Ipswich Town 1 Fortuna Dusseldorf 2

July 28, 2024August 1, 2024 / martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

It’s late July already, summer has almost arrived, and so has the new football season. In the Eastern Counties Premier League, the likes of Brantham Athletic and Walsham le Willows are starting their league fixtures today, but I have decided to prolong the sense of anticipation for the ‘real’ stuff and am returning early to Portman Road to witness the friendly between the mighty Blues and Fortuna Dusseldorf, or “Our friends from Germany” as they have become known. I am looking forward to an afternoon of Kraftwerk and altbier.

Pre-season friendlies are strange beasts, and I don’t usually bother with them. Back in the 1970’s my youthful exuberance meant I was as eager to see a Will-hire Cup match against Cambridge United as I was to see any game, but I’m mostly out of exuberance nowadays and I begrudge paying the money just to watch the team train. I last saw Town play a pre-season friendly eight years ago when they met Union St Gilloise from Brussels, a club then in the Belgian second division but now regular Pro-League title challengers, although sadly they never quite manage to win it. The fact that St Gilloise are from Belgium and Fortuna from Germany is significant; I can’t resist seeing teams from abroad, even in friendlies. Maybe I’m pining wistfully for those happy days before that stupid referendum (emphasis on the ‘dum’) cut Britain adrift, or maybe I’m pining wistfully for those happy days when competitive European games were regular entries on Town’s fixture list, or maybe I’m just hoping to catch the lingering scent of strong beer, trams, fine wine, fast trains, chocolate and haute cuisine clinging to the replica shirts of visiting supporters.

As befits late July, it’s a fine, warm day with fluffy clouds heaped up under azure skies. My train (return ticket £9.60 with senior railcard) is on time, and as I step on board the chill of the air-conditioned carriage comes as a bit of a shock, as does the smell of the toilet. Reassuringly, the eletronic sign above the gangway tells me that this service for Ipswich will call at Ipswich. On the opposite side of the gangway to my seat a man with two young boys has a voice that sounds like a very sleepy version of the now deceased comic and Eastenders actor Mike Reid; “…know what I mean?” he says to the boys after he explains that he doesn’t think any football ticket should cost more than £50.00. I see all four polar bears at Jimmy’s farm as the train eases down the hill into Ipswich.

I am meeting Mick today, but by way of a change our rendezvous is at the Station Hotel, where Mick is already eating the sightly odd combination of a toasted cheese sandwich and chips with his friend Chris, whom he previously met off the train from Felixstowe. I join them with a pint of something called Platform Number 9 (£3.90) and we talk of summer signings, locally listed buildings, prostates, American politics, how some of the cheese in Chris’s toasted sandwich hasn’t melted and how I have had an air source heat pump installed this week and thanks to various pipes and ducts the back of my house now looks like the Pompidou Centre. Conversation continues with a further pint of Platform Number 9 for me and a Jameson whisky for Mick (£7.85 for the two), before Chris suggests we make a move for Portman Road, which is exactly what we do.

In Portman Road there are queues for the Cobbold Stand where our seats are sat waiting for our bottoms, but first I stop to acquire a programme (£2.50) from one of the blue booths that look as if they should also sell ice creams. The front cover of the programme gives Mick and I something to talk about in the snaking queue to the turnstile as we comment on the casual, hands in pockets stance of Ali Al-Hamadi, Conor Chaplin and Harry Clarke, and the somewhat macho “You looking at me?” expressions on their faces. Mick doesn’t recognise Ali Al-Hamadi or Harry Clarke and I can’t remember Clarke’s name at first either. “That full-back” I tell him, “you know, Colin Harper”.

After venting excess “Platform Number 9” we find our seats and almost immediately the game begins, as if they’d just been waiting for us to arrive. Fortuna get first go with the ball , or it could have been Town, I wasn’t really paying attention. Fortuna, in all red, are kicking the ball mostly in the direction of the telephone exchange, Barrack Corner and what used to be Anglesea Road hospital beyond, where in June of 1976 my father had a hernia operation. A couple of months later he and I would see Town beat Go Ahead Eagles Deventer one-nil in a pre-season friendly. Barely four minutes pass and Fortuna score, Schmidt. It’s an overly simple goal with a cross that reveals an absence of marking and ends with an unchallenged header. Oh well, it’s only a friendly.

“Come on Ipswich” shouts a shrill child behind us and Mick and I piece together the line-up of the Town team. The shirts show squad numbers, but the programme doesn’t provide the key to these and the Town players’ names are not on their shirts either. From what’s on the back of their shirts, all the Fortuna players appear to be called Dusseldorf. Not being ones to memorise the Town squad numbers, Mick and I are at a loss to identify Town’s number 14, but the bloke sat next to Mick that isn’t me helps us out, revealing that it is Jack Taylor; it threw us seeing him start a match. We eventually also manage to deduce that the new signings are number 22 Jacob Greaves, number 8 Liam Delap, number 2 Ben Johnson, and the goalkeeper is Arijanet Muric. After eight minutes Town fashion a first shot on goal, a weak effort by Delap.

Twenty minutes pass and my interest has mostly only been piqued by the building work on the West Stand, where swathes of seats are missing and it’s possible to see the decorative brickwork of the Corporation bus depot through the gap where there will eventually be more hospitality boxes. I note that our goalkeeper wears pink and that Jacob Greaves wears his hair in a small bun, a bit like former Pompey player Christian Burgess who coincidentally now plays for Union St Gilloise. I do like a centre-half with longer hair, it suggests to me a welcome element of flair in a position not usually known for it.

Liam Delap receives a strangely generous smattering of applause when caught offside and after twenty-five minutes Town win a corner, but then Fortuna are awarded a free-kick by referee Mr Smith and the man next to Mick that isn’t me starts waving his left arm about in anguish. “English, and he’s against us!” he shouts weirdly, as if its 1944 not 2024 and the referee is Lord Haw-Haw. I turn to Mick to tell him how surprised I am at how much some people seem to care so much about a friendly; but soon I’m thinking to myself that I’ve not sat in the Cobbold Stand since the Blue Action group has moved in and at half-way through the half the drums are beginning to get on my nerves. Perhaps with the players feeling the same as me, the twenty ninth minute is an unexpected drinks-break, and Mick checks his phone to see what the temperature is. Twenty-five degrees is evidently warm enough to crack open the Lucozade, or whatever isotonic elixir the modern Premier League player and his coach prefer.

