Stanway Pegasus 0 Haringey Borough 2

August 24, 2025August 25, 2025 / martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

Pegasus, Wikipedia tells us was a Greek mythological winged stallion, the offspring of Poseidon and Medusa who sprang from the Medusa’s blood when in an everyday incident for the characters of Greek mythology she had her head chopped off by Perseus. After time spent carrying lightning bolts for Zeus, being ridden about by Bellophron and then as a constellation of stars, having been killed by Zeus who presumably then had to carry his own lightning bolts, between 1948 and 1963 Pegasus more prosaically became the name of an amateur football team made up of Oxford and Cambridge graduates obviously keen to mix football with their classical education. Even more prosaically, the name of Pegasus then became that of a youth and then Sunday football team in Colchester and most recently that club has aspired to men’s senior football and for reasons unknown has attached the name Pegasus to Stanway, a suburb of Colchester that some of its residents still think is a village and which already had one senior football team in the shape of Stanway Rovers.

Today, Stanway Pegasus who are now in the snappily titled Thurlow Nunn Eastern Counties League South play Haringey Borough of the only slightly less snappily titled Spartan South Midlands Football League in the first qualifying round of the FA Vase, a competition which, to my shame, I have not witnessed a game in for over ten years. It is for this reason, and it being the closest game to where I live, that today I choose to ignore the ’Town’ -centric draw of Braintree Town v Yeovil Town in the National League and the charming alliteration of Chelmsford v Chippenham in the National League South, and make my way to ‘The Crops’ in West Street Coggeshall home of Coggeshall Town but where Stanway Pegasus currently play their home games too.

After a morning breathing in noxious fumes from the white gloss paint I am applying to the banisters, skirting boards and miscellaneous surrounding woodwork of a domestic staircase, standing at a bus stop on the A120 under a grey late August sky feels like suddenly being on holiday. The X20 bus to Stansted Airport via Coggeshall, Braintree and Great Dunmow turns up more or less on time and I cheerily tender the correct fare (£3) in coins to the driver, who wears a peaked cap in the style of the late Sir Francis Chichester. The driver, who does not speak looks at me inscrutably from beneath the peak of his hat as if weighing up this passenger’s likely back story. I look back at him in the same way, imagining I too am wearing a hat, before climbing the stairs to the top deck where I sit behind a man sporting short hair and an earring. Behind us, a girl evidently lacking all sense of self-awareness talks loudly on her mobile phone, broadcasting the other half of the conversation on speaker phone. Leaving the A120, the bus (fleet number 34423) wends its way through Coggeshall’s narrow medieval streets before I alight at the stop called ‘Nursery’ just a couple of hundred yards away from ‘The Crops’.

Arriving at the turnstile I’m not surprised to find there is no queue but am delighted to see a small pile of glossy programmes, which I had not expected. I ask if I should pay by cash or card. “Cash if you’ve got it, please” says the turnstile operator “I’ve started to run out”. This is the first time I have paid on the turnstile at a match since I turned sixty-five, and paying in cash adds something to this auspicious occasion as I tender a five pound note for my concessionary entry fee and a two pound coin for the programme.

Once through the turnstile I head for the bar at the far end of the ground; it is virtually empty, and not liking the look of the fizzy draught beer on offer I warily request a bottle of Adnams Southwold Bitter (£6) from the fridge. Much to my surprise the beer is merely cool not chilled and therefore very drinkable. I step outside to await kick-off amongst a good following of Haringey supporters identifiable from their club colours but also as the only people obviously in the throes of enjoying a day out. Two of them wear pork pie hats and I wonder if they play the saxophone. Except for an old couple sat in foldable chairs the home supporters are rather anonymous. In the corner of the pitch by what passes as the players’ tunnel but looks a bit like a stockade stands a plinth on top of which sits the match ball. The Haringey fans eye the plinth both jealously and with a degree of amusement discussing what design of plinth they might have if they were to have one of their own, they seem keen on something more sculptural.

“Sing if you’re Haringey, Sing if your happy that way” chant the Haringey fans imaginatively to the tune of the Tom Robinson Band’s 1978 hit “Glad to be gay” as the team emerge from the stockade and the plinth fulfils its job of relieving the referee of having to remember to bring the ball with him from the dressing room. The match kicks off at five minutes to three with Stanway Pegasus getting first go with the ball and sending it in the direction of the bus stop from whence I arrived and Coggeshall beyond. “You on a promise Ref?” bawls a Haringey supporter “It’s only five to three”. “That’s close to being abusive, that is” says another Haringeyite. “No it’s not, it’s just a question” continues the first supporter. “A very personal one” is the response. “Alright, do you have something nice waiting for you when you get home, Ref?” Comes the re-phrased enquiry.

Pegasus are wearing a kit of yellow shirts with black trim and black shorts, which weirdly are also the colours of Stanway Rovers. Haringey meanwhile sport a change kit of all over green as their supporters expand on their theme of chants based on ‘new wave’ hits of the late 1970’s and sing the praises of their team’s Matty Young to the tune of “To much too young” by The Specials and then sample the oeuvre of Sham69 with chants of “Come On, Come On, Come on Haringey Come On, We’re going down the pub”.

Back on the pitch, one of the linesmen is attracting a lot of attention to himself both with his offside decisions and his insistence on explaining them to the players. As if that isn’t enough, he is very bouncy on his feet and, because he sports a poorly shaped goatee beard and has grey highlights in his swept back hair I am reminded of the match between Arsenal and Liverpool in September1972 when one of the linesmen was injured and Jimmy Hill emerged from the stands to run the line.

At three minutes past three Haringey Borough take the lead with a neat shot into the corner of the goal from somewhere near the edge of the penalty area. The goal scorer, I think, is the aforementioned Matty Young who evidently continues to strive to allow people to look back and say he did a lot in his youth. “We’re the Borough, The Mighty Borough, We always sing away, We sing away, we sing away, we sing away, we sing away” chant the Haringey fans in response to the goal, channelling Tight Fit’s cheesy cover version of “The Lion Sleeps Tonight” from 1982.

The Jimmy Hill lookalike linesman continues to grab attention as he rules a Haringey player onside and then proceeds to explain that the Pegasus number five had played him onside. “Don’t tell them lino, they can learn for themselves” shouts an exasperated Haringey fan. The Haringey support delve into their ‘new wave’ singles collection once more, impressively getting “We’re Haringey, We’re Haringey” into The Jam’s “Going Underground”.

Haringey are clearly the stronger team, as their higher league status implied before kick-off and the majority of play is at the club house end of the ground, although in a rare breakaway the Pegasus number four , Harry Morton is free in the centre of penalty area, has the ball pulled back to him perfectly, but then contrives to hit a truly, spectacularly terrible shot as high and as wide as anyone not under the influence of mind expanding drugs could imagine; in some circles it might be called ‘a worldy’. Morton might be excused however for blaming the pitch, very little of which is any shade of green except in a few ‘fairy circles’, and when more than a handful of players are in the penalty area a cloud of dust is kicked up which lingers momentarily over the pitch like a swarm of tiny insects.

