Ipswich Town 2 Birmingham City 1

April 7, 2026April 7, 2026 / martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

It feels like it’s been a while since I last trekked into Ipswich to see the Town play. In fact, it was only just over a fortnight ago, but so little has happened in my life since then that it feels like eons ago, I think I need to get out more. But at least I don’t live in Gaza, Iran, or the United States of America and this morning the sun is shining brightly as I make my way to the railway station, and the only clouds in the sky seem to be there merely for decoration, although there is a stingy breeze. A message from Greater Anglia tells me that the train is on time, and indeed it’s been a busy morning for messages on my mobile phone, with Mick disturbing my sleep as early as 6:15 to confirm our rendez-vous at the Arb in what was then seven and a half hours-time, and Pat from Clacton telling me that she won’t be at the match today because she twisted her knee last Monday getting in to her car to go to a whist drive.

Having boarded the punctual train, I am soon talking with Gary who continues to remain impressively discreet about his continuing jury service, which is now entering its fourth week. Our journey is again illuminated by the sight of two polar bears in Wherstead, and we briefly speculate as to whether polar bears notice that the clocks have changed given that they are used to winters and summers of almost perpetual darkness or light. Alighting from the train in Ipswich, it feels like that stingy breeze is even stingier here, probably because we’re nearer the coast. Princes Street is well populated with police officers today and I seem to recall this is always the case when today’s visitors Birmingham City come to town. I hadn’t realised that Brummies were such a recalcitrant lot, but then my experience of Birmingham City supporters is limited to a history teacher from when I was at school in the 1970’s, and like most history teachers he never struck me as being much of a threat to public order.

Arriving at the Arb, getting through the door is unexpectedly difficult due to people queuing at the bar, but it’s not long before I’m ordering a pint of Lager 43 for Gary and because there is no Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride available, pints of Mighty Oak Brown Hare for Mick and me. I have no idea of the cost but bravely wave my bank card in the direction of the card reader before we retire to the beer garden and sit at a table at one end of the shelter backing onto High Street. Today is Mick’s birthday and once we have sat down, I present him with a card that I have made especially for him, which features Conservative party leader Kemi Badenoch in the guise of a burlesque dancer, a theme which I had correctly guessed he would find very exciting.

Our conversation veers from Gary’s jury service to Mick’s recent visit to the Fitzwilliam Museum in Cambridge, to today’s team, before Gary buys another pint of Lager 43 for himself, another of Brown Hare for me and a double whisky for Mick. Gary then spills most of his lager down his leg and over his jacket as he finds himself guilty of waving his hands around too much when he talks. It is gone twenty to three when we head for Portman Road and like the bons viveurs that we are, we are of course the last to leave the pub.

Pleasingly, at the back of the Sir Alf Ramsey stand there are no queues to be checked for weapons and scrap metal and the attractive young woman in the hijab soon waves me through once I’ve shown her that my mobile phone is not a ballistic missile or a nunchuk. There is a short queue at the feted turnstile 62, but I’m happy to wait my turn to pass through it and after dispensing some spent Brown Hare I arrive at my seat behind ever-present Phil who never misses a game, and his son Elwood, and next to Fiona, just as the excitable young stadium announcer reads out the names of the last four players in the Town team today, the ones with the highest squad numbers. Like a Frenchman at the Stade Marie-Marvingt in Le Mans or Stade Velodrome in Marseille I bawl out the players surnames as the excitable young announcer announces them.

Eventually, after an abridged rendition of Edward Ebenezer Jeremiah Brown and a few bars of the Beatles’ Hey Jude the game begins, and it is Town who get first go with the ball, which they are directing towards me and my fellow ultras. Fiona and I share the thought that we wish we could just be told now that we’re going to win, or not. It would spare us the pain. Town wear their signature blue and white kit whilst Birmingham are in an unfamiliar all red ensemble and look like a knock-off Swindon Town or Workington. Mysteriously, Birmingham’s shirts feature a white ‘five bar gate’ on the front as if they are keeping a tally of something like games without a win or consecutive years of crushing disappointment; “Keep right on to the end of the road” sing the Brummies in the Cobbold stand miserably, suggesting it might be the latter.

Within a minute, Kasey McAteer is set up at the edge of the penalty area by Nunez and shoots hard, but over the Birmingham cross bar. It looked like a good opportunity to score but Town are continuing to have the ball most of the time, although after five minutes Birmingham are the first of the two teams to raise and then dash their supporters hopes with a fruitless corner kick. The name RJ Dean follows that of Edison in the illuminations that cross the front of the Sir Bobby Robson stand and in spite of myself I think of Pearl and Dean, and one hit wonder soft rockers Edison Lighthouse (Love Grows (where my Rosemary goes)), although I’ve never had a Rosemary.

Despite Town having the better of the game so far, the Birmingham goalkeeper James Beadle isn’t exactly being forced to pull off a string of fine saves and I sense that the people around me aren’t giving the game their full attention. “Watch out Beadle’s about” laughs a man a couple of seats away from me in what could be a pitiful attempt at humour or more likely a cry for help. I ask Fiona what she’s having for her tea and given that she’s sitting where Pat from Clacton usually sits, I shouldn’t be surprised when she says “A baked potato”. But Fiona is quick to point out that unlike Pat from Clacton she won’t be having any fancy toppings from Marks & Spencer such as prawns, she’ll be having baked beans.

“Hark now hear the Ipswich sing, the Norwich ran away” sing the Sir Bobby Robson standers realising that this is the weekend of a Christian festival, but evidently unsure which one. George Hirst wins a corner for Town and along with ever-present Phil I chant “Come On You Blues”. The half is half over and Birmingham win another pointless corner too. Nearly a third of the match has been lost to the ages and I think to myself that I can only remember one shot on goal. Hope springs eternal however and Town earn two more corner kicks in quick succession but as Fiona and I joke, they might as well have turned them down and said to Birmingham, “No, really, it’s ok, you have a goal kick, it’ll save time and all that pushing and shoving”.

Open play seems Town’s best bet for a goal and within sixty seconds a short pass from George Hirst has Kasey McAteer bearing down on Beadle only for his decent looking shot to be saved. Somewhat typically, Birmingham immediately take the ball to the other end of the pitch and a limp, aimless cross later, the ball is swept into the Town goal net by an unhappy looking Spaniard called Carlos Vicente. “How shit must you be? we’re winning away” chant the Brummies, thoughtfully demeaning both teams at once in the spirit of equal opportunities.

The Birmingham supporters are now in good voice with their team’s goal seemingly having lifted the pall of gloom that their Black Country accent usually conveys. “I can’t read and I can’t write but that don’t really matter, I’m a supporter of Ipswich Town and I can drive a tractor” they chant as they strangely feign a west country burr worthy of the Wurzels. It’s not a chant I’ve heard from away supporters in sometime and it suggests that they might get lost on the way home as they look for the signs to the A45 rather than the A14.