Drinks supped and play resumed, Marcus Harness replaces Wes Burns and I admit to Mick that I hadn’t realised Wes was even playing. Harness’s introduction is an immediate success as his first cross is headed goalwards by Jack Taylor and Town have another corner, which George Edmundson heads at the Fortuna goalkeeper Florian Kastenmeier who interestingly shares his first name with Florian Schneider, one of the two founder members of 1970’s Dusseldorf-based ‘Krautrock’ band Kraftwerk. “Use your height Conor” shouts a man behind us before he laughs at his own ’joke’, hopefully out of embarrassment. Not totally absorbed by the match, I’ve noticed that a lot of surfaces around the ground are now painted matt black, including all the vomitoriums (vomitoria?) and I wonder if this is something required by the Premier League along with canapes and a shrubbery for Sky Sports presenters and a toilet reserved for Alan Shearer.

Three minutes of added on time are announced and I realise that from beneath the roof of the Cobbold Stand I cannot see the sky, it’s like looking out through a letterbox. When half-time arrives, I stay where I am for the duration unable to face the confined spaces beneath the venerable Cobbold Stand, although Mick bravely heads off to the lav.

Predictably, the re-start after half-time brings multiple personnel changes on the field of play and Delap, Edmundson, Greaves and Muric can catch the early bus home as they are replaced by Hirst, Burgess, Woolfenden and Walton. Fortuna win an early corner after a mistake by Woolfenden, who Mick remarks will need to improve to retain his place this season, and I agree with him. Then Marcus Harness equalises with a goal not dissimilar to Fortuna’s in that he is left alone on the right-hand side of the penalty area, but it’s a shot, not a header, at the end of a pass from Conor Chaplin.

After a rather dull first half, Town seem for a short while to have re-discovered themselves, and George Hirst breaks forward and plays in Jack Taylor to shoot high towards goal but have his shot saved. The thrills around the Fortuna goal don’t last however and soon it is the German Bundesliga team that are breaking forward with Ao Tanaka who, running on his toes and with a floppy mop of hair looks a bit like an oriental Trevor Putney. Tanaka misses, but within minutes Tim Rossmann is left with almost a quarter of the pitch to himself and he runs on to shoot past Walton with aplomb, and Fortuna lead 2-1. It’s nearly 3- 1 soon afterwards, again thanks to Tim Rossmann, but this time he misses the goal.

With the German lead restored, the game reverts to how it was in the first half and the Fortuna goalkeeper Kastenmeier has the time to stand and watch a seagull soar and swoop above the pitch and I wonder if he doesn’t get to see many seagulls at the Merkur-Spiel Arena in Dusseldorf. Dusseldorf is some way in land, but it is on the Rhine which I imagine seagulls follow up-stream. Annoyingly, I don’t remember if there were seagulls or not when I saw Town play at the Paul Janes Stadion in Dusseldorf back in pre-season,2015. Whatever the ornithological ins and outs of the Rhineland, nine years on and Fortuna are the better team today. On the touchline, Kieran McKenna retreats to the dugout to peer thoughtfully at a his lap top and rest his head on his chin in contemplation.

More substitutions ensue, but I‘ve lost interest to a large degree and the adverts announcing “University of Suffolk – apply now through clearing” and the sight of OGC Nice club crest catch my eye almost as much as the balding pate of Fortuna’s number 27, the obviously bleached blond hair of their number 18 and the enormity of their number 43 who, for a short while until Mr Smith tells him his fortune seems to ‘want a piece’ of Sam Morsy.

“Mwa mwa mwa mwa mwa, Sam Morsy mwa mwa mwa” says the stadium announcer incomprehensibly as the match draws to a close, and we guess Sam Morsy is man of the match, for what it’s worth. Mick and I share our mild disappointment at having forked out £35.00 between us to watch two teams train, and then our equally mild confusion that there is to be a penalty shoot-out despite the game not having ended in a draw. With Fortuna having lost the play-off match for promotion to Bundesliga 1 on penalties at the end of last season, it almost seems like mental cruelty to remind them of the experience so soon afterwards. On the other hand, there is every chance it will be more exciting than this afternoon’s match was, or at least it would be if anyone cared.

Both teams miss their first penalty and score their next four, and the next one , (or is it two?) after that. When Luke Woolfenden steps up to take the next penalty, I tell Mick that he will miss. Whilst Woolfy’s shot is on target it is nevertheless saved quite comfortably and if these are “sudden-death” penalties Fortuna have won for the second time this afternoon. But then Christian Walton gets to take a penalty, which he scores, and I have no idea what is going on, although looking at my watch I realise I’m going to miss my train, and I do.

Unbowed, or just stupid and somewhat mystified, as we head away from Portman Road Mick and I agree to speak soon to arrange buying tickets for the final friendly of pre-season versus OGC Nice (Olympic Gymnaste Club de Nice) of French Ligue 1. A pre-season friendly against French opposition ? We wouldn’t miss it for the world.

Ipswich Town 3 Southampton 2

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Ipswich Town 6 Sheffield Wednesday 0

March 17, 2024March 23, 2024 / martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

Although I began watching football in 1971, it took until September 1984 for me to first see Sheffield Wednesday play Ipswich Town. This was largely because, despite an illustrious past back in the days of Arthur Balfour and then Ramsay McDonald, Sheffield Wednesday were until 1984 bobbing about in the second division and then even visiting the likes of Layer Road, Colchester rather than Portman Road. Indeed, I had first seen Wednesday five years before when they played out a thrilling goalless draw at Layer Road in what was only my third ever visit to the then home of our pauper cousins from over the border in Essex. That first encounter with Ipswich ended in a draw also, but four goals were shared that late summer or early autumn day, I honestly don’t remember which it was. Since then, I have seen Town play Sheffield Wednesday a further twenty-four times and of those games Ipswich have won a paltry six, with Sheffield winning an indecent eleven, including a five-nil embarrassment at Hillsborough in April 1994 and a relegation confirming one-nil defeat in May of 1986. So, with this record in mind I feel I have good reason to bear Sheffield Wednesday a degree of ill-will, and on the morning of our latest encounter I hope for retribution, vengeance and other things Jesus wouldn’t have approved of.

It’s been a beautiful, bright spring morning; I had awoken to sunlight streaming into the bedroom and birds chirruping from the branches of the tree outside my window, in spite of the world of pain beyond. After a hearty breakfast and a morning of garden tidying and playing at being Andy Warhol with photos of Ray Crawford and Ted Phillips, I leave my wife watching people in lycra cycling round Italy, to catch the train to Ipswich. The train arrives on time, but leaves late. I sit opposite an elderly Town fan who I recognise from previous journeys to the match. He tells me how watching football has been “…a way of life” for him, and how he would travel on the train to watch Sudbury Town when he was at Earls Colne Grammar school. He asks me if I remember certain players like he does, they all have names like Len and Reg, Syd and Larry. He’s seen them all he tells me, but the best player he thinks he ever saw was Ipswich’s Billy Baxter. I ask him how old he is; he’s eighty-seven, and every other Saturday his daughter buys him a match ticket and a train ticket and puts him on the train to Ipswich. I hope I’m still doing this when I’m eighty-seven, I think to myself.

