Ipswich Town

Ipswich Town 2 Oxford United 1

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I just can’t help it but this morning I feel bright and optimistic. It’s the dawn of a new year, I had a good night’s sleep, a pale winter sun is shining, and I still haven’t forgotten Ipswich Town’s fabulous two-nil win at top-of-the-table, previously unbeaten at home Coventry City last Monday evening.  So cheerful am I that I can’t help feeling that everyone else must feel the same too.  Indeed, supporting my theory, yesterday in a work e-mail from my boss, he couldn’t resist telling me that he too was still “buzzing” from Monday’s win.   To add to the mix, today Town are playing Oxford United, who are just part of the sludge at the bottom of what I call the second division.

I’m not sure that I am buzzing or have ever buzzed, but I think I can at least lay claim to a pleasant hum as I make for the railway station, where the train arrives on time and I sit next to a man who will remain almost bent double over his mobile phone all the way to Ipswich.  Gary joins me at the first station stop and after the usual polite enquiries about our respective Christmases, he is eager to tell me about how Celtic lost the 1926 Scottish FA Cup final two-nil to St Mirren wearing white shirts.  Being at best still Medieval in outlook, Celtic blamed the shirts for their defeat and quickly off-loaded them onto Barhill Football Club in Ayrshire, who had conveniently just written to both Celtic and Rangers asking if they had any old kit they didn’t want.  The punchline to Gary’s tale of silly Scottish superstition resulting in generosity is a photo on Gary’s phone of four Barhill footballers, one of whom is Gary’s grandfather, each wearing one of the said shirts.  The story is the highlight of today’s journey because we fail to spot a single polar bear as the train eases down the gentle incline through Wherstead into Ipswich.

In historic, interesting Ipswich the sun still shines as we make our way down Princes Street and Portman Road and then uphill towards ‘the Arb’ on High Street.  Pints of Lager 43 and Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride (Eight pounds something for the two with Camra discount) are soon sitting before us in the beer garden, where we talk of Gary having only watched Tanzania in the African Cup of Nations on the telly, whilst I have watched at least some of almost every game.   Our conversation progresses onto  the defining characteristics and dates of Generations X, Y, Z, the “Great Generation” and the “Silent Generation”,  the merits of Dad’s Army, Porridge, the Detectorists and Morecambe and Wise, and the novel ‘The Ragged Trousered Philanthropist’ by Robert Tressell, which we decide is as relevant today as it was when it was first published in 1914.  By the time Gary fetches two more pints our fellow drinkers in the beer garden are fewer in number than they were, and eventually at twenty to three we retain our record of being last to leave.

Gary and I part ways somewhere near the statue of Sir Alf Ramsey, bidding each other adieu until next Saturday’s eagerly awaited FA Cup tie versus Blackpool.  As has become normal, there are no queues outside the Sir Alf Ramsey Stand, only men in black of mostly south Asian heritage each brandishing some sort of hand-held detection equipment. For a moment as I pass through the famed turnstile sixty-two, I speculate whether a sitcom set outside a football ground and amounting to Citizen Kahn meets The Detectorists could be funny.   Having never watched Citizen Kahn I decide I ‘m not going to know.

After venting spent Suffolk Pride I emerge into the lower tier of the Sir Alf Ramsey stand just as the excitable young stadium announcer is reading out the Ipswich Town team and failing to co-ordinate his reading with the players’ names appearing on the score board.  I bellow out the players’ surnames, nevertheless, sounding like the echo to a public address system more than I do the crowd at Stade de l’Aube in Troyes or Stade de Furiani in Bastia. Before the na-na-nas of The Beatles’ Hey Jude can ring in the new year I wish a happy new one to Pat from Clacton and Fiona and nod to ever-present Phil who never misses a game and who is accompanied by his son Elwood, although the man from Stowmarket (Paul) is once again absent.

The final prelude to the match beginning is a minute’s applause for recently deceased former Town player Robin Turner, who in ten years started only twenty-nine games with thirty-three as substitute, but nevertheless famously kept Town on course for the 1978 FA Cup with two goals away to Bristol Rovers.  The respect shown for Robin is only very slightly diminished by the scoreboard at the Sir Bobby Robson Stand end of the ground showing his name as ‘Robin Tuner 1955-2025’, but it sounds worse than it looks as if aurally he might have been related to that Lesley Dolphin on Radio Suffolk.

