Another Weekend Of Being A Ground-Hopping Loser

With Hampton & Richmond annoyingly deciding to go on an FA Trophy run this season, our away fixture with them was postponed which freed up another weekend for us. Having got the Sunday off of work, I decided that I would take in Birmingham v Southampton at St Andrews with Russell and have a night out in Nottingham afterwards. While the prospect of watching two Championship sides gunning for promotion was a mouth-watering one, it completely failed to live up to any expections, mainly in part to the atrocious weather which would have certainly of seen our match with Hampton been posponed regardless.

As I woke up on Saturday morning I hadn't actually planned to get any specific train, instead waiting to see if the predicted snow had fallen over night and put the plans into jeopardy. Thankfully they hadn't and there was only a thin layer of snow in Dover and having checked the live departure boards the trains seemed to be running fine (shock horror). With the game kicking off at 5:20PM and it being live on Sky, I had plenty of time to get there and there was little danger of the game being called off regardless of how bad condition the pitch would be in - anyone who remembers the farce at Ipswich last season will know that if the game is on Sky then it will go ahead at all costs.

Anyway, I decided on getting the 10.44 out of Dover which would give me and Russell plenty of time to get some cheeky lagers down us (or a lager, in his case).  But before leaving I discovered a lottery ticket in my wallet from the previous weekend, which I checked just by the off-chance that I might win something on it for the first time ever. And I had! A massive tenner, after matching three numbers, which was a very welcoming bonus.
I also had four cans of Kronenbourg left outside from the Dorchester game a fortnight ago and they were awesomely ice cold thanks to the conditions, so I picked them up and set off oooop north to the land where inhabitants are unable to pronounce words in proper English.

As this train journey was on my lonesome, theres no particular exciting tale to tell. I charged my phone up on the excellent hi-speed train to London and for the majority of both journeys I spent reading a couple of FourFourTwo magazines from the previous few months that I haven't read. When you can be arsed to go through the articles in full detail then its not actually a bad magazine, but I'm not in any hurry at the moment to renew my suscription to it.

I had to make the short 10 minute walk over to Euston for my train to Birmingham New Street, and had enough time to use my BOGOF Burger King Voucher for Two Angus burgers before hopping onto the fantastic virgin train. Its train companies like that that make having free first class rail travel all the more fantastic. Its keeps me away from the regular working class scratters like myself and leaves me to get on with life in comfort and in peace. You do get the looks from train guards "what the fuck is that fat scruffy prick doing on here? I best get over there and tell him to move away" but as soon as they approach i'm already waving my perfectly valid ticket in their face. Its great.
So another journey of consisting of not doing very much - devouring my burgers (which like most fast foods, were disgusting and greasy but rather succulent at the same time), drinking my cans of kronenbourg while continuing to read my 442 magazines in depth. It was an incedibly short journey though - taking around 1 hour, 25 minutes to get into Northern territory. Its amazing how quick it is to get to places once you've reached London. The hi-speed journey to London from Dover only took marginally less than it did to get to Birmingham. Quite incredible really when you consider it will probably take longer to get to Farnborough next weekend should the game go ahead. 3 hours from Dover to Birmingham is fairly impressive in the grand scheme of things, particularly when it includes a 30 minute wait at London.

I arrived into the station about 5 minutes before Russell did from his Nottingham gaff. Amusingly though, we somehow failed to spot each other despite me waiting in the main entrance for him, and it took several minutes, a phone call and few exchanged texts to finally see each other's face.

It was fucking typical that as soon as we arrived the inevitable snow finally decided to make its appearence. So while we were trying to make our way round Birmingham and find a nearest boozer in the freezing cold we received texts from a few other Dover boys, saying they wanted to meet us for a drink. The likes of Jared, Sappo and Martyn, plus a few others, were staying coincidently staying in Birmingham after having a pre-booked drinking weekend there. So we eventually had to walk all the way back to the station to find them, where we jumped into a cab to get to a weatherspoons which was nearby their hotel.