Barring the unknown amount of time to be stolen from our futures and added on, there are seven minutes of the first half remaining as Azore Matusiwa is substituted for Anis Mehemeti and I remark to Fiona that they both have the same initials, like Nigel Farage and National Front. “Is this a library” ask the Brummies up in the Cobbold Stand and the obviously well-read and studious man two seats along from me who likes Jeremy Beadle shouts back “You’ve never seen a fucking a library”.

With the forty-first minute comes the confirmation needed that this isn’t a library at all as Ben Johnson cleverly bounces a cross from Furlong into the Birmingham goal, from where it is quickly cleared but not before it has crossed the goal line. Town are level. Four minutes later, and the last library cards are melted down and “Quiet Please” signs burnt as an incisive passing move cuts through the heart of the Birmingham defence putting the constantly running Kasey McAteer through to slip the ball beneath Beadle, and Town are winning. Six minutes of added on time are added on in which Town win another corner from which George Hirst heads over the Birmingham cross bar; but in the circumstances everyone seems happy for now with the one goal lead.

After a slow start the half has ended very well indeed, and Town are deserving of their interval lead as I head down to the front of the stand to talk to Ray, his grandson Harrison and son Michael, stopping only to speak with Dave the steward before later decanting the dregs of the Brown Hare and getting back to my seat by nine minutes past four, when the football resumes.

It is soon apparent that the second half is not living up to the excitement of the first as Ipswich are incapable of retaining the ball. They try to play out from the back as usual, and manage it to the point where Clarke or McAteer are outnumbered and squashed against the touchline and concede throw-ins. Meanwhile, if the ball strays in-field the Birmingham players are falling over like they’ve heard that the ghost of Mack Sennett is in the stand looking for candidates to star in a re-make of the Keystone Cops movies; referee Mr Adam Herczeg is predictably unpredictable but is generally a sucker for anyone falling over.

Birmingham are the first to make substitutions but with just under a half an hour left to play the Town support is beginning to plead with their team. “Come on Ipswich, Come on Ipswich” they implore before moving onto a current favourite, “When the Town go marching in”, which is delivered at a pace that suggests Town will be limping in and we’ll be “in that number” because well, we ‘re here now and we can’t be arsed to move elsewhere. I try to make myself feel better by looking up at the almost clear, blue, afternoon sky and thinking that the stars are still there, I just can’t see them at the moment.

On seventy minutes Birmingham’s Ibrahim Osman gets to the by-line and his cross strikes the chest of Dara O’Shea and drops into the Ipswich goal. From where I’m sat it looks like a perfectly good own goal but happily and perhaps fortunately it’s not. According to the referee’s assistant the ball had gone over the line before it was crossed. The close shave is enough to stir Keiran McKenna into action and he embarks on a mass substitution the like of which has usually occurred about a quarter of an hour before now. Off go Clarke and Nunez, on comes Jaden Philogene and from the excitable young stadium announcer’s announcement it sounds like George Hirst is replaced by both Jack Taylor and Chuba Akpom. Jack Taylor is almost immediately booked for throwing the ball into the crowd, suggesting that his role will be to “manage the game” by just mucking about as much as possible.

From the low point of the near own goal, Town are now improving, looking more resilient. Luckily, although Birmingham are big and strong, with the possible exception of Osman they seem to lack skill and guile. A chant of ”Ole, Ole Ole” , albeit a brief one, suggests some Town fans are confident Town will hang on and I am surprised by how quickly the time passes as we lurch into the final ten minutes. Eighty-four minutes are gone and the excitable young stadium announcer thanks us for our “incredible support” before announcing that we number 29,381 and I cringe as people applaud their own existence. A minute later I gasp as Osman shoots low and Christian Walton dives to tip the ball onto the right-hand post before it is booted clear. But that’s as bad as it gets and four minutes and another four minutes of added-on time slip away into the past without further undue pain, and Ipswich win.

With the final whistle, Fiona is quickly away, but with twenty minutes until my train is due to depart, I linger to applaud the Town and sing another verse or two of Edward Ebenezer Jeremiah Brown. It has been a mostly uncomfortable second half for Town supporters, but Town have won, we have reasons to be cheerful.

Ipswich Town 1 Preston North End 1

February 1, 2026February 2, 2026 / martinpbrooks / 1 Comment

It’s been an unexpectedly sunny morning but everywhere is still dripping with last night’s and yesterday’s rain. The morning has drifted by after an energetic start, which consisted of popping to the Co-op before breakfast to buy mushrooms, fruit and three bottles of local beer not available in the monopolising supermarket chains. In the Co-op car park, a large petrol-engined pick-up truck, of the sort I imagine American rednecks driving was parked in one of the electric vehicle charging spaces; the legend along the side of the truck in big letters read ‘Barbarian’, which seems appropriate.

Now, the train to Ipswich is on time but confusingly only half as long as it usually is, as if there is a shortage of carriages, but it doesn’t matter as there is still plenty of room on board and Gary and I can comfortably spread out over four seats when he boards at the next station stop, although it takes him time to find me because the train hadn’t stopped as far up the platform as he thought it would. As we descend through Wherstead, Gary admits to considering buying a season ticket for Jimmy’s Farm, although he’s not sure it would be as good value as one for Colchester Zoo. I spot two polar bears patrolling the fence of their enclosure, but Gary doesn’t.

Sunny Ipswich is busy with pre-football people and as we walk along Portman Road I ask Gary what colour kit he thinks Preston North End will wear today. He doesn’t know but hopes all-white. I tell him that if Wikipedia can be believed Preston is home of the tallest parish church spire in Britain, although here in puritan Ipswich I’m not sure it counts because it’s a Roman Catholic one. Somewhere near the Spiral underground car park I listen to a voicemail message from Mick which tells me he is going to be late because he got half-way to the Arb and has realised he left his season ticket at home, so has gone back to get it. Wracked with doubt and disappointment we arrive at the Arb where, as ever, I am first through the door, and following pub etiquette invest in the first round, a pint of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride for me and one of Estrella Galicia for Gary (£10.40 with Camra discount).

Beers in hand we make for the beer garden and select metal chairs to sit on because the wooden seats are damp and the shelter backing on to High Street is fully occupied. When Mick arrives he buys another round of drinks (Estrella, two pints of Suffolk Pride and a whisky chaser) and we settle down to look at today’s team line-up, have Mick regale us with tales of his recent trip to Glasgow and what he did there on Burns (Robert not Wes) night, discuss Charles Rennie Mackintosh, how AI might be able to tells us why Celtic football club has a soft ‘C’ but Celtic culture has a hard one, Antonio Gaudi and the Sagrada Familia, pick pockets in Barcelona, Frank Lloyd Wright, Frank Gehry and the Guggenheim Museums in New York and Bilbao, and the contents of the Kelvin Hall Museum.

