Ipswich Town 3 Leeds United 4

/ martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

Leeds United form part of my earliest football memories; they were the dirty, losing 1970 FA Cup finalists; I watched them draw the first game with Chelsea at Wembley on the TV on a May afternoon at my grandparent’s house on the Isle of Sheppey.  Before that, I don’t remember any games, only World Cup Willie.  After that, there were the Esso World Cup coins featuring Madeley, Reaney, Hunter, Charlton, Cooper, Jones and Clarke in 1970, then the centenary FA Cup final victory in 1972, the fondly remembered defeat to Sunderland the following year and then their long unbeaten run in the First Division the season after, when Ipswich were the first team to beat them, albeit in the piffling League Cup. Added to that, I travelled on the bus to school every day with a boy called Andy and he supported them, although he had a good excuse, his whole family were extras on Emmerdale Farm, and whilst that is a lie, they really were from Yorkshire, some people are apparently.  Despite a wonky eye (we called him Cyclops), Andy was quite a tidy footballer, much better than me, and he wore blakey’s on his shoes, which clicked and sparked when we played at lunchtimes on the tarmac school tennis court.  Everyone who grew up in the 1970’s must have memories of Leeds United; they helped the whole country lose its innocence.  I almost feel sorry for the younger Generation X’ers and their successors who have missed out on experiencing 1970’s Leeds United first hand.

Playing Leeds again is therefore a good thing, and I am light of heart as I head for the railway station beneath a sky decorated with fluffy clouds which recede in layers, off into the distance. On the train there is a Leeds fan sat behind me, he’s talking boringly about some player getting “regular game time”.  The train smells of toilet cleaner, which I suppose is a good thing too, but then there is a whiff of cloying body spray; it smells a bit like Brut and I’m back in the 1970’s again.

Coming out of Ipswich railway station, by way of a change I turn right along Burrell Road towards what were the docks, but is now the waterfront, and the Briarbank Brewery where there is a beer festival today and bouncers at the door; it’s home fans only.  My wife Paulene has encouraged me to do something different and not stick with the routine of going to the ‘Arb’; she says it will be good for my brain, but that’s from the woman who tried to make coffee this morning without putting any coffee in the coffee machine.  I follow a bloke in a Town shirt with the name Counago on his back, but I don’t think it’s him.  At the Briarbank, I eschew the ‘Yogi Bear’ picnic tables in the yard and head upstairs to what I think is one of my favourite bars anywhere in terms of décor.  The wood panels have me in mind of being on a ship, but it also reminds me of the pub next to the high- level bridge in Newcastle, although I haven’t actually been in that pub for about forty years.  I order a pint of Briarbank Bitter (£4.20) and take a seat by the window looking out on the Lord Nelson pub opposite and St Clement’s church, it makes me think of Sir Thomas Slade, architect of HMS Victory who is buried in the church and after whom nearby Slade Street is named.  I also can’t help thinking of Noddy Holder and Dave Hill.

A bloke stood at the bar with another bloke says “The trouble is I can’t ignore social media all day” and I read the Summer edition of the local Camra magazine ‘Last Orders’.   The pint of Briarbank Bitter is so good I finish it and buy another, and watch the cars pass by in the street below, I am struck by how most of them are grey, black or white, it seems a pity.  Time runs down like the beer in my oddly shaped glass and after a comfort break in which I discover mats in the urinals which look like slices of melon, I thank the bar maids and leave for Portman Road. I am proud to be the last person to leave and the kindly bouncers bid be farewell and tell me to ‘take care’, which makes me feel like someone with ill intent might be looking for me; I do wish people wouldn’t say that.

There are long queues outside the Sir Alf Ramsey Stand, which I blame on all these bar codes and QR codes and the average Alf Ramsey stander being over sixty.  Getting through the turnstile just as Murphy the stadium announcer is reading out the Leeds team, I decide to syphon off more Briarbank Bitter to avoid accidents in moments of extreme excitement.  I am stood in front of the steel trough as the Town players are announced and tempted as I am to bellow out their surnames in the manner of a French football crowd, I remain politely silent.  Up in the stand, my seat is alone in being vacant as I shuffle past Pat from Clacton and Fiona towards the man from Stowmarket; two rows in front, ever-present Phil who never misses a game, and his young son Elwood are already here too, but then the game is about to begin.

It’s Leeds United who get first go with the ball and they wear all white, with pale blue and yellow stripes along the tops of their shoulders and down the sleeves, disappointingly they don’t have garters on their socks. Town as ever are in blue shirts and socks and white shorts.  “Marching altogether” sing the Leeds fans in the Cobbold Stand “…and that’s the way we like it , Wo-oh, Oh, Oh” chant the Town fans in the Sir Bobby Robson Stand. Suddenly Kayden Jackson is bearing down on the Leeds goal in front of us, but perhaps through lack of confidence he squares it hopefully to no one in particular and what looked like a chance dissipates into the mass of legs and turf before us.  Then Leeds are through on goal, but the shot is wildly off target and whoever it was, was offside anyway, so all the Town fans jeer derisively. It’s a good start.

“Hark now hear the Ipswich sing” chant the Sir Bobby Robson stand, reviving a 1970’s Christmas song from when 1970’s Leeds United were well past their best. The seventh minute and Kayden Jackson races off down the left again and crosses the ball.  There’s no Town player to get on the end of this cross but there does not need to be as the ball hits Leeds defender Joe Ridon and rides on onto the net.  “Ipswich Town, one-nil up this afternoon, an own goal” announces announcer Murphy and I reflect on how many players have names that are nearly the same as those of American presidents.  “What a player, we should sign that centre-back and put him up front.” Says the bloke behind me.  Minutes later and Wes Burns has a shot saved and Town have their first corner.  “And it’s Ipswich Town, Ipswich Town FC, they’re by far the greatest team, the world has ever seen” sing the Sir Bobby Robson stand to the tune of the Irish Rover, but then sixty-seconds on and a bloke with the unlikely name of Georginio Rutter sort of pirouettes and wriggles and turns between two or three Town defenders before placing the ball in the Town net to equalise.  Rutter is from Brittany, so his surname doesn’t sound so incongruous if you roll those r’s.  “We all love Leeds” chant the people who all love Leeds.

This is an unexpected set-back, but another corner goes to Town soon after and a couple of shots go wide to give us hope, but then a cross from the Leeds left perplexes the Town defence and Willy Gnonto is left to score from very close range and Town are losing.  Far behind us at the back the stand,  a Leeds supporter or supporters celebrate as one does when one’s team takes the lead and a few uppity Town fans are mortally offended and begin to rail and moan and whine  and generally behave as if someone has murdered their children and eaten them along with their pet dog, garnished with their favourite houseplants. In the Cobbold stand meanwhile, the Leeds fans who are as far as we know innocent of infanticide sing “Top of the league, You’re ‘aving a laff”, treating us to their short vowels and wit all in one fell swoop.

Just four minutes later, as the home crowd begin sixty-seconds applause for a supporter who has died, Leeds break down the left, the ball is crossed and after a first shot is blocked, another close-range finish, this time from Joel Piroe, puts Leeds into a 3-1 lead.  It hardly seems possible, we’d got used to always being the ones in the lead and not conceding goals, and the applause just adds to the surreal nature of it all.  The Leeds goals have been scored by a Frenchman, an Italian and a Dutchman.

Town settle down and still look capable of scoring and a Wes Burns cross elicits a Kayden Jackson backheel which produces another corner.  The Leeds fans of course remain horribly  buoyant, to the extent that like people on an 18-30 holiday they lose all self-respect and  sing “Agadoo” by Black Lace (1984) as well as “Rocking All Over the World “ by Status Quo (1977).  If only Stephen Foster had still been stadium announcer, he’d have played the originals I’m sure.