Approaching the next stop, I remember I had arranged to meet Gary on the train, but I’ve been so busy talking about football in the 1950’s I have forgotten to text him to tell him which carriage I’m in. Fortuitously, my carriage pulls up against the platform just where a slightly perplexed looking Gary is standing. I leave my seat and walk over to the door as it opens so Gary can see me. Unfortunately, I have lost my seat by the man from the 1950’s, but I’ll look out for him next time. Arriving in Ipswich, Gary and I head for ‘the Arb’ pausing only so that I can buy an ice cream in Portman Road, but as usual I come away with just a programme (£3.50). At the bottom of Lady Lane an odd-looking man on an electric scooter covered in stickers weaves his way past us with a mobile phone pressed up against his ear. Gary and I look at one another and burst out laughing. I tell him I often see strange things in this part of town, but then, Lady Lane was the site of a medieval Catholic shrine.

Once at ‘the Arb’ I buy Gary a pint of Lager 43 and myself a pint of Maldon’s Suffolk Pride (£8 something with Camra discount) before we repair to the beer garden where all the seats at tables are taken and we have to sit on a park bench next to the back gate. We talk of people we worked with in the 1990’s, how Gary’s season ticket is next to someone who is a close relative of a friend of my sister, and discover that Gary has forgotten that we have tickets to see Stewart Lee at Chelmsford Civic Theatre next Friday. Gary buys another pint of Lager 43, and another pint of Suffolk Pride for me and has spotted a free table which we then occupy. Soon we are the only people left in the beer garden and it’s not even twenty to three; belatedly we join the herd.

Having bid Gary farewell within earshot of Sir Alf Ramsey’s statue, it’s not long before I’m queuing at turnstile 62 and then shuffling past Pat from Clacton and Fiona to my seat, next but one to the man rom Stowmarket (Paul) and two rows behind ever-present Phil who never misses a game, and his son Elwood. As usual, my arrival has pretty-much coincided with the appearance of the teams and I joke with the man from Stowmarket that this is because I have in fact just left the dressing room having given the team talk. On the pitch one of today’s mascots is wearing a Town shirt and pink party dress, I hope the kit designers at Umbro are taking notes. Murphy the stadium announcer reads out the teams, and as if in a French football crowd ever-present Phil and I shout out the surnames. As usual, the first few names appear on the scoreboard and Murphy is in time with them, but it doesn’t usually continue like that . The names keep appearing and Murphy keeps on reading and the names keep appearing and Murphy keeps on reading and I’m still waiting for the two to fall out of sync, but we’ve reached the substitutes and they haven’t. Ever-present Phil turns around wide-eyed and incredulous, we can’t believe what we’ve witnessed, Murphy has only gone and done it! He’s read out the team in sync with the names appearing on the scoreboard. “Crikey” I think to myself “We must be going to win by seven or eight today”.

The game begins, Sheffield Wednesday getting first go with the ball and pointing it mostly in the general direction of the Co-op on Norwich Road, Castle Hill and Whitton Sports Centre. Sheffield wear a smart but not eye-catching kit of white shirts and black shorts, like Germany or Port Vale. As ever, Town are in their signature blue and white. “Hi-Ho, Sheffield Wednesday” sing the visiting fans to the tune of Jeff Beck’s ‘Hi-Ho Silver Lining’, although Wikipedia tells us that the song was first released by a band called The Attack a few days before Beck’s version in March 1967. Weirdly, the Wednesday fans only sing those four words, as if they couldn’t think up any other lyrics, but liked the tune anyway. The net effect is like a musical version of driving into a cul de sac, but there’s no harm in it and they soon move on to April of 1967 with a fuller rendition of Frankie Valli’s ‘You’re just to good to be true’ . Their efforts deservedly earn Wednesday a corner after just four minutes, which is a full six minutes before Ipswich ‘s first corner and my first chance to bellow “Come On You Blues”, but to no avail . “Not comfortable at the back” says the bloke behind me of Sheffield Wednesday. “Don’t like pressure do they?” adds his sidekick.

Fourteen minutes pass. “Football in a library, do-do-do”. So far, so ordinary, then Wes Burns crosses the ball from the right. The ball is played to Omari Hutchinson, he turns and in a perfect impersonation of Conor Chaplin accurately places a not unnecessarily hard shot inside a post and into the net. Town lead one-nil. “Aye Aye Ippy Ippy Town, Singing Aye Aye Ippy Ippy Town” I sing, hoping to encourage a new craze of referring to Ipswich as “Ippy” because it sounds appropriately hip and happening.

Eighteen minutes gone and Town win another corner and I bawl again, and then a minute later, mysteriously six people in black anoraks arrive and sit down just over the gangway from us. “Men in black” says the bloke behind me. “Is there a funeral?” I ask Fiona. Nobody knows, but with the half, half over Axel Tuanzebe earns another Town corner. “Come On You Blues” chant our tiny band of Ultras. But it’s soon Vaclav Hladky who is being applauded as he has to make a diving save and Sheffield have a corner of their own before Town win another and as Sheffield threaten to breakaway, Omari Hutchinson is booked by the uncharacteristically tall referee Mr Leigh Doughty for nothing more than a playful shove.

There are ten minutes until half-time and disaster strikes as despite having won yet another corner for Town, Wes Burns is down on the pitch clutching his leg and has to go off; the only good thing being that he only had a short walk to the players’ tunnel, although I don’t suppose players generally think to themselves “I don’t mind getting injured as long as I don’t have to walk far back to the players’ tunnel”.

When the corner is eventually taken, Keiffer Moore heads the ball against the cross bar, it drops down, isn’t cleared and Cameron Burgess wellies it into the net from inside the six-yard box. Town lead 2-0 and Cameron’s goal possesses the blunt, messy ugliness that has us reminiscing about the days of Mick McCarthy. Kayden Jackson replaces Wes Burns and Portman Road is very nearly reverberating to the sound of chants of “Blue and White Army, Blue and White Army”. For pretty much the first time in the game the Sheffield fans have fallen silent. “Ipswich Town, Ipswich Town FC, The finest football team the world has ever seen” sing the Sir Bobby Robson Stand digging into their stash of Irish folk songs.

