EFL

Ipswich Town 1 Watford 1

/ martinpbrooks / 1 Comment

 Leaving off work on a November evening is one of life’s many pleasures, as indeed is leaving off work at any time of day or year but the fading light and swirling russet leaves, like in the opening scene of The Exorcist, somehow add a layer of gloomy beauty that enchants.  Add the prospect of an evening kick-off at Portman Road, and the streets of Ipswich are alive with worried expectation.  Opposite the bus depot I ‘bump into’ Richard, a long-since disillusioned but long-time Town supporter, who now occasionally catches a game when he can but mostly watches local non-league football.  He’s on his way to meet a friend for a pre-match drink but has arrived early, so we have time to stand in the glow of a streetlight and talk of Brightlingsea Regent, Wivenhoe Town, Hackney Wick, SOUL Tower Hamlets and Kings Park Rangers, who sound from Richard’s account of a recent match like hired hitmen.  Richard is concerned that the team that starts tonight’s match will not be the same one that started the match on Saturday.

Leaving Richard to go his own way, I have time to visit the recently installed ‘portal’ on Cornhill, and because I’m not sure what else to do, wave to people in Dublin and New York, some of whom wave back.  Unfortunately, I hadn’t thought ahead and prepared a rude comment about Donald Trump to hold up on a piece of cardboard.  I had wondered what the point of the portal is and still do but think I like it.  It’s good to know I can momentarily make meaningless, mute contact with someone in Lithuania, Poland or Brazil.

At ‘the Arb,’ there are people crowding around the bar umming and ahhing over what they want to eat. Over their heads I order a pint of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride, and they seem surprised when I am being served, and they are not.  When did people stop understanding the etiquette of pubs and bars?  I add an order of chilli, chips and cheese (£13) and retire to the beer garden with my beer to wait for Gary, Mick and the chilli, chips and cheese.  Gary is first to arrive in his orange puffa jacket and with a pint of Spanish lager.  The chilli, chips and cheese are next, followed by some cutlery, and then Mick who arrives before I finish eating.  Mick has a pint of Suffolk Pride, Gary then has chilli, chips and cheese and Mick has chips and Emmental and he also buys another round of two pints of Suffolk Pride and Spanish lager as we talk of how busy the funeral business is currently, inter-sex sports people, Gary’s favourite places in India, Gary’s quiz team, the sale of Mick’s deceased neighbour’s house, a woman Gary and I knew who reached the final of tv’s Mastermind, whether Quorn comes from Quorn in Leicestershire, re-using Haig Fund poppies, the presence of gender in the Romance languages and  other things that I’ve probably forgotten.  There’s finally still time for me to buy another half of Suffolk Pride for myself and a whisky for Mick, but Gary is too full of chilli, chips, cheese and gassy Spanish lager to consume another drop.

As ever, we are the last to leave for Portman Road; it is twenty-three minutes past seven.  At Portman Road there is no queue into the stand formerly known as Churchman’s and seeing the security staff brandishing their magic wands for detecting weapons, I stick my arms out wide as I approach. The security man smiles broadly, “You’re flying already” he says in a jolly Afro-Caribbean-cum-London accent.  “High as a kite” I tell him, pretending to be, in the words of Marge Simpson ‘whacked out of my gourd’. After venting the spent drug of my choice, Suffolk Pride, I emerge into the stand in time for a minute’s silence for Armistice Day and the last post, something I still find odd in the context of attending a football match. Inevitably, Fiona, the man from Stowmarket (Paul) and ever-present Phil who never misses a game are already here, but Phil’s son Elwood is absent and so is Pat from Clacton, although on the end of the row sits a woman in dark glasses who looks a bit like her.  Of course, in reality, the woman on the end of the row is Pat from Clacton and she’s not in disguise, only shielding her eyes from the glare of the floodlights having recently had cataracts removed.

I seem to have missed the announcing of tonight’s team, the ritual of remembrance having taken precedence over the usual pre-match ritual, and with players’ huddles out of the way it’s Ipswich who proceed to get first go with the ball, which they predominantly aim in the direction of the goal in front of me and my fellow ultras.  As usual, Town sport their signature blue and white kit, whilst visiting Watford sport lurid, garish yellow shirts with red stripes and red shorts, colours which remind me of centrifuged blood and the French second division team Le Mans FC.

Ipswich quickly win a corner, so quickly in fact that I forget to chant “Come on You Blues” and the attacking opportunity is hopelessly wasted before I even realise.  I’m still getting to grips with the diminutive height of the referee and the poppies on the players’ shirts as Town win a free-kick and Jaden Philogene places the ball very inexpertly and disappointingly over the Watford crossbar.   A short while later Jens Cajuste shimmies wonderfully between a couple of Watford players on the edge of their penalty area, and the home crowd sing supportively for their team. Watford look tidy, but Ipswich are tidier.

Almost inevitably, despite not being as tidy as Ipswich, it is Watford who score.  The sixteenth minute is Town’s undoing along with a general melting away of any defence on the right-hand side of the pitch, resulting in a low cross and a simple close-range goal from the misleadingly named Louza.  “We’re winning away, we’re winning away, how shit must you be?  We’re winning away” chant the Watford supporters to the tune of the Beach Boys’ Sloop John B in what passes for humour amongst most football crowds.  Meanwhile I snigger because Watford’s number six is called Matthew Pollock, I just can’t help myself when people are named after certain fish.

Happily, Watford won’t be winning for long and after George Hirst heads over the crossbar, central defender Cedric Kipre provides a through ball worthy of any midfield maestro and Jaden Philogene scoops and curls the ball over the prone body of Watford’s Norwegian goalkeeper, and the score is one all.  “We’re no longer winning away, we’re no longer winning away, you’re better than we thought you were, we’re no longer winning away” chant the Watford fans, except of course they don’t.  Instead, the excitable young stadium announcer tells us excitedly and loudly that the goalscorer is “Our” Jaden Philogene, and he then proceeds to bawl “Jaden” and wonderfully allows the crowd to chant “Philogene”, which happens three times, as if we were in the Stade Roudourou or somewhere equally French.  Ever-present Phil who never misses a game turns around wide-eyed, with a look of surprised recognition on his face to celebrate the moment with me. “All hail the excitable young stadium announcer” I think to myself.