“Get a bit fucking tighter” bawls a bloke a few rows back as Leeds go forward again and the bloke behind me is similarly afflicted with doubt as he says to his neighbour  “He always fuckin’ loses it don’t he?” as Massimo Luongo is surrounded by Leeds players who he doesn’t manage to dribble between.   Another man, possibly the one who was so enraged by the Leeds supporter in the ‘home end’, shouts out something about Jimmy Savile and the Leeds fans sing a song which alludes to people with six fingers. On the pitch, Wes Burns is through on goal again but delays his shot, and a defender slides across to block it just as his foot makes contact with the ball. “De-de-de, Football in a library” chant the Leeds fans, possibly planning what they’re going to do with their time next week.  Half- time looms as Nathan Broadhead shoots wide, and Wes Burns shoots over.  There will be six minutes of additional time and Sinistrerra blazes a shot over the bar with spectacular aplomb for Leeds, Sam Morsy is booked and finally Kayden Jackson robs the ball off the toe of a defender and pulls it back from the goal line to Nathan Broadhead who makes the half-time score 2-3.   

I go down to the front of the stand to chat with Ray and his grandson Harrison, who enjoyed the Robyn Hitchcock CD (Life After Infinity) which I gave him at the Stoke game.  Ray thinks Town are not quite as quick as Leeds, he might be right.

With all the goals and shot of the first half I feel as if I’ve already seen a whole match, so it’s almost a shock when the second half begins and Leeds begin by substituting the substitute who they brought on just twenty odd minutes ago.   I think we can take a lot of positives from this says the bloke behind me,” sounding like someone who has watched too many football managers being interviewed on TV.  The Sir Bobby Robson stand reprise “Hark now hear the Ipswich sing, the Norwich ran away” as Town begin to dominate possession and push for an equalising goal.  Massimo Luongo is booked, and I opine to Fiona that it’s his first foul. “But it was a good one” she says, referring euphemistically to its severity as ‘good,’ and I can’t really disagree.

Leeds full back Ayling emerges as this afternoon’s pantomime villain as he collapses under a challenge from Leif Davis, but the referee Robert Madley and his assistant aren’t fooled and give a free-kick to Town. “Ayling wasn’t ailing” I tell Pat from Clacton, who says she might have to get ‘Monkey’, the Cambodian masturbating monkey charm out of her bag if we don’t score soon.    Then Vaclav Hladky makes a good save; Fiona had thought it was going to be a goal and with about twenty minutes of normal time left Town make mass (three) substitutions with Nathan Broadhead, Harry Clark and Kayden Jackson swapping places with Omari Hutchinson, Bradley Williams and Freddie Ladapo.  It’s a change which brings almost immediate results as five minutes later Williams fails to prevent the appropriately named Sinisterra running down the left, cutting into the penalty and shooting beyond Hladky to put Leeds 4-2 ahead.

Behind us, at the back of the stand the Leeds fan or fans show their pleasure again and the grey-haired man who got so upset before becomes apoplectic with rage, as do several others.   He’s running up the steps of the stand demanding that the Leeds fan is evicted from the ground.  I think he might be a Nazi.   “Who cares?” I ask the bloke behind me rhetorically. “I expect there are people in the crowd who vote Tory, but I don’t want them chucked out, live and let live, surely?”  There’s enough hate and intolerance in the world without people getting weird just because someone cheers for another football team, or worships another God.  Happily, I think it is the Nazi who gets removed from the ground.

With the uproar over, we return to contemplating defeat. “We can’t win ’em all” says Pat from Clacton philosophically. “Yes, but we had started to”, I reply.    The fourth goal has made a comeback unlikely, but we continue to live in hope and Town are dominating the game.  More substitutions are made in the absence of the ability to perform ‘fresh leg’ transplants and the search for at least two goals continues. Pat tells me that she’s having chicken drumsticks and salad for tea, she bought them from the new ‘out of town’ Marks & Spencer store in Clacton. After a couple of corners,  five minutes of added on time is eventually all that holds our slender hopes of avoiding defeat.  The stands start to empty out as those of little faith and others who never stay until the end because of a morbid fear of queuing traffic, or because they ‘must get home’ bugger off. The game is nearly over when Conor Chaplin scores; a typical shot into the corner, and hopes, though slender, suddenly fatten up.  The re-start after the goal is greeted with slightly tired encouragement from the crowd and for a moment, Town surge forward, but only for a moment, and then time inevitably runs out.  We’ve lost.

It’s been a great game, very entertaining and Town have played well despite losing.  The analysis will perhaps suggest both team’s defenders were outplayed by their opponents’ forwards, but the Leeds forwards outplayed Town’s defence just a little bit more than Town’s forwards outplayed the Leeds defence.  Either way, as Pat from Clacton rightfully said, we can’t win ‘em all.

Ipswich Town 2 Stoke City 0

/ martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

After the low key, League Cup game against the Rovers of Bristol on Wednesday night, which began mine and everyone’s new season at Portman Road, today is the start of the Football League season at home, and Town face the ancient City of Stoke, one of the founder members of the football league way back in 1888, before Sky television.  August 12th still seems a bit early to start playing football seriously, but Wednesday’s game has helped to immunise me against the shock and at about twenty minutes to one I am on my way out of my front door, setting off for Portman Road and the joys and horrors that may or may not await.

By way of a change from last season, I am leaving my planet saving Citroen e-C4 at home today and taking the train (£8.95 with senior railcard), at last feeling more confident or perhaps just blasé about my chances of not being struck down with the terrible lurgi that is Covid.  If I hold my breath, avoid anyone who looks a bit peaky or coughs, and don’t touch anything I might be alright.  The train is on time and the journey pleasant as I gaze out of the window at the world spinning by beneath a heavy grey August sky.  I look on in wonder at the myriad of colours and shapes and textures within the plain, familiar streets and landscapes outside.

Alighting from the train in Ipswich, I talk to a man I know called Kevin as we cross the bridge from platforms three and four to two.  We part as we cross the bridge over the river and I head first for Portman Road, where after a few moments hesitation as I think of the space they take up and the poor value for money, I decide I will nevertheless buy a programme (£3.50). I queue briefly behind two morbidly obese women one of whom ‘has a fag on’, before obtaining a programme in the modern cashless manner saying “Just the one please” to the youthful person in the blue sales booth who remains silent.

As I am about to turn the corner on to High Street, Mick appears on his bike, which having dismounted he locks to the railings outside the old art school before we enter the Arb together and Mick very kindly asks me what I want to drink.  At first, I opt for a pint of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride, but then seeing the array of other beers on offer I change my mind, selecting the altogether more exotic, Moongazer BellyWhite Belgique IPA. Mick chooses the same and we head for the beer garden which is busy, but there is one vacant table, the same one I sat at when I was here on Wednesday evening.   Like the hypochondriac old men that we are, we talk of our physical ailments. Mick has had housemaid’s knee. He was lying in the back of a hearse cleaning the inside of the windows when he got cramp in his calf.  The cramp went, but a couple of hours later his knee began to swell, although it’s okay now.  From Mick’s knee we move on to his liver, our stomach’s, prostates and my eyes and heart.  The beer is tasty and not knowing how long I have left I quickly buy another for myself and a single Jamieson whisky for Mick.  Our conversation leaves the world of hypochondria for holidays, Haverfordwest County’s foray into the qualifying rounds of the European Conference League and Town’s new goalkeeper Cieran Slicker who, we discover through the wonder of the interweb, was born in Oldham, but has played youth football for Scotland; we agree that his surname can easily be imagined being announced with a Scottish accent.

