Jimmy’s Farm

Ipswich Town 1 Millwall 1

/ martinpbrooks / 1 Comment

Yesterday was the Spring equinox, when the tilt of the Earth is neither towards or away from the Sun and the northern and southern hemispheres receive equal sunlight; it was also the start of astronomical Spring.  With balance and optimism agogo, it is a shame therefore that the stupid EFL and stupid Sky tv decree that today’s game versus Millwall is a 12:30 kick off and the day will therefore have no worthwhile morning or afternoon that isn’t occupied by being at the pub or by football.

After a hearty breakfast that includes two hot cross buns but is otherwise a secular affair, the condemned man (that’s me) takes to the train beneath a clear blue sky. The train has only five carriages today and I text Gary so that he is not stranded expectantly at the wrong end of the platform when the train pulls in at the next station stop, where he will board. The train is quite full because the previous train, which was bound for Norwich never appeared, lost in a pagan ritual to welcome Spring somewhere near Witham, but our journey is pleasant enough and we get to see a polar bear without having to pay the entrance money for Jimmy’s Farm.

Today, we elect to take the seemingly convoluted and arguably less scenic route to ‘the Arb’ via Portman Road, across Civic Drive and past the fantastical spiral underground car park, sadly one of only a few elements of Ipswich’s Greyfriars to St Matthews psychedelic, 1960’s wonderland to remain intact. Arriving at our destination I am back to being first through the door at the Arb as Gary trails behind me, and we are soon transporting a pint of Lager 43 for Gary and pints of Mauldon’s Suffolk Pride for me and Mick (£14 something with Camra discount) out into the beer garden, where we decide unanimously  to sit at a table in the full sun.  We have barely sat down before Mick arrives.  Gary has ordered a sausage sandwich which soon arrives too, but without any sauces, and he has to return indoors to ask for his preferred brown sauce, which is then brought to him in a stainless-steel dish; not a plastic sachet in sight.  Later, Gary will have a sesame seed left on his bottom lip, but he will wipe it off just as I am about to tell him so.

Our conversation today soon establishes that our lives are currently quite dull, Gary having the wildest times of the three of us, being on jury service, but like the good citizen that he is he won’t talk about it, although being from Essex and not having had the benefit of a classical education courtesy of Suffolk County Council like Mick and me, he never once uses the term sub judice.  Time travels on and Mick buys more Suffolk Pride for me, a pint of Estrella Galicia for Gary and a whisky for himself before Gary buys Mick a half of Suffolk Pride and another pint of Suffolk Pride for me.

I have no real clue what time it is when we get up to leave for Portman Road, but I imagine it to be gone twenty to three, which would be rather late for a twelve-thirty kick-off.  As one we visit the gents before departing, and it is just about possible there are a couple of people following on, meaning that somewhat exceptionally we are not the last to leave.  As we cross Civic Drive on our way to the ground Mick reveals how when walking down a supermarket aisle the other day he was struck by how much processed ‘crap’ was sold to people under the auspices of ‘food’, and how pretty much no one cares as long as it makes a profit.  Once in Portman Road, Mick and Gary head for what I still think of as the Pioneer Stand and I head for ‘Churchmans’ as we bid one another adieu until Easter Monday somewhere near Sir Alf’s statue.

Passage into the Sir Alf Ramsey stand is quick and painless today and I stand very briefly behind one other person before being checked for weaponry, explosives and scrap metal. Entry to the stadium is through the commemorative turnstile number sixty-two, and after tripping William the Conqueror-like up the steps into the lower tier of the stand I soon find myself shuffling past Pat from Clacton and Fiona, a couple of rows behind ever-present Phil who never misses a game.  Absent today are Phil’s son Elwood and the man from Stowmarket (Paul), who I think really comes from Stowupland.  I have rocked up too late to see the excitable young stadium announcer reading out the team but as much as I enjoy pretending to be a Frenchman at the Stade Roazhon by bawling out the players’ surnames I can’t say it has overly reduced my enjoyment of the day so far.

When the time comes, it is Millwall who get first go with the ball, which they are attempting to send in the direction of the goal at the far end of the ground from me and my fellow ultras.  Town are in their natural colours of blue and white whilst due to a colour clash Millwall sport off-white shirts and shorts with what looks like green trim; it’s a look that suggests the kit was left too long in the boil wash.  Portman Road is noisy today, with an atmosphere a bit like that for a Norwich match but without the bile, and Norfolk variants of the Habsburg chin.  After five minutes, Dan Neil shoots wide of the Millwall goal and then Millwall win a corner.  Up in the Cobbold stand even the gangways look full in the away ‘end’, as if those crafty, lawless cockneys have somehow managed to sneak in ticketless fans in the pockets of their fashionable short coats or disguised as sharp haircuts.

Ipswich dominate and shots rain in on the Millwall goal. The Millwall goalkeeper Patterson ‘spills’ a shot from Ben Johnson and Dan Neil has a shot blocked before Ivan Azon volleys goalwards from reasonably close range and Patterson makes a remarkable reflex save to divert it over the cross bar for a corner.  From the corner I am struck by the enormity of Millwall’s centre halves Cooper and Taylor and by Cooper’s mullet haircut, which suggest either that he would rather be playing Aussie Rules Football or that he has travelled forward through time to be here from circa1984.