Another Town corner comes and goes before Wednesday’s number thirty-six, Ian Poveda runs worryingly at the Town defence. “Don’t stand off ‘im Wolfie” calls the bloke behind me not expecting his advice to be taken. “As soon as he lets him get in the box he’s fucked” says his sidekick. But happily disaster is averted, nothing unfortunate happens to Wolfie and with three minutes of injury time announced Kayden Jackson sprints down the right, crosses low towards the goal and Nathan Broadhead subtly clips the ball into the goal from close range to give Town a 3-0 lead. It’s the best goal so far and makes half-time a time to kick back, relax and hope for another three goals in the second half, which is what I tell Dave the steward and Ray.

No sooner have I eaten a Nature Valley Oats and Honey Crunchy bar than the second half is upon us and Sheffield have substituted their star player, Barry Bannan, which is a shame because players called Barry are a rarity. Omari Hutchinson quickly shoots over the cross-bar before there is a minute’s applause for another recently deceased Town fan, someone myself, Fiona, Pat from Clacton and ever-present Phil all remember from our days twenty-odd years ago of travelling to away matches with the Clacton branch of the supporters’ club. By beautiful coincidence and synchronisation worthy of stadium announcer Murphy, on the stroke of the minute ending, Town score a fourth goal, Omari ‘Mbappe’ Hutchinson despatching a decisive shot after an equally decisive run and pass from Nathan Broadhead. The goal provokes a dash for the exits from an indecently large number of Sheffield Wednesday supporters who have either just remembered they have urgent appointments elsewhere or who feel unable to support their team when the going gets this tough.

Happily, I have never seen Town surrender a four goal lead and so I am now confident of victory. Massimo Luongo is as confident as me it seems and shoot from almost the half way line to earn yet another corner. “E-i, E-i, E-i-o, Up the Football League We Go! “ Sing the Sir Bobby Robson Stand triumphantly and a substituted Sheffield Wednesday player walks grimly, head down, along the touchline to the tunnel, in a long black hooded coat, looking a bit like he’s lost his scythe.

The pre-match blue skies have now gone to be replaced by a glorious grey expanse , like one massive dull cloud that surrounds the stadium making it feel like a shining, green, floodlit island within a becalmed sea of gloom. I can’t imagine how the Sheffield supporters are feeling. Keiffer Moore shoots over and Town win another corner as the first hour of the game recedes into recent history and Pat tells us that she’s off to Great Yarmouth next week to play whist. All of a sudden, Sheffield unexpectedly break away and Ike Ugbo is bearing down on goal, but as he shoots Cameron Burgess whisks the ball away for a corner “He came from nowhere” says the bloke beside me, exaggerating very little.

“ We love you Wednesday, we do” sing the Wednesdayites admirably, before reprising “You’re just too good to be true” and then going on the offensive with the oddly familiar chant of “ Your support is fucking shit”, which despite occasional outbursts of passion is a mostly a fair point, well made. If Ipswich has a distinct ‘fan culture’ it is one of stoic reticence. “Four-nil and you still don’t sing” chant the Wednesdayites providing the evidence to back up their earlier assertions.

But oddly, the game has gone a bit flat. “Come On Town” calls the bloke behind me echoing my inner dialogue and right on cue Kieran Mckenna, like someone brandishing a carton of Shake n’Vac, makes the substitutions needed to put the freshness back. Jeremy Sarmiento and Ali Al-Hamadi replace Nathan Broadhead and Keiffer Moore, and Murphy tells us that collectively we are 29,325 with 1,945 from Sheffield. “Thank you for your continued support” he adds, like a man fully capable of reading out the team names as they appear on the scoreboard.

Sixteen minutes of the future still to look forward to and Al-Hamadi runs and shoots, but embarrassingly wide. To make Ali feel better about himself, Kayden Jackson then fluffs a volley with equal aplomb. “Football in a library, do-do-do” chant the Wednesdayites again, reliving one of their early triumphs of the first half before revisiting the well-worn path of our support being faecal and the familiar and satisfying rhyming couplet of “No noise from the Tractor Boys”. The Wednesday fans are sounding increasingly angry at the Town fans for being so quiet, as if it is almost an affront to them, which it probably is. I can imagine them sitting in the Cobbold Stand saying “These Ipswich fans, 4-0 up, they don’t know they’re born. Back in my day we’d be thirty-four nil down at half time, with ten players sent off, and we’d have all had our heads cut off by over zealous stewards and we’d still be singing.”

But now the final ten minutes are here, the time when in popular fan culture Ipswich are lucky because they score goals and win the game. Today of course we’re all ready 4-0 up so it’s just for old times sake that Omari Hutchinson runs, Jeremy Sarmento shoots and Ali Al-Hamadi taps in the rebound after the Wednesday goal keeper only parries Sarmiento’s shot. It’s 5-0 to Ipswich and more Wednesday fans remember urgent appointments. “We want six” I chant. “Stand up if you’re five-nil up” chant lots of Town fans and we have to stand up or else we can’t see anything. Why can’t we just do something like “Go Weeee” if we’re five-nil up, why is it always the standing up?

Six minutes left and we haven’t scored enough goals in the final ten minutes yet, so the remainder of the midfield is replaced. “You’re fucking shit, you’re fucking shit, you’re fucking shit” chant the Sir Bobby Robson Stand uncharitably to the visitors, but no doubt finally confident that with less than five minutes to go Town shouldn’t lose now, before optimistically asking “ Can we play you every week?”. The final minute arrives and we still need another goal to fully avenge that 5-0 defeat in 1994. Omari Hutchinson runs, he shoots or may be crosses the ball and Al-Hamadi taps in again, and Town will win six nil for the third time in twelve months. “We want seven” I chant greedily, but three minutes of added on time evaporates and I have to make do with six.

With the final whistle, Pat and Fiona are quickly away into the early evening. I linger to applaud the team and Kieran McKenna and reflect on a day of perfect timings. I shall be cracking open the Cremant tonight.