When we come to leave for Portman Road at about twenty-five minutes to three, the beer garden is already almost completely empty and the people remaining do not look like they will be watching the football this afternoon.  We join the gathering crowds on our journey to the match. Although we’ve had to wrench ourselves away from the pub, this is always one of the best bits of the afternoon with the steady accretion of souls and anticipation and the odour of frying onions all increasing the closer we get to the stadium.

Mick and I go our separate ways somewhere near where Sir Alf Ramsey stands cooly with one hand in his suit pocket.  There are queues at the turnstiles, but they aren’t as long as on Wednesday and after waiting behind a man who has to present his mobile phone three times to let his family through the turnstile before him, I eventually walk into the Sir Alf Ramsey stand myself.  After draining away some Belgique IPA, I emerge into the bright sunlight of the stand and after two and a bit months absence re-acquaint myself with Pat from Clacton, Fiona, the man from Stowmarket, ever-present Phil who never misses a game, and his young son Elwood.

Today, I am in time for the announcing of the teams, and I shout out the surnames of the Town players like a Frenchman would. The ‘new’ stadium announcer Mark Murphy then proceeds to stoke up the crowd by asking, somewhat ridiculously, each stand in turn if they are ready. It’s enough to make anyone roll their eyes. The teams appear and bursts of flame shoot into the air like a Kevin Beattie barbecue; I can feel the heat from where I’m sitting. So much for football caring about global warming and its carbon footprint, but then we all join in with the na-na-nas of Hey Jude and the stadium is full of noise.

The game begins beneath azure blue skies punctuated with  puffy white cloud and Stoke City get first go with the ball, sending it mostly in the direction of what was the plain, old, tatty North Stand the first time I witnessed Stoke play at Portman Road back in the 1970’s. Happily, both teams are wearing their signature kits which is particularly  good in the case of Stoke because their red and white stripey ensemble is a classic, although if I have to be critical, and I do, I think the present incarnation has a few too many stripes. 

“We’re the Blue Armeee” chant the Sir Bobby Robson stand to rhyme with something else ending in ‘eee’ and the bloke behind me joins in just as the chant fades away.  The ambience in the ground is one of excitement as Town dominate the early part of the game inspiring more chants of “ Blue and White Army” and Wes Burns hits a shot which the Stoke goalkeeper Travers, who is dressed from head to toe in orange, tips spectacularly over the cross bar for the game’s first corner.  Travers is a surname similar enough to Travis to have me suddenly thinking of Lyndsay Anderson’s brilliant 1968 film ‘If’ , but it soon passes as Town’s early pressure earns two more corners in quick succession and I bellow “Come On You Blues” in the vain hope that my vocal encouragement will result in a goal.

The immediate hope of a goal fades for the moment and Pat tells Fiona that when the Clacton supporters coach arrived at the ground today and went to park in the usual spot by the bus depot, the driver had been told “You can’t park here”.  When he asked why not, the driver was told “Because someone might plant a bomb under it”.  I didn’t realise Clacton people had such a bad reputation.  Behind me the bloke says to the bloke beside him “We’re making it uncomfortable for them” which I think is in reference to what’s happening on the pitch, rather than the Clacton supporters bus.

Town continue to pour forward, threatening the Stoke goal with crosses and incisive passes but no proper shots. “Now switch it, switch it” calls the bloke beside me to Sam Morsy, but Sam ignores him. “Stand up if you ‘ate the scum” chant the Sir Bobby Robson to the tune of Village People’s ‘Go West’ and then, in a personal message to the Stoke manager and sung to the tune of the Beachboys’ ‘Sloop John B’ “You’ll always be scum, you’ll always be scum, Alex Neil, you’ll always be scum”.   Believing in forgiveness, redemption and that people can change, it’s not a view that I agree with.

After eighteen minutes Conor Chaplin delivers the first half-decent shot on goal and the Town fans sing “ Hark now hear the Ipswich sing, the Norwich ran way”before Wes Burns is cynically blocked  by some or other bloke in a pyjama top in the shadow of the west stand.   Sam Morsy takes the free kick, curving a cross into the penalty area where Luke Wooflenden heads the ball into the net in the style of Terry Butcher, and Town lead 1-0.  “Oh when the Town, Go marching in” chant the home crowd, a bit mournfully considering the score.  Town are imperious, and a superb move between Conor Chaplin and Nathan Broadhead results in another corner. “Champagne Football” says the bloke behind me, oblivious to the fact that Stade de Reims will later take the lead against Olympique Marseille but ultimately lose 1-2.

The game is not a third of the way through but Stoke find it necessary to replace the economically named Wesley with the almost as economically named Chiquinho. I wonder to myself if Wesley has an appointment or an early bus and whether league rules stipulate that you can only replace a player with just one name with another player with just one name.  Seven minutes on and Stoke have their first shot,  which loops wide of the goal and then, after an unexpectedly long passage of possession, another shot has to be saved by Town ‘keeper Vaclav Hladky.  The blokes behind me head for the bar as half-time approaches and the sky clouds over, Wes Burns sends over a low cross and George Hirst strikes the ball first time against the outside of the near post. Two minutes of additional time are played and on the touchline Kieran Mckenna looks agitated in a way he never did when we in the third division; I like to think that as manager of a ‘big club’  in the third division he didn’t think it was right to bemoan his team’s luck, whereas now, in a league full of Premier league wannabees it’s fine to get a bit huffy and precious every now and then.

With the half-time whistle I go down to the front of the stand to speak with Ray and his grandson Harrison.  I give Harrison a copy of ‘Life after Infinity’ the latest album by the excellent Robyn Hitchcock, an artist who makes Ed Sheeran look and sound like Neil Reid.  On the back of the programme I notice that the match ball sponsor today is Bob Harris and the home shirt sponsor is Henry Gibson; I am reminded the Old Grey Whistle Test and Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In.

The match resumes at five minutes past four with Stoke winning a very early corner and the ‘Stokees’ in the corner of the Cobbold Stand optimistically singing “When the Reds go marching in” .  For a short while Stoke are the better side and only six minutes into the half the referee, Mr Smith even books Vaclav Hladky for perceived time-wasting as he waits to take a free-kick.  Cameron Burgess heads away a second corner kick, and George Hirst has a shot easily saved.

In the first half, several fouls by Stoke players were spotted by Mr Smith, but despite some of them being serious foul play he only booked one Stoke player.  It’s a theme that is continuing in the second half with Wes Burns and Massimo Luongo being hacked down without punishment.  But Town have weathered the early Stoke pressure  and the Sir Bobby Robson stand chant “ Ipswich, Ipswich, Ipswich”, interspersing the “Ipswiches” with  rhythmic clapping.  Pat from Clacton informs me that she is having chicken and prawn salad tonight with new potatoes, she won’t have a baked potato for her tea again until the autumn or the winter.

The final twenty minutes are approaching and with them come substitutions as Marcus Harness replaces the classy Nathan Broadhead and surprisingly perhaps to those expecting Freddie Ladapo, Kayden Jackson replaces George Hirst.  Massimo Luongo shoots over the Stoke cross bar. Town win a corner. Stoke win a corner.  Pat announces that the masturbating monkey ‘charm,’ which came from Cambodia, and which she keeps in her bag, has got something “…caught on his willy”.   Stoke’s fascinatingly surnamed Ryan Mmae is then substituted by someone or other, but his surname has made me think too much of the Steve Martin film ‘The Man With Two Brains’ and the names of Miss Uumellmahaye and Dr Hfuhruhurr.

Just a goal ahead and less than fifteen minutes to go, and we’re all willing a second goal to help us relax.  It’s not quite the same, but Murphy announcing todays’ attendance takes our minds off the close score for a moment, although he does spoil it rather by calling the attendance of 29,006 “staggering”. The last three league games at Portman Road have all had attendances of around 29,000 so 29,000 is now average. If the crowd had been 35,000, that would have been staggering because the ground doesn’t have that many seats.  To cap things, Murphy then says “Give yourself a round of applause”.  Why?