There are still the best part of seventy minutes left to record a famous victory, although the tiny referee seems to want to make things as difficult as he can as he takes his time allowing Chuba Akpom back on the pitch after receiving treatment.   The expected goals don’t happen. Watford win a couple of corners. “Event cleaning” say the electronic advertising boards on the Sir Bobby Robson stand before promoting the name of RJ Dean Plasterers, and probably because this is advertising, I think of Pearl & Dean at the cinema; Baba, baba, baba, baba, bababa. There are three minutes of added on time, which is long enough for Watford’s Kwadwo Baah to claim the first booking of the evening. BahBah, BahBah, BahBah, BahBah, BahBahBah.    The Watford supporters complain, perhaps because given the number of fouls that had previously gone unpunished they thought their team had diplomatic immunity, and the Town supporters claim to have forgotten the Watford supporters were here.  “Plus ca change” I think to myself, briefly returning to the Stade Roudourou.

With the half-time whistle I speak to Ray his son Michael and grandson Harrison at the front of the stand.  Strangely, we don’t mention the match, perhaps because we can’t hear ourselves think, let alone speak above the deafening public address system.

The second half brings a booking for George Hirst after ten minutes after he is fouled and no free-kick is given and so he not unreasonably assumes it’s open season; if it is it ends just before he gets to the other bloke.  “Watford, Watford, Watford, Watford” sing the Watford fans to the tune of “Amazing Grace”, which is itself amazing and also rather funny.  Nearly an hour has gone the way of history, and we get to cheer another booking for Watford’s Mark Bola, who is momentarily as popular as Ebola.  The second half has ebbed and flowed a bit but whilst Watford create no chances whatsoever, they still pass the ball very nicely and I think they look quite good, which might help explain an unusual interlude in which Jaden Philogene and Azor Matusiwa almost come to blows and probably would do if Cajuste doesn’t step into keep them apart.

It’s always time for change with about a half an hour left to play and tonight is no exception as Clarke, Azon and Taylor usurp Jaden Philogene, George Hirst and Jens Cajuste.  Pat from Clacton clearly thinks in the same way as Keiran McKenna, but with no substitutes of her own to bring on she just delves into her handbag to pull out the masturbating monkey charm, who reportedly has changed many a game in the past, although I’ve never witnessed it myself. The monkey passes from Pat to Fiona to me and I ask what I’m supposed to do with him. “Rub his head” says Fiona. Relieved, I hand him back to Fiona who hands him back to Pat who puts him back in her handbag.  Victory is now assured.

Time takes us into the last twenty minutes of ‘normal’ time and Watford make a copycat triple substitution as the bloke beside me complains that “There’s no end product” and then says it again.  Moments later there is an ‘end product’ from Ivan Arzon, but what should be a decisive net-rustling header is one that goes unpleasantly wide.  Akpom and Johnson are replaced by Nunez and Greaves.

Eighty-two minutes have joined the persistence of memory and Arzon misses again, this time shooting over the cross bar, and we are told that there are 27,184 of us here tonight, the lowest attendance for a home fixture in over two and half years; since we played Shrewsbury Town and the Shrews brought just 343 supporters with them.  As time begins to run away from us, Watford win a corner and then Ivan Arzom has a header saved by the Watford goalkeeper. Two minutes remain of the original ninety and it’s Town’s turn to have a corner from which the ball lands at the feet of Nunez, clear at the far post and perhaps six yards from it.  Nunez proceeds to display how he may always be tainted by having played for Norwich City and boots the ball hopelessly high and wide of the gaping target.

Seven minutes of added on time are added on and whilst it seems like renewed hope, of course it isn’t , and we even have to defend another couple of Watford corner kicks, although I remain confident that there will be no injury time defeat snatched from the jaws of victory, mainly because we’ve never been winning.  With the final whistle I rise from my seat and promptly depart because I have only eight or nine minutes in which to get the ‘early’ train home.   I console myself with the thought that although we should have won, at least we didn’t lose, although at the railway station I will meet Richard again, who will  describe himself as ‘underwhelmed’, but may be he doesn’t enjoy leaving off work on a November evening as much as I do.

Ipswich Town 0 Charlton Athletic 3

/ martinpbrooks / 1 Comment

The waking hours that fill most of the time before a mid-week evening fixture are a bit odd.  I’m ‘at work’, albeit at home but my thoughts are mostly of knocking-off and travelling to Ippy, of pre-match pints and the match itself as I wish the day away waiting for the main event, the floodlight beams and the darkened streets.

It’s been a miserable day of showers and grey, threatening clouds and just as I walk out of my front door a heavy squall sends me back indoors looking for an umbrella.   The train is on time however, and even though kick-off is not for nearly another three hours blue shirts bearing the mysterious word ‘Halo’ are out in force.  Gary is soon sitting next to me having negotiated the assault course of the narrow aisle between the carriage seats.  We see a polar bear through the deepening gloom outside as we settle into our familiar pre-match world.

In Ipswich the streets are wet and shiny as the traffic swishes up Civic Drive and what I still think of as a corporation bus lurches round the roundabout by the spiral car park, all glowing interior, rain-dappled windows and blurry faces heading home for tea.  Low, setting sunlight shines onto the plate glass windows of the abandoned Crown Court building as Ipswich slips towards darkness.  I remark to Gary how beautiful it all is, but I’m not sure he’s as moved as I am.   At ‘the Arb’, homely electric light spills out into High Street, a welcoming beacon for the pre-match drinker.  I buy a pint of Suffolk Pride for myself and a pint of Estrella lager for Gary (£10.21 with Camra discount) and we choose what we are going to eat before heading out the back to the beer garden, where we get out from under the spits of rain in the long rustic shelter that backs onto the road

By the time Mick arrives Gary and I are about to tuck into pulled pork and Haloumi chips respectively, and we talk of boycotting the World Cup in the USA, Mick’s work and who saw Ipswich lose at Middlesbrough on the telly last Friday.  Because he bought me my Haloumi chips, I buy Gary another pint of Estrella, and a Monkey Shoulder whisky for Mick and more Suffolk Pride for myself, before Gary then buys me another pint of Suffolk Pride and another Monkey Shoulder for Mick, and I tell him I fancy mooching around Europe for a bit when I retire.   All the time our conversation has to compete to be heard above that of the half dozen blokes at the table at the other end of the shelter.  I can’t quite decide if they’re loud or if the tin roof makes for unhelpful acoustics.

As ever, we are the last to leave for Portman Road, probably because we are the coolest over-sixties in the pub, me in my dark overcoat, Mick looking like a mature student revolutionary and Gary in his tan puffa jacket, like a lost ski instructor. We join the gathering crowds as we cross Civic Drive again and part ways beneath the dead gaze of Sir Alf Ramsey’s statue.  The queues for Sir Alf’s stand are long again tonight, possibly because there are now rows of barriers funnelling us towards trestle tables and then the turnstiles, although I eventually make my entrance via the side entrance as Mr Benn might have done had the shopkeeper given him a blue a white scarf and a bobble hat one day.   It’s strange how often I think of Mr Benn.