When the game eventually begins it is today’s opponents Oxford United who get first go with the ball, which after a couple of short passes they boot in the general direction of Cumberland Towers and the YMCA.  Town soon have possession however, which they rarely lose, but they seldom make much of it either, although it feels like it will just be a matter of time before they do.   Oxford lack bold intentions and it smacks of gloating by Oxford tourist guides grown big-headed on fancy college architecture when their supporters’ chant that Ipswich is a “shit ‘ole”, when plainly it’s not.  But weak revenge is wrought on the hopefully thinned skinned academic visitors with the words ‘Cambridge Windows’ scrolling across the front of the Sir Bobby Robson Stand in brightly illuminated letters.  “Is this a library?” chant the Oxonians ironically in response, as if they don’t know what a library is and before anyone can chant “Oh fuck off you privileged twats”  to the tune of something by Gaz Coombes of Supergrass, they launch into “Football in a library , do-do-do” just like every other bunch of away supporters that ever visits Portman Road.

“Columbus Mechanical” announces the Sir Bobby Robson stand illuminations, and then “We are Columbus”.  I ask, but Fiona has no more idea of who Columbus might be than I do before she has a conversation with Pat from Clacton about this year’s pantomimes.  The sky has turned from blue to pale grey, Eggy loops a shot lazily over the Oxford crossbar. Only twelve minutes have dissolved into the past and Town win a corner. “Come On You Blues” I bellow, and perhaps as many as half a dozen people join in or at least turn round to stare at the idiot making all the noise. The early pussyfooting has gone; the corner came to nought but five minutes on and Town now attack with pace and clever passes. Oxford intercept the ball, they think it’s all over, but Chuba Akpom wrestles the ball back, Jaden Philogene advances feints, turns, twists feints again and shoots, and Town lead 1-0. Wow. I can feel myself smiling so much it makes me smile some more.

So how many more can we score? Eggy crosses to the far post, Davis heads the ball back and Philogene swipes the ball narrowly over the angle of post and bar from 12 metres or so.  As a brief side-show Oxford’s Siriki Dembele, who has replaced the poorly spelt and now injured Tyler Goodrham, looks to shadow box Town’s Darnell Furlong and is booked for his trouble by referee Mr Finnie, another one of those small, very neat men who seem attracted to officiating.

A half an hour has disappeared into the past and strangely Oxford have a corner. “Yellows, Yellows, Yellows” chant the Oxonians up in the corner of the Cobbold Stand, and some big bloke wearing a yellow shirt heads high over the Town goal.  Then Oxford equalise.  A poorly protected left flank, an unhindered run to the penalty area, an exchange of passes and someone with the unlikely surname of Lankshear scores.   We have ten minutes to live until half-time.  In the fifth of those minutes Furlong surges into the Oxford penalty area, squares from the by-line and Chuba Akpom diverts the ball into the Oxford net, well wide of goalkeeper Jamie Cumming. Town lead 2-1 and the world’s natural order is restored.

Forty-two minutes lost to the past and Nunez shoots, Town have another corner. “Come On You Blues” I bawl, but the Oxford goalkeeper gathers.  “Down with the Norwich, You’re going down with the Norwich” sing the Sir Bobby Robson standers to the tune of ‘Guantanamerra’, although stupidly keen to imagine university-based puns I like to think they are singing “sent down with the Norwich, you’re being sent down with the Norwich”.   “Two-one and you still don’t sing” is the Oxonians momentarily inaccurate but understandable response, followed up with an ironic “Your support is fucking shit” from a group of fans who would need to have bought two seats each to fill their allotted space in the Cobbold Stand.  Jaden Philogene shoots wide and three minutes are stolen from the future never to be returned, and are added to the first half.

With the half-time hiatus I vent more spent Suffolk Pride and then head for Ray, his son Michael and grandson Harrison at the front of the stand, stopping briefly to speak with Dave the steward on the way.   I tell Harrison to check out a music artiste called Spencer Cullum, whilst Ray tells me he won’t be at the next match because he is off on a cruise in the Caribbean; I hope it’s not on a Venezuelan fishing boat.