Sometime after twenty-five to three we depart for Portman Road and part ways in what would be the shadow of Alf Ramsey’s statue if the sun shone from the North not the South, as Mick kneels down to tie his shoelace. Parting is such sweet sorrow in the knowledge that we might not meet again for a whole month before the next home fixture on 28^th February versus Swansea City. There are short queues at the back of the Sir Alf Ramsey stand where the search by smiling people of mostly Asian heritage for weaponry and scrap metal continues zealously. I enter the stand through turnstile sixty-two, vent spent Suffolk Pride and join Pat from Clacton, Fiona, ever-present Phil who never misses a game, his son Elwood and Angie, who is back in her usual seat, just as the excitable young stadium announcer tells us the names of the Town team and I am able to bawl a few surnames as if I was a Frenchman at Stade du Moustoir, Lorient or Stade de l’Abbe Deschamps, Auxerre.

When the game begins, it is Preston North End who get first go with the ball, which they kick loosely in the direction of Gaye Street and what used to be the appropriately named Revett’s motorcycle shop at 53-67 Norwich Road. Preston, or PNE (pronounced Pernee) as I usually think of them are suited in a plain, but classic kit of white shirts and navy-blue shorts, like England or Bolton Wanderers. The virgin whiteness of PNE’s white shirts is relieved only by a frankly under-sized, curvy orange logo that not very clearly reads ‘Spud Bros’ and looks like the brothers might have designed it themselves. Possible relatives of Mr Potato-Head, Spud Bros are more reliably known as purveyors of takeaway baked potatoes to the people of Lancashire, and “stars” of Tik-Tok, although according to Companies House their registered office is in Brentwood. As ever, the Town are in blue shirts and white shorts that make no reference to vegetables or hot, takeaway food.

The first few minutes of the game have me noting mentally the home debut of recent signing Anis Mehmeti , the fact that the referee Mr John Busby is a very short man who might consider wearing a busby to make him look a bit taller, and how I think today’s tactic should just be to ‘give it to Jack Clarke’. Fiona meanwhile explains her absence from the Bristol City game; although she didn’t feel unwell, she just had to keep running to the loo, so thought it advisable to stay home and watch the match on the telly. Above us, the sky has turned a heavy grey but with welcome patches of blue. With the arrival of the ninth minute Town win a corner and enough of us to form a five-a-side team chant “Come on You Blues”. Fiona asks if Mehmeti is Albanian and the PNE fans sing “Who the fuck are Blackburn Rovers?” to the tune of “John Brown’s Body”.

Six minutes later, and Town win another corner. Again, we chant “Come on you Blues”, but to no avail. Above us there is now more white cloud, and before us the green neon light from the Sir Bobby Robson stand flashes “Health care you can trust” implying rather worryingly that there is also health care that you can’t trust. If Nuffield, who claim to be the trustworthy ones know something, they should tell the rest of us. Four minutes later and Jack Clarke shoots high and wide with the admirable style and panache of a man with a hair band, and he was plainly attempting the curl into the top corner.

The half is not quite half over and a foul throw from a PNE player brings the biggest cheer or rather jeer of the afternoon so far. I decide I don’t really care about foul throws, why not let players just chuck the ball however they like? Town meanwhile have the ball most of the time but are not getting through the massed ranks of white-shirted players and not a single cross has come from the right-hand side, where Mehmeti is possibly crowding out Wes Burns. Finding entertainment where they can, Pat from Clacton and Fiona laugh as they recall occasions when Pat’s sister has fallen over, which apparently, she did today when she called at Pat’s before setting off for the football; I didn’t realise they were so cruel. The best move of the half sees Davis cross the ball, Burns head it back and Azom boot an overhead kick straight into the arms of PNE goalkeeper David Cornell, who forgettably, played for Ipswich in the 2020/21 season; if only Azom had been facing the right way and could have seen where he was kicking it,

A third Town corner turns up to tease us and more lonely chants of ‘Come on You Blues’ prove fruitless again before PNE break up field with their number nine, who expertly lifts the ball over the advancing Christian Walton and comfortably wide of the goal. It was probably the best chance of the half. Little Mr Busby meanwhile is making himself very unpopular with the majority of people in Portman Road by only giving free kicks to PNE, and his efforts to atone by going back and booking PNE’s Thompson for a foul committed a minute or so earlier don’t convince anyone. Mehmeti shoots high into the side netting with great velocity and then PNE win their first corner. “Come On Ipswich, Come On Ipswich” plead the home crowd staving off boredom as sunshine plays on the Cobbold Stand through gaps in the cloud. If anyone has to shield their eyes, they won’t miss much except perhaps Mr Busby squirming slightly to the choruses of “Shit referee, shit referee, shit referee, shit referee, shit referee”. With the final minute of the half Town claim their fourth corner and the cries of “Come on You Blues” briefly reach audible levels before two minutes of the future are requisitioned by the fourth official to make up for moments of collective inertia since three o’clock and Town win a fifth pointless corner.

With the half-time whistle, I break ranks to vent more spent Suffolk Pride and then chat briefly to Dave the steward whilst on my way to speak with Harrison and his dad Michael down at the front of the stand. We talk of music and Harrison tells me of his liking for Paul McCartney’s first solo album ‘McCartney’ and we agree it is his best, even if some of it wasn’t considered good enough to be on the Beatles ‘White Album’.

The football resumes at four minutes past four with George Hirst unexpectedly replacing Ivan Azom before Mr Busby tries to curry favour by booking another Prestonian and the PNE manager Paul Heckingbottom, who sounds like he could be a character from the BBC tv sitcom ‘Last of the Summer Wine’. Soon afterwards PNE miss the second-best chance of the game so far as Alfie Devine shoots over the Town bar after a quick break through a sleepy looking Town defence. The smell of damp turf drifts pleasantly up my nasal passages as any remaining sunlight slips behind the West Stand.

Ten minutes of the half have been and gone and already there are desperate pleas of “Come on Ipswich, Come on Ipswich” from the home support. For a few minutes PNE dominate possession and I wonder if maybe Town could turn the tables with a quick break away of their own, but we’re never that quick. To pass the time, Town win a sixth corner and Pat from Clacton tells us that in the ‘pick the correct score’ competition on the Clacton supporters’ bus she has drawn 3-3 and 3-1. “Something had better change pretty soon then” I tell her gloomily. A third decent shot on target from PNE sees Christian Walton make a low diving save prompting chants of “P,N,E, P,N,E, P,N,E” from the inhabitants of the town most famous for its admittedly magnificent bus station and having been the first to be by-passed by a motorway.