By the time I emerge onto Sir Alf’s lower tier the teams are on the pitch, I have missed the antics of the excitable young stadium announcer, his suit and his Basil Fawlty style contortions, and everyone is shaping up for the kick-off.  The man from Stowmarket (Paul), Fiona, ever-present Phil who never misses a game, and his son Elwood are all here of course, but sadly Pat from Clacton is not; she’s in Clacton where, following her week playing whist in Great Yarmouth she has contracted Covid.  I learned this through social media where it’s possibly the only thing I have ever believed to be true.

It is Ipswich who get first go with the ball tonight, kicking it towards me and my fellow ultras and wearing our signature blue and white, whilst our opponents Charlton Athletic sport sensible, plain red shirts and white shorts, a sight which has me reminiscing about my Continental Club Edition Subbuteo set and its anonymous and strangely posed red and blue teams.  Town quickly win a couple of corners and I’m singing ‘Come On You Blues’ before I get a chance to work out who are ‘the Blues’ tonight; it takes me a while because it seems like another team and it’s going to be nearly half-time before I work out that number 29 is Akpom, and realise Philogene our top scorer isn’t even in the starting line-up. 

In the Cobbold stand, the Charlton fans are singing “ I want to go home, Ipswich is a shit-hole, I want to go home” and whilst I will admit I am ignorant of the attractions of beautiful downtown Plumstead, I surmise that they couldn’t have seen the fading sunlight on the plate glass windows of the old Crown Court or that glowing corporation bus.  Meanwhile, I notice that the Charlton number six has the unusual surname of Coventry, which I mention to Fiona but we quickly decide there aren’t any potential quips and anything about being sent to Coventry wouldn’t really work. 

Ipswich are dominating possession but in a somewhat dull manner devoid of decent shots and it’s no surprise when the Charlton supporters make the traditional “Is this a library?” enquiry and Fiona suggests it probably isn’t a library because as Ipswich fans we can’t read or write, only drive tractors.  Such is fan “culture”.  Non-plussed by everything, my eye is caught by the electronic advertisements on the Sir Bobby Robson stand which are thanking “today’s programme sponsor Cambridge Windows” before the words “Doors” and “Conservatories” flash up in neon blue and I wonder if this isn’t subliminal advertising.  “Your support is fucking shit” chant the Charltonites and I like to think they mean Cambridge Windows’support, because if the programme is sponsored why does it cost four quid?

Town win another couple of corners and I chant “Come On You Blues”, but as usual to no avail although the bloke beside me concludes “They’re there for the taking “ meaning Charlton, and I tend to agree that they look pretty useless, I just can’t understand why their goalkeeper hasn’t had to make a save yet.  The half is half over when there is a break in play as Town ‘keeper Alex Palmer is mysteriously stranded about thirty yards from his goal and receiving treatment, whilst the other twenty-one players all congregate by the dugouts for drinks, chit-chat and possibly nibbles and the exchange of phone numbers.  The upshot is that Palmer retires hurt and Christian Walton takes his place.

When play resumes ,Town continue to accumulate corner kicks and with no football to cheer from their own team the Charlton fans resort to chanting “Ed Sheeran is a wanker”, and who wouldn’t? Ipswich accumulate a still larger stack of corner kicks as the first third of the match passes into forgettable history but experiencing a flashback from  the ‘high’ of the last home game against Norwich, Town fans reprise The Cranberries’ “Zombie” singing “Nunez, he’s in your head” even though there are no Norwich fans here to fall victim to our untamed wit.  The Norwich baiting continues with chants of  “He’s only a poor little budgie”  as the Sir Bobby Robson standers dredge up the euphoria of the last game to compensate for the lack of euphoria from this one.  It’s a ploy that almost works however as Akpom strikes a fierce shot against the Charlton cross bar, although then soon afterwards weak defending by Leif Davis results in Christian Walton having to make a fine save from Olaofe who is left free to run at goal.

The half concludes with four minutes of added time, Nunez shooting wide and firing a free-kick over the bar, Town getting a final corner of the half, Charlton’s Docherty being the first player to be booked and Charlton getting two corners of their own, which are enthusiastically greeted by sonorous chants of “Come on you Reds” and also a header wide of the goal.

With the break for half-time, after venting spent Suffolk Pride I join Ray and his grandson Harrison at the front of the stand where Ray and I express mild dissatisfaction that Town are not several goals up against what appears to be the worst visiting team to rock up at Portman Road since our time in the third division.  More optimistically, Harrison predicts a final score of 4-0 and I predict 3-0, although with unintended foresight I don’t say who to, or even to whom.

The match resumes at nine minutes to nine and within seven minutes Charlton score as the childishly named Sonny Carey easily runs at and past Dara O’Shea and shoots under Christian Walton.  A man somewhere behind me becomes very sweary and the Charlton fans get so carried away that they start singing about being on their way to something called the Premier League.  Two minutes later it’s almost 2-0 to Charlton from a corner and a minute later it is as Christian Walton dives low to spring the ball up in the air for an unmarked player with the possibly misspelt name of Gillesphey to head it unchallenged into the gaping goal.  Charlton’s supporters are suddenly very loud indeed, and I begin to wonder if Keiran McKenna’s half time talk hadn’t included the ritual slaughter of a black cat. 

Hopes are raised as a Leif Davis shot, or may be a cross, hits the Charlton net, but these hopes are then dashed on the lineman’s raised flag.   Substitutions naturally follow with thirty minutes to go as they nearly always do, but tonight they need to be game changers.  In a way they are as two minutes later Charlton score a third, another header into a gaping net after Davis defends weakly again and Walton dives at the near post and no one marks Miles Leaburn who can’t believe his luck from the middle of the goal.  Some people leave and the Charlton fans ask “Can we play you every week?”. With perfect timing the illuminated adverts on the Sir Bobby Robson stand read “If you see something that doesn’t look right…”

I sing “We’ll have to win 4-3” to the baleful tune of Rogers and Hart’s song form 1934 “Blue Moon” and as if to show willing Town continue to have the majority of possession and win even more corners.  As I tell the bloke next to me however, we look no more dangerous from our corners than we do from Charlton goal kicks. Akpom shoots wide for Town and more substitutions follow, but nothing changes except for the Charlton songs which move on to Tom Hark with the curious words “See the Charlton, then fuck off home” and it’s hard to tell if this is an existential commentary on their lives, ours, or everyone’s, and if so, why?