Ipswich Town 0 AFC Wimbledon 0

March 8, 2024March 26, 2024 / martinpbrooks / 2 Comments

I’ve been waiting a while to see my team Ipswich Town play AFC Wimbledon at Portman Road. Sadly for me I missed the clubs’ first encounter back in September 2019 having been detained by the National Health Service; something to do with heart valves. Town’s 2-1 victory back then no doubt aided my recovery from surgery and now, re-built using bovine spare parts, I am fit enough to attend Portman Road, but circumstances have conspired against me again and the global pandemic means I along with everyone else must once again witness today’s match via the marvel of modern technology that is the ifollow. But with Town in a remarkable run of form that has seen them fail to score a single goal in five matches, mine and everyone else’s exile from Portman Road is probably for the best. Excited at the prospect of today’s game nevertheless, I have made the effort to order a programme, on the cover which is a slightly startled, or possibly forlorn, looking Kane Vincent-Young

Earlier today, as part of an attempt to ensure that the nation’s investment in one of my vital organs should not be in vain, I pumped up the tyres on my bicycle for the first time in three years and cycled a little over six miles. I had quite forgotten how uncomfortable a bicycle saddle can be and I am now only just able to walk, my legs feeling as if I am wading thigh deep through thick mud. Such exercise requires reward and I therefore enjoy a pre-match ‘pint’ of Fuller’s ESB (four for £6 from Waitrose) as I slump lifelessly in front of the telly catching the tail-end of Portsmouth versus Bristol Rovers on the ifollow, which my wife Paulene has been watching, Pompey being her team. Pompey win and Bristol Rovers are relegated. Coincidentally, Pompey and Bristol Rovers are the only two teams against whom Ipswich have scored in the last nine games; furthermore Town have beaten Bristol Rovers three times this season whilst Pompey have beaten Ipswich three times. I regale Paulene with these fascinating facts in the style of a radio commentator; predictably she is unimpressed, but it doesn’t stop me.

With tv pictures of Fratton Park now just a memory, I log on to the ifollow in time to catch the names of today’s virtual mascots who are Finlay, Harrison, and what sounds like RJ and Milan, but I could be wrong. It nevertheless sets me to hoping that Milan has a sister called Florence and that somewhere in northern Italy there is a child called Ipswich. In the manner of the FA Cup draw the next voice I hear is that of BBC Radio Suffolk’s stalwart commentator Brenner Woolley, who as ever has alongside him the redoubtable and legendary Mick Mills. “We really are at the business end of the season” says Brenner , by which I think he means that all the speculation since August about which teams would be promoted and relegated will soon be resolved. Ipswich will neither be promoted nor relegated, but their ‘business’ appears to be that of setting a new record for consecutive matches without scoring a goal; five and counting.

Brenner asks Mick to expound his current theory as to Town’s existence. Mick postulates that Town “…went from playing ‘A’ class football and not being able to do it and going for a more direct style”. Mick continues at length and I start to stare into the distance, but I get the drift. “No sign of the boys in blue” says Brenner as the Town team begin to saunter onto the pitch. I don’t think he’s talking about the police, he’s just not being very observant.

After the teams “take the knee” the game begins, Wimbledon getting first go with the ball and kicking towards the Sir Bobby Robson Stand. “Here’s Vincent-Young coming in-field with pink footwear” announces Brenner, eschewing deeper analysis for the sheer colour of the spectacle. “Not very much has happened so far but the one thing that’s happened is watching Teddy Bishop…” chips in Mick before completing his observation, which is that Teddy Bishop has been pushing forward down the left; so far he’s successfully been caught offside twice, but Mick’s advice is that he should keep trying.

“Paul Cook sipping on his coffee” says Brenner, introducing the by now obligatory mention of Paul Cook drinking coffee, and providing the sort of aimless detail worthy of an existential novel. It’s the fourth minute and Wimbledon’s Will Nightingale heads over the Town cross-bar. Mick Mills muses on how Town goalkeeper David Cornell stayed on his goal line but should have come to catch the cross. Mick is not impressed. Meanwhile Brenner tells us that Wimbledon have scored as many goals in their last four games as Ipswich have in their last nineteen, before reporting “Beautiful day at Portman Road, nil-nil, Town have now gone nine hours without a goal”. It’s a careful combination of facts from Brenner that leaves me not knowing whether to feel happy, disappointed or in awe. Wimbledon win a corner, Town win a corner. A punt forward sees Mark McGuinness head the ball away from David Cornell as he comes out to collect the ball. “McGuinness and Cornell got in a bit of a sixes and sevens situation” is Brenner’s peculiar description of events.

The match proceeds much as all recent games have done. “Bennetts; that was terrible” says Brenner as the oddly-named Keanan Bennetts runs at the Wimbledon defence and then sends a shot hopelessly wide of the far post. At the other end Wimbledon are no better. “Rudoni shoots wide, he should have scored”. Twenty minutes have passed. “Wimbledon on top at the moment; the better side” is Brenner’s assessment and then Wimbledon are awarded a penalty, possibly for shirt-pulling. Happily Joe Piggott’s spot-kick is easily saved by Cornell, albeit with his legs and feet. “ I didn’t like the run-up of the player” explains Mick relaying how he thought Piggott would miss.

“Bennetts; terrible lay-off” says Brenner, continuing the theme of inept play that has “ Paul Cook screaming his heart out down below” ; it’s a description from Brenner that suggests an image of the Town manager suffering infernal torment. There are twelve minutes of the half remaining. “Surprise, surprise it’s nil-nil” says Brenner, introducing an unwelcome note of sarcasm. Gwion Edwards shoots over the Wimbledon cross-bar; it’s Town’s second shot on goal in thirty-four minutes. “A massive difference in positivity in both teams” says Mick attempting to explain what we’re seeing.

Some passing breaks out. “Good play this from Ipswich Town” says Brenner as a corner is won, but then taken short and Mick shares our frustration. With none of the current Town team capable of scoring, Brenner resorts to telling BBC Radio Suffolk listeners that former Town player Will Keane has scored for Wigan Athletic and is currently in a “rich vein of form”. It’s just the sort of thing we all want to hear. Back to Portman Road and “Poor from Dozzell, ball out” are Brenner’s words. “He wanted to do something that wasn’t there” explains Mick raising philosophical questions about the nature of reality. Gwion Edwards wins Town’s third corner of the half with two minutes to go before a minute of added on time is…added on. It’s time enough for Brenner to refer to “Cornell…the Welshman” in much the same way that he usually refers to “Holy…the Czech”. Half-time arrives and Brenner concludes that “Ipswich continue to struggle”. “We are the inferior team” is Mick’s summation before he is rudely cut-off by the ifollow commercial break; it’s a phrase from Mick that would look good on a banner in the North Stand or on a t-shirt.

Half-time relief comes in the form of a mug of tea and two Christmas tree-shaped ginger biscuits; stocks of the un-seasonal confections acquired at a knock-down price remain healthy. All too quickly the game begins again. “Just three and a half more games for us to suffer” says Brenner. Armando Dobra has replaced the oddly-named Keanan Bennetts although “…anybody could have come off at half-time” is the honest assessment of Brenner.