Twenty-minutes into the second and final half and Eggy and Jack Taylor replace Wes Burns and Jens Cajuste. Within sixty-seconds, George Hirst misses what looks from the lower reaches of the Sir Alf Ramsey stand like an open goal as he heads wide. Such is our anxiety now that it is agreed that Pat from Clacton should release the masturbating monkey good luck charm from her handbag and he is passed amongst us like some sort of weird Communion cup. The blue Dodo from Mauritius follows the same ritual soon afterwards. Meanwhile, today’s attendance is announced as being 27,549 and as we are thanked for attending by the excitable young announcer, Christian Walton makes an acrobatic save to tip a fourth decent PNE shot over the cross bar for a corner kick.

Sadly, whilst corner kicks have a strong element of lucky dip about them, the odds of Town scoring from them are akin to the likelihood of winning the national lottery, whilst for other teams the odds seem more like the chances of winning a game of whist. This being the case, an outstretched leg and a rebound and then a close range scuffed shot are enough to ensure PNE take the lead with eighteen minutes of the originally allotted ninety minutes remaining. The scorer is number nineteen Lewis Gibson, who bizarrely celebrates by cupping his hands either side of his head to make him look as if he has very big ears, and then running towards the PNE supporters. I can only think he has been rendered temporarily insane with the excitement of scoring.

As we head into the last fifteen minutes, Town continue to rack up corners, and the home crowd show growing impatience as Dara O’Shea lingers over the ball rather than surging forward like Kevin Beattie, or just booting it, like Kevin Beattie. Mehmeti shoots wide before Akpom replaces him and Johnson usurps Furlong. Another Town corner develops into an exciting head tennis match or bout of pinball. PNE make substitutions. Town take another corner and I tell myself I am still believing Town will score and go on to win. That things don’t go as they should seems in part due to Mr Busby and the Sir Bobby Robson standers chant “Shit referee, Shit referee, Shit referee” with a passion and a volume never produced when merely attempting to encourage the team.

The final ten minutes of the ninety see George Hirst’s flick over Cornell cleared off the line after a fine pass from Jack Taylor but otherwise Town possession does not translate into shots on goal or the PNE defence being torn asunder. But then, as if by magic, in the very final minute, with additional time of six minutes having just been announced, Jack Clarke runs across the PNE penalty area and is tripped by a Spaniard by the name of Pol Valentin. Mr Busby awards a penalty kick and Jack Clarke scores. Apparently, because Clarke slips when taking the kick, the PNE players try to claim the ball was kicked twice but Mr Busby has received enough abuse this afternoon to stop him entertaining specious claims like that.

Eventually, the six added minutes are played and despite multiple claims for penalties for firstly another foul on Clarke and then two or three handballs, no further goals are scored. It’s been a disappointing afternoon of course, one to file with the catalogue of similar matches from the past against the likes of Cheltenham Town, Oxford United, and Port Vale, clubs often desperately punching above their weight. We win most of them but not all and today we have been lucky to draw.

The crowd depart quickly into the dusky evening both happy and unhappy to have drawn. The late goal almost feels like a win if like me you adjusted your expectations with only time added on standing between the present and defeat. Even if the football wasn’t always the best, we’ve had our money’s worth this afternoon in terms of drama. The Wolsey Theatre would be worried about the competition, but pantomime season has finished.

Ipswich Town 2 Bristol City 0

January 22, 2026January 22, 2026 / martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

Looking back, as I often seem to do nowadays, I find that the first time I saw Ipswich Town play Bristol City was nearly forty-nine years ago. Back then, both clubs were in what has since become the Evil Premier League but this has no bearing whatsoever on the fixture that is taking place tonight at Portman Road. The past is a foreign country, which makes us all immigrants.

It’s been a dull day decorated with scudding clouds courtesy of a brisk but strangely cold southerly breeze. But then, it is January. After a day’s work at home, I head for the railway station. The train is on time and Gary joins me on it at the first station stop. It’s dark outside so we don’t see any polar bears as the train reaches Wherstead and I’m not about to suggest the bears begin to wear dayglo gilets. Leaving Ipswich railway station, the Portman Road football ground shines like a glorious blue and white beacon or even a jewel on Ipswich’s evening skyline. Gary, a man not known for his interest in graphic design remarks upon the clear, classic font of the letters that spell out the words ‘Ipswich Town Football Club’ on the back of the Sir Alf Ramsey stand.

By way of a change this evening, I decide we should not walk up Portman Road, across the corner of Portman Road car park, along Great Gipping Street, up Civic Drive, across the car park where the Civic Centre used to be, up Lady Lane, over the crossing where St Matthews Street meets Crown Street, up St George’s Street, along Upper High Street and into High Street to reach the Arb. Instead, we just walk up Princes Street and Museum Street and into High Street. Gary thinks the other way is quicker but he’s an Ipswich supporter who is awkwardly unfamiliar with Ipswich’s historic town centre and doesn’t realise how many more listed buildings we have passed tonight.

I’m first to burst through the door when we reach the Arb (not listed), and I get to the bar first to invest in a pint of Estrella Galicia for Gary and a pint of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride (£10 something for the two with Camra discount) for myself. Gary heads for the cool of the beer garden whilst I linger a little longer to select a snack to help sustain me through the evening, choosing a felafel Scotch egg (£8) before joining him in the shelter (not listed) backing onto High Street, which is otherwise empty, for the time being anyway.

Our conversation meanders from Trump to religion to ‘famous’ Bristol City players (Billy Wedlock and Gerry Gow,) to how far south and east we’ve travelled, to tonight’s team and how unexpectedly cold it is this evening. Gary buys another pint of Estrella Galicia for himself and one of Suffolk Pride for me. I buy another half of Suffolk Pride and when there is no one else in the beer garden we up and leave; it’s a bit before twenty-five past seven.

At the back of the Sir Alf Ramsey stand tonight, there are queues to be scanned for weaponry and scrap metal, it’s hard to know why, other than lots of people arriving at once or more people than usual carrying weapons and scrap metal. But I’m soon on my way through the Football League Champions Memorial Turnstile, number 62, and after releasing spent Suffolk Pride I’m joining ever-present Phil who never misses a game and Pat from Clacton on the lower tier of the stand. There’s no Elwood tonight, nor man from Stowmarket (Paul), although his grandson is here with his girlfriend (Paul’s grandson’s girlfriend that is, not Paul’s), nor Fiona, who is feeling unwell. In Fiona’s place however is Angie, who usually occupies the seat in front of Pat from Clacton. I shout out the players’ names as best I can when the excitable young stadium announcer reads them aloud, but he’s not in time with the scoreboard. In the questionnaire I receive from the club by e-mail after the match I will suggest he goes on a fact finding mission to Lens, Lille or Paris to see how it’s done.