I am stood to one side of the suitably bucolic looking main stand and every now and then I receive a whiff of pungent and rather cloying body spray or scent. At first, I think it must be from the occupants of the stand, but to be honest they don’t look the sort to be familiar with anything more than an occasional dab of Old Spice or bit of talc. I eventually realise, when he bouncily stops near me to signal another offside, that the culprit is Jimmy Hill, the unique styling of whose hair is challenged, but not matched only by the Pegasus number sixteen, Tom Lewis who has a neat blond bob.

The game is being played in a good spirit with unusually little, if any audible swearing from the players, or the management on the benches. Pegasus’s number nine Callum Griffith is booked however, just as the first third of the game rolls into the second third when twice in quick succession he fails to give space for a free-kick to be taken. As thoughts of half-time refreshment begin to form Pegasus win a couple of corners and then almost unexpectedly there is a second goal as a poorly cleared low cross reaches Haringey’s number fourteen who firmly and concisely despatches it into the opposite bottom corner to the first goal, and Haringey lead 2-0.

Due to judicious manoeuvring in the approach to half-time, I am first in the queue at the refreshment hatch where I invest in £1.50’s worth of tea in large paper cup. I read the half-time ‘results’ as I wait for my tea to cool and then for the teams to re-emerge. My mood is barely affected by the news that Ipswich are losing at Preston; it’s not a place we often do well at; “a difficult place to go” is probably the accepted wisdom, despite the M6. At four minutes to four the football resumes and I move to the other end of the main stand expecting most of the action to again take place in the half of the pitch that Haringey are attacking.

The first half was adequately entertaining if not exactly a pulsating cup-tie. Sadly, the second half does not live up to what we didn’t know at the time was the comparatively high standard of its predecessor. The Haringey supporters nevertheless continue to enjoy themselves as they repeatedly dip into the back catalogues of Sham69, The Jam and with somewhat less ‘street credibility’, but plenty of irony, Tight Fit. My highlight of the half is when I realise that Derek Asamoah is playing as number forty-four for Haringey. He is a player who I probably last saw playing on the telly for Ghana in the African Cup of Nations. I should have really worked out he was playing when the Haringey fans chanted his name in the first half, but I was probably too busy wondering which Buzzcocks, The Clash or The Damned single it was they were singing to.

With the final whistle there is justified applause for everyone’s efforts and I leave The Crops to the sound of the Haringey fans singing “Bus stop in Tottenham, we’re just a bus stop in Tottenham” because wonderfully, as anyone who has travelled the W3 through north London will know, they really are and as far as I’m concerned that’s just as interesting as Greek mythology.

Ipswich Town 0 Arsenal 4

April 22, 2025April 22, 2025 / martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

Easter Sunday is the most significant date in the Christian calendar, one of only two days in England when even the big, mainly Mammon-worshipping supermarkets don’t open. As well as not going shopping for groceries on Easter Sunday, until today I don’t think I’ve ever been to a football match on Easter Sunday either, but today, because Ipswich Town are for now still in the evil Premier League, it is their turn to play Arsenal at Portman Road. My memories of previous Easter fixtures against Arsenal are not happy ones, with Easter Saturday 1981 looming large as one on which hopes of becoming champions of England were mortally wounded courtesy of a 2-0 defeat. Those hopes failed to be resurrected on the Easter Monday when we lost at Carrow Road, pretty much like today’s hopes of avoiding relegation, although I am told there is life after death in the second division.

The sun is shining this morning, but a cold north-easterly wind chills my un-gloved hands as I step out for the local railway station. It’s an eventful walk enlivened as it is by the sight of a horse’s bum through the open back of a horsebox trailer, the Colchester United team bus, a bumble bee crawling on the pavement where I’ve seen a bumble bee on the pavement before, a squashed ladybird with yellow innards, a dead squirrel, and a tall man sitting on the bonnet of a small car smoking a cigarette. By way of a conclusion to this odd combination of sightings, today’s train is going to be a bus that celebrates the fourth letter of the alphabet, a double-decker belonging to Don’s of Dunmow. But at least I get to sit upstairs at the front, from where I spot a banner imploring me to say ‘No’ to 180km of ‘giant pylons’. The banner sets me thinking about the stark beauty of electricity pylons in the rural landscape; I’m not sure about ‘giant’ ones mind, but imagine they’re better than tiny ones, which could be a trip hazard.

The bus journey is mercifully short, and I’m soon sat on a train next to Gary looking out for polar bears. I spot a couple as we pass through Wherstead, and when I tell Gary he asks if they were waving to the train. I tell him they were, and that it was a scene reminiscent of a polar bear-based version of the Railway Children, but without Jenny Agutter. In Ipswich, our carriage lands perfectly adjacent to the bridge over the tracks that has fewest steps, and with the benefit of the energy saved we are soon in Portman Road buying programmes (£3.50 each) and looking at what the design of the programme front cover should look like. Today’s design is a mash of the Town and Arsenal club crests and for some reason reminds me a little of the programme for the 1951 Festival of Britain ,I think it’s the colours. Cursing the grandees of Umbro for the actual programme cover picture (Conor Chaplin’s modelling for Edvard Munch’s ‘The Scream’), we ascend to the Arb, where for £8.94 including Camra discount I buy a pint of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride for me and a pint of Lager 43 for Gary. Drinks in hand we find Mick in the beer garden and join him to talk of film, religion, sexual politics, double funerals, beer, wedding anniversaries, incels and birthdays before Gary buys a repeat round of drinks, including a Jameson whisky for Mick. Eventually Mick says “Its twenty to three, we’d better leave” so we do.

Either our ambling has got faster or The Arb and Portman Road have drawn closer together, but I’ve been checked for firearms, relieved myself and am shuffling past Pat from Clacton and Fiona to my seat next but one to the man from Stowmarket (Paul) and two rows behind ever-present Phil who never misses a game, and his son Elwood before the teams are even on the pitch. This means I get the opportunity to bellow the Town player’s surnames in the manner of a Gallic ultra as the over enthusiastic young stadium announcer reads them out, although sadly like a latter day Murphy he is not wholly in sync with the names appearing on the scoreboard today. The announcer ends his announcement by doubling over in the style of the deranged Basil Fawlty and bawling “Blue Armeeee! ” into his microphone three times before turning to hug his silent sidekick, Boo Boo, who I can only think is on hand to finish the announcement if he were to suddenly explode or have a seizure.

It is Ipswich who get first go with the ball this afternoon, sending it for a short while, until Arsenal steal it, towards the goal just in front of me and my fellow over-fifties ultras. Town are in blue and white, whilst Arsenal are in their customary red with white sleeves and shorts, resembling, to those familiar with the ‘lower divisions’, an uncharacteristically ‘up themselves’ version of Fleetwood Town . “We ain’t getting nuthin against this lot” remarks the bloke behind me optimistically, before the first minute has elapsed. “Fuckin’ unbelievable play” he says. “Just the way they play” he continues , explaining himself to the bloke next to him.

