MADE TO MAKE YOUR MOUTH WATER

An 'Opal Fruit green' Ford Capri II sparked a Liverpudlian schoolboy's fantasy that would one day become reality

- CHARLIE CALDERWOOD

"Pss off! And take that bleedin' ball with ya!" That's all the first owner of this 1978 Ford Capri II 2.0S ever said to its now longtime custodian, John Collins.

But those words, shouted at the then 11-year-old Scouser as he inadvertently threatened the brand-new Ford's gleaming, Regency Green bodywork with his football, have stuck in John's mind ever since. Now, more than 40 years after that first interaction, he has completed the restoration of his 'Jade', and he finally has the car he always promised himself.

Growing up in a late-1970s Liverpool that even the proud John admits was dreary, his neighbour's Capri was a rare glimpse of colour and a crucial source of hope. The shortlived Capri II (production lasted from 1974 to '78) is as good a demonstration as any of the power of styling and marketing, which were always Ford's relative strengths. Although lacking in mechanical sophistication compared with not only its contemporaries, but also some rivals' outputs of a decade earlier, the blue-collar Capri's swooping lines, long bonnet and rakish reputation made it a consistent best-seller with which Brits in particular fell in love. A beige Austin Maxi might have been more advanced technically, but few 11-year-olds were at risk of coveting passionately one of those.