Back on the pitch, referee Smith shows his yellow card to Janoi Donacien, again for perceived time wasting, as he prepares to take a free-kick for a foul by a Stoke player.  Mr Smith seems to have no problem with one player kicking another, as long as it happens quickly and doesn’t delay the game. But then Conor Chaplin is in space in the middle, he sends Wesley Burns away down the right and his firm pass into the centre of the penalty area connects with the boot of the incoming Kayden Jackson who side foots the ball into the net with grace and style and Town lead 2-0, and it’s no more than they deserve. Several of the 1749 Stokees in the Cobbold Stand evacuate prematurely.

There are ten minutes left plus ‘time added on’, but it feels like the game is won and so it is.  Sam Morsy is announced by Murphy to be the man of the match, as selected by Jade Smiles, although I can’t decide if this is a person or just a sort of green-coloured, perhaps envious facial expression.  Just four minutes of additional time are announced, despite several substitutions and all the apparent timewasting by Vaclav Hladky and Janoi Donacien, and Sam Morsy is booked for a foul, which is a novelty.  The four minutes pass by without incident, but the home crowd is buoyant, thrilled by an exciting, fast, competitive match that Town have mostly dominated and deserve to win.    When the final whistle blows, the feeling is not of relief but of pride and joy and expectation for the remaining forty-four games.  On the basis of one home league game we have no idea if Stoke City or Ipswich are good second division teams or bad ones but we’ve not lost yet and for the moment everything feels good, and we’re all looking forward to being a part of more ‘staggering’ attendances at Portman Road.

Ipswich Town 2 Bristol Rovers 0

/ martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

When the draw for what used to be called the League Cup was made, I was quite pleased to find that Ipswich had drawn Bristol Rovers; this was because Bristol Rovers were the only one of Town’s third division opponents I didn’t see last season.  I’m not sure why that mattered, it’s not as if I keep notes on each team, although in an odd way, through this blog, I suppose I do. Oh dear.

Despite my earlier happiness at the draw, it has taken me until the night before the game to get round to buying a ticket because despite the grotty weather, in my head it’s still summer, and summer is for dreaming and for World Cups, oh, and occasionally for European Conference League qualifying games.   Football is mostly something for autumn, winter and spring.  As usual for League Cup matches, because all the seats cost a tenner I choose not to sit in my season ticket seat, but to explore one of the twenty-nine and half thousand odd other viewpoints.   Usually, I head for the best view and the padded seats of Block Y, and there are still single seats available, but craving company I texted my friend Gary to see if he is going; he is, and gives me his seat number which he tells me is close to where he usually sits in what used to be called the West Stand.  I buy the seat next to Gary which turns out to be uncomfortably  close to the corner of the ground; but it’s okay as I had warned Gary that I would blame him if the seat wasn’t very good, and now I can.  To think, I could have been in Block Y.   I also texted my friend Mick to see if he is going to the game, but he tells me that he has “no interest in the League (Carabao) Cup”, which I thought was a bit haughty of him.

Having parked up my planet-saving Citroen e-C4 in a street between Norwich Road and Anglesea Road, it’s a short walk to the Arb on High Street where I obtain a pint of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride (£3.60 with Camra 10% discount). The bar is not very busy, and I tell the barman that I had expected it to be busier, but he tells me most people are in the beer garden.  He’s correct, most people are, but there are still free tables and I can only see one bloke in an Ipswich Town shirt.  I settle down to drink my unexpectedly cloudy pint, and read Issue 26 of the Turnstile Blue fanzine, a small pile of which were in the corridor between the bar and the gents.  I read an article which, in the context of the ‘fuss’ surrounding the death of the old queen, attempts to debunk the apparently mythical status afforded to former Town chairmen John and Patrick Cobbold.  The basis of the argument seems to be that they were incredibly wealthy and posh, and ‘Mr John’ drank and swore a lot.  I don’t read much more because the penetrating voice of a man possibly in his late twenties, who is with the bloke in an Ipswich shirt, and the mild but loud Ipswich accent of a woman probably in her forties are preventing me from concentrating.  After half an hour of slow supping and covering my ears, I leave for Portman Road.

Arriving in Sir Alf Ramsey Way shortly after seven-thirty, I buy a programme (£2.00) in the modern cashless manner and am then surprised to see long queues at the turnstiles.  Tonight, in the spirit of saving the planet by not using unnecessary pieces of paper, my ticket is on my mobile phone and my inner Luddite wonders if technology is the reason for the slow progress into the stadium.  Moments before reaching the turnstile, my finger slips on my phone screen  and I accidentally delete the e-mail that includes my ticket, but fortunately I know I can still find it if  I look through all my e-mails and that’s what I do.  Happily, the QR code on my e-mail also works and I pass through the turnstile just in time to drain off some Suffolk Pride and make it to my seat before the names of the Ipswich team have all been announced.  I try to call out the surnames of Town players in the manner of a French football crowd, but the ‘new’ stadium announcer Mark Murphy says Dom Ball instead of Dominic Ball and ruins things completely.

The match kicks off at fourteen minutes to eight according to the digital clock on the scoreboard. Town get first go with ball, kicking it mostly towards Sir Alf Ramsey’s stand, and are wearing the traditional blue and white kit, which this season has broad white stripes down the sleeves that from some angles make the whole sleeve look white.  Kits have to be imbued with meaning nowadays and we are told that the design is inspired by the kit worn by the promotion winning team of 2000.  When the sleeves look all white, I am reminded of our Premier League winning side of 1962.  Bristol Rovers for their part wear black shorts and white socks to cover their loins, buttocks and calves and grey shirts over their torsos.  I do not know if the Rovers shirts are imbued with meaning or not, but I like to think they are inspired by a foggy day in the Bristol Channel or specks of ghostly coal dust blown across from the South Wales pits or Cardiff docks.  Gary and I speculate as to whether we have already seen this season’s dullest kit worn by an away team at Portman Road and recall how Manchester United once wore a grey and black kit at Southampton and changed at half-time when already three or four goals down, supposedly because the players couldn’t see each other against the background of the crowd.  It seems probable from the half-time score that they couldn’t see the Southampton players either.

Town dominate possession and after just twelve minutes take the lead. A passing move down the right ends with Jack Taylor passing a ball from Kayden Jackson into the Bristol goal net.  That was easy.  I haven’t really tuned myself into the game yet however, and rather than leaping up and punching the air in a display of forgotten youthful exuberance like I would normally, I just slowly raise my bottom off my seat and applaud politely in a semi-stooped position.  Gary’s reaction is similarly sluggish. For these supporters it still feels like pre-season, the overture, or to employ a war-themed comparison popular with football pundits, like 1939, the phoney war.  Elsewhere in the stadium people are more attuned to the programme as they beat drums and chant “Blue and White Army.”

Town continue to dominate possession and occasionally come close to scoring a goal, but not close enough.  I haven’t seen Gary since July 1st, so we talk as much as we concentrate on the game.   Gary asks me what is the worst football ground I’ve ever been to. I tell him I think it was Oxford United’s Manor Ground.  He asks what the best ground was. I tell him possibly The Velodrome in Marseille, although the Allianz Riviera in Nice is pretty good when full.  Having been unexpectedly put on the spot I forget to mention the Stade Felix Boleart in Lens and the Stade Geoffrey Guichard in St Etienne.

