The pub has stood in Walton since the 1880s
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Licensee Dave Bond standing behind the bar at The Winslow Hotel, holding a pint of Guinness
Dave Bond, general manager at The Winslow Hotel(Image: Andrew Teebay Liverpool Echo)
"I'd experienced the matchday build up here. Little did I know so many years later that I would be running this place - it's a bit surreal", says Dave Bond. Dave, 58, is the general manager of The Winslow Hotel, an Everton matchday pub that has stood on Goodison Road in Walton longer than Goodison Park itself.
Nicknamed 'The People's Pub', The Winslow has been at the heart of matchday rituals for generations of Evertonians. It is decorated in blue and white, with club memorabilia throughout - including tributes to dearly missed former club captain Kevin Campbell.
Lifelong Blue Dave's route to running the pub was quite the journey, but it started with a love of Everton. Born in County Clare, he developed his adoration for the Toffees through reading books as a child - and he was able to catch commentary of games thanks to Radio Merseyside's signal just about reaching Ireland.
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As Dave grew up, he went to the odd game, always stopping at The Winslow for a pint beforehand. But the journey to running the pub began in earnest with Everton's UEFA Cup run in the 2007/08 season. He told the ECHO: "How I ended up here is linked to the 2007 game at Nuremberg - I lived in Germany for 19 years.
"Evertonfc.com used to have a chatroom, I was on that. The game was coming up and people were looking for tickets. With me living in Germany, my IP address was German. I could get as many tickets as I wanted because Nuremberg weren't filling their own allocations.
"I think I got about 18 or 20 tickets. People I didn't know, people I was chatting with and exchanged numbers and what have you.
"I got a block of tickets for fans. I had them on me, I paid for them, people met me and gave me cash, it was all sorted. I made a connection with quite a few Evertonians.
"On the way down, I was on the train to Nuremberg. I'm sitting on the train, I've got a bag of beer, I'm on my own, the doors open and these four lads walk right across and sit down. I could tell they were Irish straight away, by the look of them.
Everton fans having a drink outside The Winslow Hotel
Everton fans having a drink outside The Winslow Hotel(Image: Andrew Teebay Liverpool Echo)
"Within ten seconds, I was like 'alright lads, do you want a beer?'. I joined their company. It was one of those lads who I hung out with on the train trip and afterwards in the bar, who seven years later, he's here at a game.
"I'd kept in touch with him and I went back to Ireland in 2010. I opened a pub, we stayed in touch, he came up for a couple of pints or I would meet him for lunch.
"Then he came over to Goodison for a game in January of 2014. He sent me a photo of outside The Winslow. It had been closed since 2012, I didn't even know it had.
"I got in touch and the rest is history. The owner of the building said 'come over and let's have a chat'.
"If I hadn't met the guy on the train, it never would have happened. The guy on the train comes in here all the time from Ireland."
Dave has been in charge of the pub since 2014 and loves the "buzz" of a matchday. For many Blues, The Winslow serves a number of purposes - a place to settle the nerves before kick off, celebrate a win afterwards or commiserate among friends.
About running a matchday pub, Dave said: "For me, the hardest part of the week is the set up and the organisation for getting the pub open. It's not a case of just turning up and turning the lights on. It's quite busy.
"The actual matchday itself I enjoy - I get the adrenaline rush, I enjoy the buzz. I'm going to miss this.
"If I could click my fingers and the set up was done, it would be great and I would be stress free. The matchday itself isn't super stressful for me, I enjoy the buzz. I'm going to miss the buzz."
"After the match, the difference is night and day between a win and a loss - a difference in sales, in atmosphere. The singers we have on are brilliant but they can only lift so much if you get beaten. That game that we lost 3-2 to Bournemouth, having led 2-0, everyone was just in a state of shock.
Dave Bond at The Winslow Hotel
Dave Bond at The Winslow Hotel(Image: Andrew Teebay Liverpool Echo)
"When we get a win, after the match here, the atmosphere is brilliant. That carries on for many hours."
However, it is a time of great change for Everton FC and the pubs that surround Goodison. The club will move from its home of 133 years to a new stadium at Bramley-Moore Dock at the end of this season.
Dave thinks it will be a very emotional time for all involved. He said: "It's more engrained in people who are born and raised here, let's be honest. I'm not born and raised here, but having been full on with this for eleven years, right across from the ground, and knowing the history of The Winslow and it being pretty much an annexe of Goodison Park - it's six years older.
"It was here when the first ball was kicked, it's been a matchday ritual for Evertonians since 1892. I remember, poignantly, sitting in here one time and speaking to a man in his 80s. He was about 86, he was with his son and his grandson.
"The grandson was married and his wife was pregnant, so there would have been four generations of Evertonians. The grandfather was telling me about how he would come in with his father and grandfather. If you put that all together, that's 100 years plus of history and memories right there at that table.
"They've all been coming to The Winslow. It's part of Goodison's DNA, this building, 100%. It's going to be gut-wrenching for everyone, it's going to be very emotional.
An Everton fan with a blue flare outside the Winslow Hotel before the game against Bournemouth in 2023
An Everton fan with a blue flare outside the Winslow Hotel before the game against Bournemouth in 2023
"I don't think the reality will really hit until February or March. I think it will hit home that it's the last ten games or whatever. It will be a countdown."
The Winslow has plans for a future without Everton matchdays on its doorstep, however. Dave has submitted a planning application to convert the building's upper floors into serviced accommodation, keeping the pub operating on the ground floor.
He explained: "We're going to run buses from here. Obviously our turnover is going to drop right off - we're lucky if we keep one bar open and have a couple of coaches.
"But again, you don't know until the time comes. We've done an online poll and we've done sheets on the tables here asking 'would you keep your matchday rituals?'.
"The feedback was 90-95% saying 'yes, we're going to keep coming to The Winslow. But it's like when you invite 100 people to your birthday party six months in advance. They say they're all coming but then 50 turn up."
About a future with The Winslow Hotel operating as a hotel once more, he said: "It's now a rebirth, going back to that with serviced accommodation. We don't know what avenue it's going to go. We just want to keep on catering for football fans, but also in an accommodation sense."