Tales From North And South America

Posted on June 29, 2025 by Chris Axon

Chelsea vs. Flamengo : 20 June 2025.

The 2024/25 football season began for me on Saturday 29 June when I flew out to Rio de Janeiro and saw three matches in that incredible city. The second game took place on the evening of my 59^th birthday on Saturday 6 July with an entertaining and noisy game between Flamengo and Cuiba at the Maracana Stadium. Almost twelve months later, my second-from-last game of this season would also feature Flamengo, but this time I would be crossing the Atlantic Ocean to see them play Chelsea in Philadelphia.

This is damned close to “completing the circle” and it’s good enough for me.

I am used to trips across the Atlantic. In September 1989 I visited North America for the very first time. I travelled over to New York with my college mate Ian and embarked on a ten-month odyssey of North America, which famously included a nine-hundred-mile cycle ride down the East Coast. Since then, my love for Chelsea Football Club and of travel, and of baseball and of Americana, kept calling me back.

But then, for some time, my love for the US waned. My last pre-season trip with Chelsea was in 2016 – Ann Arbor and Minneapolis – and I was not tempted by recent ones, especially when the club decided to play a bit-part role in the reality TV show that is Wrexham Football Club, not once but twice.

Modern football, eh?

We became World Club Champions against Palmeiras in 2022 – in lieu of 2021 – but then Gianni Infantino and the money-makers at FIFA decided to expand this competition to include a massive thirty-two teams and to stage a new version of the FIFA Club World Cup in the US.

And lo, I was conflicted.

Was I in favour of this competition?

Honestly, no.

More games, more expense, a new competition, FIFA personified.

Would I go? I was not sure.

But my mind went to work on this. If I was to go, it would be my twentieth trip to the US, and a perfect way to celebrate my 60^th birthday a few weeks after. The 2024/25 season would be a long and demanding season for me, for various reasons, but I knew for some time that it would almost certainly end with a trip to the United States for the latest incarnation of the Intercontinental Cup.

Soon into the planning stages, my old Chelsea mate Glenn showed an interest in going too, and it would be a lovely addition to the pre-season games we saw in Beijing in 2017 and then Perth in 2018.

The fixtures were announced with one game in Atlanta and two in Philadelphia. This pleased me no end. I didn’t fancy Atlanta as I had visited it a few times before, including two Atlanta Braves games in 1996 and 2002, but also en route to visit my friend Roma and her family in the Great Smoky Mountains a few times.

Two games in Philly would be more than perfect. I have a huge personal attachment to this city. My great great grandparents lived in Philadelphia in the mid-nineteenth century for five years before returning to Somerset, and I visited the city in 2010 with my eighty-year-old mother, who often said that she wanted to see where her relatives had resided all those years ago. At the time of our visit in 2010, we only knew a few facts about our relatives; that they had been shipwrecked on the voyage to Philadelphia in Newfoundland and that they returned to England not too long after.

To see my team play in a city where my family had lived in the 1850s pleased me no end.

I made the decision to add New York to our trip, since I figured that it would be a mortal sin for Glenn not to see one of the greatest cities in the world with me.

Flights were booked. Match tickets were purchased. The accommodation took a while to sort out. But we were on our way.

Phackinell.

New York.

After months of preparation and anticipation, I picked up Glenn at his house in Harris ( ! ) Close in Frome at 4am on Saturday 14 July. Glenn’s only other trip to the US was to Florida in 1992. He went with a mate of ours, Chippy, who was the Liverpool fan from Frome that I saw in the Annie Road seats on my first visit to Anfield in 1985, but I digress!

He was excited, I was excited, ah the joy of foreign travel.

At 6.30am, I was parked up at my mate Ian’s house in Stanwell, so close to Heathrow T5. Ironically, prior to my trip to Rio a year earlier, I had booked a “JustPark” spot in Stanwell, and then walked to a bus stop to take me to T5 and the bus stop was just fifty yards from his house.

The 1230 flight to JFK departed a few minutes late, but the pilot knew of a short cut, and we landed in Queens ahead of schedule.

A little light rain welcomed us to New York, but our trip into the city could not have been easier or cheaper.

AirTrain to Jamaica, Long Island Rail Road to Penn Station.

$8.

Cheap as French fries.

Now then, dear reader, let’s delve back into Chelsea’s history.

