 30 years.
Allan joined the Society, officially, on 1st August 1973 and enjoyed a refereeing career which had not long come to an end when I joined the Society in 1990. I first got to know Allan when attending the North Area Group of the Society, which, by comparison with the South Area Group, was, as we saw it, small but select, lead by Peter Kay and David Leslie, with the essential practical arrangements mainly in Allan’s hands.
My recollection of those meetings are a valuable mixture of refereeing lore and practice and refereeing stories, with tales from David and Peter at the senior end of the Game and some of Allan’s rich fund of stories from the real refereeing world. For many of us, attendance at those meetings added to our sense of belonging to the Society and enriched our refereeing enjoyment. Allan’s dry wit and rugby experience were major contributors to that.
Allan would occasionally relate a refereeing story of his own, sometimes of refereeing matches at HM Prison Kirkham where, apparently, the strict amateur code didn’t apply as, every now and again, a familiar face from rugby league appeared for the home team, with a characteristically vigorous style of play. He refereed sometimes at Weeton Camp and was having a drink with the Colonel of the then resident regiment who asked if he had served. Allan explained that just before his National Service call-up he embarked in his first merchant navy vessel, so was absent from home when the Army called to pick him up. At this the Colonel bawled: “Sarn’t Major, arrest this man. He’s absent without leave!”.
One of the off-shoots of the Area Groups was the Referee Roadshow. This was an open invitation to Clubs for a group of Referees to attend at the Club to give a presentation on the Laws and on refereeing. Response in the north was sparse but we did get an invitation from HM Prison Garth, a Category B prison near Ulnes Walton. Allan and I, together with a colleague, duly turned up and gave our presentation to an attentive audience in the prison gym. We were well received but we somehow didn’t fancy the tea. Safely outside the front gate, Allan remarked how aspirational it had been to encourage compliance with the Laws of the game to those who found it difficult to comply with the laws of the land. Having subsequently had the experience of refereeing at Garth, we could claim to have had some degree of success, but we would say that, wouldn’t we?
One of the highlights of the season used to be the Schools Sevens Competition held annually at Fylde RFC, a national event involving schools located in places where British Aerospace had a presence. Appointment to this competition, especially on the second day, Sunday, was much sought after. (There are those who still remember George Seddon, fresh from refereeing in the Singapore Sevens, refereeing the final in an all-white kit!) As Fylde’s Referee Contact, and being one of us, Allan ensured that the Referees were well looked after across the weekend, based in the Referees’ Room which at that time was the boiler room – always warm but sometimes cramped. So well looked after were the Referees that champagne was produced to celebrate the birth of Peter Kay’s daughter at the 1991 competition.
Allan was one of the small but dedicated band of Society members who got on quietly with some of the jobs which make the Society tick but without having a great profile. For many years he collected and collated the match card reporting system in its various guises, analysing the cards which came in, often in impressive numbers, and reporting on them to the Society Executive and the Grading Committee.
Society members who are regular attenders at the Society meetings will be aware of Allan’s impassioned pleas for responses from Referees to form the basis for the award of the Whistler’s Trophy. As a Club Contact himself, he understood the value of recognising good hospitality from our Clubs and their teams.
In the days when the Society held an annual dinner, Allan was the central figure in making the arrangements, including engaging speakers as well as dealing with the host Club. Ever mindful of the need for efficiency and economy, Allan drove a hard but fair bargain with the host Club, although, on one occasion, I had a call from one host Club who thought that Allan’s negotiation was being more hard than fair. I didn’t agree.
The Society held its centenary celebrations in 2002. The Centenary Committee, of which Allan was a member, organised a number of events throughout the year, culminating in a Centenary Dinner on a much larger and grander scale than the Society annual dinner. Allan was central in the organisation of the dinner at Bolton Town Hall, including the by then traditional Stand-Up Bingo, which I think may have been a Townsend innovation.
The discontinuance of the annual dinner left a requirement for an event at which the Society could entertain its partners in the Game and show its appreciation for the efforts of those who made a significant contribution to the work of the Society. That gave rise to the President’s Dinner which Allan organised with his usual quiet efficiency and which always attracts favourable comments from the Society’s guests.
Allan was my Vice-Chairman during some or the whole of my three terms in the Chair. He was always supportive and was a source of down-to-earth wise counsel in some of the unusual situations which would arise from time to time. As in most things, this was done quietly and without fuss and greatly appreciated.
In 2003, when it had been decided who should be nominated to become Vice-President at the AGM in that year, and would succeed to the Presidency in 2005, I called Allan and explained what I was calling about. Before I could say any more he listed several people whom he thought would be a suitable candidate. Typically, he had thought that he was being consulted about candidates rather than being invited himself. When the penny eventually dropped, Allan was more than pleased to accept and had a successful Presidency from 2005-2007.
The Society has, over the years, developed reward and recognition for 10 years’ service (a tie) and 25 years service (an even more distinguished tie); for 40 years’ service (a tankard) and for fifty years’ service a silver salver. Allan was for many years been the custodian of the ties and the procurer of the tankards and salvers. Another of those quietly in the background jobs which only attracts attention when things go wrong – but Allan made sure they didn’t. But then the then Society Secretary pointed out that Allan was coming up for his 50 year salver – what to do? Well, as history relates, nobody mentioned anything about it but Paul Houston quietly arranged for the salver and Allan was pleasantly surprised (or was he?) to receive it.
Over the years many Referees, both from the Society and from the Panel (now the NLMOT), have remarked to me about the quiet efficiency of, and the warm welcome from, Allan when appointed at Fylde – the contact; the drinks and meal tickets; and, most importantly on 1st XV match days, the car park pass. That reminds me of one of the little known but highly distinguished honours which Allan earned through his service to Fylde – an invitation to the prestigious and exclusive Gate Committee Lunch. They will miss Allan, as will all who knew him.
E.R. Bowden
Former President and Chairman, Manchester & District Rugby Union Referees’ Society