Sadly, this weatherspoons would be the only pub in Birmingham that we drink in. Due to the horrific bouts of snow outside, we couldn't really be arsed to venture out in a massive city where we didn't know where anything was. And weatherspoons serves really well when you want to keep to a budget and not spend silly amounts. Although I was drinking more premium that I usually do - a shortage of carlsberg led me onto a pint of Kronenbourg and I also had 3 pints of Amstel, which flowed down exquisitely.
Other than listening to tales of what the others had got up to the other night, we didn't really do much. Russell ordered himself a burger and had two pints of guiness, a strange choice of tipple for somebody who isn't even 20 years old.
The most entertaining part though was Martyn 'Doozer' McGarrigle. He'd met up with some girl he knew and brought her along to the pub, probably in the hope that he'd end up smashing her backdoors in later on. But there was one stumbling block in his way; the young lady in question 2 year old son. The little annoying shit screaming terror proved quite to be a irrattible nuisance cock block as Martyn tried to show his sensitive side in playing the father role, while bemoaning the kid whenever the female in question went off. It was quite entertaining.

But around the 4:30PM mark we bid our farewells and hailed a cab outside the weatherspoons to take us to St Andrews, which seemed like quite a distance away from where we were. The fee cost me and Russell £4 each but you never know whether taxi drivers are deliberately taking you on a slow route.

Anyway, we got out of the taxi with the skies still pelting out snow, meaning we didn't want to hang about outside the ground. I quickly bought a programme, as I always do when I visit a proper ground, before trying to find our seats that Russell has bought online earlier in the day. We initially went to the wrong stand so had to make our way over to the other side. There didn't seem to be too many people about for what is a fairly large Championship club.
We eventually found our entrance block and easily managed to get in with our under 19 tickets, which cost an impressive £11. Fairly decent considering a 19 year old at Crabble has to pay £12 to get in.

We stayed inside the warmth until just before kick-off. I bought myself a pie and pint for £5.80, in what is considered a special deal at St Andrews. The pie was a branded one (Premier I think?) and the steak and kidney goodness went down rather well amidst the freezing conditions. As did my final proper pint of the day.

My first thoughts of the ground was that it was pretty decent. Nothing particularly special though and nowhere I would want to go back to in a hurry. We were in the middle of the stand, right in the front row of the ground so got a decent view. The main stand on the other side seemed quite old and in need of re-furbishment, but was probably the most characteristic stand in the ground. The other stand in which the away supporters were seated was the best in my opinion; a two tiered beast that was near to the home supporters and made for some good banter. Anyway, I'll shut the fuck up and show a few photos.

A closer look at the Saints travelling support, who were in good voice all game.

Clearing the snow at half time

Annoying fat Southampton bastard at the bottom, thinking he was amusing by having his shirt off the entire game. I hope he caught pneumonia.

 

But yes, another ground ticked off from the Great 92 for moi, but I certainly prefered a more traditional ground like Crystal Palace. The 17902 spectators who turned up at St Andrews for this clash was only marginally more than 17000 odd at Selhurst Park 3 weeks back, but there seemed so much more there at the latter, mainly because the fans were less spread out in the stadium. There were plenty of empty seats in the lower tier that me and Russell were in (which enabled us to sit closer to the Saints fans in the second half) and the ground felt half-empty (which it pretty much was). Cue a chorus of "They're here, they're there, they're every fucking where, empty seats, empty seats" from the travelling contigent, which I assume was ironic given the St Mary's is hardly much better.

Anyway onto the football. Well, what little football was played anyway. I said to Russell before the game that this game would either be action packed and full of mistakes, drama and plenty of goals or the whether would completely kill the game as a spectacle. Sadly, it was the latter. I didn't feel that the pitch was particularly dangerous - the players seemed to stay on their feet for the majority of the contest. But neither side could take control in the game and you'd be lucky to find either side stringing along a move consisting of more than 5 passes. It really was an utterly fucking woeful game, completely devoid of any real chances. Curtis Davies glanced a header wide in the first half but thats about as close as it got for either side. Although in credit to both teams, they did both defend well in  the horrid conditions. But that's not what I paid my money to see!
One positive note of the first half was me probably appearing on Sky TV. I don't now if anyone watched the full match but at some point in the first half I managed to catch the ball and throw it directly to one of the Southampton players for the throw-in. LOOK AT ME I'M FAMOUS FACT.

For the second half, me and Russell decided to sit closer to the Southampton fans who had been making a decent racket for most of the game, and were a rare breed in the fact they had some original chants. Unfortunately this meant sitting behind some annoying brummies, and some typically fickle home supporters, the type who constantly scream "keep it on the deck" and "for fuck sake, not good enough" in their whiney non sensicle brummie accents.
But the back and forth between both sets of supporters proved to be the most exciting thing in the second half, as the game sadly never picked up. Sadly, I can't remember most of the witty retorts but I do remember a couple.