Cornell is soon making a decent save at the feet of Wimbledon’s Ayoub Assal. “A lovely afternoon at Portman Road” says Brenner trying hard to look on the bright side of life before referring to “spring-heeled McGuinness”, which almost sounds like an epithet he’d pre-prepared. Ollie Hawkins appears to head the ball against the Wimbledon crossbar but Town earn a corner so he probably didn’t. “Nice little spell, it’s not lasted long, but it’s promising” says Mick as Town start to look more like a team that hasn’t just turned up because it’s a sunny afternoon and they’ve nothing better to do.

The game is nearly an hour old. “Nine and three-quarter hours since a Town goal” says Brenner, clearly not counting down the minutes until he can say that Town haven’t scored in ten hours. Kane Vincent-Young breaks down the right. “Vincent-Young has got open grass in front of him, just opening his legs” is Brenner’s slightly unpleasant description which probably sounds even more disturbing to BBC Radio Suffolk listeners who don’t have the accompanying tv pictures. Town players are moving and passing the ball well; another corner kick ensues which Gwion Edwards steps up to take and lumps way beyond the penalty area. “Ridiculous” says Mick “An awful corner kick”, and there is not a soul on Earth who would contradict him.

Woolfenden wrestles the ball from Assal; “…too big and strong for the young Moroccan” says Brenner, ticking another off the list of nationalities that he has referenced in his commentaries this season. Cole Skuse replaces Teddy Bishop and Armando Dobra has a shot on goal. “Tzanev finally makes a save after sixty-three minutes of this game” says Brenner. Mick then points out that Vincent-Young had made a good run ahead of Dobra “…if he’d rolled the ball to him” says Mick “I think we might have created a walk-in opportunity”. Oh for a “walk-in opportunity” I think to myself, whilst also reflecting that Brenner’s pronunciation of Tzanev sounds a lot like Sanef, the company that manages the best part of 2,000 kilometres of the French motorway network.

Aaron Drinan replaces Ollie Hawkins. Wimbledon are awarded a free-kick about 25 metres from goal after a foul by Andre Dozzell; Joe Piggott takes the kick, “The Welshman had to make the save and he did” Brenner tells us leaving radio listeners unsure if the shot had been saved by David Cornell, Gwion Edwards or Harry Secombe. The game reaches its seventieth minute; “Ipswich Town have now gone ten hours without scoring a goal” announces Brenner unable to hide the fact that he has been waiting all afternoon to say it.

“We’ve been better in this half” says Mick very reasonably. “Are Ipswich Town going to score another goal this season?” asks Brenner, rhetorically I assume and so does Mick because he doesn’t offer an answer. Kayden Jackson replaces Andre Dozzell and I begin to feel a little sleepy. Tzanev makes a block at the feet of Jackson. Mick suggests Town could score “since we’ve tinkered with a few changes”. Brenner guffaws loudly, seemingly amused by Mick’s tentative suggestion that this Town team “could score a goal against AFC Wimbledon”. How dare Brenner laugh at anything Mick says, particularly just two days before the forty-fifth anniversary of his testimonial match against FC Twente Enschede.

With the game into its final ten minutes of normal time, Town win a free-kick to the left of the Wimbledon penalty area. “It’s ten hours since Ipswich Town last scored a goal, is this their moment?” asks Brenner as Gwion Edwards steps up to take it. Edwards boots the ball high over the penalty area and cross-bar and into the North Stand. “Oh, Christ” Mick can be heard to say off-mike, sounding as glum as Marvin the paranoid android in the ‘Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy’. Despite excellent comic timing Mick apologises for his blasphemy whilst Brenner laughs like a schoolboy. This is the sort of enjoyment supporters of clubs at the top of the table will never know.

Five minutes remain of normal time. My eyes close involuntarily and I have to try hard to stay awake; I blame strong beer at lunchtime. Wimbledon win a corner, Cornell takes a drop kick and “…hits it high into the Suffolk sky” according to Brenner. A throw-in is taken and “Dobra offers himself up” continues Brenner in his own slightly weird poetic mode. Three minutes of added on time are played and the game ends. “Another ninety-minutes in the can for Vincent -Young” is as good as it gets from Brenner who doesn’t bother to explain, depending on your choice of slang, either why he is now drawing analogies with film making or why Vincent-Young spent ninety minutes in the toilet.

The ifollow doesn’t allow us to enjoy Mick’s match summary before its broadcast effs-off into adverts and match statistics. For myself, I think the second half has been reasonably enjoyable despite the absence of goals, but after six and a bit matches I have now become accustomed to that and have sought my pleasure where I can. Today I have particularly enjoyed the exotic name of the Wimbledon right-back Nesta Guinness-Walker and every mention by Brenner of Wimbledon’s Ben Heneghan has to my addled mind sounded like van Hanegem, and has had me imagining I was watching Feyenoord or Holland in the mid 1970’s. On that basis, the wait to watch AFC Wimbledon play at Portman Road was worth it.

Three more matches, four and half more hours…plus time added-on.

Ipswich Town 3 Birmingham City 1

February 25, 2024March 17, 2024 / martinpbrooks / 4 Comments

When I was growing up in 1960’s Shotley, a village about 13 kilometres from Ipswich, our next door neighbour was from Birmingham. Barbara spoke with a somewhat whiny, nasal accent but was a very skilled seamstress and made some excellent clothes for my Action Man, including a pair of stripey pyjamas and a set of underwear, the sort of apparel I would wager most Action Men could only dream of, if indeed Action Men do dream, which I doubt. A few years later my sister left school and went to Birmingham University, and I remember visiting her there and discovering the delights of the Bull Ring and the then brand new, but now sadly demolished Birmingham Central Library, a concrete wonder in the Brutalist style; I also remember Birmingham having lots of blue and cream buses and I came home with a pocket full of bus tickets, which on the back had what looked like a squirrel stuck in a glass, the logo of Ansell’s brewery.

It was in December 1973 that I first saw Birmingham City play Ipswich Town at Portman Road; although eventually avoiding relegation by two places and five points (Norwich finished bottom), Birmingham were rubbish and Town won 3-0, and throughout the rest of the 1970’s I never saw Birmingham City do anything but lose at Portman Road. Fifty years later I’m hoping history is repeated as I watch Town play Birmingham for the thirty-sixth time. It’s a glorious, bright, sunny day as I leave my wife to an afternoon of watching people in lycra cycling around Belgium on the telly. The train is six minutes late, but once on board I am entertained by a man on his ‘phone who says “Let me call you on a normal phone, I’m on the train” and “I think it’s a bit of a crap connection”, sadly I can hear him perfectly. The phone man gets off the train at the next stop and a chubbier man sits opposite me who looks a bit like the former Poet Laureate Sir John Betjeman, but of course it can’t be him because he died in 1984. The dead poet doesn’t stay long and soon walks off down the train, perhaps seeking inspiration.