For all their ability, it takes Fleetwood nearly five minutes to win a corner. “Oh, When the Town, go marching in, Oh when the Town go marching in, I’m gonna be in that number, when the Town go marching in” drone the Sir Bobby Robson standers mournfully and the mood only lifts when the words “Home of the XL vent shipping container “ chase themselves across the illuminated billboard between the tiers of the Sir Bobby stand. Then, suddenly, Julio Enciso incisively runs at the Fleetwood defence, singling himself out as the Ipswich player with attacking intent, but sadly his flash of inspiration, is just that, a flash.

It’s the fourteenth minute, it’s still goalless and then it’s not as a run down the Town left and a low centre becomes a goal and the illuminated billboard reads “External Wall Insulation”. Fleetwood lead 1-0. “Come to see the Arsenal you’ve only come to see the Arsenal” sing the jubilant Fleetwood fans and then “We’ll never play you again, we’ll never play you again” confirming perhaps that they are some of the more pessimistic supporters with regard to their hopes for the future of the planet.

The once blue sky above Portman Road has become cloudy. A corner is headed over the Town crossbar, but otherwise the game consists of Fleetwood just passing the ball about endlessly. I begin to wish to myself that somebody would just do something. Fourteen minutes after the first goal comes a second. Again, a run down the left, a low cross, which is more of a pass, a flick which is a pass, and a player is free to pass the ball into the Town net. Fleetwood lead 2-0.

Four minutes later and Leif Davis’s studs come into contact with the back of Bukayo Saka’s ankle. Saka leaps into the air like a startled cat and Davis is sent off for endangering life, which VAR confirms. Later this evening in France, in an almost identical incident a St Etienne player (Lucas Stassin) will be sent off for a similar foul against the less feline Corentin Tolisso of OL, but this will then be rescinded and changed to a yellow card when the referee looks at the VAR screen. Tolisso will be carried off on a stretcher and Lucas Stassin will go on to score the winning goal. Sadly, Ipswich is not St Etienne.

In the aftermath of Davis’s dismissal, Cameron Burgess replaces Jack Clarke and Saka proceeds to miss two decent chances for a goal to loud jeers and boos from Town supporters before I notice that the floodlights are now on and it’s not even a quarter to three yet. I surmise that the lights are on because conspicuous consumption is one of the rules in the Premier League. Five minutes of added on time are added on thanks to the delay when Saka received treatment from the club vet. It allows time for a moment of joy for Town fans and the opportunity to cheer ironically when George Hirst is awarded a free-kick for being fouled. Ironic cheering is one of the skills supporters of ‘little’ teams promoted to the Premier League quickly develop .

Half-time is a brief island of pleasure in a sea of pain and is made all the more pleasurable by my consumption of a catchily named Na Okraglo chocolate and wafer bar, which I picked up in the World Food aisle at Sainsbury’s, and which is made in Poland and is just one of the many benefits of immigration into Britain in recent years.

But the football resumes all too soon at seven minutes past three and Town are quickly defending another corner. The highlight of the match for Town arrives in the fifty seventh minute as Sam Morsy shrugs off a couple of opponents, strides forward and places a ball over the top of our opponents’ defence, for George Hirst to run onto and then cut inside a defender to curve a shot just beyond the far post. Apart from Enciso’s early enthusiasm, it’s probably been the only thing worth seeing from Town all afternoon and I can’t help wondering if the opposition are that good, or if we’ve just given up.

Fleetwood make some substitutions, but it doesn’t seem to alter their ability to dominate the game and as I begin to wonder what Pat from Clacton might be having for her tea and whether it will be any different to usual because it’s Easter Sunday, I hear her say “potato”. “Mashed?” I ask, half believing I heard her say that too, but no, she said “Jacket”. I then have a brief conversation with Fiona about hot cross buns. She had hers on Friday as you should, but I admit to having been eating them for weeks now.

We’re heading towards the last twenty minutes and corner follows corner follows corner, and from the last one Town concede a third goal, as some bloke in a red shirt turns, shimmies and just kicks the ball into the goal in a ridiculously simple manner, as if suddenly bored with all this passing the ball around the goal, so he thought he’d just score instead. “We’ll never play you again” chant the Arsenal fans once more, gloomily foreseeing Armageddon within all our lifetimes and then the excitable young stadium announcer gives us that the news that there are 29,549 of us here this afternoon, but 2,955 of us are just passing through. Unsportingly, but failing to realise most of us no longer care, the Arsenal fans now taunt us with chants about ‘going down’. But who won the FA Cup in 1978 eh? Winning the Cup is permanent, as is losing in the final, but relegation isn’t.

Nothing continues to happen except the ball going backwards and forwards across the pitch as if we’re playing a team of hypnotists. I’m struck by what a miserable looking lot the Fleetwood players are. Eighty-seven minutes are pretty much up and a shot hits a Town goalpost when no one is looking, and then a minute later a different shot strikes Cameron Burgess’s bum and swerves off the perfectly angled buttock into the goal; perhaps that’s why they call them the Arsenal; Town lose, four-nil. As if to rub it in, there are four minutes of added on time too.

With the final whistle, those that haven’t already left, mostly leave quickly. With just thirteen minutes until my train departs I swiftly clear off too, feeling suddenly alive as if awoken from the afternoon nap equivalent of a nightmare in which I’ve been mesmerised by life-sapping close passing and bad singing. I’m just glad it’s over, just Brentford and West Ham United to go now.

Ipswich Town 1 AFC Bournemouth 2

December 10, 2024December 13, 2024 / martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

It was a dark and stormy night, but luckily today is just grey and stormy…and wet. The illuminated reindeer in the garden over the road, which actually looks more like a somewhat effete ‘Monarch of the Glen’ has fallen over, and I think its head might have come off too. But life is not all good, and sadly I have to venture out on this inclement Sunday afternoon to watch Ipswich Town play AFC Bournemouth at the very un-footbally time of two o’clock. I imagine the kick-off time is dictated by the match being broadcast on some obscure subscription tv channel owned by a billionaire, who likes to tinker with the lives of us little people.

Before AFC Bournemouth were AFC Bournemouth, this happened in 1972, they were Bournemouth and Boscombe Athletic and had a club crest featuring birds, fish, lions, and a tree, all things I like to think were commonplace in the two seaside towns. The crest also featured the Latin motto ‘Pulchritudo et Salubritas’, which isn’t a pithy line from the Catholic mass but rather translates as ‘beauty and health’, and sounds a bit like the name of a magazine for nudists, much enjoyed by schoolboys in the 1960’s and 1970’s, called Health and Efficiency. As well as changing their name for the worse in an attempt to at least be top of an alphabetical league of football clubs, if not top of one based on footballing merit, AFC Bournemouth then changed their club crest to one in which a football hovers above the head of man with a receding hairline, who looks a bit like Ron Futcher, the former Luton Town and Tulsa Roughnecks centre-forward. The 1970’s would also see AFC Bournemouth provide a manager to Norwich City in the form of John Bond; such is their place in history. I think Bournemouth was also possibly the only town in Britain where I ever rode on a trolleybus, but I can’t be sure.