The football resumes at five past four as Portman Road is briefly enveloped in a radiant, pink sky like the backwash to an unexpected mid-afternoon aurora borealis.  Two more Town corners ensue and along with Oxford’s Brown, Chuba Akpom’s name is entered, no doubt very neatly into Mr Finnie’s notebook when his ire is stoked by the rough conduct of the Oxford defender. “Hot Sausage Company” read the Sir Bobby Robson stand illuminations.  As the violence continues, Helik scythes down Akpom and the home crowd jeer, singing “Who the fuckin’ ‘ell are you” to the tune of “Cwm Rhondda”, boastful of their ignorance of the Polish international defender.  Mr Finnie again licks the end of his pencil and re-opens his notebook.  “We forgot that you were here” sing the Oxonians, again ironically because judging by the empty seats in the away enclosure many of them genuinely aren’t here, although at £38 a ticket I can’t say I blame them. Whatever happened to ‘twenty’s plenty’?

Almost two-thirds of our afternoon’s ‘football experience’ has been experienced. Leif Davis crosses low, Nunez shoots, Cumming saves and Town have another corner.  Fiona and Pat from Clacton discuss Pat’s handbag.  Pat says she won’t get the masturbating monkey lucky charm out today, it’s too cold; anyway, we’re still winning. A Town free-kick is awarded; Nunez curls the ball over the defensive wall towards the top corner of the goal, but Cumming claws the ball away spectacularly.

It’s time for substitutions and Eggy and Nunez leave, making way for Wes Burns and Jack Clarke.  “Burns, Burns will tear you apart, again” predict the Sir Bobby Robson standers with help from Joy Division.  There is another Town corner and we are thanked for our incredible support by the excitable young stadium announcer, who tells us that we number 28,199.  Will Vaulks completes the neat list of Oxford names in Mr Finnie’s notebook, yet more substitutions are made and yet another Town corner and even an Oxford corner come and go.  At last, another additional three minutes are drawn from the infinite bank of time and then Town are up to second place in the league table because Middlesbrough have lost; vanquished Oxford face the ignominy of being one place below Norwich City who have beaten some Park Rangers belonging to the Queen.

The new year has begun, Ipswich Town have played and I’m still feeling optimistic.  As Pat from Clacton told me earlier, it’s the Chinese year of the horse, which it was in 1978 when Town won the FA Cup and in 1990, 2002 and 2014 when they didn’t.

Ipswich Town 1 Stoke City 0

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Matches against Stoke City always remind me of a bloke I knew when I was at university in the late 1970’s called Tony.  Tony was from Wolverhampton and had a thick West Midlands accent but supported Stoke City, or “Stowke” as his accent forced him to call them.  Tony, however, was what many people might term “a bit of an oik” and as well liking to boast that he had “shagged the Chief Constable’s daughter”, (Staffordshire’s or West Midlands’ I assumed), he also once defecated into a milk bottle and regularly claimed that he only went to Stoke City matches for the violence, or “vorlence” as his accent called it.  Oddly, however, he was also a really nice bloke.

Also a really nice bloke is my friend Gary, although he has no discernible accent and as far as I know has never been carnally involved with any relative of a senior police officer.   I must remember to ask him one day what he does with his empty milk bottles.    Gary joins me on the train to Ipswich, which a text from Greater Anglia has told me is running a little late this evening.  Unperturbed, we talk of the World Cup and Gary tells me how the city of Seattle, which has been nominated as one of the venues for World Cup matches, had decided to combine one of its match days with a Gay Pride Day.  The Gay Pride Day was chosen before the World Cup draw took place and when the draw was made last Friday Seattle discovered that on its Gay Pride Day it would be hosting Iran versus Egypt.  I laugh out loud as does the woman opposite us.

We arrive in Ipswich more than two hours before kick-off, but the floodlights of Portman Road are already shining, and Ipswich is aglow with electric light from lamp posts, buses, traffic signs, headlights and windows.  The sky is a deepening dark blue and the tarmac of the roads shiny black. The red and white stripes of a Stoke City shirt peak out from beneath a jumper. Gary and I hasten as best we can to ‘the Arb’, which isn’t quite as busy as usual, probably because it is mid-week.  First to the bar, I buy a pint of Lager 43 for Gary and a pint of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride and, impressed by Mick’s lunchtime snack on Saturday order a Falafel Scotch egg for myself, before we retire to the beer garden to drink, eat and wait for Mick.

