Kings Park Rangers 2 Stanway Pegasus 0

November 16, 2025November 17, 2025 / martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

The snappily titled Thurlow Nunn Eastern Counties League Division One South has in the last year been shorn of two Suffolk clubs in the shape of Whitton United and Debenham Leisure Centre, who voluntarily dropped into the Suffolk and Ipswich League. But as if by magic, two replacements have immediately filled the gaps left, one in the shape of the venerable Halesworth Town (founded 1887) and the other in the form of the altogether less venerable King’s Park Rangers, who sprang suddenly from the Essex and Suffolk Border League after a brief two-season gestation, a bit like The Alien did from John Hurt’s stomach.

It is the final chapter of my two-part quest to be able to boast idly that I have seen every senior team in Suffolk play a home game. Today I am making the brief 19.2-kilometre road trip across the border from Essex to Backhouse Lane, Little Cornard where I hope to see King’s Park Rangers play another team of recent graduates from the Border League, Stanway Pegasus. If I was a younger man for whom the concept of time on this planet running out was less of an immediate concern, I might have caught the train to Colchester, or from Marks Tey to Bures, and then the number 44 bus to Great Cornard, but in truth I couldn’t really be bothered with the palaver, and in any case I have an electric car, so I am doing my bit to save the planet and reduce global warming. It is therefore a little after two o’clock when I set off from my front drive towards Sudbury.

Being in Little Cornard, it is no surprise that Backhouse Lane is the longstanding home of Cornard United, but more intriguing is why is it now also the home of Kings Park Rangers, who are they, why are they, and where is Kings Park? These questions have been niggling me all week in my idle moments, and fancifully I had postulated that they are perhaps a team from Kings Park, Suffolk County, Long Island, New York, a team of South African ex-pats who have named their club after Kings Park Stadium in Durban, or even that they are an incel’s bitter and twisted response to the existence of Queens Park Rangers. Eventually, there was nothing for it but to consult the interweb and hope I could find some information that was believable and not merely ‘content’ designed to enrage, influence or peddle consumer goods. It turns out, so it seems, that Kings Park Rangers are a sort of works team for Kings Park Fulfilment Ltd of Pebmarsh, Essex, a company that works for Amazon, aiding Jeff Bezos’s bid for world domination. According to ‘Suffolk News’, the club was set up in 2023 by “former Cornard resident” Josh Pollard “…as a way of connecting his family- including famous cousin Olly Murs – and work colleagues through their shared love of football.” I can’t decide if this is philanthropy, megalomania or just weird but it probably makes Kings Park Rangers a Pebmarsh team, an Essex team, that just plays in Suffolk.

Looking out from the drizzle flecked windows of my planet saving Citroen e-C4 it’s a miserable, depressingly grey November day, the aftermath of an even more depressingly miserable, wet, November day, the day before. The only thing to raise one’s spirits a little is the fact that today the moisture in the air is just occasional fine drizzle, not the persistent rain and occasional monsoon that hit yesterday. Nevertheless, there’s no denying that the dripping trees, puddles, mud and soggy leaves are all rather glorious in their own way and provide a characterful backdrop to the twisting, turning, undulating B1508 as it makes its way along the north bank of the River Stour from Bures towards Sudbury.

Suddenly, out of the gloom I reach Great Cornard and quickly identify the need to brake and turn right into Backhouse Lane, a very narrow road which in places has a deep water-filled ditch on one side; it is not wide enough for two cars to pass. Fortunately, I meet only one car coming in the opposite direction and that is at one of the few passing places. I am therefore soon parking up my planet saving Citroen in the mostly full car park, next to a white Ford Transit van. The entrance to the football ground is off to my right, through the mist and back towards the B1508 along a concrete path strewn with fallen, brown leaves that have the consistency of wet papier mache. Two men stand talking each other by the entrance, which seems to marked by a collection of beer kegs, and as I approach they end their conversation and one of them nips into the turnstile booth. When I last came to Cornard, back in January 2019, the ‘turnstile’ was just a wooden hut but at some time in the intervening six years and ten months this has been replaced by a very neat structure that looks something like a cross between a very small domestic conservatory and one of the old toll booths at the Dartford tunnel. I tender my £5 concessionary entry fee by means of my bank card. There is no printed programme, but the window of the toll booth displays a QR code for a programme which is free. Pretending to be completely familiar with QR codes I point my mobile phone at it, because I think I know that is what you do. I have succeeded in accessing on-line programmes in the past, but not today, but at least I will have a nice photo of a QR code. The young man at the turnstile then strangely tells me that there are plenty of people in the club house, perhaps he thinks I look lonely.