The train to Ipswich is on-time, but the journey is dull like the weather as the high-backed seat in front of me shields my eyes from glimpses of fellow passengers, but at least I see a polar bear through the train window, albeit a rather grubby looking one. I guess it’s difficult staying a whiter shade of pale when you should be in a snow field, not a muddy field. Emerging from Ipswich railway station, I am met by wind and rain and murk. I hurry across the bridge over the river and down to Portman Road, where I buy a programme (£3.50) from one of the blue kiosks, which look they should sell ice creams. Reaching ‘the Arb’ I swear under my breath at the throng of people just inside the door who are between me and the bar. One of them it turns out is Mick and he buys pints of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride while I head outside into the beer garden to find seats. Mick’s eventual arrival outside with the beers more or less coincides with the departure of another group of drinkers and we take their places in the shelter to discuss defeat to Crystal Palace, Syria, ultra-processed food, a forthcoming trip to Reims, what it’s like in Monaco and a text from Gary telling me he’d pulled a muscle in his chest and wasn’t going to make the walk up to ‘ the Arb’ today. Another pint of Suffolk Pride and a Jameson whisky for Mick follow before with everyone else having left for Portman Road, we do too. We part on the corner of Sir Alf Ramsey Way.

Unexpectedly, I make it to my seat alongside Fiona and next but one to Pat from Clacton and the man from Stowmarket (Paul), and two rows behind ever-present Phil who never misses a game, and his son Elwood before the excitable young stadium announcer in the cheap looking suit has read out the teams, and I am therefore happily able to bellow out their surnames in the manner of a Frenchman. “What a match we have for you this afternoon” witters the gangly announcer ridiculously, “Bournemouth”. “Super Kieran Mckenna” chant the North standers, and Town get first go with the ball, kicking it towards me and my fellow ultras. The Bournemouth fans up in the Cobbold stand sing the ‘Red Flag’ perhaps in solidarity with the Tolpuddle martyrs who would probably have been Bournemouth fans given the chance, being only 35 kilometres away. Sam Morsy wins an early corner.

“You got here on time today then” says Pat accusingly. “Only by accident” I tell her. But now Bournemouth head towards the Town goal and their fans reveal that they probably bought their SatNavs from a dodgy looking bloke down the pub as they sing “Small Town in Norwich, You’re just a small town in Norwich”. Liam Delap is booked for the sort of foul that school bullies commit, and I imagine him smirking as the referee tells him off; he is the Nelson Muntz of the current Ipswich team. Bournemouth earn a corner of their own, but Ipswich have started the game very well and Sam Szmodics now wins a corner for Town after a flick at goal is deflected away. “Come On You Blues” I bellow, just like everyone seemed to years ago.

It sounds like the Bournemouth fans are singing “Down with the Palace”, which I don’t think is some republican protest to accompany their singing of the ‘Red Flag’, but rather a reflection of where they think Ipswich will finish in the league table. I realise later that they’re not singing “Palace” either, but rather “Scummers”, because seemingly everyone on the South Coast hates Southampton. The Bournemouth No15, who very peculiarly given his team’s fans singing of the Red Flag is called Adam Smith, is rolling on the ground whilst the crowd serenades him with a chorus of “There’s nothing wrong with you”. It’s an enjoyable interlude, but although we don’t know it, the football will soon be more so.

Almost twenty minutes have gone when Cameron Burgess heads an Omari Hutchinson cross over the bar in the aftermath of a corner, “Come on you Blues!”. Then Hutchinson shoots over the bar himself. If this was a wrestling match Town would have Bournemouth in a headlock, and a minute later the ball is pulled back from the left for Conor Chaplin to despatch into the goal net with his customary aplomb, and Town lead 1-0. “Conor Chaplin, Baby” sings the other end other ground to the tune of the Christmas number one record from 1980.

The goal is followed not by Bournemouth pressure and an equaliser but by two more Town corners, the second one of which is headed imperiously into the net by Cameron Burgess to give Town a 2-0 lead for a second or two until it is disallowed by referee Mr Salisbury, whose name suggests to me some sort of Wessex conspiracy. VAR confirms that it was Liam Delap’s fault because he fouled someone, but no one really believes it.

The disappointment of the disallowed goal is followed by more anguish as a Bournemouth shot strikes a post, but fortunately rebounds back out, and to make us feel a little better Mr Salisbury conducts a long distance booking of someone on the Bournemouth bench. “Wanker, wanker” chant the Bournemouth fans at Mr Salisbury and then “Down with the Scummers” as they struggle to find anything nice to chant about anything. Bournemouth win a corner and the words “Hot Sausage Co” shine out in lurid, illuminated lettering progressing across the front of the Sir Bobby Robson stand as if it’s a seaside pier.

The last ten minutes of the half belong more to Bournemouth than to Ipswich as a brilliant last ditch Cameron Burgess tackle saves Sam Morsy’s embarrassment after he loses the ball, and Bournemouth win a succession of corners, but still the home fans sing “Blue and White Army”. Three minutes of added on time are added on but cause no pain or joy.

Half-time, and it’s time to talk to Ray, his son Michael and grandson Harrison, and Dave the steward. So deep is our conversation that I leave it a bit late to visit the facilities and by the time I have adjusted my attire and come back up the steps into the stand again, the match has already re-started. “At least you’ve managed to miss the start of the second half today” quips Fiona, although ironically this afternoon we will all live to regret not missing the end of the half.

Nine minutes gone of the second half and Leif Davis wins a corner for Town, but then mysteriously his team-mates go to pieces allowing an admittedly busy, hyper-active Bournemouth team to run all over them causing mayhem on the grass right in front of us. Only the ball going into touch and Conor Chaplin having a sit down on the turf until everyone has calmed down and received some remedial coaching prevents footballing catastrophe. When order resumes Bournemouth make two substitutions and win a corner all in the space of three minutes, and we start descending into the final fifth of the game, and like characters in a Thomas Hardy novel unknowingly towards our terrible fate.

Sixty-nine minutes lost, another Bournemouth corner and a shot straight at Muric the Town ‘keeper. But Town have a chance too as Szmodics shoots and Delap can’t get to the re-bound off the Bournemouth ‘keeper. I wonder to myself if Pat from Clacton has had her lunch today or will she eat when she gets home, but I’m too engrossed to ask. “I—pswich Town, I-pswich Town FC, the finest football team the world has ever seen” sing the crowd with earnest belief.

Seventy-four minutes closer to a Town victory and Bournemouth make more substitutions, including David Brooks, who makes me think of Thomas Hardy’s Tess of the D’Urbervilles and Mrs Brooks the owner of the stylish lodging house in Sandbourne (Bournemouth) where Tess murders Alec d’Urberville. This afternoon’s attendance is announced by the excitable young stadium announcer as 29,180 of whom 2,144 are crusted characters from Hardy’s Wessex. “Thank you so much…” gushes the fawning young announcer. “Your support, your support, your support is fucking shit” sing the Bournemouth boys, perhaps ironically, perhaps not.

