'My Perfect Season'
When David Bryant was reintroduced to Leatherhead FC after many years away, he fell quickly in love- and then wrote a book about his new passion. We caught up with David to talk Tanners
Leatherhead fan David Bryant hasn’t really been a Leatherhead fan for very long; and yet he speaks about the Tanners with the passion of a diehard.
He can’t regale us with remembrances of the ‘Leatherhead Lip’ and trips to Wembley, but his commitment is total. Indeed, so wrapped up is he in Fetcham folklore that last season he decided to document the entire campaign in book form. That this endeavour coincided with the Tanners having their best season in many a year and sweeping to the Pitching In Isthmian South Central title was very much a coincidence, but it makes the book rather joyous from beginning to end; indeed, it makes it a record of a ‘Perfect Season.’
Not many people can say that they have been seduced by watching Leatherhead and Badshot Lea, but David is nothing if not unique. He explains:
“Having returned to the area after twenty-five years living elsewhere, I decided I wanted to get involved with ‘local things’. I’ve always loved football, and so an obvious choice was to go and watch the local team. After the first month of Saturdays spent unpacking boxes of useful stuff, and shredding boxes of useless stuff that should never really have come with us, I decided I’d wander down the hill to watch the local team – Leatherhead FC. It was 21st December 2024, and they were at home to Badshot Lea.
After forty-one minutes, the Tanners were 2-0 up, courtesy of goals from Cerny Ando and Deondre Date. I quite liked that – I supposed I was, after all, a ‘home’ supporter. In the third minute of first half injury time, Finlay Evans pulled one back for the visitors. I found myself mildly annoyed by this turn of events. Four minutes after the restart, someone called Niran Butler scored for the home side, making the score 3-1. Two things happened. Firstly, my arms went up involuntarily, and secondly a kind of roar erupted from me. If I’m not much mistaken, it went something like, “Yeeeerrrrssss, get iiiiin!”
And with that, I was hooked. Sure, Badshot Lea went on to score a second, but it was a mere detail. ‘We’, the Tanners, won the match 3-2. Fast forward twenty months, and here we are - I've written a book, I do the match reports, and I contribute bits for the match day programmes.”
David didn’t really intend to write a book. Initially his idea was to produce a blog, but as he continued to write and the campaign began to gather momentum, he realised that, just perhaps, his efforts could become something more.
“We hadn't won the league for 62 years, so it felt as if the occasion should be marked. So I revisited my efforts, self-published, and gifted the book to the club. I figured it would serve a number of purposes - be a bit of a fundraiser, a means by which to give back to the club with which I'd fallen in love, and a keepsake for other supporters.
I didn’t expect it to be a bestseller, obviously! It’s pretty niche, and not everybody is a reader - people also prefer e- and audio books these days. Nonetheless, it seems to have sold well - I know it sold close to 40 copies at the first match it was available, and I've seen people wandering around with their freshly-bought copies at each subsequent game. I've also been involved in posting/delivering multilpe other copies. I've actually had people ask me to sign their copies too, which is surreal and flattering in equal measure!”
‘My Perfect Season’ is rather a personal tome, alongside being a fine historical record of a magnificent campaign. David is able to revisit the site of a personal football triumph of yesteryear, recount a meeting with a collection of drunken Cumbrians in Woking, catalogue some of his best and worst moments as a follower of Everton (we won’t hold that against him- at least, not much), and you can feel the joy and despair of the campaign at every turn of a page. So, what were the ‘best bits?’
“You might expect me to say winning the league, but without being dismissive, that had become a case of 'when, not if' by the time it happened. The late, late wins over Hanworth Villa and Kingstonian in my first season hold fond memories of the 'hugging overjoyed strangers' kind, and I've enjoyed the general anticipation and match day experience of being a home and away fan - it never gets old. Maybe I'd go for the double over Raynes Park Vale in the space of four days in March as my best memory. We absolutely destroyed them 6-1 away, then four days later, in a very different type of game, we beat them 1-0 at home with a 93rd minute Jacob Breckon winner. That was massive, as our two main rivals dropped points that day to late goals in their own games. From that point on, you could feel the title coming our way.”
If you pick up a copy of David’s book, not only can you “feel” the title win through the emotions of its author, you’ll also be immersing yourself in a story that, whatever your club, will feel very real and very relatable. We all dream of success for our chosen club, even if many of us never really get beyond dreaming.
‘My Perfect Season’ does, to coin a phrase, what it says on the cover; it recounts the ups and downs, but mainly ups, of a fantastic campaign for Leatherhead- and for those who follow the Tanners home and away. It allows you to share their triumphs, their disasters, their road traffic calamities, and Dickie’s Golden Balls (no, we’re not making this stuff up, honesty…).
If you would like a beautifully illustrated copy of ‘My Perfect Season’- and we can’t think of any reason why you wouldn’t- then it is available for the price of ten pounds (plus 4.95 towards post and packaging) at the following address- [email protected]. You can, of course, also purchase a copy at Fetcham Grove- and, just to attract Arsenal fans, it has a foreword by Ian Selley, too.