Bristol Rovers only occasionally approach the Town goal and their first shot just creeps and bobs and bounces its way across the turf into the arms of the Town goalkeeper, the interestingly monikered Cieran Slicker. It takes a good twenty minutes or more for Rovers to have another shot and this time Grant Ward’s much more powerful shot is parried away by Slicker for what amounts to a pretty good save. It’s a moment which results in my hearing the faint call of “Come On Rovers” carried over the pitch on the warm evening air from the one hundred and twenty-three Bristolians in  the far corner of the stadium.  Otherwise, the first half of the game leaves no lasting impression on me and after a minute of time added on it’s time for Gary to nip to use the facilities whilst I stand up and try to manipulate my neck, which has grown achy and stiff from having my head turned towards the Sir Alf Ramsey stand for most of the previous forty-six minutes.

 Once Gary has returned, the ‘new’ stadium announcer Mark Murphy appears on the pitch wearing what looks like the same suit that replaced announcer Stephen Foster used to wear.  Murphy tells us he is going to talk to a Town legend and with the artificially excited intonation and words-all-rolled-into-one pronunciation of a former local radio DJ, he announces “Johnny Warks here” and Gary and I look at each other wondering who the hell Johnny Warksear is.  Johnny Wark appears on the big screen and all that’s missing are the subtitles when he speaks.

The game resumes at ten minutes to nine and my hopes of spending the second half just looking straight ahead take a dive as Bristol start quite well.  “Wo-o-o-oh, That’s the way we like it” or something like that sing the Sir Bobby Robson Stand to the tune of what seems to be an original composition or a song I don’t know.  Rovers are gifted a corner as Lee Evans passes the ball back to a place where Cieran Slicker isn’t standing.  But then Ipswich win a couple of corners of their own to redress the balance, before on-loan Omari Hutchinson is the first player to be booked after not so much a bad tackle as an inept one.  “Ole, Ole, Ole” sing the Sir Bobby Robson stand and the drums up in the corner of the stand by the club shop beat; inside the shop stuff must be bouncing off the shelves.  In the seat in front of me a bloke with not much hair has a pair of sunglasses perched on top of his head.    There’s a holiday feel to the crowd tonight with adults and children wearing T-shirts and shorts, looking as if they’ve been at the beach all day.  I half expect to see someome eating candy floss or wearing a ‘kiss me quick’ hat. On the pitch, the second half is reflecting the cheery mood with carefree attacking football and as result Cieran Slicker makes a spectacular save with his feet.

Substitutions arrive on sixty-six minutes with Cameron Humphryes and Sone Aluko taking a bow. Shots rain in on the Bristol goal and a corner is won.  “Oooh Sone Aluko” sing the Sir Bobby Robson Stand to the tune of the White Stripes’ Seven Nation Army.  Marcus Harness half-volleys the ball from close range, but too weakly to bother the Rovers’ goalkeeper.  As more substitutes warm up on the touchline in front of us I say the name of George Hirst to Gary.  “I know what you’re going to say” says Gary “He has a haircut that looks like his mum cut it using a pudding bowl”.  Gary knows me too well and is almost exactly right, but I’d say she used a side plate or small frying pan giving his hair the appearance of a little hat or beret.  I struggle so much to accept George’s haircut that if it had been up to me I wouldn’t have signed him, so it’s probably as well that it wasn’t.

In the seventy-third minute George and Conor Chaplin and Harry Clarke get to make the transition from bench to pitch, but the only immediate result is that Javani Brown shoots wide of the Town goal for Bristol. Within a minute of that however, a sweet passing move down the left sees the ball relayed across the penalty area for Sone Aluko, who seems to be existing in his own isolated moment of time and space, which allows him to then pass the ball into the far corner of the Bristol goal, and Town lead 2-0. Gary tells me how his mother recently received a new copy of the local telephone directory and that there were three people in it with his surname; they were Gary, his mother and his uncle who died several years ago, but it wouldn’t surprise me if BT was a hotbed of spiritualists.

All that remains is for Murphy to announce the crowd as being 15,047 with 123 of that number being from Bristol, and for people to applaud themselves, each other, and more acceptably the travelling Bristolians.  Bristol is a long way from Ipswich on a Wednesday night, although logically no further than at any other time of day or week.  Five minutes of time are added on to ensure we get our money’s worth and when that expires we rise as one to applaud and then seep out into the night.  It’s been a decent little game, a bit low key like a pre-season match, but it’s good to see a match where none of the players appear to think winning matters more than life itself.  Bristol Rovers played their part and should have scored at least once, but on the plus side they will now have time on their hands in the middle of the week to think about what their away kit should look like next season.   As for Ipswich,  we are on our way to Wembley, my stepson and his family live in the RG24 postcode area so if I get the urge I might march on to Basingstoke, or Reading.

Haverfordwest County 1 B36 Torshavn 1(aet)

/ martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

(B36 Torshavn win 3-2 on aggregate)

Haverfordwest County’s progress into the second qualifying round of the European Conference League was a beautiful thing and a tremendous way to witness my long-awaited first ever Haverfordwest County match.  It brought its own problems, however.  I hadn’t honestly expected that win, as welcome and wonderful as it was, but having started out on the ‘European adventure’ I now had to see the next game and consequently arrange time off work, match tickets and somewhere to stay in Cardiff.  Lovely, first world problems, but to a fundamentally lazy person committed only to bobbing through life like a cork on the tide, a challenge that had me feeling unpleasantly like Odysseus or other heroic figure charged with completing onerous tasks.

My wife Paulene arranged everything of course, except the time off, which I managed, and after intermittently aquaplaning and queuing along the M4, waking up to a spectacular view of the Bristol Channel from our ninth-floor hotel room and whiling away the day marvelling at the cuddly dragon and sheep souvenirs available in Cardiff gift shops, we now find ourselves on platform 3 of Cardiff Queen Street station awaiting the 18:31 for Radyr, calling at Cardiff Central (Caerdydd Canelog) and more importantly Ninian Park (Parc Ninian).  On platform 2 are two well-built women, one carries a large koala bear on her back, the other an even larger red and white fluffy octopus; they gaze across the tracks then descend the stairs into the subway that connects the platforms and disappear from view forever.   When the ‘train’ eventually arrives, seven minutes late, it is sadly no Ivor the Engine, but instead an aged sort of bus on rails, which chugs and grinds and squeals its way past Cardiff’s ripped backside towards once elegant Cardiff Central station where, the guard explains, we are held by a red light. “A riddle for you while we wait” says the guard, “What starts red and ends on green?”.   The riddle solved, some passengers alight and others climb aboard before we continue what is probably the shortest and slowest train journey I have ever been on (£2.60 return with Senior railcard).  Ninian Park station consists of two windswept open platforms and if the train hadn’t stopped there to disgorge, we might have thought it had been closed since the days of the evil Dr Beeching.

It’s a short and now familiar walk to the Cardiff City stadium, across Sloper Road, past the Jubilee Recreation Ground where a rugby team is about to begin a practice session, and then through the Lidl car park.  Entry to the stadium tonight is again through Gate 9.  Approaching the nest of steel barriers around the turnstiles, I spot a man wearing a day-glo coat featuring an Ipswich Town club crest.  Being an Ipswich Town season ticket holder myself we accost him but don’t learn much. He’s lives in Torquay, would very much like a Haverfordwest shirt, was an Ipswich season ticket holder several years ago and claims Ipswich is a dump nowadays and Colchester is better. I re-educate him as best I can about the relative merits of Ipswich and Colchester and tell him Ipswich still has its beautiful buildings and parks and history and is therefore as good as it ever was, it’s just that the inhabitants buy everything on-line, so the town centre shops have shut and for some of them being miserable and a bit racist is all that keeps them happy, hence we have a Tory MP.