The seventy-eighth minute is here with a Bournemouth corner and then Town’s first substitutions, Al-Hamadi and Jack Clarke replacing Delap and Szmodics. Eighty-three minutes, and Bournemouth have another corner. Surely, we will win now, we haven’t really looked like conceding, as nippy and nimble as Bournemouth are. Eighty-six minutes and Bournemouth replace someone called Ryan Christie, a relative perhaps of Julie Christie who played Bathsheba Everdene in the 1967 film of Thomas Hardy’s Far from the Madding Crowd, with James Hill. Surely we’ll win now with Bournemouth resorting to bringing on Jimmy Hill.

A minute later, a punt forward, Muric rushes out, the ball goes over him and is bundled into the goal at the far post as for once Cameron Burgess can’t get his foot to it to clear. Bugger. Bugger Bournemouth as King George V should have said. Perhaps we’ll score again, we’re good at scoring late goals, aren’t we? “Who are ya?” chant the Bournemouth supporters, seemingly having lost their memories in all the excitement.

Our depression is barely relieved by six minutes of added on time, time to win, time to lose. We lose after three Town players are attracted to the man with the ball, another runs past un-noticed and rolls the ball into the six-yard box where legs flail and one with a black sock on strikes it into the roof of the Town net. I’ve not felt so bad in a while. Snatching defeat from the jaws of victory has seldom been so unpleasant because victory was so sorely wanted and for the most part deserved. The truth about the Town team bus running over a whole cattery full of black cats will surely make the papers any day now.

The game ends and I forget what happens next. I can’t even think of any tenuous links to Thomas Hardy.

Ipswich Town 3 Southampton 2

April 3, 2024August 19, 2024 / martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

I woke up this morning and without moving my leaden carcass squinted at the bedside clock. It was nine minutes past seven. I rolled over and soon descended back into a drowsy, drifting sleep. After what I thought was about twenty minutes I awoke and looked at the clock again. It was seven minutes past eight and l lay there thinking I should get up, whilst also becoming depressed at the thought that this is Easter Monday and I will have to go back to work tomorrow. I guess that with still a whole day of the four-day Easter break in front of me and a trip to Portman Road too, such thoughts must mark me down as a pessimist. I don’t think so though, I think I just don’t like having to work for a living.

Outside it is sunny, but it’s also breezy, so everything in the garden is moving and jiggling about, like I’m watching a Roobarb and Custard cartoon. My internal dialogue adopts the breathless voice of the late Richard Briers and I think of a young Felicity Kendal before wondering what people from the time before television thought of in idle moments. I get up, shower, eat breakfast, drink coffee and probably make my wife Paulene suspicious by performing a range of domestic tasks including ‘hoovering’ and ironing, before we enjoy a comforting late lunch of bangers and mash.

As a I step outside to walk to the railway station, it is spitting with rain; Paulene was watching men in lycra cycling around San Sebastien on the telly as I bade her farewell, and she gave me strict instructions that Ipswich Town must win today because they are playing Southampton and Paulene is a Pompey person, a former joint owner no less, before the rest of them sold out to Walt Disney. The train is on time but it’s an uneventful train journey, there aren’t many other passengers on board, although a young blonde woman asks me to look after her bag when she goes to the loo. I tell her “Don’t be long, I’m getting off in Ipswich.” But she’s back in her seat even before we glide on past one of the Wherstead Polar Bears, who appears to be hiding from the small handful of people who have paid to see him, or her.

In Ipswich, I exit the train and cross the railway tracks by the old footbridge because it has fewer steps than the new one. The streets are busy with policemen in baseball hats and day-glo gilets standing in pairs and watching. As ever, I stop in Portman Road to buy a programme (£3.50) from one of the ice cream booths, the vendor looks very young and is possibly very careless too as the screens on both her mobile phone and card reader terminal thing are cracked. “Did you drop them both?” I ask her, but don’t catch the reply; I’m beginning to worry about my hearing.

Approaching ‘the Arb’ however, I can hear the distinctive burble of pub conversation and the chink of glasses. Inside, ‘the Arb’ is heaving with people gathered around the bar, although most of them aren’t buying the drinks, but just waiting for them as if worried that theirs will be forgotten or slyly stolen. Next time I buy three drinks or more at once, I’m going to ask for a tray and reduce congestion at the bar; I urge everyone to do the same. But today it is academic as I am on my own; Mick still convalesces from the operation on his foot, whilst Gary has travelled by car with his brother. After acquiring a pint of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride (£3.78 with Camra discount) I retire to the beer garden where there are no unoccupied tables except for one which would seem to be designed for standing at, so that’s what I do as I flick through my programme. Nearby, at a metal table a Mick Channon era Southampton shirt stretches across a beer belly and has me thinking about the first time I saw Ipswich play Southampton. It was during the three-day week, on a Saturday evening in February 1974 and Ipswich won 7-0. Southampton would go on to be relegated from what people now call the Premier League, along with Manchester United, and Norwich. The Seventies weren’t all bad.

Not getting a seat and having to queue at the bar felt like conceding early goals, but I’m back in the game with a second pint of Suffolk Pride, for which I don’t have to queue, and a seat at a Yogi-Bear style picnic table as the Johnny-Come Lately’s to Portman Road, who possibly weren’t alive in 1974, leave early for kick-off and a chance to be on the telly. By ten past five I’m on my own as a Town fan in the pub garden, or in the pub itself for that matter, so feeling lonely I drain my glass and head for Portman Road too.

I arrive at turnstile 62 early and have to queue, but I’m seemingly in the company of people who are unusually proficient in the wielding of bar codes and after a succession of green lights I’m soon bidding good evening to Pat from Clacton, Fiona and the man from Stowmarket (Paul), as I settle in a couple of rows behind ever-present Phil who never misses a game and his son Elwood. The teams parade onto the pitch and I feel the warmth of the pyrotechnics on my face, a mildly spectacular if not poetic expression of professional football’s double-standards. Murphy the stadium announcer does his stuff and for a second game in succession reads out the Town players’ names as they appear on the scoreboard, and we all pretend to be in France as we bawl out their surnames together. By ‘all’ I mean ever-present Phil and me. It’s taken him a while, (eighteen matches excluding the one he missed) but to mis-quote Rex Harrison (Henry Higgins) in the film My Fair Lady, like Eliza Doolittle “By George he’s got it!” I should really write to congratulate him.

At twenty-eight minutes to six the match begins very noisily. It’s Southampton that get first go with the ball, aiming it roughly in the direction of the telephone exchange and London Road Baptist church whilst wearing an un-Southampton-like kit of what looks like red and pink halved shirts with black shorts, “Are they in red and pink?” says a text from my wife, who I am guessing is no longer watching blokes in lycra on bicycles. In fact, the pink turns out to be an optical illusion created by very thin red and white stripes. Town of course are in their signature blue and white.