Mick arrives just as Gary returns from the bar with more Lager43 and more Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride; at my suggestion he also has a pint of Suffolk Pride for the previously imminent Mick.   We talk of relatives’ funerals, Gary’s grandfather, who was a member of the Communist Party, and I tell of how I was watching Toulouse v Strasbourg on tv at the weekend and how when Strasbourg replaced Diego Moreira with substitute Martial Godo I remarked that I had been waiting for him to come on.  In fact, however, I had been waiting for some club or other to sign a player called Godot, or Godo as it turned out, so I could make that joke.

The beer garden begins to empty out as other drinkers fold and head for Portman Road, but like the carefree over-sixties that we are Mick gets another round in; rather curiously a gin and tonic for Gary this time, but I have another pint of Suffolk Pride and  Mick, eager for alcohol has a pint of Leffe.  Gary then tells us about a friend of his who went to Ireland and wanted to buy a newspaper in a village shop, but all the newspapers were dated the day before.   When he asked if they had any of today’s newspapers, the shopkeeper told him yes, but he’ll need to come back tomorrow.   We continue to laugh and drink and enjoy living before I suddenly notice that it’s twenty-six minutes past seven and we probably ought to go.

Once again, down in Portman Road where I can already hear the excitable young stadium announcer excitedly announcing the Town team, there are no queues at the entrances to the Sir Alf Ramsey Stand and I breeze through, throwing my aeroplane pose as I’m cleared of carrying any weapons by a man in dark clothing and a hi-vis jacket with a hand-held scanner.  Another similarly attired man tries to scan me again as I reach the famous turnstile 62 but rather than tell him I’ve already been scanned I just say “Oooh, I’m gonna be scanned twice”, which perhaps oddly, perhaps not, seems enough to deter him.

After venting spent Suffolk Pride, I arrive in the strangely sulphurous smelling stand to edge past Pat from Clacton and Fiona to my seat just as everyone bursts into respectful, appreciative applause for former Town goalkeeper David Best, who has died this week at the age of eighty-two.  I don’t know why, but I always think of David Best in the context of the night Town beat Real Madrid, but also wearing a red goalkeeper’s jersey, flying horizontally across the face of the goal in front of the North Stand to perfectly catch a shot and, when he spoke to me as he autographed my Texaco Cup final programme, having the sort of Dorset accent that I imagined belonged in the fictional creations of Thomas Hardy . Incidentally, David Best was for a while manager of Dorchester Town (Casterbridge) where Hardy had lived.

There’s barely time after the minute’s applause for Fiona and ever-present Phil who never misses a game to each hand me a Christmas card before the match begins.  It’s Stoke City who get first go with the ball, which they propel in the general direction of the Brewer’s Arms on Orford Street and the former Spiritualist church on Anglesea Road, whilst sporting their handsome traditional kit of red and white striped shirts and white shorts.   I will later notice however that the red stripes are all a bit wavy as if the kit designer had spent a long lunch hour in the Brewer’s Arms or was trying to convey the sort of weird ghostly aura normally accompanied by the made-up word “Woo-oooh”.  Happily, Town are in their standard blue and white and perhaps as a direct result of this soon have possession of the ball, are advancing down the left, exchanging a couple of passes and Jaden Philogene is cutting inside at the edge of the penalty area to curl the ball inside the far post of the Stoke City goal.  Town lead one-nil, and the game is barely two minutes old.  Every match should be like this I tell Fiona.

Two minutes later however, and Stoke have a corner, and three minutes after that their supporters are singing “Football in a library” and then “Your support is fucking shit” as they embark on a desperate attempt to make us feel bad about ourselves.  Stoke also start to dominate possession.  Behind me a bloke has his scarf wrapped over the top his head. “Dress rehearsal for your nativity play?” asks the bloke next to him.  Sixteen more minutes of winning one-nil elapse and Town dismantle the Stoke City defence again, only for Ivor Azon to shoot high and wide from a metre or so inside the penalty area with Stoke defenders scattered like shards of broken pottery.  The bloke behind me thinks he sees Nunez chuckling.

“One of you singing, there’s only one of you singing” chant the Stoke fans to an oblivious audience, and Jack Taylor generously allows time for the whole Stoke team to receive remedial coaching on the touchline as he receives treatment from a Town physio for some ailment or other.  “Who’s the Stoke manager?” asks Fiona, but I tell her I don’t know and all Fiona can come up with is Tony Pulis.  Later on, I will remember the name Tony Waddington, but Wikipedia will tell me he died in 1994.