Having previously mastered the concept of my mobile phone having a wallet, entry to the stadium is a breeze tonight and I am soon eagerly presenting my bank card to pay for a replica Haverfordwest County shirt (£45) and a bucket hat (£15) which both commemorate the Pembrokeshire club’s presence in this season’s European Conference League. Excited beyond words and now sporting my commemorative bucket hat, I head with Paulene for our seats.  Emerging from beneath the stand back into the evening sunlight we talk to the steward at the top of the stairs who tells us where we will find our seats, but also points out there are free Haverfordwest T-shirts randomly draped over the backs of the seats; they’re in different sizes so it’s a question of looking until we find two our size.  The tag inside the neck of the first shirt I pick up reads ‘L’ and on the back of the shirt is the surname of the current French president.  That’s me kitted out, but the search for a ‘S’ for Paulene continues.  A man with two sons says all the ‘kids’ have been looking for them, then another younger man says “What size do you want?” I tell him I need a small. “Here you are” he says, almost immediately turning up the required shirt on the next seat he comes to. What a kind bloke, I think to myself as I thank him.

We watch the two teams warm up and the seats about us fill up with Welsh bottoms; I return ‘below’ to buy two bottles of water (£2.50 each), but experience no urge to pay £6 for a paper carton of insipid Amstel beer, I did that before the previous match, so do not need to do it again.  I reminisce that the only other occasion when I ever drank Amstel was in a bar in Amsterdam before the second leg of the 1981 UEFA Cup Final, I don’t know how many guilders and cents it cost but I expect it was my father’s round anyway.  When the game eventually kicks off, B36 Torshavn get first go with the ball and are kicking from left to right towards far off Pontypridd and Aberdare; they wear yellow shirts and socks with navy blue shorts, a bit like Oxford United or the Swedish national team, which is unexpected because the Faroes are Danish.  Haverfordwest are in this season’s signature kit of all navy blue with pale blue and white chevrons on the front, and to my knowledge resemble no one else but Haverfordwest.  Away from the pitch and back in the stand, people are still emerging at the top of the stairs like bubbles from a crack in the seabed, but they’re much more annoying as they dither on the steps trying to find their seats and blocking my view.  I can at least console myself with the thought that they have arrived too late to nab a free T-shirt, that’ll teach them.

“Blooobi-irds, Blooobi-irds!” chant several people like demented evening paper vendors as the excitement of the game having actually started takes hold.  “What seat is your number?” says a bloke behind me confusedly to the person next to him and in a not overly Welsh accent.  I don’t catch the answer, and I’m not really interested.  On the pitch, Torshavn’s number 8 Taufee Skandari hacks down Haverfordwest number 3 Rhys Abbruzzese, and whilst escaping punishment from the referee, other than a free-kick, he will hereafter be roundly booed by the crowd whenever he touches the ball.  Barely ten minutes have passed, but it’s always good to identify a pantomime villain early on.

“That’s blown my mind a little bit” says the bloke behind me about something which disappointingly I didn’t catch.  The game is close at the moment and cagey, and perhaps therefore a little dull, so I would have liked to have known what blew his mind, even if it did only get blown a little.  After ten minutes Haverfordwest get the kudos of winning the game’s first corner. “Blooobi-irds” chant the blokes who like to chant, and when Skandari touches the ball they boo too.  “  ‘kin ‘ell man” says the bloke behind me as the ball seems to wilfully run away from a Haverfordwest defender as he shapes to clear it.  “Aaah, talk man” continues my neighbour as the ball is booted out for Torshavn’s first corner kick just a goalkeeper Zac Jones arrives hoping to gather it up in his arms.  The Faroese number three takes an age to take the corner as if he’s first having to calculate precisely the trajectory of the ball before kicking it.  A second corner follows but thankfully to no effect.

It takes a half an hour before Haverfordwest have a shot on goal, although a diving header is required from Torshavn defender moments before to clear the ball for a corner and a few minutes before that Oscar Borg sent Martell Taylor-Crossdale away down the left to optimistic and encouraging cheers, but the Faroese goalkeeper got to the ball first.  To even things up, Skandari volleys over the cross bar to inevitable jeers and his team are on the up as they win two more corners and Haverfordwest captain Jazz Richards goes down injured and has to be substituted with ten minutes still to go until half time.  It’s not a good time for the home team as a shot now has to be cleared off the goal line after a Torshavn free-kick; I thought it was going to go in.  As if by way of desperately trying to restore the balance in favour of Haverfordwest, the boos when Skandari next touches the ball are even louder.

After another Torshavn corner and a shot which narrowly misses the Haverfordwest goal but ‘scores’ in the staircase up into the seats behind the goal, Haverfordwest’s Lee Jenkins misses arguably the best chance for a goal so far as he heads a fine cross back across the goal instead of into it.  With half-time two minutes away a mass exodus occurs, which includes the bloke behind me and his friends who it seems are heading for the bar.   Above us, a gang of three or four seagulls circle and swoop over the crowd, perhaps on the look out for someone who has already obtained a hot, half-time carton of chips or someone who has discarded a cold one.  Paulene is intrigued by the men in suits stood by the players’ tunnel and remarks that at every game there are always men in suits stood by the players’ tunnel.  We wonder who they are, and I speculate that they are no one in particular, but that for a fee football clubs will hire anyone a suit and let you stand there, like a sort of adult mascot. Then half-time arrives.

I usually like to take a wander at half-time, but tonight I don’t. I think the sight of that mass exodus a few minutes ago has made me want to stay put; I‘m not one to follow the herd.  The match resumes at twelve minutes to nine and Haverfordwest set off as if the first half was just a warm-up and now they’re going to play properly.  A corner is soon won and then Ben Fawcett is free in space and time at the edge of the penalty area, but he shoots wide of the Torshavn goal.

As always seems to happen in the second half of games, players start getting shown the referee’s yellow card.  Like in life, the more time goes on the less one cares, but perhaps others become more desperate.  The names of Lee Jenkins, Ricky Watts and Torshavn’s Isak Jonsson all enter the referee’s notebook in just seven minutes of deviant behaviour.   From the crowd a new song is heard to the tune of Jeff Beck’s ‘Hi-Ho Silver Lining’, with the words ‘Silver Lining’ being substituted rather neatly and amusingly with ‘Hav-er-ford-west’.  Twenty-minutes of the second half pass and the ball is knocked down in the Torshavn penalty area. Messy moments of uncertainty follow before the ball is slamming into the roof of the goal net; booted there by Ben Fawcett. Haverfordwest have scored, and the tie is level on aggregate; I begin to mentally prepare for penalties and Fawcett slides across the turf towards the adoring, cheering crowd before disappearing under a pile of his excited team-mates.

TV pundits tell us that goals change games, but Torshavn change their team by bringing on a couple of substitutes.  It works to an extent as they reverse the traffic towards their goal and win a corner, and their number nine has a shot on goal which draws a few worried gasps from fellow spectators around me, but happily the shot goes wide.

Tonight’s attendance is announced as 2,119, and as often happens at football matches nowadays some people break into a round of applause.  I can’t decide if they’re clapping themselves, each other, the announcer or whoever it was who counted everyone.  There are seven minutes of normal time remaining and Skandari falls to the ground with an anguished groan; naturally he is booed. When he gets up a bloke behind me somewhere shouts “Miracle!”.  The final minutes belong to Torshavn who win a succession of corners as Kai Whitmore joins the gang of Haverfordwest renegades who have been booked and Torshavn substitute Valerijs Sabala shoots over the cross bar. Only two-minutes of added on time are added on, it’s as if the referee thinks it’s pointless adding any more because no one’s going to score so we might as get on with extra-time.

Extra-time begins at twenty-one minutes to ten and I realise there will be no prospect of catching the five to ten train from Ninian Park back to Cardiff Queen Street, or the ten-thirteen.  The first half of extra-time sees Haverfordwest’s Oscar Borg stride forward and shoot over the cross bar, but then disaster strikes as a mess in the Haverfordwest goal mouth ends with a shot which is blocked on the goal line by Rhys Abruzzese and the referee awards a penalty for handball. Jann Julian Benjaminsen accepts the referee’s gift to the people of the Faroe Islands and scores high into the net as Zac Jones dives, conveniently for Benjaminsen, in the opposite direction.  A minute of added on time is played and the final fifteen minutes of the European tour beckon.