When the game begins it is Ipswich that get first go with the ball, which they send mostly in the direction of me and my fellow ultras. Naturally, Town are in blue shirts and white shorts but strangely, Bristol City, or ‘The Robins’ as they are known, presumably because of their signature red shirts, are wearing what must be their little-known winter plumage of white shirts and black shorts, like a poor man’s Germany or Port Vale. Town are soon on the attack and win their first corner after barely three minutes. Angie remarks on the height of referee’s assistant, who although bearded like a garden gnome is much taller than the usual. “Come On You Blues” five, or possibly six of us bawl and we do it again and then again as Town take two more corner kicks until Bristol goalkeeper Vitek punches the ball high into the air before catching it on its descent to spoil our fun.

It is the ninth minute. Jens Cajuste pirouettes to leave some hired imitation Bristolian in his wake and passes to Jack Clarke. All floppy hair and loping gait, Clarke drops a shoulder or two, eases the ball on with a stroke of the outside of a boot, and then side foots it inside the far post past a clutch of legs from about twelve metres out. Town lead 1-0. It’s yet another early goal from the left and Jack Clarke and Jaden Philogene who isn’t playing tonight seem to have become one.

“One-nil and you still don’t sing” chant the Bristolians up in the Cobbold Stand, mysteriously goading the pensioners and conservative people in late middle age who populate the Sir Alf Ramsey Stand. Fifteen minutes have melted into history and Town continue to do what is sometimes described as ‘taking the game to the opposition’. “Go on Wes, do ‘im” says Angie as Wes Burns receives the ball on the touchline and runs at the Bristol full-back.

But five minutes later Bristol almost score, as ‘playing out from the back’ fails to live up to expectations and Bristol get gifted a free shot on goal that Christian Walton saves rather well, giving Bristol a corner. Tension is relieved however by the sight of former ‘Blue’ Sam Morsy stepping out from what once was a dugout but now looks like a section from a short but wide open-top team bus. “He’s Egyptian, but he comes from Wolver’ampton” sing the Sir Bobby Robson standers to the tune of “She’s electric” by Oasis, although I might have misheard. After Wes Burns shoots to win Town another corner that comes to nothing Sam Morsy then replaces a bloke called Adam Randell and everyone applauds arguably Town’s best captain since Matt Holland.

The first third of the match begins to slip out of sight, except as recorded highlights, and Ivan Azon wins another corner and then shoots narrowly and quite spectacularly over the Bristol crossbar from about 20 metres away. “Ole, Ole Ole Ole, Azon, Azon” sing the Sir Bobby Robson standers as they tuck into their tapas and click their castanets. Seemingly aiming to please the home crowd further, Sam Morsy shoots wide and everyone cheers ironically, and then with no hint of irony at all the few hundred visiting supporters and possibly the fifteen-hundred or so empty plastic seats allocated to Bristol City but left unsold sing “Your support is fucking shit” to the tune of Cwm Rhondda.

Nine minutes until half-time and Town notch yet another corner to a tiny chorus of “Come On You Blues” before Bristol City hint at having a pact with the devil as Cajuste’s shot is blocked and Azon’s sudden follow-up attempt is deflected by unseen forces over the bar, although it is goalkeeper Radek Vitek who gets the thanks from his team mates. With five minutes until half-time the home crowd celebrate again as referee Mr Whitestone selects Bristol’s Neto Borge to be the recipient of his first yellow card, after Borge shoves Dara O’Shea headlong into the West Stand advert hoardings.

The half comes to a close with three minutes of added-on time, another necessary save from Christian Walton and yet another hollow chorus of “Come On You Blues” from me and the other five ultras as Town’s corner count exceeds its ultra count. Applause greets the half-time whistle, and I take a short trip to the front of the stand to speak with Harrison and his dad Michael, and briefly with Dave the steward before I head indoors to release more spent Suffolk Pride, returning in time to see the football resume at twelve minutes to nine.

Unexpectedly, it is Bristol City who win the first corner within a minute of the re-start, whilst Pat from Clacton shares the news that Angie’s bobble hat was new from the club shop tonight; nine pounds in the ‘under a tenner’ sale. Angie wears the woollen hat well, but I don’t think such a large bobble would suit me at all. I might write to the club to suggest the shop stocks blue berets and ITFC pin badges to be sold in tandem with prescription sunglasses for that authentic Ultra look.

Seven minutes into the latest half and Walton makes another save, this time from Emil Riis. It’s an incident that prompts Town fans to plead “Come On Ipswich, Come On Ipswich” a minute later. Clearly struck by the crowd’s imploring cries Town up their game and Azon chases down the right before squaring the ball to Jack Clarke who sweeps the ball very precisely but stylishly inside the far post as only a man wearing a hair band can. Two-nil to Ipswich. “We’re on our way to the Premier League” chant the Sir Bobby Robson standers suddenly filled with a hitherto missing confidence, although they soon reveal that they’re a little unsure how promotion actually works chanting “How do we get there? I don’t know”. Moments later however they seem more certain as they launch into “Ee-I, Ee-I, Ee-I, Oh, Up the Football League We Go”, again probably for the first time this season.

Mass substitutions soon follow for Bristol City as their fabulously Germanic sounding manager Gerhard Struber trusts in ringing the changes and bringing on players called Pring and Earthy. Although often messy, with possession changing hands a bit too frequently, the game provides plenty for the crowd to enjoy and no more so than when, possibly just for old times’ sake, Sam Morsy gets shown Mr Whitehouse’s yellow card. But Morsy is in good company in this Bristol City team, which almost queues up to be cautioned with a series of assaults on Jack Clarke, Dara O’Shea and Ivan Azon or anyone who runs past with or stands between them and the ball.

Not to be outdone by the former insurance salesman from Austria, Keiran Mckenna makes the customary multiple substitutions too, giving opportunities for the home crowd to give dedicated applause for the excellent efforts of Azon, Burns, Cajuste, Clarke, and Nunez, who have all shown skill and endeavour in the face of a team that with the possible exception of Sam Morsy due to his religious beliefs, probably trains on rough cider.

With the second goal the game had become a matter of will we or won’t we score a third goal. “I don’t need to get Monkey out do I” says Pat from Clacton, referring to the lucky charm who apparently used to cause instant changes of fortune for struggling Town teams upon leaving her handbag but has since lost his touch a bit. Angie is reduced to giggling about the surname of Bristol’s Rob Dickie, whilst I enquire of her whether she thinks he’s from Billericay. I hope she remembers Ian Dury.