Ipswich of course win the moral victory as Charlton have another player booked and then another and we also win the corner count and the curious satisfaction of knowing that tonight’s attendance of 28,006 is too large to fit into Charlton’s stadium at The Valley.  But sadly, the actual victory, what we showed up to see go the way of Ipswich, is Charlton’s, and I haven’t even had the consolation of knowing what Pat from Clacton had for her tea.  “Is there a fire drill?” enquire the Charlton fans as the Town fans head en masse for the exits, and it’s good to know that even if their team has won the match quite comfortably, they remain pitifully unoriginal in their attempts at humour.   The four minutes of added on time will prove hopelessly insufficient for Town, but at least I will easily be able to catch the 9:53 train, which in these days of concern about our mental well being will help me ‘move on’, so it’s not all bad.

Of course it hasn’t helped me ‘move on’ , not for long anyway , and after one gloomy day there will follow another.  But that’s autumn as one’s early season hopes and expectations wither and fall like leaves from the trees.  I’m sure we’ll win on Saturday mind. Up the Town!

Ipswich Town 3 Norwich City 1

/ martinpbrooks / 1 Comment

One of the many unpleasant things about returning to work having been on holiday is once again being shaken from one’s slumbers at an unearthly hour by an alarm clock.  The first weekend after the return to work is usually a beautiful thing therefore because of the albeit temporary return to what had been the normality when on holiday of not having to get up before you naturally wake up.  Today however, Ipswich Town are playing local rivals, nasty Norwich City and because of human beings’ apparent need to divide ourselves into groups which hate one other, the people charged with maintaining peace and good order have decreed that the match shall begin at 12 o’clock on a Sunday morning.  I had planned to catch the 10:05 train but having received an e-mail from Ipswich Town entreating him to get to the game early, Mick seems anxious that he should.  I therefore set my alarm for 7.30 to give me time to shower, prepare and eat a hearty breakfast, drink coffee with a glass of advocaat and walk to the railway station to catch the 09:30.

It’s a bright sunny morning as I walk to the station and through the leaves of the trees the wind seems to whisper, “Ipswich win, Norwich lose”.   The train is on time, and I sit across the aisle from a man at least in late middle age who wears shorts and a body warmer, as if his legs still want to be on holiday but his torso realises it is autumn.  Another man of a similar age relives his past by wearing a blue Harrington jacket.  The sun is still climbing in the sky and dances between those Ipswich supporting trees as we speed down the line towards Gary, who joins me on my journey along with his recovering achilles tendon.  We chat about the tendon, Ipswich having only played Norwich fourteen times in sixteen years, and Ipswich still having won as many local derbies as Norwich despite Norwich’s eight victories since Ipswich’s last victory in 2009, before looking out for the Wherstead polar bears, of which we see two out of the surviving three.

The streets of Ipswich are heaving with police persons in day-glo gilets, baseball hats and other “street-wear” encouraging Gary and I to reminisce about the days of pointy helmets and long dark coats.  Neither of us stops to buy a programme, deeming £4.00 too much for something glossy but of little real interest, which will sit on a shelf and gather dust until our younger relatives clear our homes when we die and optimistically put them on e-bay.  At the Arb’ I buy Gary a pint of Estrella Gallicia and one of Suffolk Pride for myself (ten pound something with Camra discount). We find Mick in the beer garden basking in the morning sunlight; at first we don’t see him at all and go to sit elsewhere, it’s been a while and it’s as if we’ve forgotten what he looks like, although Gary mistakenly thinks we have seen him once this season, but we haven’t.  Mick jokes, in poor taste, about oncoming senility, but like the baby boomers we are we laugh anyway.

We talk of Ipswich’s first book festival, Brittany, bagpipes, neolithic standing stones, Sligo and Galway, tacky souvenirs and the Catholic church,  electric vehicle charging points and the sale of Mick’s deceased neighbour’s house.  Mick buys us more pints of beer and before long we’re the only people left in the beer garden, everyone else having heeded their e-mails like the obedient, malleable citizens that they are, not like us independent thinking baby-boomers with our pensions and Palestinian flags.   We nevertheless leave the pub perhaps ten minutes earlier than we might normally, but then, Gary’s achilles tendon is still slowing him down. In Sir Alf Ramsey Way the turnstiles are queue-less, although the same is not true of the back of Sir Alf Ramsey’s stand where entry is slowed by scanning for weapons, frisking for stale dumplings and dead budgies with which people might taunt the visiting fans, and an old boy in front of me who is trying to use his season ticket card like a chip and pin and is ignoring the QR code.

After venting spent Suffolk Pride it’s soon a joy to be re-united with Pat from Clacton, Fiona, the man from Stowmarket (Paul), ever-present Phil who never misses a game, and his young son Elwood who are all inevitably awaiting kick-off.  From the Sir Bobby Robson stand a blue and white banner hangs, which slightly cryptically asks “who’s that team we all adore?”.  Given the Gothic typeface I’m thinking someone Germanic, Schalke perhaps or Karlsruher? Hansa Rostock?  But it’s a question that doesn’t really need asking.  On the pitch, the excitable young stadium announcer is contorting his lanky frame as he bellows into his microphone and announces the team.  Sadly, he is becoming as hopeless as his predecessor Murphy and he fails miserably to co-ordinate his announcing of the player’s names with them appearing on the big screen in the corner.  He is possibly just too excited.   I simply ignore him therefore and bawl the players’ names as they appear on the screen, as if I were at the Stade Marie-Marvigt in Le Mans or Stade Ocean in Le Havre.

Eventually, the noise through the PA system subsides and the game begins as the wind howls around us and small pieces of torn up paper flutter about.  It’s Norwich who get first go with the ball and they boot it more or less in the direction of where they come from whilst wearing their traditionally unpleasant signature kit of yellow and green, like a poor man’s Runcorn or Hitchin Town.  Ipswich meanwhile are of course resplendent in blue and white.  If the bloke beside me is to be believed, early Town play is a bit sloppy. “Come on Town for fuck’s sake” he shouts as a pass or two go astray.  Typically, Norwich commit the first foul as if to keep alive the memory of Duncan Forbes.  “All aspects of plastering and drylining” announce the electric advertisement screens brightly between the two tiers of the Sir Bobby Robson stand.   A Town free-kick is wasted. “Fucking numpty” says the bloke behind me as the linesman gives a throw to Norwich.

