Bournemouth vs. Chelsea : 28 October 2017.

The Chuckle Bus bumped and swerved through picturesque tree-lined country lanes en route south from Salisbury to Bournemouth. There had been a road closure on the usual direct route, so Glenn – the driver – was forced into a Plan B. Sitting in the back of his VW Chuckle Bus, I was tossed around like a buoy on the ocean wave. I craved for dry land so I could steady myself.

It wasn’t a day out on the South Coast in the April sun of the two previous seasons, but The Chuckle Brothers were still happy to be on our way to Bournemouth on a pleasant autumnal morning for our tea-time encounter with the underperforming Cherries. We would be spending a lot of time in each other’s company over these last few days of October. There is a trip to Rome coming up for PD, Parky and myself. And the four of us had spent a very enjoyable evening together on the Friday night; for the third time in three years, we saw From The Jam in Frome’s much-prized musical venue, The Cheese & Grain (terrible name, great setting for music.) Over the past ten years or so, I have seen a fantastic array of gigs there; The Damned, Stiff Little Fingers, Glenn Tilbrook, Big Country, Toyah, Inspiral Carpets, The Blockheads, Hugh Cornwall and Grandmaster Flash. Not bad for a small town with a population of just 27,000. Famously, Frome hosted the Foo Fighters this year. It’s a town which continually punches above its weight and I bloody love it.

It was a brilliant gig, featuring the bass player from the iconic band The Jam, Bruce Foxton.

All the old favourites. The place was truly rocking.

“Saturdays boys live life with insults.
Drink lots of beer and wait for half time results.”

Yes. That’s us alright. The Saturday boys.

Once parked-up in Bournemouth, we only had to walk for five minutes before we found ourselves in the same pub as last season, The Moon On The Square. We walked past the hotel where the team, and a few lucky supporters, had stayed on the Friday night. We had missed another “walk in the park” by the players, but we were not too bothered.

We spotted a few of the usual suspects and sat ourselves down for around four hours of chat and laughter.

I was still feeling sea-sick from the voyage down on the Good Ship Chucklebus, so my first couple of pints were non-alcoholic.

An hour later, I was on San Miguel. Everyone was chilled and relaxed. There was a nice vibe.

The news that United had beaten Tottenham was met with a shrug off the shoulders, but Glenn observed that a win at Bournemouth would put us just a point behind Tottenham.

At 4.30pm, with other scores confirmed and with no real surprises, we caught cabs to the Vitality Stadium a mile or so to the north.

This was my second football match in the county of Dorset within five days. The day before our League Cup game with Everton, I drove down with my old friend Francis – school, five-a-side football, concerts, football – to watch my local team Frome Town play at Weymouth. Frome have been playing in the Evostik Premier – formerly the famous Southern League, once a rival to the Football League itself – for seven seasons now, but I was yet to visit Weymouth’s Wessex Stadium. It was a fixture that I was longing to tick-off.

We had a blast. A real blast. It seemed like a proper away game. We had both attended the reverse fixture at the start of the season, when a quick and skilful Weymouth handed Frome a crushing 4-1 defeat. The visiting away fans from the resort town on the Dorset coast bolstered the crowd to over 400.

The drive down took about an hour and a half. The fog thickened over the last few miles. We prayed that our first visit to their stadium would not end with a postponement. This would be a tough old game. Weymouth were on a six-game winning run. After a poor start, Frome have enjoyed a recent resurgence in the league.

But just the buzz of an away game was enough. I loved it.

Weymouth are a large club within the non-league scene. Somerset and Dorset are two counties which are certainly not known for their footballing heritage, but there are signs of growth. Yeovil Town, with a rich history and a county-wide catchment area was promoted to the Football League in 2003. For many years, The Glovers were the best-supported non-league team in the country. They were promoted to the heady heights of the Championship a few seasons ago – quite a story – but are now in the Second Division. I keep a look out for their results, nothing more than that. They remain my home county’s sole members of the Football League. To ignore them would be plain rude.

