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The transplanted Englishman joined what was one one of several charter flights booked by a well-travelled supporters group. It wasn’t unusual to get 8,000 such fans to a game in Seattle, but it was only several hundred who flew to New York City to watch the final.

“The day before, we found out somebody managed to procure a charter, and it was going to be $360. So we jumped on it. We left work on our lunch break, went down to the bank and drained our accounts,” he said. “It was a red-eye flight … They had a supply of beer on the flight that was complimentary. And that lasted like an hour. But there was lots of cheering; it was a very … ‘congenial’ atmosphere, to put in mildly. I remember there were a few of (the fans) who got to the stadium and passed out, and never saw the game. They had over-imbibed to the point where they were legless, as my mom used to say.

Photo by Brian Kent / PNG files

“We got back on the bus, went back to the airport where we sat for a few hours, back on the plane, landed early in the wee hours of the next day … and why go to sleep? We all piled in a van, drove into Vancouver and went to the Robson Square reception. It was total euphoria.”

Clarke, who emigrated with his family from Birkenhead, England, when he was four-and-a-half years old, felt a kinship with Waiters’ British-heavy team, as did his parents. His mom frequently had Caps forward Carl Valentine, then a 19-year-old lad from Manchester, over for dinner, along with several other players.

“She would basically adopt at lot of the English players who came in,” he chuckled.