In June 2001, I visited New York to see the New York Yankees play five games of baseball, but to also meet up with my friend Roma from North Carolina. I had an unforgettable week. On the last day together, we found ourselves in the main forecourt of Penn Station, which is a deeply unlovable subterranean hellhole right below Madison Square Garden. On that morning, I ’phoned Glenn who had been calling in to check on my dear mother while I was away. And it was during that ‘phone-call that Glenn told me that we had signed Frank Lampard and Emanuel Petit. So, a little bit of my Chelsea history took place right in the middle of Manhattan.

And here we were, walking past that very spot.

There should be a royal blue plaque to commemorate this moment on a wall nearby.

Up at street level, I took a photo of Glenn with a misty Empire State Building in the background, and my heart was buzzing and bouncing. An hour later, we had located our apartment on East 14^th Street, near Union Square, and were making our way to my favourite bar in Manhattan, “McSorley’s”, and our walk took us past the hotel on St. Mark’s Place where Roma and I had stayed in 2001.

At “McSorley’s” the New York Fairytale began in earnest.

Here are some highlights…

McSorley’s.

This was my fourth visit. In 1997, Ian – my college mate who was with me in 1989 – returned to New York with me to watch the first-ever “Subway Series” between the Yankees and the Mets, and we visited this grand old pub for the first-time with our friend Stacey, who we met in Florida nearing the end of our cycle ride in 1989. In 2001, I visited it with Roma on our first night together. In 2015, I met up with my friend Steve from Philly prior to a Mets game. Steve’s grandparents were married in the Ukranian church opposite. Steve loves it that the bar is officially on Shevchenko Place.

With Glenn, we stayed around an hour and a half and drank their light and dark beers – the only choices – which are always served in two half-pints. The place was heaving, full of happy tourists. We were given free crackers, cheese and onion, and some lads from Portland bought us two rounds of our beers. It was a perfect start to our trip.

Jack Demsey’s.

Unbeknown to Glenn, I had contacted some great friends in New York to stage a little “surprise party” for him underneath the Empire State Building in a fantastic bar, “Jack Demsey’s”, on West 33^rd Street. The “meet” was at 6pm, and by 7pm around a dozen friends had accumulated together, and a fantastic night followed. The bar was full of Palmeiras fans, and there were a few Fluminense fans floating about too. The usual watering hole for the New York Blues – “Legends” – had been block-booked by Fluminense for five whole days. Both teams from Brazil were playing two games in New Jersey. Every time that we saw a Fluminense fan, we sang “Thiago Silva.” The volume of Brazilian fans in the city shocked me but I loved the buzz of seeing so many fans enjoying life.

Later, my friend Dom took us to a rooftop bar right underneath the Empire State Building and another one too, and we caught a late cab home. It had been one of the greatest nights.

Ten Miles.

On the Sunday, we slept on, but by around midday we were up. The misty and cool weather was perfect for a walk through the streets of Lower Manhattan, and it was a pleasure to be able to see Glenn’s reaction to a new city. Many people who read my rambling prose have commented how they often feel like they are living vicariously through my experiences, and it was now rewarding to see Glenn’s reactions to places that were more familiar to me, but unfamiliar to him. I had mentioned to him on the flight that I was relishing this. It was as if I was seeing New York for the very first time all over again, but through his eyes.

We craved a meal at a typical diner – booths, stools at the counter, eggs over easy, free coffee refills, rude waitresses, you know the type – but our neighbourhood was sadly lacking in these. We eventually found an Italian restaurant for a filling sandwich and then an Argentinian café, complete with Diego Maradona references, for a coffee.

Our walk took us through Little Italy, the outskirts of Chinatown, close to the Brooklyn Bridge and South Street Seaport, all the way down to Wall Street, then Battery Park and views of the Statue of Liberty. From there, we delved into “Century 21” for a little shopping, then walked north up Broadway and eventually back to our digs. In total, we walked ten miles, and the last two were as painful as hell. But it had been a magnificent first full day, and a little like the ground travelled on my first full day with Ian back in 1989.

Old Friends.

On the Monday, my friend Stacey – from 1989 and 1997, but also from visits in other years including with my mother to her house in New Jersey in 2010 – came into the city and met us for breakfast on Third Avenue. Glenn departed to take in a ferry trip to Liberty and Ellis Islands. Stacey and I did our own tour but were dismayed when we found out that the International Centre of Photography was closed until 19 June. We are both keen photographers. Instead, I suggested that we visited the Lower East Side Tenement Museum. It was fascinating. We learned of a beer parlour that was run by a German family, and then a trader who was Jewish, and it really enabled me to go back in time, to let my mind wander. I studied the migration of Europeans into North America while at college and it is a fascination of mine, enhanced through my own family’s experience in Philadelphia.