It’s been a relatively comfortable game for the Town with the feeling that if we wanted or needed to, we could always try a little harder and score some more goals. Six minutes of added on time is therefore a little unwanted for both teams probably, but we survive it. With the final whistle we can clear off home safe in the knowledge that a third consecutive home victory over teams beginning with letter ‘B’, after just one win and two draws in consecutive games against teams beginning with the letter ‘W’ back in September and October is a slightly strange measure of how much the team has improved. It’s just a pity that if things keep on like this, we might end up in the bloody Premier League again

Ipswich Town 3 Blackburn Rovers 0

January 18, 2026January 20, 2026 / martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

Woke up, fell out of bed. It was damp and dreary outside when I drew back the bedroom curtains. Feeling inspired, I thought I’d check to see when I had last seen Ipswich Town play Blackburn Rovers, and I was surprised to learn that it was in August of 2018; it was the first game at Portman Road under the pitiful and thankfully brief leadership of the diminutive Paul Hurst. In case you’re wondering, I missed Blackburn’s last visit to Ipswich in September 2023 because I was in Brest, where I witnessed Stade Brestois beat Olympique Lyonnais one-nil to go top of Ligue1.

Times change, but Ipswich Town are playing Blackburn Rovers again today (Brest are away to Lyon tomorrow) and today’s match kicks-off at the silly time of 12:30pm, when civilised people should be eating lunch, in the pub, or still in bed. I catch the train to Ipswich, looking up I notice it isn’t late, and I have a carriage to myself until Gary joins me at the first station stop in his brightly coloured anorak. The train speeds on through a damp and dismal winter wonderland of bare trees and decaying vegetation, brightened only by the sighting of two very off-white polar bears that live by a lake in Wherstead. Arriving in Ipswich, pale sunshine is straining its way through the cloud because the sun always shines in Ipswich or tries to. As we cross Princes Street bridge there are just two people sat in the beer garden of the Station Hotel and they look very young; they’re probably drinking Vimto.

In Portman Road, a crowd of people loiter, waiting for the turnstiles to open. Gary and I speculate as to the attractions that Portman Road holds ninety minutes before kick-off but can’t think of any. I am first through the door at the Arb and with no other punters at the bar I am soon paying for a pint of Estrella Galicia for Gary and a pint each of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride for Mick and myself (£14.90 with Camra discount). We repair to the beer garden to sit in the shelter that backs on to High Street, joining a solitary man with glasses and tied back hair at the end table having first asked if we may; we may. Mick is late, but it’s not long before he arrives. We talk of the African Cup of Nations, how Mick will miss Tuesday’s match because he must go to Scotland for a funeral, of the Tory councillor from Lymington in Hampshire sent to prison for twenty weeks for stalking former Tory MP Penny Mordaunt, and jury service. Gary buys more drinks and we leave for Portman Road at about ten past twelve once we’re happy that we are the last to leave.

We part ways near Sir Alf Ramsey’s statue; Mick and Gary heading for the west stand whilst I make for turnstile sixty-two and the cheap seats of the Sir Alf Ramsey stand, where a smiling man first scans me for concealed weapons and scrap metal. From outside, I have already heard the excitable young stadium announcer reading out the names of the teams and I didn’t join in. After disposing of spent Suffolk Pride in the proper manner, I make for the stand, pausing only to allow the minute’s applause for all deceased Ipswich Town fans to end. I’m not a fan of the mawkish, public sentimentality of the ‘Memorial Day’. Grief is private, life is for the living and we’re all going to die.

Kick-off is moments away as I shuffle past Pat from Clacton and Fiona to my seat a row or two behind ever-present Phil who never misses a game and his son Elwood, and two along from the man from Stowmarket (Paul), who today is making his return to Portman Road after missing several matches. When the game begins, it’s Blackburn who get first go with the ball, which they launch in the general direction of the Vets for Pets premises on Handford Road and the Co-op next door. Blackburn are wearing an unpleasant looking yellow kit, which from where I am sitting looks as if it is covered in brown smudges, ‘skid marks’ perhaps. According to the Lancashire Telegraph however, the shirt is gold in colour and is a ‘love letter to Blackburn’ featuring several of the town’s landmarks throughout the design. I squint and think I might just be able to make out the four thousand holes, give or take three thousand nine hundred and ninety-nine. Aside from the shirts, the first two minutes of the game are ‘all Blackburn’ and in the third minute their number 20, Erain Cashin scores a spectacular goal, albeit in his own net. Nunez and Philogene exchange passes before Nunez delivers a low, hard cross, which Cashin belts into the top corner of the goal from a seated position, thereby promoting himself as the possible answer to Town’s perceived need for a ‘top striker’. Town lead one-nil.

The goal results in Ipswich gaining the confidence for Eggy to have a volley tipped over the crossbar by Blackburn goalkeeper and ancient Egyptian deity Toth. The Blackburn number 10 is jeered by home supporters. “That’s Cantwell” says the fella in front of me. “Whoever he is” I respond, genuinely not knowing who he is although I’d seen his face before. “He used to play for Norwich” says the fella. “Like Nunez” says Fiona. Ipswich have a corner “Come on You Blues” chant at least five of us. A far post header sends the ball into the six-yard box, Toth smothers the ball but then doesn’t and Jack Taylor belts it into the roof of the goal net from less than a metre out. It’s a goal ugly enough to have travelled through time from the days of Mick McCarthy. Town lead 2-0, although I had expected the goal to be disallowed, but that was before I remembered we’re not in the Premier League anymore.

“All games should start like this” I think to myself and then tell Fiona. Seventeen minutes have left us, Town still lead two-nil, Blackburn win a corner. Eight further minutes pass into history and Blackburn’s Atcheson claims the day’s first booking after fouling Jaden Philogene. I had been wondering how many goals we might score but things have quietened down. A long throw from Darnell Furling momentarily excites. “A helluva throw” says the bloke beside me, “Like a bullet”, and it was. Then Blackburn win another corner. “Wanker, wanker, wanker” chant the Sir Bobby Robson standers, and “He’s only a poor little budgie” to the tune of ’The Sparrow’, a Christmas 1979 hit for The Ramblers, a choir from the Abbey Hey Junior School, Manchester, and along with Brian and Michael and St Winifred’s School Choir, a rarely celebrated part of the ‘Madchester scene’. I assume the target for the abuse is Cantwell, a man who sports a mullet, which makes him resemble a cross between Jerry Seinfeld and Mickey from the Job Centre in the BBC tv series ‘The League of Gentlemen’.

There are twelve minutes remaining until half-time and as we wait for Leif Davis to take a corner having chanted “Come on You Blues” a few times for luck, Fiona comments on the grubby appearance of Blackburn’s yellow shirts that look like they’re covered in brown marks of unknown provenance. An injured Jaden Philogene is replaced by Jack Clarke, Blackburn win another corner and two minutes of added on time are stolen from our futures before half-time arrives.