The game re-starts and Stoke still keep the ball most of the time, but without ever looking like scoring.  I realise I recognise Stoke’s Nzonzi, having seen him play previously on the telly for Rennes and then I realise he even came on as a substitute for France in the 2018 World Cup final.  “Addy, Addy, Addy-O” sing the Sir Bobby Robson standers out of the blue, perhaps to celebrate the twenty-sixth minute but possibly in an attempt to encourage Town to keep possession of the ball a bit more often.  The chanting of “Come-On Ipswich”, a few minutes later, which sounds more like pleading, betrays our anxiety despite still being a goal ahead.  But gradually the chanting and pleading starts to work, and Town dominate the final ten minutes of the half, even inspiring more confident sounding but boringly repetitive chants of “Blue Army”, whilst Nunez and Philogene both shoot on target but at the Stoke goalkeeper, and Nunez also shoots wide.   

Three minutes of added on time are added on and then it’s time to leak more spent Suffolk Pride before speaking with Ray, his son Michael and grandson Harrison.  When asked by Ray for my thoughts on the game so far, I tell him that despite seemingly never having the ball, Ipswich look like the only team likely to score.  The football comes back at nine minutes to nine and Town soon have their first corner of the game in what will become a better half for the Town in which Stoke look even less like scoring than they did in the first half; although Pat from Clacton woke up with a blood-shot left eye this morning and so even if we did score again, it would be a bit blurry to her. 

Five minutes pass and it’s about now that I notice that the stripes on the Stoke shirts are not straight but a bit wiggly, and not for the first time when watching a team in red and white stripes I am reminded of Signal toothpaste.  Signal co-incidentally and appropriately, given tonight’s opponents, also being the name of the fictional local newspaper in Arnold Bennett’s passingly football-related, 1910, Potteries located novel ‘The Card’.  More Town corners ensue.  “Your support is fucking shit” opine the travelling “Stokies” as they ironically become the first set of away fans in well over two years to fail to fill at least half of the away section.  Not surprisingly, their chants are greeted with disinterested silence, which is followed later by confirmation that tonight’s attendance is a meagre 27,008, the lowest of the season so far.   The drop in attendance and therefore income is large enough to mean that at least one player won’t be getting paid this week.

Only fifteen minutes of normal time remain by now and later than usual Keiran McKenna dives into the world of multiple substitutions as Eggy, Azon and Taylor go for a sit down and Clarke, Cajuste and Akpom get to run around for a bit. Ten minutes left and Azor Matusiwa becomes the first player to be booked tonight by the referee, Mr Adam Herczeg, who is a sucker for giving a free-kick when anyone falls over. Meanwhile, Pat from Clacton won’t be having a baked potato when she gets in tonight, but she will have something cheesy from Marks & Spencer with a latte and she won’t be go to bed until midnight.  As for me, I wish my bed was just the other side of my front door so I could step straight into it when I get indoors.

The final ten minutes ebbs and flows a bit more than has been the pattern up to now but it’s Ipswich who should score and don’t.  Behind me a bloke complains that if he’d only known there would be no more goals he could have gone home after two minutes.   The game soon ends in the second and final minute of the unexpectedly brief period of added on time following a Stoke City corner, which doubtless has legions of pessimistic Ipswich fans anticipating going home disappointed.  With the final whistle, Pat from Clacton and Fiona disappear like water vapour, although Fiona does turn to say good-bye, which water vapour never does.  I applaud briefly and then, conscious that I have perhaps nine minutes in which to catch my train make a bolt for the exits.

It’s been a decent game again tonight, mainly because Ipswich have won again, but despite Stoke dominating possession by a reported 57% to 43%, Town have apparently had twice as many shots at goal (16) and six times as many shots on target.   Statistics are however famously boring and do nothing for one’s personal safety.  On my way back to the railway station therefore I instead keep a look out for any angry looking Stoke fans brandishing milk bottles. 

Halesworth Town 3 Haverhill Rovers 1

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Between March 2017 and April 2019, I watched matches at each one of Suffolk’s then twenty-four senior football clubs and recounted my experiences in this here blog.  Since then, Debenham Leisure Centre and Whitton United have sadly dropped out of senior football but this season the Eastern Counties League First Division North has welcomed two more Suffolk clubs into the fold in the shape of Kings Park Rangers, who are from Great Cornard but seemingly too shy to admit it, and Halesworth Town, who are proudly, clearly from Halesworth. 