Arriving in Ipswich I find it full of policeman in baseball hats, who eye everyone suspiciously and to my mind look like what would have happened if Sir Francis Chichester had been in Z cars. I want to stop and ask a policeman if Birmingham City supporters are considered dangerous, but I don’t, I just assume they are. I carry on up Portman Road to ‘the Arb’, pausing only to buy a programme (£3.50) from one of the ice cream booths, and crossing Civic Drive I admire a snippet of Victorian Ipswich skyline which includes the town hall clock, St Mary Le Tower and a bit of the Corn Exchange. The sound of happy drinking and chatter spills from an open upstairs window and from the garden of ‘the Arb’ as I approach. Soon, with a pint of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride (£3.60 with Camra discount) in hand I find a seat in the beer garden which is full of pre-match drinkers. I flick through my programme, which today has a front cover across which stride the well-proportioned features of recent signing Lewis Travis, a bearded man who I am pleased to see doesn’t have all his hair shaved off in a band around his ears and the back of his head like some unfortunate army conscript.

Another pint of Suffolk Pride later, and with everyone else in the beer garden already gone, I depart for Portman Road, politely returning my glass to the bar and thanking the bar staff as I do so. It seems it must be one of those days when the automatic turnstiles haven’t been working as they should, as Portman Road is thick with queuing spectators and so is the back of the Sir Alf Ramsey Stand, but the queue at turnstile 62 moves along at an acceptable pace and I am soon shuffling past Pat from Clacton and Fiona and behind ever-present Phil who never misses a game and his son Elwood, to take my seat next but one to the man from Stowmarket (Paul). Between me and Paul today is a quiet man with a dome-like bald head, although facially he resembles Baldric (Tony Robinson). In no time at all the players are parading onto the pitch and Murphy is announcing the team; at first he succeeds in keeping at the same pace as the scoreboard, but as usual he races off like a whippet after a rabbit and by the time we get to Wes Burns he is hopelessly out of sync and I am left to bawl out the players surnames on my own as they appear on the scoreboard if I want to continue to pretend to be at a football match in France, which I do. Murphy finishes his awful announcement with a cringe inducing “1-2-3, Blue Army” and as he says it again I think we are all meant to join in and shout “Blue Army” after three, but needless to say I don’t. He’ll by saying “Nice to see ya, to see ya nice” next week.

With the usual communal rendition of Hey Jude out of the way, it is Ipswich, and more precisely Conor Chaplin who gets first go with the ball as the game begins under a pale blue, late winter’s afternoon sky decorated with puffs of grey cloud. Town are aiming at the goal in front of me and my fellow ultras, and as ever wear blue and white, whilst Birmingham City sport vivid, flaming red or orange shirts the colour of red-hot pokers, but adorned with black marks that make the shirt look as if it had been momentarily placed on top of a hot grill or barbecue. Their shorts are black and their socks are same colour as their shirts, but minus the decorative soot and scorch marks.

“Keep right on to the end of the road” sing the visiting Brummies, and Pat from Clacton complains that it was Town fans who used to sing that when she first came to games, I think Pat thinks the Brummies stole it, and they apparently first sang it as recently as the 1956 FA Cup semi-final, so she might be right. At the front of the stand I can see Ray’s slightly bristly pate glinting in the winter sunlight. The flags on the roof of the Cobbold Stand hang limply, but below them it’s pretty noisy. The Birmingham goalkeeper John Ruddy is roundly booed by the Town fans because he used to play for Norwich. Four minutes pass; Town earn a corner and I bellow “Come On You Blues”. Pat from Clacton joins in, but doesn’t bellow, and I’m pretty sure ever-present Phil joins in too, but as boiling cauldrons of noise go, the Sir Alf Ramsey Stand is still an ice bucket.

The corner comes to nought, but two minutes later as, in a spirit of bonhomie, the whole crowd joins in with a minute’s applause for Birmingham manager and former town captain Tony Mowbray, who is ill, Wes Burns scoots away down the Town right and pulls back a low cross which Keiffer Moore is about to sweep into the net when it is cleared off the end of his toe by a Brummie defender. Within sixty-seconds Moore nearly scores again, but shoots over when through on goal and it’s not long before he’s chalking up a third near miss with a scuff. He can’t seem to get anything quite right, but undeterred the Town fans that sing, sing “Addy, Addy , Addy – O” and then those that serenade, serenade John Ruddy with “He’s only a poor little budgie, his shirt is all tattered and torn”. Birmingham have some forays forward too, but not as good as Ipswich ‘s and the afternoon is tense and exciting.

“Come On You Blues” I yell again and again as Town win their second corner, in the eighteenth minute, and Conor Chaplin’s header is caught by Ruddy. Two minutes later Wes Burns limps off and Omari Hutchinson sprints on. Then Birmingham’s number four Marc Roberts is laying prone on the grass and the game is stopped, but referee Mr Gavin Ward walks over to him lays his hand upon his back and Roberts is back up on his feet; I speculate to Fiona as to whether Mr Ward has healing hands before Pat from Clacton, having watched Leicester City play Leeds United on the telly last night reveals that she doesn’t like the Leeds manager Daniel Farke, she thinks he looks scruffy and even dirty. I agree with her that he is a bit of a “Farke” because he managed Norwich City (twice), but secretly I quite like his German hippy vibe and suspect he’s quite nice, probably giving his players lifts home after training in his VW camper van.

A Conor Chaplin shot, another corner. Another chance to bawl “Come On You Blues”, and the first half is half over. Seven or eight minutes on and Sam Morsy shoots from 20 metres or so, Conor Chaplin is in the way, he looks offside, but diverts the ball past Ruddy and he’s not offside and he scores! Town lead 1-0. “E-i, E-i, E-i, O, Up the Football League we go” sing the Sir Bobby Robson Stand before progressing on to their all-time favourite Christmas ‘Number One’ and “Hark now hear the Ipswich sing, the Norwich ran away”; who cares that Christmas is still another ten months away, although admittedly almost to the day.