"We wanna go home, Birmingham's a shithole, we wanna go home"
Which was responded with "We wanna go home, It's fucking freezing, I wanna go home"

"We'll slip where we want, we'll slip where we want, we're Birmingham City we don't give a fuck" was one that amused me then the tannoy announcer advised the support to keep safe when exiting the ground.

Birmingham fans were probably outsung by by Southampton fans, which is a no shame considering hardly any football grounds are fortresses these days. But the home support did attempt to make some noise at times, with most of it aimed at Aston Villa. Heck, their first song of the evening was "shit on the villa".
I full accept the concept of big rivalries but i've never understood why teams sing against their rivals when they're not playing them? Fair enough if its something like "Are you x team in disguise" but singing specific anti-rival songs is very pointless in my opinion. And that extends to even when we do it sometimes.

Back to the game though. The second half only featured two moments that I feel are worth jotting down. First was the sending off of Southampton's Danny Fox fairly late on, for a second yellow card. I didn't see the full incident but it appeared to be a bit harsh. Which brings me to another point that I raised with Russell at the match. Why the fuck do supporters clap off a player that has got themselves sent off? I admitted that I've probably been guilty of it myself in the past but its another strange concept in the footballing world.

Secondly was Ricky Lambert's 88th minute free-kick. Southampton had won themselves a decent looking free-kick about 25 yards out, which spelt dangerous news with free-kick specialist Lambert still on the pitch. Perfect shooting distance to try and bend it in, or even to strike it hard and low and hope it finds its way into the goal with the chaotic conditions. But no, instead one of the highest rated players outside the top flight decides to float a weak ball into a crowded box and the ball gets cleared immedietly for another failed Brummie counter attack. What a stupid fucking waste - at least have a bloody attempt for christ sake. As a neutral I was very pissed off so i'd be very angry if I was a Southampton fans that had travelled up for that..

Despite willing on either side that was attacking forward, neither side could produce a goal, or even come close to it for that matter, so the final whistle from Phil Dowd was welcome music to our ears, which had almost turned blue in the sub zero temperatures.

The first thing me and Russell tried doing was finding a bus stop as we exited the stadium, but we got a lucky break almost right away as we hailed a rare cab within the area. Although the taxi driver ended up going by a few dead ends in the thick snow, me and Russell didn't mind paying a £5 fee each as we were just desperate to keep in the warmth, and not get lost on the way to the station.

We entered the station to discover our train was in only 6 minutes, so I rushed into the offy to pick up four cans while Russell bought himself a poncy baguette for an extorniate price. Who has the correct priorities? I ended up drinking all four cans to myself aswell, and had a good read of my programme on the train, which had been too cold to read at the actual game. We suffered about 35 minutes worth of delays on the train and tram, and didn't get back into Russell's flat until 10PM. Luckily, I was in a pissed-but-not-too-pissed state and was in a reasonable condition to go out.

I can't be arsed to go into major details over what happened in Nottingham, so i'll keep it brief. Russell's flat-mate Matthew was celebrating his birthday so aswell as my fat stinking presense, there were another 9 or 10 lads in the flat making guest appearences. Luckily most of them seemed alright (and Newcastle fans) and I ended up having a pretty decent night out in Rock City again, a grotty but loveable club that was a bit of a let down on the music front this time. Soo much cheesy American pop-rock stuff like Green Day and Bullet for a valentine rather than focusing on decent stuff like nirvana. The muff was up to a high standard too but not quite the level of last time, sadly.

Anyway, this night ended up with me falling asleep locked inside his toilet, (Where have we heard this before?), in an enjoyable but not very eventful (as far as im aware, other than bumping into some Stevenage fans) evening out. I had drunk enough to chunder in his garden the following morning, but recovered enough to thrash Russell and his flat mate Luke numerous times on FIFA without tasting defeat myself. TRUE HERO.
I had planned on going home on the Sunday but with my hangover, simply couldn't be arsed to make the effort, so enjoyed the delights of Nottingham and his his other flat-mate James, for another 24 hours.

Overall, the football fucking sucked but it proved to be quite an enjoyable weekend. I tend not to mind having free weekends without Dover because it means that I can visit another ground, while I'll always go to the re-arranged fixture anyway. Everyones a winner!

Mind you, I sincerely hope Saturday's fixture at Farnborough doesn't fall victim to this shit weather. Theres numerous people up for the train journey on Saturday and it looks like we'll be dressing up in suits/smart clothes, so it should be a good day as out as well as a chance for Nicky Forster's men to get out play-off bid back on track.