There are indeed plenty of people in the clubhouse as the young man in the toll booth said, but I only talk to the barman who, when I ask if there is a bitter available, tells me there isn’t the call for it nowadays but helpfully adds that a pub nearby wins awards for its beer. Sadly, there’s no danger of that here and I settle for a bottle of alcohol-free St Austell Brewery Proper Job (£4.90). The barman apologises for not letting me have the bottle to pour the beer myself and explains that whilst he doesn’t think I look like I would cause any trouble, he’s not allowed to. Avoiding eye-contact with anyone else in the bar, I worry a little for my safety and take my beer outside where I watch the players, the referee and his assistants warm up, and a player in a track suit top walks a small brown dog. I notice that the two dugouts are almost at opposite ends of the pitch, when I was here in 2019, they were next to one another.

The referee is a young man with impossibly short hair who looks very keen and serious as he turns and sprints along the touchline and then does the same again. His assistants, two much older men, follow him for all of a few seconds, by which time he is almost out of sight. “Five minutes. Do your stretches”, says the referee and one of the assistants a portly, grey-haired man wearing an open knee support stretches down to his knee once or twice and the expression on his face says “that’ll do”.

The game begins at a minute past three and it’s Kings Park who get first go with ball, which they rapidly boot towards Sudbury and the Thomas Gainsborough school, which is just over the fence from the ground. Kings Park sport an all-blue kit with a wide, white, slightly blurry diagonal stripe across the front, and I think to myself what kit would I choose if I was inventing my own football club, probably not this one. Stanway Pegasus meanwhile are in all-green with a blurry white stripe down their left side and black socks, like an unhappy man’s Plymouth Argyle.

The most notable thing about this game from the start is the shouting on the pitch and from the dugouts. “You gotta work”, “Chase”, come the early, more polite commands extolling effort over skill. “Away” shouts the Kings Park goalkeeper and for some reason I think of the Teletubbies. Kings Park win an early corner. “Seconds, seconds” is another shout, appropriately twice. On the pitch, both teams seem wound up already and the Pegasus number nine screams at the referee’s assistant as he strides towards him intimidatingly over the trivial matter of a throw in. “Mental” he says to himself after being told to calm down by referee Mr Glasson-Cox, who coincidentally also refereed the match I saw at Halesworth last week.

The half is half over. “Fuckin’ ‘ell ref” says someone about possibly anything but soon the initial intensity of the match seems to have thankfully subsided a bit. I move into the main stand, a utilitarian, boxy looking structure but with a bit more character than most of the prefabricated metal stands erected nowadays. In a quiet moment I reflect upon the referee’s assistant stood in front of me, a wiry man with a large beard, which he looks as if he might have grown having been told by his doctor that he needs to put on a bit of weight. Between me and the referee’s assistant raindrops cling to the white painted rail around the pitch. The slightly calmer mood continues into a short delay in which the referee speaks to his assistant on the far side, the portly, grey-haired one with the dodgy knee who it seems has noticed that following a goal mouth scramble the goal at the Sudbury end of the ground, which is on wheels, has moved a little. Mr Gasson-Cox takes a look and gives the goal a little shove.

