Bore draw at Luton before dinner with Kylie - all in a football fan's trip down memory lane

It’s probably safe to presume most of the 8,902 people who attended Luton Town’s 0-0 draw with Swindon in March 1993 have long forgotten it.

Dave Bassett certainly hasn’t - but then it’s not every day you have dinner with Kylie Minogue.

The story of how a midweek trip to Kenilworth Road resulted in being sat next to the Princess of Pop is told in his book, the wonderfully-titled 92 Grounds for Divorce?, which charts his 60-year journey visiting the home of every team in English football’s top four divisions.

“I’d been down in Bedfordshire on work and it was actually the owner of the hotel I was staying at, a big Luton fan, who invited me to the game,” Bassett explains.

“The hotel had a large dining room with big tables and they encouraged people to sit together, rather than eat alone.

“That’s how I ended up sat next to Kylie, who it turned out was a fellow guest.”

He continued: “To this day I cannot remember what on earth we talked about.

“The one thing I do know is my daughter, a huge fan at the time, has never forgiven me for not getting her autograph!

“I feel sure I must have impressed her with my sparkling wit and repartee. Maybe one of these days she will get in touch to have another chat. I should be so lucky!”

Bassett recalls the match itself being “as dull as the scoreline would suggest”. Yet there have been plenty during his six-decade football odyssey which were memorable for the actual football and chronicled in his book.

Many of the matches involved Albion, the team he has supported since childhood though, ironically, the first match he ever attended was at Molineux and a 3-1 win for Wolves over Tottenham in February, 1962.

When Spurs were beaten by the same scoreline at home by Brentford in 2023, as Bassett first completed the 92 in north London, it sparked the idea for the book.

“I thought it was quite quirky, the scorelines being the same and I reckoned there were probably a few tales to tell about some of the matches I’d been to between those two games, 61 years apart,” explains Bassett, who grew up in Sedgley but now lives in Bridgnorth.

“To be honest, I only began seriously trying to finish the 92 grounds about 10 years ago.

“I was chatting with some friends about how many we’d been to and I realised I’d done 70-odd over the years, without even thinking about it. Having got so close, I thought why not finish it? It was never an ambition but it became one.”

Standout occasions include Wolves’ infamous 2-1 win over Leeds which cost the latter the 1972 league title, Albion’s 6-3 victory over Manchester United four years earlier and Kidderminster knocking Blues out of the FA Cup in 1994.

In addition to the details of what happened, Bassett also tells the stories of the people involved.

“I picked out the matches which stood out to me, for whatever reason, and was able to piece a few stories around them,” he says.

“It’s not just about football. There is other stuff in there, a bit of the history from the time.”

Those interviewed include Ron Atkinson and the late Dave Wharton, who scored the first goal he ever saw live while playing for Wolves in that aforementioned win over Spurs.

Bassett also recalls the time he met his more famous namesake, the former Wimbledon and Sheffield United manager, while a period living next-door to Mick McCarthy, when the latter was in charge at Molineux, was also a source of great anecdotes. The pair got on well, albeit Bassett acknowledges taking something of a risk after Albion beat Wolves in the play-offs.

“I couldn’t resist placing my Albion gnome in a fairly prominent position on Mick’s side of the fence,” he says.

“Mick saw the funny side of it, but did suggest next time it may end up through our lounge window.”

It really needs clarifying the eye-catching title, suggested by a friend, is purely tongue-in-cheek. Bassett and his wife Jan will soon celebrate 50 years of marriage and she even accompanied him on some of the trips, including one last season to Everton’s new stadium to again complete the full set.

Perhaps it should be no surprise to learn, as a semi-retired financial advisor, Bassett has crunched the numbers.

“I worked out I’ve been to about 1,400 matches but it only actually equates to about two-and-a-half per cent of your waking hours, even accounting for a couple of hours travelling each way,” he says.

“It sounds a lot but when you break it down, as long as you manage your time half decently and look after people the other 98 per cent, it’s nothing really. Well, that’s my excuse anyway!”

Amid all the humour and stories, there’s also a serious point to this. Proceeds from the book will go to charities involved in helping former footballers suffering from dementia and their families, among them the Astle Foundation.

Jeff Astle was one of Bassett’s sporting heroes and his daughter Dawn, who has done such vital work raising awareness of brain injury in sport, has written a foreword for the book. So too has Sky Sports presenter Hayley McQueen, whose dad Gordon, the former Leeds and Manchester United centre-back, died in 2023 after developing chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE).

“I am not really one for hero worship but I have had two or three and Jeff Astle was one,” says Bassett.

“When I was at school, he was the main man and I was fortunate enough to meet him a few times later on.

“On one occasion I was walking out of The Hawthorns with my son Daniel after a game in the 1990s.

“Albion weren’t very good at the time and Jeff was walking behind us.

“I turned to tell Daniel he had been a star when we were a good team. Jeff stopped to have a chat and took Daniel’s name and address. A few days later a signed photo arrived through the post.

“While he was a great player on the pitch, he was also a lovely bloke off it. With how his life ended, at 59, was so heart-wrenching.

“Then you realise there are so many other players I’ve enjoyed watching over the years suffering.

“So I thought, if I could just do something to help. Hopefully, the book helps raise the issue a little bit more.”

92 Grounds for Divorce is available to buy at amazon.co.uk and jmdmedia.co.uk