It could have been a very similar story for Weymouth over the past decade or so. They too have always been very well supported. Until Yeovil Town, their fierce rivals, joined the footballing elite, Weymouth too enjoyed a large catchment area. There were no Football League teams nearby. Exeter City was fifty miles to the west, the two Bristol teams were seventy miles to the north and Bournemouth was forty miles to the east. They have a neat stadium on the edge of town. It holds a creditable 6,600. They are a Football League club in terms of set-up, support and “clout.” Previous managers over the past fifteen years have included Steve Claridge and our own John Hollins.

We had passed through Dorchester, just fifteen minutes away from Weymouth – another sizeable club with better-than-average gates with a fine stadium – and I remembered my trip there in 2015 with Frome when a 1-1 draw was a fair result. I always remember that a “Chelsea XI” opened-up Dorchester’s new stadium in 1990.

When Weymouth visited Dorchester this season, over 1,500 attended.

In this footballing backwater of England, in a straight line from Yeovil through Dorchester to Weymouth, maybe there will be a continuing resurgence. I certainly hope so.

Francis and I enjoyed a pre-match lager in the club bar and then made our way into the seats of the impressive main stand. We shared some chips. The misty rain threatened. The pitch was greasy, but immaculate. It was a perfect night for football. High above the pitch, which has old-style covered terracing on the three other sides, we were able to watch unhindered as Jake Jackson prodded the ball home on eighteen minutes. Frome put in a fine performance for the rest of the game. Nobody had poor games. At half-time, we walked all around the stadium, and bumped into some of the forty or so away fans who had made the journey. Buoyed by cheap admittance prices for children – taking advantage of half-term – the attendance was a healthy 805. In the closing minutes, the home team threw everything at the Frome goal. Their ‘keeper twice came up for a corner. One Weymouth effort was cleared off the line. We were under the cosh. Another corner followed, deep in injury time, and the Weymouth ‘keeper volleyed straight at his Frome counterpart Kyle Phillips, who miraculously saved. What drama. But more soon followed as the ball broke and Frome substitute Darren Jeffries found the ball at his feet with the entire pitch ahead of him, with a chasing pack of Weymouth players, proper Keystone Kops, huffing-and-puffing behind him. From thirty yards out, he steadied himself and swiped at the empty net. We watched as the ball trickled over the line. It was hardly Fernando Torres in the Camp Nou, but it brought the same guttural roar from myself.

Weymouth 0 Frome Town 2 – bloody fantastic.

I honestly cannot remember a better Frome Town performance.

It had proved to be a hugely enjoyable first-visit to Weymouth. Driving away, I joked with Fran that it reminded me of my first-ever trip to Old Trafford in 1986 when Kerry nabbed a late winner.

You can’t beat a good away game, at any level.

The cab dropped us right outside the neat Bournemouth stadium. Its capacity is listed as 11,360. It seems even smaller. There was contradictory talk from a couple of locals during the day about the club’s plans to either enlarge the stadium or find a new location. The problem is that the ground is in the middle of a residential area. I’m not so sure it could cope with an extra ten thousand visitors on match days. To be frank, the current set-up is crying out for a return to terraces at both ends, increasing the capacity to around 15,000 and seeing if that would suffice. Of course, that will never happen. Maybe a new build, further out, is the logical conclusion.

We were inside with a good thirty minutes to spare.

The players were doing stretches and shuttle runs. After a while, I noted four of the substitutes – Ampadu, Cahill, Drinkwater, Christensen – laughing and smiling as they knocked the ball about between them.

Player unrest at Chelsea? No evidence of it there.

Clearly “bullshit.” Ask the manager.

The team?

Courtois

Azpilicueta – Luiz – Rudiger

Zappacosta – Bakayoko – Fabregas – Alonso

Pedro – Morata – Hazard

Although my bag was thoroughly searched outside the turnstiles, and my camera waved in, my position in the second row, next to the exit – surrounded by stewards and police – made me wonder if I would quickly be told to put my trusty Canon away. Thankfully, I was able to snap away to my heart’s content.