After the calm, there follows a short storm as Kings Park’s number eight and captain Noah Collard scythes down an unidentified Pegasus player who proceeds to writhe on the ground screaming. Once the Pegasus player has cried wolf for long enough Collard becomes the first player to see Mr Gasson-Cox’s yellow card, but discussion in the crowd is more about the girlish screaming than the booking. “Does he have to go off with the screaming?” asks a spectator not unreasonably. But as if to quickly even things up, a Pegasus player also gets to view the yellow card before half-time, although there is no further screaming from either side and the half ends goalless.

With half-time I drain-off some of the Proper Job and eat a Polish Grzeski chocolate bar from the World food aisle in Sainsbury’s. I peer through the window of the club house where a man and a woman, presumably club officials from Stanway Pegasus, and two men in large black coats featuring the crest of the Suffolk County Football Association drink tea with an array of what look like shop bought sausage rolls and homemade bread pudding wrapped in tin foil laid out before them. Only the man from Stanway Pegasus seems to be eating anything. I wonder to myself where the Battenburg and Swiss Roll are. Outside, next to the window I look at today’s team sheet, which looks like whoever wrote it might have been eating an orange at the same time. Beyond the club house the small brown dog is being walked by a different man, possibly a player, who is evidently not playing today; I hear him say he doesn’t know the dog’s name. “Come on you” he says. Two other small dogs are present in the crowd today too, one in a coat and one not.

At three minutes past four the match resumes and the Kings Park coach is immediately barking instructions to Georgie, Zammo and Hughsie as if his very existence depended on it, whilst also sounding like the games teacher from tv’s Grange Hill, but only because he said ‘Zammo’. His shouting works however and six minutes later a ball from left to right finds number twenty-two Daniel Cousens inside the penalty area. Cousens calmly places the ball wide of the Pegasus goalkeeper, and Kings Park lead one-nil.

Ten minutes later and Kings Park lead two-nil when a low cross from the right travels across the face of the goal, past the flailing limbs of a couple of Pegasus players until it reaches Kings Park number ten Harry Willoughby, who bundles it into the goal from close range before running off madly. “Whatever ‘appens, don’t let ‘em fucking score again” bawls a rough voice, presumably of a Pegasus supporter.

It’s getting on for half past four and the game seems over. Pegasus don’t offer much else but for a goal mouth scramble which leaves the Pegasus coach feeling hard done by and asking rhetorically “ ‘ow’s your luck?” and then asking it again. For Kings Park the goalscorer Willoughby is substituted for the 50-year-old former Norwich City, Colchester United, Reading, Queens Park Rangers, Swindon Town, Shrewsbury Town, Bristol Rovers, Leyton Orient, Bournemouth, Barnsley and umpteen other clubs’ player Jamie Cureton. As Willoughby heads for the changing room, he emits a sort of howl.

Back on the pitch, Pegasus number five Jordan Robertson is booked after Kings Park’s number ninety-nine Oliver Sims is not given offside, and Robertson seemingly exorcises his disappointment by hacking Sims down. “Fucking embarrassing” says the Pegasus coach, but only about the presumed offside. Time runs down, on into the ninetieth minute. Pegasus can’t decide whether to just boot the ball forward as quickly as possible or pass it. “Just kick the fuckin’ thing” shouts an elderly spectator summarising a century and a half of tactics from the country that apparently invented the game. “Darren, time” shouts a player. “Darren, man on” shouts the same player a moment later. The final action sees another booking for Kings Park. “Fuck me, it’s getting boring now” say the Pegasus coach and happily at 16:52 Mr Gasson-Cox, who I think has had a good game calls time.

I wait as the players leave the field to no applause, just the blokey clasping of fists with a few spectators and shouts from inside the changing rooms. It’s been a good game in terms of the ability shown, but it’s not been a particularly enjoyable one. There’s been too much trying to pressure the referee, too much needless swearing and too much of a sense of needing to win above all else. I think I’ll just try to remember the afternoon for the miserable weather, the soggy leaves and the small dogs.

Halesworth Town 3 Haverhill Rovers 1

November 10, 2025November 11, 2025 / martinpbrooks / Leave a comment

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Ipswich Town 1 Watford 1

November 6, 2025November 7, 2025 / martinpbrooks / 1 Comment

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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