Today, with Ipswich Town playing far too far away in deepest Wales to trouble me to even think of getting a ticket, even if I had enough ‘points,’ I am travelling up to Halesworth in part one of my plan to restore my record of having seen all of Suffolk’s senior teams on their home turf.  Fortuitously, today’s fixture is also an all-Suffolk cup-tie against Haverhill Rovers of the Eastern Counties Premier League, and the first time Halesworth Town have ever reached the second round of the FA Vase.   To add to the adventure even more, despite the additional twenty minutes each way that it will take me, I am responsibly reducing congestion on the roads by eschewing making the 88-kilometre journey from my home by planet saving Citroen e-C4 in favour of taking the train (£18.10 return with senior railcard). It also means I can get plastered if I choose to.

It’s an intermittently cloudy but mild November day as I set off for Halesworth, but I am nevertheless surprised as I wait for the train that one of my fellow travellers appears to have forgotten to put on any trousers or a skirt.  Once on the train, the infinite variety of human life continues to reveal itself as a small man of pensionable age repeats the names of the station stops as they are heard over the public address system; every now and then he delves headfirst into a large carrier bag as if checking on the wellbeing of a small animal or perhaps a baby.  When the woman sitting opposite me goes to the buffet car, she asks me to mind her belongings. I of course agree but tell her she needs to be back before we get to Ipswich.   When she returns, I tell her I had to fight off a couple of people who looked interested in her jacket but otherwise everything has been fine.  Fortunately, she laughs, but the man of east Asian origin next to me looks at me askance and when she begins to struggle to open a bottle of drink, he very quickly offers to help so that she doesn’t have to deal with the looney opposite her again.  The woman soon begins to chew on a large sandwich and a younger man on the other side of the aisle between the seats does the same thing, but takes much bigger bites, happily from a different sandwich, although with every bite he looks like he might lose a finger.

I change trains at Ipswich, boarding the 13:16 to Lowestoft, which departs a good twelve seconds early.  I like the East Suffolk line, to me it feels like a one-hundred- and seventy-year-old umbilical cord connecting the outside world to rural Suffolk with its rustic sounding stations such as Campsea Ashe and Darsham and their Victorian architecture.  Between the stations are Suffolk landscapes of river and marsh, Oak and Broom, sheep and pigs, outwash sands and boulder clay and gaunt, grey, flint church towers.  As the guard checks passengers’ tickets, he helpfully advises those alighting at Halesworth not to use the doors in the front carriage, because the Halesworth station platform is not that long.  There seem to be quite a few of us alighting at Halesworth.

The train arrives on time in Halesworth, where the sun shines from a pale blue autumn sky. A helpful sign points and tells pedestrians that it’s a seven-minute walk to the town centre and a minute’s walk to local bus stops on Norwich Road. Sadly however, no sign points helpfully towards Halesworth Town football ground, although having previously consulted the interweb I happen to know it is very close indeed, perhaps no more than a hefty goal-kick away.   I walk up an alley between the railway lines and Halesworth Police station, a huge four-storey block of a building, which although it probably dates from the1960’s makes me think of a Norman castle keep, built to keep the locals in check.  At the top of the alley, I turn right over a bridge above the railway and then right again down another alley the other side of the tracks, and down to the Ipswich bound railway platform. From here it is no more than 150 metres up Dairy Hill to the football ground, making it a toss-up between Halesworth and Newmarket as to which senior Suffolk football ground is most easily accessible by rail, my money’s on Halesworth.

Despite its attractive name, Dairy Hill is just an uninspiring street of modest modern houses; from the top I make my way across the stony club car park and along the back of the club house to the ground entrance.  For a mere seven pounds I gain a programme (£1.00) and entry to the match as an over sixty-five, all that is missing is the click of a turnstile.  The ground itself is underwhelming, but it does boast a decent looking pitch with a smart timber fence all around and a small stand at the end nearest the clubhouse, which according to ground grading rules needs to be big enough to accommodate fifty spectators, although I’m not sure if FA rules say how large or small the spectators need to be.  The height of Halesworth’s stand suggests they should not be significantly taller than about 1.8 metres unless wearing crash helmets.