Ten minutes pass and Norwich are probably having more possession of the ball than Ipswich.  The Norwich supporters sing “Your support is fucking shit”.  Ipswich win a corner and along with Pat from Clacton and ever-present Phil I shout “Come On You Blues” a good three or four times as we support our team without using swear words.  On the touchline meanwhile, Keiran McKenna looks a little drab in his grey trousers and black polo neck top, and I think to myself that it surely wouldn’t break our American backers if they let him have a blue and white scarf out of the club shop to brighten him up a bit.  Back in the Cobbold Stand the Norwich supporters think they’re being clever as they sing to the home supporters “Sit down if you love Norwich”, somehow not noticing that they themselves are all standing up.  Sixteen minutes pass and Town win another corner and it’s time to chant “Come On You Blues” again, and again and probably once more for luck, but the score remains goalless, although I do notice that Norwich have a player called Topic and I am reminded of the nougat, caramel and chocolate based confection that reportedly had a hazelnut in every bite but which according to Wikipedia ceased production in 2021 having been introduced in 1962, the year Ipswich were English Champions.

The 19th minute witnesses Norwich’s number twenty-nine kick Town’s Furlong up in the air but escape punishment from the referee who seems to have the authority to absolve Norwich players of sin rather than book them.  The advertisement for Aspall cider that says “Made in Suffolk since 1728, now available in a can” runs across the Sir Bobby Robson stand and I can’t decide whether or not  this is meant to be ironically amusing. My reverie should be shattered as everyone in the ground except for Fiona and myself stands up to celebrate Jaden Philogene smashing the ball into the Norwich net.  But it seems we were alone in hearing the referee’s whistle signalling that a Norwich player had fallen over in the build-up.  Then Norwich win a couple of corners before there’s a cross from the right and a George Hirst header, albeit straight at the Norwich goalkeeper, which stands out as the first incident easily recognisable as attacking football.

The game is now a third of its way into history and Town win another corner.  Along with my fellow ultras I chant “Come on You Blues” again and this time the ball drops down, avoids a couple of boots before being launched comprehensively into the roof of the Norwich goal net by Ivorian Cedric Kipre for whom, seeing as he is on loan from Reims, this must be Champagne football.

Confusingly, the Ipswich supporters begin to sing “You’re not singing anymore” as the Norwich supporters sing “Sing when you’re winning, you only sing when you’re winning”. But the musical interlude lasts only a couple of minutes as Norwich win a corner and the Town players ignore the Norwich number twenty-nine to whom the ball drops at the edge of the penalty area; he shoots, and the ball is by some fluke deflected past Palmer and into the Town goal for an unexpected equaliser and hopefully the last bit of good luck Norwich City will ever get.

For a minute or two Norwich look puffed-up and pleased with themselves and their number six, who laughingly is called Darling, fouls Leif Davis and referee Mr Thomas Kirk picks him as the first player of the afternoon to see his yellow card. “Name?” says Mr Kirk. “Darling” says Darling. “You can’t get round me like that” says Mr Kirk, blushing slightly. “No, my name is Darling” says Darling. “Well, I’m going to have to book you Darling” replies Mr Kirk, then adding “I hope you don’t mind me calling you Darling, Darling.” 

As the last five minutes of the first half run on, Town win another couple of corners and yet again in vain, we chant “Come on you Blues”. Meanwhile the bloke beside me is analysing the game with the man from Stowmarket (Paul). The last minute of the half is here, and the Norwich number seven fails to control the ball. Jaden Philogene runs on to the loose ball as it rebounds away from the Norwich bloke’s rubber foot, Philogene spins on the ball to leave rubber toes staggering and about to fall over, Philogene takes a stride or two towards goal and then unleashes a left foot shot. Grazing the underside of the crossbar the ball then strikes the Norwich goal net and Town are winning. My jaw drops. English reserve evaporates as Fiona and I hug, and I open my eyes wide just merrily thinking “Wow”.

Naturally, half-time is a time of happiness, a time to reflect on a job half done. I head to the front of the stand to go and speak with Ray, but my way is blocked by a steward, who won’t let me through to the front of the stand. I ask why not. “Instructions” says the steward. “What is the reason for the instructions?” I ask. “Instructions” says the steward suggesting some sort of peculiar chain of command in which no one ever explains the reasons for anything. Fortunately, Ray walks over to me and we talk the usual nonsense, but I can only wave to Ray’s grandson Harrison and tell him to be careful, he is in a restricted zone.

Hostilities resume at five minutes past one and initially Norwich look keen to level the scores, but somehow without actually scoring, or even having a shot. Town’s Sindre Egele fouls some bloke in a yellow shirt “Great tackle” says the bloke behind me appreciatively “Shudda been a bit higher”. Town win the ball back from the subsequent free kick but stubbornly insist on ‘playing out from the back’ at all times and consequently concede a corner.

Substitutions are made by Norwich because the players they have had on the field up to now have clearly not been much good. Above, the sky is turning increasingly grey and with an hour gone the floodlights suddenly burst into life as if someone had unwittingly leant on the switch. “Stand up if you ‘ate the scum” chant the home supporters now able to see the yellow and green shirts again and also Marcelino Nunez warming up on the touchline, before launching into what is to become the theme tune of the afternoon, “He’s in your head, He’s In your head ,  Nunez, Nunez, Nunez” to the tune of ‘Zombie’ by The Cranberries.   Feeding off the growing sense of joie de vivre amongst the Ipswich fans Sindra Egele goes past a Norwich player by flicking the ball up over the hapless defender’s head, thereby making a monkey out of a canary.

Twenty minutes of normal time remain and perhaps needing to get his breath back, referee Mr Kirk awards Norwich four corners in quick succession, whilst the Norwich number twenty-three, a belligerent fellow with a shrew-like face, gives up on football and just tries to push and shove and generally wrestle with anyone in a blue shirt. Mr Kirk shows him the yellow card for his trouble.  With the succession of corners over, Keiran Mckenna, still looking ready for a funeral in grey and black, makes three substitutions bringing on Nunez, Ivan Azon and Jack Clarke.  Within three minutes, possibly two, Nunez chips the ball up for Azon to run on to and strike a low shot against the far post and with grace and style Jack Clarke majestically sweeps in the rebound to put Town 3-1 up.

The final twelve minutes of normal time bring two more Town corners after a free kick by Nunez, which 28,000 people fail to will into the Norwich net, and Pat from Clacton tells me she’s off to Great Yarmouth to play whist next week, in a hotel where the manager is a Norwich fan. Today’s attendance is announced by the excitable young stadium announcer as being 29,809 and five minutes of added on time is called, a bit like drinking up time.  Town fans meanwhile are drunk on Philogene and Nunez whilst Norwich are getting chucked out with the empties and throwing up on the pavement outside.  With the final whistle, everyone in blue and white is delirious; I resolve to drink champagne and dance all night and try not to forget to set my alarm clock.