During half time, I talk to the man from Stowmarket (Paul), who has been in hospital. He tells me all about it and I can only marvel again at the NHS and the beautiful idea of distributing resources amongst the population for the common good and according to people’s needs. I vent more spent Suffolk Pride and at twenty-six minutes to two the football resumes beneath a hint of winter sunshine. Five minutes in and Ipswich have a corner. The crowd is mostly quiet today because Blackburn have had a lot of the ball, albeit without doing much with it. But Ipswich are dominating now and the Sir Bobby Robson standers sing “When the Town go marching in” at a depressingly funereal pace appropriate for ‘Memorial Day’. Five minutes later however they feeling are more up-beat as they chant ‘Blue and White Army’ and it works as Town win another corner.

But Ipswich’s domination is fleeting as a Blackburn shot is blocked and another goes tamely wide. When Blackburn win another corner, I see just how bad Cantwell’s mullet is and so advise him to “get your ‘air cut, Cantwell” as any responsible citizen would. “Come On Ipswich, Come On Ipswich” pleads the home crowd and as if in response Eggy and Hirst are replaced by Ivan Azom and Wes Burns who draws a cheer for just trotting onto the pitch. “I don’t need to get Monkey out, do I?” asks Pat from Clacton, and Fiona and I agree we don’t need any lucky charms yet, because we’re still two-nil up.

In the final twenty minutes of normal time three more Blackburn players, Trondstad, Cantwell and Cashin are booked by referee Mr Kitchen, all for fouls on Jack Clarke who has become Blackburn’s target man since Philogene had to go off. Mr Kitchen meanwhile sports an impossibly neat but receding hairline as if like a 1960’s Action Man his hair has been painted on to his scalp. More substitutions are made, Pat from Clacton tells me about the pantomime she saw, the dame was called Belle Ringer, and for a short while my mind wanders off, I’m not sure where but I’m back in time for the eighty-eighth minute when Jens Cajuste surges forward, slips a through ball to Wes Burns and his square pass is swept into the Blackburn goal by Sammy Szmodics. Town lead three-nil and five minutes of added on time make no difference, although it sounds like Cedric Kipre has been chosen as man of the match by something called Holiday Testing Concrete Limited; I expect it’s something to do with Brutalist architecture.

The final whistle sounds and people stay and leave in equal measure to cheer the victors or catch buses and trains or queue in car parks. or just walk home. It’s been a slightly odd game, good in parts, very good in flashes. Ipswich have been too good for Blackburn whose greatest contribution to the spectacle has been providing a pantomime villain in Cantwell. Most significantly however, for the first time this season the visiting supporters have failed to sing “Football in a library, do-do-do”. Having had to get up in the middle of the night to travel over 400 kilometres for a 12:30 kick-off I don’t suppose they could be bothered.

Ipswich Town 1 West Bromwich Albion 0

October 26, 2025October 27, 2025 / martinpbrooks / 2 Comments

Another Saturday, another kick-off time, this time 12:30 when most civilized people are at least beginning to think about a pre-lunch drink or perhaps even lunch itself. But it’s not lunchtime yet and I’m struggling to make breakfast as the seven-month-old induction hob in my kitchen refuses to turn on, simply announcing ‘error’ every time I press the on button, and refusing to give me any of the error numbers listed in the instruction manual. Frustrated but not beaten I resort to an earlier technology using the grill to cook the bacon and microwave for the scrambled eggs.

Barely ten minutes after finishing breakfast I’m off down the road to the railway station as rooks circle above as if about to re-enact a scene from ‘The Birds’. Arriving at the railway station I am conscious that for the first time this season my hands feel cold, and putting on my woolly gloves I witness a man who had been standing about 50m away from all the other passengers on the London bound platform having to walk back down the platform when the train pulls in because it is half the length he evidently expected to be. I am still feeling sympathy for him when the Ipswich train arrives, probably because there’s been nothing else to make me forget him and probably because it’s the sort of thing I can envisage happening to me.

Not much more than five minutes later Gary is sitting opposite me and we’re talking about how there will be forty-eight teams at the next World Cup finals and how games will take place thousands of miles apart in America, Canada and Mexico, which won’t help save the planet so there can be future World Cup finals with even more teams.

Arriving in Ipswich, Gary remarks on how well located the Station Hotel is for away fans and I add that Ipswich Town generally has one of the best locations of any football ground anywhere, being close to both the town centre and the main railway station. Why everywhere is not like Ipswich I cannot imagine, all we’re missing are some trams. It’s still about two hours until kick-off, so the streets are relatively quiet, but there are still eager, expectant people seemingly with nowhere better to go, hanging round the turnstiles of Portman Road. At the Arb,’ our path to the bar is unhindered by other drinkers and although I order a pint of Estrella Galicia for Gary and a pint of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride for myself Gary offers to pay for them, and I let him. We repair to the beer garden to sit in the cold because that’s what we’ll be doing at Portman Road. We’re talking of someone Gary knew who died in tragic circumstances when Mick arrives and when Mick returns from the bar our grim conversation continues with talk of wills and probate and then the worryingly large number of despotic political figures around the world and how it can only end in war; it must be our age. Mick buys another round of drinks and with the clock ticking past noon I ponder whether there is time for another pint, or perhaps a half before we leave. I almost reluctantly decide against it and Mick says, “You could have an orange juice”. “Why on earth would I want to do that?” I ask as incredulously as I possibly can.

As ever, we revel in being the last to leave for Portman Road, scoffing at the ‘lightweights’ who have gone before us. We part near Sir Alf Ramsey’s statue and bid each other ‘adieu’ until Tuesday week when we will meet again for the match versus Watford. I march onto Chancery Road to make my approach to the Sir Alf Ramsey stand where there no queues at all for the turnstiles, my way being only interrupted by a pretty, Muslim lady with a magic wand looking for weapons. She asks me what I have in pockets and I show her my pair of woolly gloves. I enter the stadium through the hallowed turnstile 62 and with no one else about it feels like Portman Road belongs to me.

After siphoning off excess Suffolk Pride I arrive at my seat as flames erupt into the air in front of Cobbold Stand and pigeons take evasive action. Fiona, the man from Stowmarket (Paul), ever-present Phil who never misses a game, and his son Elwood are all here of course, but Pat from Clacton has failed a late fitness test, and she remains in Clacton with the remains of her Covid infection. On the pitch-side, the excitable young stadium announcer and his sidekick are sporting shiny new sports coats over their shiny suits and look like two grey, striped sausage rolls on legs. Oddly, my mind is elsewhere as the Town team is announced and I forget to bellow out the players’ names in the style of a Frenchman at the Stade Marcel-Picot or Stade Oceane, only emerging from my reverie in time to shout “O’Shea!”. I think I must have been thinking of Pat from Clacton.