Naturally, Haverfordwest attack.  A shot is tipped over the bar for a corner, Martell Taylor-Crossdale is crowded out and falls down in the penalty area; was he shoved?  A shout of “The referee’s a wanker” from somewhere behind me suggests someone thinks he was, but it could be cramp.  When they get the ball, Torshavn pass it around just to retain possession, which they do quite well.  With the game into two minutes of added on time, Zac Jones heads up field to join the throng in the penalty area for a corner but, there’s to be no glorious goal from the goalkeeper tonight, and no glorious penalty saves.

With the final whistle, the applause from the crowd is every bit as loud and appreciative as it might have been had Haverfordwest won, it just lacks the roar and the beaming smiles.  Paulene and I stay for a while to pay our respects before heading off into the night for Ninian Park station.  It’s 10:30 when we get there; the last train is at five to eleven, but the information screen says it’s not expected until eight minutes past.  With over half an hour to wait on a bleak cold platform we decide it will be quicker to walk, and this is how our European Tour ends.

Haverfordwest County 1 FK Skandija 0

/ martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

(1-1 on aggregate, Haverfordwest win 3-2 on penalties)

Entering the world in Haverfordwest, Pembrokeshire just a couple of days before the great Welsh statesman Aneurin Bevan departed it, in July 1960, I sadly didn’t hang about in Wales for very long and instead grew up on the far side of neighbouring England, in Suffolk.  I always liked the idea of being a bit Welsh however, and having developed an interest in football I quietly hankered for the day when I might watch Haverfordwest County play; but distance, idleness and following Ipswich Town home and away  each week conspired for over fifty years to deny me the opportunity, although I did twice get as far as Swansea and have become an avid viewer of S4C’s Sgorio.  Then, earlier this year, having finished seventh in the twelve team Welsh Premier League, Haverfordwest unexpectedly won two penalty shoot-outs against Cardiff Metropolitan University and Newtown in an unlikely European qulification play-off success. Haverfordwest, known also as The Bluebirds, were drawn to play FK Shkendija, a team from North Macedonia and the second leg of the tie was to be played at the Cardiff City Stadium in Cardiff.  Cardiff seems a lot closer and indeed is quite a bit closer to my home near Colchester than Haverfordwest; I’d been to Ninian Park and the new place a few times before to see Ipswich play Cardiff City and as this would be a landmark game, being only the second time ever that Haverfordwest had qualified for European football I decided that this was the time to at last fulfil my ambition and see Haverfordwest County in the flesh.

Travelling to Cardiff was a breeze in my planet saving Citroen e-C4, even if the initial stop to recharge the batteries at Membury Services had to be abandoned because the touch screen on the electric charger didn’t work.  But the chargers at Leigh Delamere services were all functioning and my wife Paulene and I arrived in plenty of time at our hotel to sample the delights of Cardiff Bay with its Norwegian sailors’ church, Welsh Assembly building, National Arts Centre, pierhead building and shops and bars, which seemed almost exactly the same as the shops and bars in every other waterfront development we’d ever been to.

 Today, we traipsed round Cardiff Castle, sampled the local Brains beer (it’s great saying “I’ll have a pint of Brains please”) and dodged hundreds of students in mortar boards and gowns and their parents and siblings all dressed up to the nines to be there when the degrees are handed out.  We ate in Wally’s delicatessen and coffee house, which is in one of the many arcades in Cardiff.  Wally, I learned, was a refugee from Nazi Austria in 1939.  Luckily for him, we didn’t have a Tory government in 1939 or else his café might be a floating one on a hulk in Cardiff Bay.

It’s a good forty-minute walk from our hotel to the Cardiff City Stadium, which means it takes Paulene and me an hour, because she’s only short and doesn’t walk very fast.  We pass the railway station and what was the Millenium Stadium; a bloke in the pub told me it’s now known as the Principality Stadium, not because Wales is a principality, although it is, but because since 2016 the Principality building society has been paying for the privilege. We walk across the bridge over the River Taff and into Tudor Street, which leads into Ninian Park Road.  As well as houses, Tudor Street has many small shops and takeaways, and realising I have forgotten to bring a pen and paper to jot down notes from tonight’s match, I go into the Al-Ismah shop at number 52 where, unable to find me a small enough notebook, the very kind man behind the counter tears five pages from his own notepad. “Would you like them stapled together?” he asks.  “…and do you need a pen?  Thanking him gushingly, I let him staple the pages for me, but happily I do already have a pen.  “What a great bloke and perhaps another refugee” I think to myself.

The Cardiff City Stadium is a disappointing looking structure, clad in grey metal and standing across a large car park beyond a Lidl and a retail park.  I photographed it from the top of Cardiff Castle earlier today, but it could be anywhere; Southampton, Derby, Leicester, Reading, they all look much the same. With no sites to see here we head quickly for the turnstiles.  My ticket says to go to Entrance 9, but as we look to step beyond the first turnstiles we come to, a steward steps in front of me and says that’s been changed, it seems we’ve been downgraded to Entrance 5.  Getting into the stadium is not easy, I’ve got the e-mail ready on my phone,  but apparently I needed to put it in my ‘wallet’, whatever that is.  I saw on the e-mail that it said “Click to put in wallet” but I thought I could equally not click if I didn’t want to put in my wallet, and not really understanding how a phone could have a wallet I didn’t want to put the ticket in there anyway.  As usual in these situations my wife Paulene takes over and downloads a wallet and puts the tickets in it.  The steward at the turnstile, a man with grey hair not unlike myself, tells me he leaves all this kind of thing to his wife as well.  Experience now tells me that on balance, matrimony is probably a good thing.

Just inside the stadium, a well-located man with what looks like a huge fold-out suitcase-come-wardrobe is flogging scarves for £15 that announce when you hold them up “Haverfordwest European Tour”.  Naturally, I buy one.  With no ticket stub or programme from this fixture, I need a souvenir of some sort to put away in a cupboard and never look at again before I die, when my stepsons will finally put it in a skip as they clear my house. Glowing with pride at the scarf around my neck, I am now in the sort of mood where I will pay a staggering £6.35 for a paper carton of Amstel beer, possibly the World’s most bland fizzy beverage. Paulene gets more intoxicated on a bottle of water for £2.50 and we head for our seats, but stop to chat with the stewards at the top of the stairs.  They tell us there is an expected crowd of 1,200 tonight and we can sit where we want regardless of what it says on our tickets, although the visiting supporters are sitting mostly to the left, so we might want to turn to the right.

We wait for kick off and enjoy the music over the appalling public address system, which includes The Jam’s version of The Kinks’ David Watts and Jeff Becks’ Hi-Ho Silver lining; it almost sounds as if I’m back in 1984 when, with my friend Stephen who I’d known since primary school, I first visited Ninian Park, arriving by train courtesy of half-price rail tickets from a promotion by Persil washing powder. We walked down Tudor Street that day too as I did today; it hasn’t change much.  As I recall, the match was an FA Cup third round tie and Ipswich won 3-0.

Eventually, kick-off approaches and the teams are announced, albeit incomprehensibly over the echoing public address system by a seemingly dyslexic announcer for whom Bluebirds’ Kai Whitmore swaps first names with a make of Korean car.  The names of the visiting team sound like random animal noises transmitted through the medium of a bowl of water, but we don’t care too much and in truth it only adds to our enjoyment.  The sun sinks slowly below the stand at the Lidl supermarket end and the game begins. Haverfordwest are a goal down from the first-leg but get first go with the ball as the sun goes down behind them.  Haverfordwest wear all navy blue with pale blue and white chevrons on their fronts and Shkendija are all in white.   The hollow sound of clapping and the cheers of a handful of excited individuals echo briefly around the thirty-one and a half thousand empty blue plastic seats that surround us all on three sides.