Ipswich Town 2 Derby County 2

/ martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

It’s been a week in which summer, previously baked by the hot sun, has started to crumble away, buffeted by cool breezes, drenched by heavy showers and obscured by clouds.   As an Ipswich Town season ticket holder however, I am used to disappointment, and more than just believing it is, I know this is the natural order of things.  This morning, after a breakfast of sausage, egg, mushrooms and toast I put a coat of white gloss paint on the inside of my upstairs toilet door.  The paint was old and past its best, another coat or two will be needed and probably from a new tin.

Outside, the sun shone this morning, and it still does.  A wild array of billowing white clouds decorate the blue sky as I walk to my local railway station to catch the train to Ipswich, which is delayed by two minutes. Three blokes sat up straight on scooters, scoot past noisily.  At the station, a grey-haired man wears a T-shirt proclaiming, “Punk’s not Dead – The Exploited”, of course even in 1981 when that album was released, that wasn’t true, Punk inevitably committed suicide or took an overdose long before that.

 Gary joins me at the first station stop and we discuss his injured achilles tendon, which means that on arrival in Ipswich we will not be walking to ‘the Arb’ but will drink in the Fanzone.  There are of course also still polar bears in Wherstead, although I only spot one today, which like a lot of other things is a little disappointing.   Gary asks if I will be buying an “ice cream” today and I think I probably will not because it feels like a football programme that costs four quid has lost sight of what a football programme is meant to be; not that football programmes can really see of course.

It feels like a long arduous walk down Princes Street and Portman Road and into Sir Alf Ramsey Way alongside a gently limping Gary, and our lack of speed worsens the confused pangs of longing I feel as I pass numerous programme sellers.  Eventually, we make it to the Fanzone with its  loud music, ice cream van, beer tent and huge tv screen, which today is telling us how lucky we are we aren’t from ‘Up North’ by showing Middlesbrough versus Sheffield United.  Many people seem strangely mesmerised by it, however.

In the beer tent queues of uneven length line up for young women to dispense plastic cups of dull yellow liquid.  Gary says he’s on a diet, so should not really have a drink but he’s going to anyway.  We look up at the list of beers, the names of which mean nothing to me. Why doesn’t it just say Lager and Bitter?  Gary has something that sounds Spanish and out of sheer cruelty I get him to ask the young woman server if they’ve got a bitter.  She looks worriedly at a list and says there’s a lager and then describes something else as an IPA, although she also mentions fruit.  Foolishly, half remembering IPAs as amber coloured beers I opt for the IPA and receive a cloudy looking tub of yellow liquid that tastes only of grapefruit; that was the fruit, I guess.  The ‘beers’ cost a staggering £6.50 each and miraculously I suddenly realise that in December 1976 the programme for the Ipswich v Liverpool match, which coincidentally advertised the Sex Pistols ‘Anarchy in the UK’ tour, cost 15 pence, whilst at that time a pint of beer cost about 23 pence.   So, in a world where the retail price index is based solely on beer and football programmes, in nearly forty-nine years the price of programmes relative to the price of beer has actually fallen a little. Nevertheless, given the choice, and I have been, I will give up football programmes before I give up beer.

At about a quarter to three a man in a day-glo coat effectively tells us to leave and go to our seats. He seems a little curt, even rude, but I let it pass considering that a lot of people have strange jobs nowadays, and Gary and I soon bid our farewells.  The blue skies punctuated with white cloud have given way to grey cloud and there is a queue to the Sir Alf Ramsey stand, but it moves as if well lubricated and I am soon passing through the hallowed turnstile 62, named in honour of Sir Alf Ramsey’s team’s achievements back in 1962.  I arrive at my seat moments before Fiona arrives at hers and not long after Pat from Clacton reached hers.  The man from Stowmarket (Paul),  ever-present Phil who never misses a game, and his son Elwood are already here too and I’m in good time to join in, in the manner of a Frenchman at the Stade Marie Marvinght or Stade Marcel Picot when the excitable young stadium announcer, who today has seemingly mislaid his jacket but wears a shiny brown waistcoat, reads out the team.

“Be loud, be proud” announces the excitable young stadium announcer as a final gesture, before the strains of The Beatles “Hey Jude” begin. With Jude’s na-na-nas fading away arm in arm with August, the game begins and it’s Derby who get first go with the ball, booting it where possible in the direction of the old telephone exchange, Coes and the Halal butcher on Norwich Road. Derby sport a modern, plastic looking version of their traditional kit of white shorts and black shorts, which sadly fails to conjure spectral visions of Kevin Hector, Archie Gemmill or Colin Todd.  Town are similarly in a modern incarnation of blue and white that doesn’t really suggest David Johnson, Jimmy Robertson or Trevor Whymark were once here either.

A man arrives and sits in the seat in front of me but then continuously turns around, his arm hanging over the back of his seat, to talk to the bloke beside me.  I try to watch the game. The bloke in front stays mostly turned round to talk to my neighbour.  The space in front of me has always been small and now it’s smaller, the seat is pressing against my knee, I’m trying to watch the match, I’m feeling a bit annoyed, a bit grumpy, that pint of IPA in the Fanzone was truly horrible, the bloke in front of me is still turning round. “Look, why don’t you just sit here, and I’ll sit there, this is getting on my nerves” I say, standing up and gesturing the bloke in front to climb over his seat whilst I do the same in the opposite direction.  The manoeuvre seems to cause a bit of consternation around me and I think the bloke now behind me is explaining what’s happened to the blokes behind him.  “I’m sure we can all read about it later” says ever-present Phil who never misses a game.

“We are Derby” sing the Derby fans.  “Create more space with a mezzanine floor” reads the illuminated advertisement between the two tiers of the Sir Bobby Robson stand.  “We hate Nottingham Forest” continue the Derby fans and it feels like the world is falling in on me. On the pitch,  Derby seem very enthusiastic, running and jumping and barging about like they’ve all over-dosed on pre-match Sunny Delight.  It’s not pretty to watch but it’s stopping Ipswich from playing much football. “Windows that Wow. Doors that delight” announces the Sir Bobby Robson stand as a Derby player takes a throw.  The Derby goalkeeper is wearing a dayglo orange kit that looks like it might also be worn by staff of the Derbyshire  County Council highways department.

Nineteen minutes have gone the way of the previous twenty-nine and a half days of August and the Derby fans chant “Football in a library, do-do-do”, illustrating how human evolution seems to be standing still.  A break by Kasey McAteer, and a cross leads to Leif Davis having Town’s first decent shot on goal but it bounces conveniently into the arms of the man from the highways department, and Town begin to get to grips with Derby’s WWF inspired style of play.   Twenty-seven minutes are up and Town earn a corner.  “Come on you Blues” chant a handful of us lamely.  Five minutes later a Conor Chaplin shot earns another corner.  More half-hearted chants but they’re all Town need and as the ball sails over the flailing fist of the bloke from the Council, Jacob Greaves applies a stooping header, the humblest of all headers, to put Town one-nil up.