The visiting supporters are in good voice, probably as loud as any away fans this season as they launch into “When the Saints go marching in”, although I still prefer Louis Armstrong’s version from 1938. “E-I, E-I, E-I, O, Up the Football League we go” sing supporters of both teams being equally optimistic, but with eight minutes gone Southampton are selfishly keeping the ball to themselves to the extent that I momentarily lose interest and count the number of seagulls on the girder that holds up the roof of the Sir Bobby Robson Stand; there are eight of them. A minute later and the Southampton fans start to sing “Your support is fucking shit” but strangely their chant gets drowned out by the noise as Leif Davis sweeps the ball wide of the goal for the game’s first missed chance.

Four minutes later and the ball is briefly becalmed in midfield before Sam Morsy plays it wide to Leif Davis, who takes one touch before it hits the back of the Southampton goal net. From my seat, almost directly in line with Davis’s shot, I feel as though I must have momentarily blinked; one second the ball was at his feet, then it hit the net. I guess the Southampton goalkeeper feels much the same way, but just a little less cheerfully so, although he had an even better view than I did; except for the hitting the net bit, that is.

I will admit the early goal was unexpected; I had been prepared to wait a while against one of the teams capable of packing out their goal mouth with parachutes stuffed full of cash. I sit back to enjoy the spectacle and unfortunately so do the Town players as a low cross from in front of the Cobbold Stand is tapped home from close range and Southampton equalise with what can only be described as indecent haste. There seems to be some debate as to the validity of the goal in the Sir Bobby Robson Stand, where the conclusion is quickly reached through the medium of song that “Linesman, linesman, you’re a cunt”. The miracle of television however, will later confirm that it was a valid goal, although it won’t mention the status of the linesman.

Things soon get worse as a Southampton player falls over and the referee Mr Michael Salisbury heaps the blame on Sam Morsy, whom he books. “Sing when you’re winning” chant the Southampton fans, which is a bit odd given that Town were barely winning for long enough for anyone to clear their throats, let alone start singing. They proceed to follow it up by letting Conor Chaplin know that like the linesman earlier, they think his GP is actually a gynaecologist, and all because long ago he played for Pompey.

The first half is now half over as one bloke in pink passes to another, who runs half the length of the pitch and passes to another who strokes the ball beyond Vaclav Hladky and Town are losing. “Top o’ the league, you’re avin’ a laugh” sing the Southampton fans to the tune of Tom Hark before turning the knife with chants of “Football in a library, doo, doo, doo”. We are no match for their untamed wit, but I gain some solace from a Southampton free-kick hopelessly launched into touch as the occupants of the Cobbold stand shield their eyes from the slowly setting sun.

Southampton are keeping the ball to themselves still, and they’re still winning, and a Conor Chaplin shot goes straight to the visiting goalkeeper before the clock turns six and it’s time for a drinks break as Keiffer Moore is attended to for what looks like a bad back. Within five minutes Ali Al-Hamadi has replaced him. Kayden Jackson gets to chase a ball into the penalty area, but stupidly opts to fall over and look around expectantly for a penalty, when if he’d carried on somebody might really have kicked him. “We need to start waking up” says the bloke behind me as a low cross travels the full width of the Town goalmouth.

After seven minutes of added on time, a Southampton corner and fulsome roars of “Come On You Reds” . It’s half-time and, as I tell Dave the steward , we can but hope for a better second half. I predict we will win 5-2 because that’s what we did in February of 1982, and when it’s not doing something different, history repeats itself. I speak to Ray, his son Michael and his grandson Harrison and offer them Marks & Spencer mint choccy speckled eggs because it’s Easter. Ray doesn’t seem as cheerful as usual and bemoans that Axel Tuanzebe is really a centre-half playing at full-back, and although he can be a bit unreliable at times he’d rather see Harry Clarke.

Back in my seat, I share some speckled eggs with Fiona and Pat from Clacton and at twenty to seven the football resumes. “Shit referee, shit referee, shit referee” sing the Sir Bobby Standers to no particular tune that I know of, as Mr Salisbury picks up where he left off and doesn’t award Town a free-kick. Southampton win a corner. “Come on You Reds” we hear. Southampton win a free-kick. Vaclav Hladky makes a fine flying save. Southampton win a corner. “Come On You Reds” again. Not fifteen minutes of the half have gone and I look up at the scoreboard, it still reads 2-1 to Southampton, but it feels like we’re losing by more. Southampton win another corner.

The game is two-thirds over and it’s the traditional time for mass substitutions. Kayden Jackson, Axel Tuanzebe and Massimo Luongo are replaced by Nathan Broadhead, Harry Clarke and Jack Taylor. Murphy announces this evening’s attendance as 29,393 with 1,969 from the place my wife calls Scumton. “Here for the Scummers, You’re only here for the Scummers” chant the Scummers to the traditional Hampshire tune of Guantanamera, and some people applaud. I can’t work out if they’re applauding themselves, each other, Murphy, the singing or just life itself.

Six minutes later and it looks like Ali Al-Hamadi must score, but his shot strikes a goal post, although from where I’m sitting it looks like he’s shot horribly wide as the ball rebounds back at an angle. “Blue and White Army, Blue and White Army, Blue and White Army, Blue and White Army” chant the Sir Bobby Robson Standers, and then possibly again, but I’m not counting. The substitutions have made a difference and just to prove it Jack Taylor plays a first time pass to Nathan Broadhead who from just inside the Southampton penalty area turns and scores, shooting beyond goalkeeper Bazunu, who interestingly also used to play for Pompey, just like Conor Chaplin, who Fiona and I both decide must, for the sake of the Southampton fans, now score the winning goal.

Southampton are no longer dominating possession, and Town only have to win a throw-in for the home crowd to roar them on. “Come On Ipswich! Come On Ipswich!”. The stands are moving with waving, punching arms and fists and wide-open, shouting mouths, and probably some spittle too. Pat from Clacton tells Fiona and me she’s been ill during the week; I ask her if she brought the lurgi back from Norfolk where she was playing whist in Great Yarmouth the week before. She won £95.00, she tells us.

“Oh when the Town go marching in” bawl the far end of the ground gloatingly, as if only the supporters of the team in the ascendency are allowed to sing black spirituals. Ali Al-Hamadi runs at goal and Conor Chaplin shoots wide with fifteen minutes left of normal time before Southampton substitute Che Adams, whose parents I like to think were, and hopefully still are, both Marxists, with Sam Edozie. Five minutes later and Southampton make a double substitution bringing on the lanky and totally bald Will Smallbone, who sounds like a character from a novel by Charles Dickens (born in Pompey) and looks like the popular perception of what an alien looks like, which is a remarkable coincidence because the other Southampton substitute is called Rothwell, which is how people who lisp pronounce Roswell.

Five minutes of normal time remain and as ever Leif Davis runs down the left, but this time he will be through on goal if defender James Bree doesn’t foul him and get sent off. Bree makes the long walk of shame to the dressing room last as long as he can, doing his best not to look ashamed or remorseful and as Nathan Broadhead lines up to eventually shoot the ‘Bree-kick’ into the defensive wall, I count fifteen seagulls on the roof of the Sir Bobby Robson Stand; squawks have spread .