I head for the club house where the bar offers the usual array of fizzy lagers and cider and a pump which intriguingly bears the name ‘Wainwright’ written in biro on a plain white sticky label.  The barman generously allows me a sampler of the ‘Wainwright’ and seeing as there’s nothing-else I might like I order a pint (£4.60) before heading outside again to visit the food trailer, where a tall man with tattooed arms, who looks like men in food trailers often do serves me chilli, chips and cheese for a modest six pounds, less than half what I paid for much the same thing in an Ipswich pub earlier this week. 

I return to the club house to eat my chips and drink my beer, not being someone who likes to eat or drink standing up.  The club house looks like there might be an older timber building, which has had a new roof and supporting structure placed over the top of it, it smells a little like that too, having a faint musty odour which isn’t uncommon in old village halls and clubhouses.  The black and white interior décor and monochrome photos of old teams on the walls remind me a little of the Long Melford club house before it was re-built.

With chips eaten and beer drunk, I wait outside for kick-off, observing the growing crowd and the queue to get in at the gate, before standing closer to where the two teams will line up before the procession on to the pitch to shake hands and then observe the minute’s silence for remembrance day, a silence  which whilst well observed around the pitch plays out to a back ground of chatter from inside the bar and clubhouse, where life continues as usual, oblivious to the  silence outside.

Eventually, it is Haverhill Rovers who begin the game, by getting first go with the ball, which they quickly hoof forward in the general direction of the stand, the railway station and town centre beyond, before it is booted into touch by a Halesworth defender, not unreasonably practicing safety first.  It’s good to see both teams wearing their signature kits, Rovers in a rich shade of all red, whilst Halesworth sport black and white stripes with black shorts. In front of the only stand, a youth bangs the sort of drum I wouldn’t bet against him having been given as a present for his sixth birthday, probably about six years ago.  The bulk of the crowd are lined up behind the post and rail fence along the touchline opposite the dug outs and when Halesworth win the ball they emit an encouraging rustic roar.

Seven minutes have passed and it’s Rovers who are the team kicking the ball most of the time; their number seven Prince Mutswunguma performs a neat turn and a decent cross which is headed over the Halesworth cross bar.  The pattern of the game is generally one where the long ball is favoured over short passes and two minutes later Mutswunguma blazes the ball high above the Halesworth cross bar.  I stroll along the front of the empty stand between it and the pre-pubescent ultras but remain nervous of hitting my head on the low roof.  I stop close to the corner flag, halted by a sign forbidding further progress and disappointingly preventing me from walking round to watch the game from behind or between the dugouts, where the angst and frequent bad language of the managers and coaches is often as entertaining as the match.   I am nevertheless now in a good position to see Rovers’ desperate claims for a penalty as Mutswunguma tumbles under a challenge from number 6, Ollie Allen and then two more players fall over. “Fucking disgraceful” opines a gruff voice from somewhere, either on the pitch or in the dugouts, but I’m not sure if he means not giving a penalty or having the temerity to appeal for one.

Keen to see the game from as many angles as possible I move again, this time to near the corner flag diagonally opposite the one I have been standing by.  I settle near a man in late middle age who sports a Stranglers t-shirt and beanie hat bearing the name of The Rezillos, the excellent late 1970’s Scottish ‘punk’ band fronted by Faye Fife and Eugene Reynolds.  He is on his mobile phone and seems to be arranging a claim on his motor insurance having hit something when parking his car in the club car park.  In my new position I also benefit from a good view of an increasing number of unsuccessful Halesworth breakaways as the home team gain in confidence from repelling all Rovers’ attempts to score.

In goal for Halesworth, George Macrae has made a string of fine saves as Rovers win a succession of corners.  Rovers’ best effort is a shot from Kyle Markwell, whose surname gives a clue to the opposition as to how to treat him, that whistles past a post.  A half an hour is lost to history and Halesworth fashion another breakaway as captain Toby Payne receives a diagonal pass out on the left.  “He’s on!  He’s on! Well, he’s not off” shouts a young man to my left with rising excitement as Rovers’ offside trap is sprung. Payne advances into the penalty box, shapes up to shoot but then side foots weakly too close to the goalkeeper Alex Archer, who doesn’t have to stretch far to prevent a goal.  Two minutes later however Halesworth break again down the left and this time the ball is pulled back from the by-line for Lewis Chenery to score easily into the middle of the Rovers’ goal from no more than 8 metres out and it’s 1-0 to Halesworth Town.