With Town ahead, it’s only a matter of two minutes before the first Derby player is booked for dissent as the Sunny Delight hangover begins to kick-in.  “Come on Town, this is good” shouts the bloke behind me and Town win another corner from which Dara O’Shea hits a post with a header before the referee laughably books McAteer, seemingly for over-optimistically jumping alongside the man from the Council who is eight centimetres taller than him.  Two minutes of additional time follow, in which Town win a fourth corner but nothing more.

Half-time is a time to talk to Ray, reflect on his forthcoming birthday which features a zero at the end and discuss why Kasey McAteer was booked. Even as a former county highways department employee Ray does not know.  On my way back to my seat Pat from Clacton tells me not to swap my seat with the same bloke again because he’s been getting on her nerves too.

The game re-starts, and I eat a Slovakian Horalky wafer bar to help my body forget the memory of what I consumed in the Fanzone.  I’m not sure if my lack of concentration whilst eating is partly to blame, but there is also a sudden lack of concentration in the Town defence and some bloke in a white shirt has to be chased into the penalty area by Leif Davis, who is then adjudged to have handled the ball as he dives in to block a shot and Derby are awarded a penalty, which one of them scores.  Despite the equalising goal, which the balance of play suggests they should be slightly embarrassed about, Derby’s players are haranguing the referee seemingly wanting Davis sent off for the handball.  Quite why these players are not booked or even sent off for unsporting behaviour is a mystery, especially when George Hirst is then booked for alleged diving and weirdly we’re all wishing we still had VAR.

With the scores once again level, Derby clearly intend not to go behind again and have evidently decided the best way to do this is to ensure as little football as possible takes place in the remaining thirty-five minutes. At times the game now resembles a match involving the Keystones Cops and American Civil War soldiers as players comically fall about and then lay on the pitch like extras from the scene in Gone With the Wind after the battle of Atlanta.  “Shit referee, shit referee, shit referee” chant the home support imaginatively.  “We forgot you were here” reply the Derby fans also failing to roll back the frontiers of witty ripostes before doing it again by once more chanting “Football in a library, do-do-do”.

Time moves on and the inevitable rash of substitutions are made with twenty-two minutes left of normal time.  Two minutes later another lack of concentration in the Town defence sees both O’Shea and Greaves miss the ball to allow some brutish part-time actor from Derby to score and give his team the lead. Town win a corner, another substitution is made and we are told by the excitable young stadium announcer that we number 29,155 and 1,144 of us are supporting the bunch that are currently winning and have a road mender for a goalkeeper.

With time not unexpectedly continuing to ebb away into the abyss, Town struggle against  Derby’s “tactic” of not wanting any one to play football and the bloke behind me announces that “Nobody seems to want it”, although Chuba Akpom’s shot that goes narrowly over the bar doesn’t really back him up. Certainly, it seems many supporters don’t want to witness the final whistle, and the stands would only empty out more quickly if Nigel Farage had made a guest appearance.  Help eventually comes from an unexpected source as it is announced that there will be a minimum of thirteen minutes additional time, and I think I detect a sudden dash to the toilets amongst anxious Derby fans.  As the additional time, unfortunately, proves no better than the wasted time it replaces,  it seems like maybe my prevailing emotion on a Saturday evening will once  again be disappointment.

But then, as once more and then once more again Town sling the ball into the Derby penalty area, the referee awards a penalty.  I couldn’t see why from the far end of the ground, but in the absence of VAR I trust the referee who obviously knows what he’s doing, on this occasion.  Jack Clarke steps up to take the penalty as the blokes behind me agree that they would have Ashley Young take it and the bloke next to me holds his head in his hands and seems to weep as he says “Not, Jack Clarke, please not Jack Clarke.”  But happily, yes, Jack Clarke,  as he takes one of the best penalties by an Ipswich player that I think I’ve ever seen, striking the ball hard and into a corner and with a bit of a curl on it too for good measure.  There’s still time to win I say to myself, but it turns out there isn’t.

Inevitably, with sixteen minutes of additional time having been played, on hearing the final whistle people don’t hang about.  I too turn and head for the exit and my train home to reflect on what despite the last minute goal, still feels like a disappointing afternoon; that beer in the Fanzone was disgusting.

Ipswich Town 1 Southampton 1

/ martinpbrooks / 2 Comments

My wife Paulene grew up in the city of Portsmouth like her parents and their parents before them.  Her father was present at Wembley to see victorious Pompey lift the FA Cup in 1939 and was a regular at Fratton Park before he got married.  Paulene started watching Pompey in the late 1960’s and hers is one of the names on the wall behind the North Stand at Fratton Park which records those who bought shares to keep the club alive and take it out of administration back in 2011.   Today, my team Ipswich Town play Pompey’s bitter rivals Southampton and must win, and by several goals.  The reason for this is that Paulene will then be in my debt because yesterday Pompey lost to flippin’ Norwich.

Weirdly, it’s Sunday, and almost every other team in whatever league it is Ipswich now play in have already played.  To make matters even more confusing, kick-off is at 12 o’clock, barely giving time for the God-fearing to get home from church before heading for the match.  Untroubled by such matters however, I have already checked that ‘The Arb’ will be opening early, and after a breakfast of all manner of things left in the fridge and then introduced to a frying pan, I am heading to the railway station in sandals, shorts and t-shirt beneath an ITFC bucket hat and a blazing August sun.  Despite my outwardly sunny disposition, I can’t help but quietly question what I’m doing embarking on yet another season of probable anguish and despair.   After all, we reached the ‘promised land’ last year and it turned out to be something of a disappointment, why bother trying to go back?  It was like saving up for a luxury holiday, expecting to stay at the Hotel de Paris in Monte Carlo and then finding yourself with half-board in a B & B in Lowestoft.