After Conor Chaplin is substituted for Jeremy Sarmiento, who of course is on loan from Brighton (the Seagulls), in the final minute of normal time I put my notepad and pencil away in my coat pocket knowing that if Town score now I might throw them up in the air and never find them again. Seven minutes of added time is more than enough for Town to score again and somehow I think they will, perhaps because it seems they always do, and it seems like everyone else feels the same.

The final minute of added on time inevitably arrives on time and equally inevitably Sam Morsy finds Leif Davis on the left. Davis plays the ball into Jeremy Sarmiento, who ‘skilfully’ meets it with his left foot as he stumbles forward, falls, and stabs it with his right into the corner of the goal as he gets up again. The roar from the crowd is the biggest I’ve heard at Portman Road since Jim Magilton slalomed through the Bolton defence to score in the play-off semi-final twenty-four years ago. Men, women, children are hugging each other in scenes of reckless abandon, not the sort of thing that happens in puritan Suffolk at all. Like in a dream there’s barely time for the game to re-start before it ends, and yet again Town have won.

One day I might wake up and not find myself in another dream, but I hope not.

Ipswich Town 4 Rotherham United 3

February 22, 2024February 23, 2024 / martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

In the interests of helping to save the planet by reducing the number of journeys I make, all be they mostly by electric train or electric car, I have once again synchronised my one day a week in the office with a mid-week football fixture at Portman Road, this time against bottom of the league Rotherham United. Eight hours of toil and sweat and sometimes blood and tears is more than enough for anyone I reckon, and so at about ten past four I down tools, pack up my bag and head off into town to enjoy dusk and the gradual, gentle illumination of Ipswich’s ancient streets. It feels almost like it did back when I was still at school, and I’d have a free lesson at the end of the day so I’d nip off and with time to kill before catching the bus home I’d may be trawl the likes of Parrot Records, or Discus on St Helen’s Street or the Record Shop opposite the Old Cattle Market bus station. By way of a hollow tribute to my past I visit the HMV store and see if they have anything by Greek prog rockers Aphrodite’s Child, they haven’t. But as Laurence told us in Abigail’s Party, “We don’t want to listen to that fat Greek caterwauling all night.”

Often recently, when I have walked through Ipswich of an evening it has felt a little down at heel, but not this evening, perhaps the soft lights and the shadows are hiding things, but there are people about, teenagers queue outside the Corn Exchange for an evening of Drum & Bass and the soul of the town is shining through with the streetlights and glowing shop signs. The recently restored pargetting of Sparrowe’s (aka The Ancient House) looks magnificent as does Cornhill, but I live in hope of one day meeting someone else who appreciates the 1950’s splendour of the old Co-op lighting department, the colourful, blocky repetition of the frontage of what once was Woolworth’s, and the little glimpse of 1960’s Brutalism left behind by the Carr Street precinct; when I was eight or nine these buildings were new and exciting, and I think they still are.

Time moves on and as six o’clock draws near I head for ‘the Arb’. An empty tin can rattles down Black Horse Lane, blown by the breeze. A woman and I catch each other’s eye and smile as crossing the road in opposite directions we both look the same way at the same time to check we’re not about to be run over. In the Arb I have to wait for my pint of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride (£3.60 with Camra discount) as the barrel has to be changed, and I use the time selecting from the menu a tea time bowl of ‘Very French’ chunky chips (£8), which come with bacon, brie and onion marmalade. Eventually, pint in hand, I repair to the beer garden to wait for my chips and delve into the match day programme (£3.50) which I purchased earlier in the club shop, before strolling around town. Keiffer Moore adorns the front cover, caught in a pose with a ball on his head, which resembles the AFC Bournemouth club badge. Inside, there is an interview with Keiffer, which at five pages in length and with small print seems like a start has been made on his biography.

My ‘Very French’ chunky chips arrive soon and are very tasty indeed, even if I am struck by the thought that if Mick or my wife were here with me, I would feel guilty at how much fat I am consuming, and if I wasn’t feeling guilty my wife would surely do her best to ensure I did. I pass my time between eating and taking sips of beer by involuntarily hearing the conversation of the three retired men sat two tables away. The conversation, if it isn’t just a monologue, is dominated by one man who talks about a gay friend whom he describes more than once as a ‘Champagne Socialist’, it’s a silly, annoying phrase with its odd implication that if you’re a Socialist you are not allowed to enjoy Champagne. Typically, people who use the phrase fail to understand that the whole point of Socialism is Champagne for all. When I finish my pint of Suffolk Pride I resist the temptation to share a bottle of Champagne with the blokes on the next table and raise a toast to Socialism, and instead buy another pint of beer, like the prole that I am. With no Mick or Gary to engage in conversation this evening, I leave unusually early for Portman Road.

After negotiating a delightfully queue-less turnstile 62, I find myself amongst Fiona, Pat from Clacton, the man from Stowmarket (Paul), ever-present Phil who never misses a game, and his son Elwood before the teams are even walking onto the pitch behind the diminutive referee, Mr Keith Stroud, who I am shocked to see hold the match ball up to the sky before kissing it. Stroud has apparently refereed “Premier League” (First Division) games and I can only think that he learned or dreamt up such poncey, pseudo-religious behaviour there. If that’s what the First Division is like nowadays, I think I’d rather stay in the second. To add to the confusion, the man from Stowmarket isn’t wearing his woolly hat tonight, I tell him I think the World must have started spinning in the other direction. Very soon, Murphy the stadium announcer is reading out the team names seemingly oblivious of them appearing on the scoreboard. I’ve had it with Murphy, and tonight I ignore him completely and bellow the player’s surnames only as they appear on the screen. “That will teach the ugly little twerp” I think to myself in a voice like that of Harold Steptoe, although a French accent would have been more appropriate. “You’re on form tonight” says Fiona, apparently impressed by my bellowing.

The game begins, Town getting first go with the ball and generally sending it in the direction of the goal in front of me and the other aging Ultras. Town, as ever, are in blue and white whilst Rotherham United, from a town in what was once known as the People’s Republic of South Yorkshire, are sartorially doing a passable impression of Arsenal or Stade de Reims, the club from the city which is considered the gateway to the historic Champagne region of France. Socialism and Champagne together at last.

When asked at work today what I thought the score would be tonight, I predicted three or four -nil to Town, perhaps more. After 83 seconds Town are losing as an awkward looking number 9 called Tom Eaves easily bustles Luke Woolfenden aside and taps the ball past Vaclav Hladky. Fiona and I look at one another as if to say “what happened there?” and agree that we weren’t really ready . But we don’t worry too much about it and soon Keiffer Moore is heading high over the Rotherham cross-bar and then just a bit past a post. “We often don’t seem to start well” says Fiona. “But we are the best in the division for gaining points from losing positions” I tell her, sounding like a boring pundit or football obsessive, “We have to be”.