Half-time is drawing near and Keiffer Moore’s close range header falls straight to ruddy Ruddy again, before Town win what will turn out to be their final corner of the half and I bawl “Come On You Blues” for all I’m worth. Then suddenly, there are chants from the Brummies up in the Cobbold stand of “Who the fuckin’ ‘ell are you?” and “I can’t read and I can’t write, but I can drive a tractor” which I don’t think I’ve heard away fans sing this century. The Brummies cap it off with a more contemporary ditty that goes “You are wankers, you are wankers, you are wankers”, and the bonhomie of the sixth minute seems to have been lost somewhere.

Two minutes of normal first half time remain and Birmingham win their first corner, and then within a minute their second. “Four additional minutes” announces Murphy and I worry how many more corners they might get, but corners are the least of our worries as following a run down the Town right by Birmingham’s Koji Myoshi, they have the cheek to equalise thanks to Jordan James. “Who are ya, who are ya ?” chant the Brummies, struggling to know how to react to their team’s moment of success, and equally confused the Sir Bobby Robson standers chant back “Who the fuckin’ ‘ell are you?”. I blame a diet of Coca Cola and fast food. Fortunately, Nathan Broadhead seems to know who he is and he dances himself into a shooting position, but sends the ball narrowly past the post before Mr Ward finally calls time on the first half.

After syphoning off some excess and spent Suffolk Pride, I join Ray and his grandson Harrison at the front of the stand and Ray bemoans Mr Ward’s inability to spot persistent fouling and thinks referees should be ex-players who understand what cheats footballers really are. Our conversation moves on to laughing about a former work colleague before the Town players are wandering on to the pitch again and it’s time for the football to begin once more and I must return to my seat where i still find time to eat a Nature Valley crunchy oats and honey bar.

There are fewer clouds in the sky and a seagull sits on the central flagpole on the Cobbold stand as play resumes. Massimo Luongo is booked for a harmless looking foul and then Nathan Broadhead wins a corner and Axel Tuanzebe heads the ball at Ruddy and Mr Gavin completes the Town central midfield on his bingo card as he books Sam Morsy for another innocuous, imagined infringement. Birmingham win a corner and I notice that the floodlights seem brighter as the sun sinks lower behind the West Stand. Birmingham have more attacking intent this half and an undetected Jay Stansfield shapes up to volley a cross at the Town goal, but gets it completely wrong and the ball skids harmlessly off the side of his boot; popular 1980’s chanteuse and winner of TV’s ‘Search for a Star’, Lisa Stansfield could probably have done better.

With thirty-one minutes of normal time remaining applause breaks out around the ground, I am a little mystified but Fiona tells me it is for another Town supporter who has sadly died. Two minutes later and Nathan Broad is substituted with Jeremy Sarmiento, whilst Birmingham ostentatiously make a triple substitution; one of the departing players being former Town starlet, Andre Dozzell, who I hadn’t really realised was playing, so some things don’t change. Birmingham and Town exchange corner kicks and the Sir Bobby Robson stand even chants “Come On You Blues” before repeating “Blue and White Army” at least three times a few minutes later after Jeremy Sarmiento shoots wide.

The sixty-ninth minute arrives with Town playing competently but unable to find the key to a second goal and therefore Pat from Clacton fishes the masturbating Cambodian monkey charm from her purse. She rubs his head for luck and then keeps him inside her glove, which is probably the best place for him. Murphy has now counted the crowd and tells us that there are 29,363 of us here today including 1,979 away supporters and he thanks us for our continuing support, which could of course melt away at any moment.

Back on the pitch, I become aware of Birmingham’s number 34, Ivan Sunjic, who, with his long hair and beard has something of the popular impression of the Messiah about him. Moments later , although he might look like Jesus, Mr Ward doesn’t think he plays like him and he books him for a foul on Omari Hutchinson. Fourteen minutes remain, and while Ipswich are dominating, Birmingham manage to break away and Jordan James forces Vaclav Hladky into a save to win a corner. Beams of golden sunlight stream across the upper tier of the Sir Bobby Robson Stand, which is probably a bit of a bugger if you’re sat there with the sun in your eyes.

Eleven minutes remain and continuing pressure wins Town a corner. Two minute later and Omari Hutchinson plays in Axel Tuanzebe who seems to run in slow motion into the box before carefully squaring the ball for Jeremy Sarmiento to side-foot into the goal and Town lead 2-1. It’s taken twelve minutes but the masturbating monkey from Cambodia has worked his magic. “Jeremy Sarmiento, something, You Know” chant the home crowd impressively, even if I can’t work out all the words. At least I know the lyrics to “Hark now hear the Ipswich sing, the Norwich ran away” so, I feel like they’re doing it for me when they sing it again.

Not long left, but another goal would be nice. As I left ‘the Arb’ earlier I heard the bloke who I assume to be the owner tell someone he would put money on 3-1 today, and that would seem to be a fair reflection of the game. Pat, Fiona and I all look at one another and agree it feels like it suddenly got colder, as if s a ghostly presence has just walked up the stand, or it’s nearly five o’clock in the afternoon and it’s February. Either way, Pat is looking forward to her baked potato when she gets home, which she’s having with a Marks & Spencer prawn salad; I think she’s a creature of habit is Pat.

The last five minutes of normal time have arrived and Conor Chaplin is down hurt. Birmingham make another substitution and the sun shines on the girder across the roof of the Sir bobby Robson Stand. It’s the final minute of normal time and Conor Chaplin is replaced by Marcus Harness with, as Pat from Clacton tells us, “his lovely blue eyes”. I tell her I can see them sparkling from here, which of course I can’t. There will be six minutes of additional time Murphy tells us. I am confident that Town are more likely to score than Birmingham and am sure a statistical analysis would prove me right. There’s a throw in, a high ball forward, Keiffer Moore nods it on and Omari Hutchinson is through on goal with just Ruddy to beat, which he does. “E-i, E-i, E-i-O, Up the Football League we go” is the chant and Town are going to win 3-1. Town do win 3-1. Axel Tuanzebe is voted man of the match by some sponsor or other with a very long name, and with smiling faces Pat and Fiona make a quick exit as Mr Ward blows the final whistle. The quiet man with the dome-like head who has quietly sat next to me leaves quietly.

I linger to enjoy the post-match celebration and to applaud. The man from Stowmarket and I agree that Axel Tuanzebe has played a masterful game as if he was told exactly what to do and he has studiously and calmly followed it to the letter. It’s been a magnificent match which I have thoroughly enjoyed. It’s been tight and close, but Ipswich have always been the better side; they had ninety minutes in which to win and saw nothing wrong in using nearly all of them all to do so, well why not? As a final thought, I’m glad I don’t have my Action Man anymore, if I did I would be regretting tonight that Barbara never made him an Ipswich Town kit.