One-nil to me.

The game began.

Chelsea in a reverse of the home kit.

White – white – blue.

We dominated possession in the first-half, with Zappacosta overlapping well down the right, and Morata freeing himself from the attentions of the Bournemouth defenders, who of course included our very own Nathan Ake. The steward next to me said that he hasn’t set the world alight since his move to Dorset. In goal was Asmir Begovic and he was much busier of the two ‘keepers. Pedro slashed high after a run into space, but this was our only real chance of the first fifteen minutes. The Chelsea support started in good voice. Saturday boys bemoan the movement away from traditional 5.30pm kick-offs, but love the fact that it results in more beers and more boozy songs. Bournemouth’s attacks were rare and David Luiz, especially, always seemed to do enough to keep trouble at bay. He was ably supported on his flanks by Rudiger and Azpilicueta.

A miss-kick by Begovic ended up at the feet of Eden Hazard, who set up Alvaro Morata, but he inexplicably shot wide when the entire Chelsea support of 1,200 were seemingly celebrating the net rippling.

The home fans to my left chortled :

“You thought you had scored, you were wrong, you were wrong.”

It was the loudest they would be all evening.

Just after, a Luiz shot was blocked and Morata bundled the ball in, only for an offside flag to be raised.

Another chorus of “You thought you had scored, you were wrong, you were wrong.”

The Chelsea choir belted out some old classics throughout the first period; there were songs for Matthew Harding, Dennis Wise and Salomon Kalou.

Bakayoko, his hair now a ridiculous shade of blue, was not as involved as I would have liked. The game was passing him by. And Eden was having a quiet one. Another chance fell for Moata, but Begovic saved well. Although we were dominating play, there was a spark missing. There were no groans at half-time, but we knew we had to step up in the second period.

With Chelsea attacking “our goal” in the second-half, I was able to witness as close hand the speed and skill of our attacking threat. On fifty-one minutes, a mistake by a Bournemouth player was pounced upon by Hazard. He advanced on goal, shot with unnerving accuracy at the near post with his left foot and we roared as the net finally rippled.

GET IN.

Eden’s run towards us – tongue out, slide, swagger – was caught on film.

I moaned at Eden’s inability to grab the game at Selhurst Park by the scruff of the neck, but he had done so under the floodlights at Bournemouth. The celebrations on the pitch were mirrored by us just yards away. I love the fact that the pitch is so close to the fans at the Vitality.

However, rather than push on, we allowed the home team a few half-chances as the game wore on. The appearance of substitute Callum Wilson was heralded by the home support as the second coming of Christ. I wondered what he had in store for us.

A lovely ball by Hazard, sometimes playing deep, in the centre, set up Pedro but his return pass was blasted over by Eden.

Into the final quarter, I kept thinking “bloody hell we are making hard work of this.”

Danny Drinkwater replaced Pedro for his league debut.

Michy Batshuayi replaced Morata.

A similar run to Hazard’s goal found him deep inside the Bournemouth box but his movement ended up being blocked by resolute defending. He then set up Fabregas, in close, but his shot was blasted over from an angle.

Willian replaced Hazard with five to go and looked willing to punish the home team further. His sudden bursts are the last thing that tiring defenders need late in the game. However, as the minutes ticked by, I almost expected a late equaliser. Bournemouth, to their credit, kept going and in the last few minutes a shot was easily saved by Thibaut. It would be, I was to learn later on “MOTD” his only save the entire game. We deserved to win, no doubt, but a 1-0 margin is always a nervous ride. I immediately likened it to our narrow 1-0 at Middlesbrough last season.

After the Roma draw, I hoped for three consecutive wins. Thankfully, we got them.

Ah Roma.

The eternal city awaits.

Andiamo.