It only takes a little more than seven minutes for Mr Stroud to show us, or more precisely Rotherham’s Hakeem Odoffin, his yellow card, but it’s Odoffin’s own fault for fouling Jeremy Sarmiento. Two minutes later and Town equalise as Sam Morsy runs into a bit of space, turns and crosses the ball back in front of the goal so that an unmarked Wes Burns can stoop to conquer and head the ball into the net. People thank the deity of their choice, I choose Wes Burns. Moments later Wes is at it again, but shoots past the far post, although undeterred the Sir Bobby Robson standers are celebrating Christmas all over again with a rendition of “Hark now hear the Ipswich Sing, the Norwich ran away”, and then they sing it again. A minute later, Keiffer Moore is unwrapping his present from Wes Burns in the form of a side-footed shot from a low cross after Wes has scampered down the wing to chase a Harry Clarke through ball. It’s a beautiful goal and I can feel myself smiling uncontrollably; this is what I had expected this evening and it’s nice for those expectations to be fulfilled.

It can only be a matter of time, and not much of it before we score again and then again. But after seven minutes we’re still waiting and Keiffer Moore is rubbing his knee and receiving treatment and it feels like we’ve lost our way a little. To compound matters Rotherham won’t stop winning corners, although they don’t do much with them, but I’m not getting to bawl ”Come On You Blues” at all. “We don’t need corners” says Fiona, perhaps trying to reassure me.

Town flounder for another nine minutes and then all of a sudden click into gear again as Wes Burns bears down on goal and has his shot saved, Leif Davis has his follow-up shot saved and then Mr Burns gets to the ball ahead of two Rotherham defenders and the goalkeeper to roll it into the goal and put Town 3-1 up. “Excellent” I say in the style of Wes’s evil cartoon namesake. This is more like what I had predicted, and surely Town will now go on to win handsomely.

Town sadly never get the chance to gain momentum from the goal as moments after the game re-starts Rotherham’s Femi Seriki dives headlong into the advert hoardings and after a long delay has to be driven away on the back of the club golf buggy/ambulance, which we have now had the pleasure of seeing two matches running. Seriki is replaced by Ollie Rathbone and I start to think of Sherlock Holmes. The remaining minutes of normal time in the first half have just two highlights, one is Wes Burns narrowly avoiding a hat-tick by heading just as narrowly past a post, and the second is the Rotherham goalkeeper sending a poorly directed clearance even more narrowly above Conor Chaplin’s head; a taller player would probably need to leave the field on the club golf buggy. Rotherham then win yet another corner before Murphy excitedly announces that there will be a minimum of ten minutes of added on time, which allows Rotherham to win more corners, but not much more.

With the half time whistle the man from Stowmarket stands up and admits to wishing he had padded trousers as he’s finding his plastic seat a little unforgiving. We discuss cushions and speculate that a patent on padded trousers could be the passport to wealth and a life of leisure. I then migrate to the front of the stand for my half-time chat with Ray and his grandson Harrison which covers Aphrodite’s Child and what an odd first half it has been.

When the football resumes I’m still expecting more Ipswich goals, but it’s Rotherham who are harrying and pressing Town into making mistakes. “Blue and White Army” chant the Sir Bobby Robson Stand and ‘Blue Action’ repetitively and then “Addy, Addy, Addy-O, ITFCeeee, We’re the Blue Armeee” and after fifty-seven minutes Town win their first corner of the game. “Are you happy now?” asks Fiona, and in a way I am, but I don’t chant “Come On You Blues” because , as I explain to Fiona, I don’t suppose the players will hear me up at the far end of the ground. I don’t think it’s my fault when the corner kick sails far beyond the goal and harmlessly away. Despite this failure, Boney M’s Christmas number one from 1978 gets a reprise in the Sir Bobby Robson stand.

Town are not playing well and Rotherham are not looking capable of scoring, but then they do. Vaclav Hladky boldly leaves his goal line for a cross which he doesn’t manage to catch and in the ensuing mess the only player to have so far been booked rolls the ball into the unguarded goal; and they say crime doesn’t pay. This wasn’t what anyone expected and suddenly we’ve been transported from a dull game in which we felt comfortably ahead to one in which we seem to be hanging on for a point. This is a poor game, it’s almost reminiscent of how we played in the dark days at the end of Mick McCarthy’s reign of terror, but we have been spoilt for two years.

For a moment or two Town are stung into action as they win a corner and Wes Burns is fouled by the French sounding Peltier, who is booked by Mr Stroud after loud baying from the home crowd. From the corner the Rotherham goalkeeper falls to the ground clutching the ball and some people think it’s crossed the line, there is a roar which isn’t so much half-stifled as three-quarters stifled as Stroud waves play on.

Another ten minutes pass with little to excite, before both teams vainly reach for inspiration in the form of matching double substitutions. For Town Omari Hutchison and Massimo Luongo usurp Conor Chaplin and Lewis Travis. As if that isn’t exciting enough, Murphy announces the attendance as 28,026 with 145 of those from the former People’s Republic. Applause follows, much of it directed at the 145 intrepid northerners. Another two minutes pass and another interruption sees Harry Clarke replaced by Axel Tuanzebe due to injury. Nothing improves and after a run down the Town left and a low cross, Peter Kioso strikes a Town goal post with a shot and the crowd groans with disapproval. Ali Al-Hamadi replaces Keiffer Moore before Rotherham make another double substitution and finally Kayden Jackson is the new Wes Burns. There will be a minimum of eight minutes of time added on says Murphy importantly and Town are hanging on. Pat from Clacton is glad she hasn’t got a baked potato waiting for her when she gets home, she’ll have a pre bedtime snack of Marks & Spencer Cheesey Combos instead. Back on the pitch it’s as if Keiran McKenna has said he wants Town to give the ball away every time they win it so we can practice defending a narrow lead.

Fortunately of course, Rotherham aren’t much good, they’re bottom of the league after all, and they’ve only scored twenty-six goals before tonight. But they have got Keith Stroud, a man who kisses footballs and raises his eyes to the heavens as he does so, and four minutes into time, added on, and enjoying life without Big Brother VAR watching him, he grants them a penalty . Cafu scores with a ‘Panenka’ (incidentally the name of a bar in Sheffield), which is why goalkeepers should never try and guess which way a penalty kick will be struck.

A draw snatched from the jaws of victory seems a certainty, except that this is Ipswich where it’s no longer over until it’s over and so it shouldn’t be a surprise when in a final flourish Omari Hutchinson reclaims the win just a minute later with a fierce shot between the goalkeeper and his near post. Portman Road explodes. With everything put back together again Mr Stroud keeps on playing for another couple of minutes over the original eight, which is enough time to book Axel Tuanzebe, but Rotherham are finally beaten.

I had thought I had seen it all in fifty plus years of coming to Portman Road, but then I already thought I’d seen it all in 1979. Tonight’s game was rubbish after what we’ve seen this season, but Town have scored four goals, all pretty good ones, and what a finale; so why does it also even feel a bit like we’ve lost? Did someone slip something in my ‘Very French’ chunky chips or in my Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride? I can only try not to get here so early in future.