Just like last season, Gary joins me on the train at the first station stop.  Our conversation joins the dots between now and last May before we look for polar bears on the rolling slopes of Wherstead.  Opposite us sits an inscrutable, full-faced and bearded man in dark glasses, who looks so miserable he makes me want to laugh.  He has a face to ward-off evil spirits.  As ever, due to careful planning our carriage draws up by the lower of the two foot bridges that span the tracks at Ipswich station, and having negotiated the ticket barriers we make for the Arb via Portman Road and its ice cream kiosks that sell programmes.  But today there is a technical issue at the first kiosk, a queue at the second and so I buy my programme from a large young bloke with just a two-wheeled, blue trolley with a stick on it bearing a sign that says “programmes”. To my horror the programme now costs four pounds. “Four pounds!” I exclaim. “Yes, everything is going up” says the large young bloke sounding like the voice of experience.  “How much were programmes when you first came to Portman Road?” asks Gary. “Five pence” I tell him, and for that you would also get a Football League Revue which cost five-pence on its own.  I wonder why at French football matches programmes are free, and speculate that if everyone at the game was given a programme it might be possible to charge more for the advertising.  On the plus side, the front cover of the programme features a painted portrait of Dara O’Shea with Umbro badge to the fore.  The painting is in a conventional style by an artist called Louise Cobbold but I look forward in the weeks to come to enjoying the faces of Luke Woolfenden and  Ali Al-Hamadi as they might have been seen by Francis Bacon, Lucian Freud or Picasso.

Since yesterday Gary has had a bad ankle.  He tells me he drove to Braintree and when he got out of his car his ankle hurt.  Our journey to the Arb is therefore a slow and arduous one and by the time we get there I feel a lot like Mao Zedong and the Red Army must have at the end of ‘Long March’, but minus the revolutionary fervour.   I buy a pint of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride for myself and a pint of Estrella Galicia for Gary (£10.50 for the two with Camra discount) because The Arb no longer sells Lager 43.  Like a twit, I pronounce ‘Galicia’ as I imagine a Spanish person would, I think it’s my age.  Beers in hands, we retire to the beer garden to mourn the absence of Mick, who is at a wedding in Scotland, and to talk of films, immigration and the town of Bromley.  Gary later buys another round of pints of Suffolk Pride and Galicia too.

It’s just gone twenty-five to twelve when we head for Portman Road; we leave a little early because of Gary’s painful ankle but proudly we’re still the last people to go.  We part ways near where Alf Ramsey’s statue stands hands in pockets perhaps wondering why football fans sing about Bobby Robson but not him, even though he won the League and the World Cup and Sir Bobby won neither.  I saunter past queues for the turnstiles in Portman Road but at the back of the Sir Alf Ramsey stand emergency measures are in place and as I arrive hopeful spectators are being ushered through the side entrance past recent building works and a sign that reads ‘Broadcasters Toilet’, which I hope is specially adapted to flush away what comes out of their mouths.

I make it into the company of the man from Stowmarket (Paul), Fiona, Pat from Clacton, ever-present Phil who never misses a game, and his son Elwood before the excitable young stadium announcer finishes telling us who ‘our’ team are today.  In the time-honoured manner, I bawl the players’ surnames out as if I was at the Stade du Roudourou in Guingamp or Stade Saint-Symphorien in Metz. It’s as if I’d never been away, or indeed to either of those stadiums and oddly enough I haven’t.  At the far end of the ground a banner, it’s not really big enough in size or ambition to be called a tifo, reads “Side by side a sea of blue and white” which doesn’t quite sound right but I think I get the general idea.

When the game begins, it is Ipswich who get first go with the ball, which they proceed to boot very effectively towards the goal just in front of me and my fellow ultras.  Naturally enough Town are in traditional blue and white, whilst Southampton are in their usual red stripes and black shorts but have seemingly travelled here through time and have donned the kit that Mike Channon and little Alan Ball used to wear back in the second half through the 1970’s.  Within four minutes Town score as George Hirst nicks a back pass and crosses to Jack Clarke who skilfully sets the ball up for the flamboyantly monikered Taylor Harwood-Bellis to score an own goal.

With promotion assured, we settle down to enjoy the match, the sunshine and the remainder of the season.  Pat from Clacton has had an operation on one of her eyes she tells me, and I guess that’s why she’s looking extra cool in her shades today; and luckily, she’s looking much more cheerful than the bloke in the dark glasses on the train this morning. “Sit down if you love Pompey” sing the Southampton fans and so because we do, we do.  

On the pitch however, things have taken a turn for the worse and Southampton unsportingly won’t let Town have the ball.   The upshot is that it all gets a bit too much and Southampton score an equalising goal with a ‘towering’ header from a bloke called Jay Robinson. All around people agree that “it had been coming”, which philosophically speaking is probably something of a truism because looking back hasn’t everything?    Disappointed, I seek solace in telling Fiona that Southampton’s number thirty-four, Wellington, used to play for Wimbledon. Without hesitation, Fiona gets the joke, possibly because I said the same thing the last time Southampton were at Portman Road.

Wellington is booked before half-time by referee Mr Madley, who has taken to annoying supporters of both teams who accuse him through the medium of a tuneless chant of not knowing what he is doing.  I however think he does know what he is doing and that is the opposite to what we think he should be doing. He proceeds to book Jack Taylor and Azor Matusiwa.

With half-time I vent excess Suffolk Pride and then reacquaint myself with Ray and his grandson Harrison  who have spent the summer attending gigs, concerts and happenings and are soon due to see Tom Jones.  I hope Ray has a clean pair of knickers to throw at the Octogenarian.

After the somewhat uneasy first-half in which Southampton would probably claim to have been the better team, in the second half it soon becomes clear that whatever Kieran McKenna said at half time to his players was much more worth listening to than whatever the ginger Anglo-Belgian Will Still said.  Sammie Szmodics hits a post and the ball defies the laws of physics by bouncing back to the goalkeeper instead of into the net and Jadon Philogene executes a spectacular overhead scissor kick.  There are other chances for Town too, whilst as a tall slim man, for Southampton I find Adam Armstrong and Ryan Frazer antagonisingly stocky.

Wellington is substituted by Will Still before he plays an hour and Fiona and I are disappointed but not surprised when he’s not replaced by Orinoco.  Pat from Clacton tells me she’s having a baked potato for tea, with chicken and salad. Southampton’s number 18 Mateus Fernandes shoots over the Town cross bar from a free-kick and then smacks the palm of one hand obliquely across the other in a gesture that says ‘darn my luck’ or, if Google translate can be believed ‘droga a minha sorte’ in Portuguese.  The excitable young stadium announcer goes on to thank us for our being 29,128 in number today and almost as a final act before declaring the game over, Mr Madley books Southampton’s Shea Charles in the manner of a man who enjoys being the architect of the practical joke.  Madley allows Charles to walk away from the scene of his crime, before suddenly calling him back and thrusting the yellow card at him the moment he turns around.  It’s a decent finale to a match that wouldn’t otherwise have one.

I don’t hang about after the final whistle and leave for the railway station to the sound of people reluctantly saying it was probably a fair result.  I’m not sure my wife Paulene will think it was and I may have some explaining to do, but at least we didn’t lose.