The remaining dozen minutes of the half repeat the established pattern of the previous thirty-three, and another Rovers’ corner is headed wide, which I view from back near the clubhouse as I prepare to be ahead of the queues for the toilet and the tea bar when the referee, the extravagantly monikered Mr Gasson-Cox sounds the half-time whistle.  Having invested in a pound’s worth of tea I take-up a position for the second half just to the right of the stand, but not before I overhear a club official talking to the man on the gate and learn that the attendance today is a stonking two-hundred and fifty-eight.    As the new half begins and the light fades, the lovely smell of the turf rises up from the pitch. A woman standing next to me tells me we will see the goals at this end in the second half and I agree, telling her that with the goal being scored at the other end in the first half, it figures that this is the end where the goals will be scored this half.  We talk a little more and after I reveal I have an Ipswich Town season ticket, she admits to being a Norwich City supporter, but sympathetically I tell her someone has to be.

With the start of the second half at three minutes past four Halesworth seem to have lost a little of the confidence they showed by the end of the first half, perhaps because they realise they have to go through another forty-five minutes similar to the first, and indeed they do. But with twenty minutes gone and no further score it is Rovers who first feel the need to make substitutions.  “Who are ya?” chant the pre-pubescent ultras, as well they might as the new players emerge from the dugout.  Five minutes later and Halesworth’s Tane Backhouse is the first player to see the yellow one of Mr Gasson-Cox’s two cards, although as I become increasingly biased in favour of the home team and their superb goalkeeper, I can’t really figure out why.  Two minutes later and I’m cheering as another characteristic break down the right sees Toby Payne run to the edge of the Rovers penalty area, cut across a little towards the middle and then shoot unerringly inside the far post and Halesworth lead 2-0.  “Oh when the Town go marching in” sing the mini ultras, as do a number of people old enough to know better, but understandably carried away by the moment.

Things get no better for Rovers as after  an innocuous looking foul Mr Gasson-Cox nevertheless seems annoyed with Prince Mutswunguma and standing his ground, summons him over before showing him the yellow card.  “Wemberley, Wemberley” sing the Halesworth fans who should know better but are now too happy to care, but as they do so Rovers, perhaps realising their desperate position with only ten minutes left embark on a final push.   It’s twenty to five as George Macrae makes another fine save, this time diving low to his left. “Two-nil down on your big day out” sing the pre-pubescents, not helping the situation with their cruel taunts and Rovers win another corner.  The corner is cleared but moments later the ball is crossed low from the right and Rovers’ number eleven and captain Jarid Robson half volleys it high into the centre of the goal from a narrow angle and the score is a nerve-wracking 2-1.

It’s now eleven minutes to five, the match is a minute into added on time and Rovers are besieging the Halesworth goal like local Saxons or Danes outside the Norman police station.  A cross comes in from the left, and a Rovers head goes up diverting the ball goalwards but once again George Macrae appears, seemingly from nowhere to save the day again by cleanly catching the ball.  “Six more minutes Haverhill” I hear a voice call, perhaps from the Rovers’ dugout, or perhaps it was Mr Gasson-Cox or someone just mucking about. Six minutes seems an awfully long time given that neither I nor the lady next to me can recall anyone really being injured.  Another Rovers corner goes straight to the arms of Macrae but then Halesworth break away again, bearing down on goal on the right and then switching the ball across the edge of the penalty box before number eleven Alex Husband shoots from a narrow angle and the ball strikes a Rovers defender and arcs up over Archer the goalkeeper and into the goal off the far post.  It’s 3-1 to Halesworth! The game is surely won and the knot of Halesworth players hugging by the corner flag and the under12’s ultras who have run along behind us hoping to celebrate with them clearly think so.

Very soon however, it’s three minutes to five and finally Mr Gasson-Cox parps his whistle for the last time today and Halesworth are into the third round of the FA Vase. Most people wait to cheer and applaud the team as they leave the pitch, but not before they applaud Mr Gasson-Cox the referee and his assistants, which is something you don’t see every day, and then the Haverhill players too.  It’s been a wonderful afternoon, an exciting cup-tie played in front of a large and appreciative crowd, and everyone’s had a lovely time.  As I leave the ground and make my way back across the stony car park and down Dairy Hill to the station I reflect on what a fine little town Halesworth is and how one day I really should return. All hail Halesworth!

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 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.