Seven minutes pass and the Shkendija supporters begin to chant.  “Bluebirds, Bluebirds” comes the response from somewhere up over my right shoulder as Pembrokeshire rises to the challenge. Fifteen minutes have gone and Haverfordwest win a corner in the aftermath of a free-kick.

“Why are their numbers so high” says the bloke behind me to the bloke next to him, having presumably spotted that two Shkendija players are sporting shirts numbered seventy-seven and ninety-five.   “I don’t know” replies his accomplice, “I think it’s an east European thing”.   “You wouldn’t get a ninety-seven unless you were a development player” he continues, strangely sounding both knowledgeable and a bit clueless at the same time.  I notice the bloke in front of me is wearing a top with the crest of Undy Athletic FC emblazoned on the back; I joke feebly to myself that rival fans probably think Undy Athletic are pants. It smells like the bloke in front or the bloke next to him might have farted.  Nearly half an hour has passed and Haverfordwest have their first real shot on goal.

“Blueb-i-rds” bellows a voice sounding like a foghorn from a ghostly collier in Cardiff Bay.  There’s a little less than ten minutes until half-time and a Shkendija player shoots straight at Haverfordwest goalkeeper Zac Jones. It’s a rare bit of excitement in a cagey first half when the loudest cheers have been for Shkendija players dribbling the ball into touch or for timely interceptions by Haverfordwest defenders.  Personally, I’ve mostly been learning about the geography of Malaysia; reading adverts around the ground beseeching me to visit Sabah, Johor, Terengganu and Pahang, places I’d previously never even heard of.  Courtesy of their club’s owner, Cardiff City fans must now be the EFL’s most knowledgeable on the tourist traps of Malaysia.

Five minutes remain until half-time and Haverfordwest have what might be a chance to score as a cross is swung in from the right, and their massive number 18, Tyrese Owen, a man seemingly double the size of anyone else on the pitch, swings a leg, but can only divert the ball over the cross bar from six yards out.  As if provoked, Shkendija respond, and number seven puts number five through on goal with just Jones to beat for a 2-0 aggregate lead, but he can only boot the ball wide of the Haverfordwest goal post.  In the final minute of the half Haverfordwest then make desperate calls for a penalty as the ball passes in front of number five at hand height, but the referee is understandably not impressed and after the game’s first booking (for Haverfordwests’s Ben Fawcett) and a minute of added on time it’s half-time, a time to wander beneath the stand and enjoy a welcome burst of the Undertones’ Teenage Kicks over the tannoy.  Paulene admits to having become bored and a bit cold.

Within three minutes of the re-start a Shkendija player flashes a header past a Haverfordwest post and six minutes later, perhaps by way of revenge Haverfordwest earn a corner.  I’m becoming more familiar with the Haverfordwest team as the game progresses and particularly like full-back with Oscar Borg with his mop of dark woolly hair and the bald-headed and bearded, chunky Emperor Ming lookalike Jazz Richards.  Haverfordwest win another corner and the ball is cleared off the goal line.  A yellow glow now shines through the Perspex at the back of the stand at the Lidl end and the game is clearly getting more competitive as the booking count racks up for both sides.  Shkendija’s Eraldo Cinari and the wonderfully named Kilsman Cake go onto my list of players who impress.

Shkendija win a rash of corners, Adents Shala heads wide, Ennur Totre shoots straight at Zac Jones and Haverfordwest lead 4-2 on bookings as the first substitutions are made. Ten minutes of normal time remain and Zac Jones makes a brilliant diving save from a header to keep the score on the night goalless.  Off to our left a Shkendija supporter in a red shirt and black bucket hat stands to conduct his fellow supporters in songs and chants, although he seems to forget the words at one stage, but gets a laugh.

Full-time is looming and I’m beginning to resign myself to Haverfordwest being knocked out, but they win another corner as the stewards line up at the front of the stand; presumably anticipating a possible a pitch invasion, but I’m not sure by whom.  Three minutes to go and Haverfordwest appeal more in hope than expectation for a penalty and are awarded a free-kick at the edge of the box, which requires a decent save from the Shkendija goalkeeper. Was that the last chance of an equaliser?  There’s a minute left of normal time but it turns out not to be normal at all as the ball skitters across the back of the penalty area  and Lee Jenkins swings a leg at it. The ball strikes a defender and deflects off, high up into the goal net beyond a hapless, flailing goalkeeper and Haverfordwest have only gone and equalised.  I leap from my seat in disbelief with fifteen hundred others.  The goal is so unexpected,  so late, and so precious  it ranks as one of the ‘best’ I’ve ever seen.  Being one of a relatively small crowd in a stadium much too large for us somehow just adds to the experience, it makes me feel like we are in a world within a world, an alternative reality. Wow.

“You’re not singing anymore” chant the Pembrokeshire contingent to the tune of Cwm Rhondda, but the visitors clearly understand some English because they immediately begin to sing again; perhaps we should have sung in Welsh (dydach chi ddim yn canu mwyach? Blame Google if it’s wrong). There’s still time for a corner for each team as time-added-on is added on and Shkendija almost equalise with a header that skids past the post, and then it’s extra-time, but it feels like we’ve won already.

Extra time sees an early exchange of corner kicks and Cinari whacks a 35 yarder over Zac Jones’ cross-bar. “Oi Borat” shouts a female voice, which doesn’t seem very politically correct and Shkendija win a couple more corners and a free-kick as they begin to dominate a visibly shattered home team, who one by one seemingly all fall victim to cramp.  Shkendija are full-time players, Haverfordwest are not, this doesn’t seem fair.  But breaking through the pain barrier Lee Jenkins chases back to execute a brilliant saving tackle. From the corner a shot is touched past the post and from another Cake heads over the bar.  The final minute of extra time arrives with Shkendija taking yet another corner and then appealing for a penalty for handball, which the referee, who remains anonymous, waves away with wonderfully dismissive and assertive body language. 

Haverfordwest might be clinging on to parity by the tips of their studs, but Shkendija are desperate and number 77 Florent Ramadani shoots wide with an extravagance to match his shirt number.  Being the only Bluebird not suffering from cramp, goal keeper Zac Jones feigns an equally extravagant  dive for the ball to ease the tension and it works, the game is over and it’s penalties.

I’m happy to say I’ve not seen many penalty shoot outs;  the one I do remember I do so because it was so bad, Ipswich beating Luton 2-1 in the long forgotten Zenith Data Systems Cup. Tonight’s penalty shoot-out starts badly for Haverfordwest; missing the first one is horrible, even more so when Shkendija score theirs, it feels like that’s it; over.  But it isn’t and soon Haverfordwest have taken a 3-1 lead.  If Kamer Qaka now misses or Zac Jones saves we win; but Qaka scores. It’s 3-2.  Now Ben Fawcett only has to score and Haverfordwest win. Surely he will score, he has to, but instead he blazes the ball out into Cardiff Bay, just so we get our money’s worth.  Shkendija have already missed two penalties, they won’t miss again and then it will be 3-3, and then who knows?  Florent Ramadani of the extravagant number 77 shirt and extravagantly wide shot steps up.  He shoots.  Zac Jones saves!  Haverfordwest win! Bloody Hell!

What a night this has been. I have seen a lot of football in fifty odd years of going to games, I’ve seen Ipswich Town win the FA Cup and the UEFA Cup and a play-off final, but tonight is up there with the most memorable of matches and tonight I’ve never been so happy and proud to have been born in Haverfordwest.  Come On You Bluebirds!