On the pitch, Ipswich begin to dominate and by the eleventh minute the noise subsides.  Every time Millwall concede a free-kick their supporters chant something about being “fucked by the FA” as they weave another repeated pattern into their rich tapestry of self-pity and conspiracy theories. Ipswich dominate. “We can do all this and then they’ll breakaway and score” says Pat from Clacton with the understandable pessimism of someone living in the constituency for which Nigel Farage is member of parliament. In the sixteenth minute, Millwall’s Josh Coburn is the first player to be booked by referee Mr Michael Salisbury, who I like to think is heir to the former high street chain of handbag shops.

The half is half over and in a rare Millwall interlude, their number four shoots wide of the Town goal. Above the goal, the electronic advertising hoarding mysteriously reads “The UK’s leading Hydrogen Water” and all around the ground people stop and think, “Ooh, I’d better stop for some Hydrogen Water on the way home”.  Ipswich otherwise continue to dominate, winning corners roughly every two minutes until in the forty-first minute Jack Clarke embarks of a short, characteristically stuttering run somewhere near the far edge of the Millwall penalty area before shooting low into the near corner of the goal, and Town lead one-nil.

The goal is no more than Town deserve and probably a lot less, but it’s enough to inspire a miserable sounding rendition of “When the Town go marching in” and a minute’s worth of time is conjured up and added on to the forty-five we’ve already lived.

With half-time, I quickly depart to dispense more spent Suffolk Pride and as I stand along with many other men, all with our penises in our hands, urinating, I wonder at our interesting juxtaposition to the posters above the urinals that introduce us to Ipswich Town’s ‘safeguarding’ team. Relieved but confused, I leave the toilet to talk to Dave the steward and then Ray, his son Michael and grandson Harrison at the front of the stand.  Ray tells me how he is going to have to have an operation in the next month or so which will involve a bone graft with bone taken from his leg that he apparently doesn’t need.   Harrison, who is in a wheelchair, has told Ray he can have the bones from his legs because he never uses them.

The second half begins at twenty-eight minutes to two and within two minutes Millwall have a corner. Three minutes later Millwall have equalised as Darnell Furlong lies pleading on the turf, knocked over by some muscular, proxy docker before a low cross is diverted into the net between Town’s two centre backs from close range by the previously booked Josh Coburn.  “The future of flat roofing” read the illuminated advertising hoardings on the Sir Bobby Robson stands.  Four minutes later, and from a corner Millwall have the ball in the Town goal net again but foul play is suspected and Town are awarded a free kick.

Millwall are stronger this half, more capable of winning the ball back and getting forward with it themselves.  Town aren’t without their moments however and as the first hour of play recedes into history three corners are won from shots on goal, with the last ending with a knot of players collapsing to the ground as if the edges of the Millwall six-yard box had been laced with trip wires.  Pat from Clacton meanwhile tells Fiona and me about the flocks of what she thinks were Canada Geese that she saw from her hotel whilst on her whist-playing holiday in Great Yarmouth. What is more, Pat shows us the photos to prove it too.

The sixty-seventh minute is later than when Keiran McKenna usually unleashes his first batch of substitutes, but today this is when Jaden Philogene and Jack Taylor replace Casey McAteer and Dan Neil, although in my head I can’t not hear the excitable young stadium announcer barking “Jack Clarke” as two very separate and distinct words as the change occurs.  It takes Fiona to convince me that he actually said “Jack Taylor” and not “Jack”  “Clarke”.

As the succession of minutes beginning with the number seven pass by, Millwall are winning more corners and now George Hirst and Chuba Akpom replace Ivan Azon and Anis Mehmeti. Pat from Clacton unfolds the two pieces of paper that show the scores she has drawn in the ‘predict the score’ competition on the Clacton supporters’ bus;  3-2 seems a bit unlikely, but 2-1 to Ipswich has us now all rooting for another Town goal twice as hard as before.

Heading down the final descent towards ninety minutes we are told that there are 29,129 of us here today and satisfyingly such crowds are now so commonplace at Portman Road that people no longer applaud themselves for their own existence. Four minutes of the standard ninety remain and Millwall’s Derek Mazou-Sacko replaces Billy Mitchell, a player who sounds more like a character from Eastenders.  Within seconds Derek Mazou-Sacko clatters Jack Clarke and as a result his name makes an interesting entry in Mr Salisbury’s notebook.  Clarke is quickly substituted, replaced by Eggy before he comes to any more harm.

The final minute has the match leaving the impression that Millwall are more of an attacking force than they have been as Walton makes an excellent reaction save from close range and then the rebound is smacked into the underside of the cross bar by Ivanovic when it looked certain that Millwall would score. Two more Millwall corners follow and yet another in the four minutes of added on time but despite the presence of the towering Cooper and Taylor Town defend these successfully before Mr Salisbury’s whistle delivers a curdled cocktail of both relief and lingering disappointment.

Fiona and Pat from Clacton are swiftly away with a brief farewell and “See you on Easter Monday” but I hang on to applaud both teams off for providing a very entertaining match.  As ever I had high hopes for a win, but as ever in the Second Division strength has matched artistry.  I should have known that on the day of the Spring equinox the two teams level on points would receive equal sunlight.

Ipswich Town 1 Preston North End 1

/ 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 28th 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.