Before kick-off this lunchtime there is a minute’s applause for recently deceased Town player Mick McNeil, although he deservedly gets a cite more than a minute’s applause because the crowd begins to clap as soon as his picture appears on the big screen in the corner or the referee blows his whistle. It might seem a bit shambolic but it’s also fitting that the fans do their own thing on these occasions because spontaneity is what football crowds are all about. With the applause finally over, it is Town’s opponents West Brom’ that get first go with the ball, which they attempt to launch at the goal at the end of the ground closest to the chip shop on the corner of London Road and Handford Road and the old waterworks on Whitton Church Lane, which is much further away and I don’t know why I thought of it. West Brom’ are ill-advisedly wearing yellow and green striped shirts and green shorts. Ipswich of course wear classic blue and white and kick towards me and my fellow ultras. Within a couple of minutes, the game surprisingly develops into an extended bout of head tennis, possibly the longest bout of head tennis I’ve ever seen in a football match. Inevitably however, like everything including life itself the head tennis ends eventually, although I’d hoped it might continue for longer, and I’m struck by the thought that West Brom and Ipswich are quite alike in being failed Premier League teams desperate to return.

After five minutes, Jaden Philogene runs and shoots for the far corner of the goal and the West Brom’ goalkeeper Griffiths dives athletically to push the ball away for a corner. It’s all very dramatic and spectacular and has me thinking “Wow!”, which is not something I do often. Like most Ipswich corners and probably every other team’s corners the resultant corner comes to nothing, and I’m left to notice how swirly the wind is as it ruffles the players shirts and makes the three flags on the Cobbold stand flutter wildly.

The ninth minute is here and so is Jaden Philogene again, crossing the ball low for Sam Szmodics to not quite reach and divert into the West Brom’ goal. Szmodics has stretched himself a bit too much and receives treatment from the physio as a result, revealing a flash of tattooed torso in the process, making me think of Rod Steiger in the film The Illustrated Man. Five minutes later and Jack Taylor breaks forward through the centre of the West Brom’ defence, which parts like the Red Sea before he unfortunately shoots wide of Griffiths’ right-hand post. I think to myself that I hope this game doesn’t turn out like the one last Tuesday as the electronic advertisement hoardings seemingly incite revolution, reading “Change the way the world works”.

Meanwhile, from up in the Cobbold Stand it sounds like the visiting fans are singing “We’re the Albion we’ll sit on our own”, although I’ll later work out that they’re not feeling anti-social, but want to “…sing on their own”, which is a jibe at the home fans not singing. But the fact is, Suffolk is probably just less musical than Warwickshire and the West Midlands, and the tally of Nik Kershaw, The Darkness, Brian Eno and Ed Sheeran versus Led Zeppelin, Black Sabbath, Roy Wood, Slade, Nick Drake and The Specials rather proves it.

Time has progressed to a point almost half-way through the first half and Sam Szmodics slopes off to be replaced by Chuba Akpom who soon wins Town another corner with a deflected shot, and I’m struck by the uncanny similarity, particularly of haircuts, between George Hirst and a pair of twins I recall from primary school who were called Nigel and Neville. Twenty-nine minutes have left us, and Town win another corner. “Come On You Blues” I shout repeatedly, but no one much seems to get that they’re meant to join in and produce a crescendo of noise which will frighten the ball into the West Brom’ net.

Town have been dominant again, but with about ten minutes to go until half-time they seem to be generously letting West Brom’ have a go with the ball, and ‘the visitors’ as radio commentators like to call them bag a couple of corners of their own, but naturally do nothing of interest with them. Indeed, West Brom’s spell of possession, is just that and nothing more, although for a short while the lack of action causes Portman Road to fall completely silent. “I thought I’d gone deaf for a moment” says the bloke behind me. Two minutes of added time are added on to give us our money’s worth, but the first half ends without a goal being scored.

Having cheered the referee off the pitch, I vent more spent Suffolk Pride and then visit Ray, his son Michael and grandson Harrison at the front of the stand. Pessimistically, Ray and I air concerns about the match so far being like Tuesday night’s, and Ray delivers his well-rehearsed joke that “It feels like deja vu all over again” before we talk about travelling around Europe and Ray reminisces about a trip to the Netherlands in his youth, before he met the woman he refers to as “the present Mrs Kemp.”

The football resumes at thirty-three minutes past one and the man from Stowmarket (Paul) gives me his assessment that the game doesn’t seem to be going anywhere, and unfortunately the absence of decent goal attempts continues. “We’re the Albion” chant the West Brom’ fans seemingly trying to stave off some sort of identity crisis and then Chuba Akpom starts to limp, takes off his left boot and with sixty minutes played is substituted with Nunez. The match however has become dull, “Football in a library” chant the West Brom’ fans consulting the well-thumbed pages of the English football supporters’ book of quick wit and ready repartee for something appropriate. On the touchline, Keiran McKenna acknowledges the chill in the air today having donned a short, dark grey puffa jacket, although he probably needs something more like the sports coats that stadium announcer Yogi and his sidekick Boo-Boo are wearing, but more colourful.

Twenty-five minutes of normal time remain and Town’s Sindre Egeli shoots wide to momentarily excite the home crowd and inspire the “witty” West Bromwichians to chant “We forgot, we forgot, we forgot that you were here” to the Welsh hymn tune Cwm Rhondda. Two minutes later and Egeli is at it again but shooting embarrassingly high and wide, which people find less exciting. With only seventeen ‘normal’ minutes remaining West Brom’ win another corner to keep the Town goal safe, and two minutes later George Hirst shows how he really is the new Rory Delap by becoming the first player to be booked. Hirst keeps in the limelight by being substituted a minute later along with Philogene and Jack Taylor, who are replaced by Ivan Arzon, Jack Clarke and Jens Cajuste before today’s attendance is announced as 28,447. In a busy couple of minutes, which almost pass for entertainment referee Mr Smith then books West Brom’ number two Chris Mepham, who coincidentally has the same surname as a girl I liked at primary school, although in truth I liked her friend Elaine a lot more.

With the end of the match in sight, either the substitutions are tactically astute or the players realise that they’d better do something quickly if they’re going to bank a win bonus this week and there is a noticeable increase in attacking intent with Nunez and Jack Clarke looking unexpectedly capable of penetrating the West Brom’ defence. The decisive play however comes from West Brom’ themselves who, keen to emulate Paris St Germain and Real Madrid by religiously “playing out from the back” conspire to lose the ball to Jens Cajuste no more than 15 metres from goal. Cajuste passes to Nunez or may be Azon ( i couldnt really tell from over 100 metres away) whose shot is parried by goalkeeper Griffiths but Jack Clarke strides forward to sweep the ball high into the goal net with the kind of stylish aplomb only accessible to a player wearing an alice band.

The remaining minutes, of which five are ones that have been dangerously ‘added on’ pass with a degree of anxiety but surprisingly without much fuss or any sharp intakes of breath. Fiona and the man from Stowmarket (Paul) make a swift exit at the final whistle, but today I am pleased to have the time before my train home to wait behind and applaud the team for forgoing lunch to deliver this unusually welcome victory. Now, I wonder what time our next match kicks off at?