We met up with Glenn at “Jack Demsey’s” at 2.30pm to enable us to watch a far from emphatic Chelsea victory over LAFC from Atlanta. The stadium in Atlanta looked so empty and the bar in Manhattan was empty too. It dismayed me that of the dozen or so Chelsea fans at “Jack Demsey’s” many were looking at their ‘phones, eating and chatting while the game took place. The game on the TV seemed an inconvenience.

My love affair with the US began to wane once again.

I remembered an odd football-related tale from 1990. On our return to England in that year, Stacey visited Ian in London but also came down to see me in Somerset. Later they stayed with some friends in Bristol, who happened to live near Eastville, the former home of Bristol Rovers. Glenn and I had seen Chelsea lose 0-3 to Rovers at Eastville in 1980, but I had remembered that Stacey went to see some greyhound racing at Eastville on her visit in 1990.

That all three of us had visited Eastville made me chuckle.

During the game, my friend Keith popped in to see us, and on walking north after the game we witnessed an event in Times Square celebrating the premier of the “F1” movie. Glenn even spotted the Frome driver, and former World Champion from 2010, Jensen Button.

High.

On Tuesday morning, we walked a large section of The Highline, and I was reminded of my walk there in 2015. I love it. It also took me back to my first week in Manhattan in 1989 when Ian and I stayed in a very cramped hostel on West 20th Street, right under the walkway which in those days was just an abandoned train line. Since 2015, the flora and fauna has established itself and parts are in complete shade from the trees.

Again, we spotted Brazilian fans, but hardly any European fans. Not surprisingly, the South Americans were taking this tournament very seriously. Out of nowhere, I commented that as most football supporters who go to games put club over country, I wondered if in one hundred years’ time, the dominant World Cup competition would be this club version rather than the established one for countries.

Would USA 2025 be as significant as Uruguay 1930?

Something to contemplate perhaps.

Meet Me At Stan’s.

Later that day, after a walk up Fifth Avenue, we took the 4 Line to Yankee Stadium, and met up with my friends Mike and Steve, both Chelsea fans, both Yankee fans, Mike from New Jersey, Steve from Philadelphia. We met at “Stan’s Sports Bar” on River Avenue, right opposite the site of the old Yankee Stadium, home of Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Yogi Berra, Mickey Mantle, Phil Rizzuto and Reggie Jackson, and a place that I visited twenty-three times from 1990 to 2008. It is where Ray Wilkins made his debut during the US Bicentennial Tournament in 1976.

I was in my element, talking to the lads, reminiscing, supping “Rolling Rock”, looking forward to the baseball, but also thinking back to 1993 when my friends Paul and Nicky from Frome met me here before a game against Detroit. And to 1997 when Ian and I drank amidst shouts of “Let’s Go Yankees” and “Let’s Go Mets” in the first official series between the two teams, giving a real football-feel to the night. And to 2010 when my mother and I had a drink in “Stan’s” before a game against Baltimore. And to 2012 and 2013 when Chelsea played two games at either end of the season at the new Yankee Stadium, acting as bookends to my personal season, and “Stan’s” was the pre-match bar once again.

Game 1 : 22 July 2012 – Chelsea 2 Paris St, Germain 2

Game 57 : 25 May 2013 – Chelsea 3 Manchester City 5

I last saw Mike at the City game, and I last saw Steve at that Mets game in 2015.

I worked out that this was my thirty-third visit to “Stan’s” and this made me smile. I have known Lou, the owner, since 1993 and I also got to know the chap who runs it too. It was a joy to see Mike again. The first two beers had been on him.

Yankee Stadium.

So, here I was. I was back at Yankee Stadium again, and it felt like I had never been away. My last visit was in late July 2015 for an easy win against Baltimore Orioles. Right after that game, I drove from the multi-story car park that used to abut the old stadium, to Charlotte in North Carolina, via an overnight stop in West Virginia, for a game against PSG.

As I have said in these reports before, I much preferred the old stadium; it was cramped, atmospheric, grubby, but reeked of atmosphere and history. I loved the way that the upper decks towered over the infield and resembled jaws waiting to clamp shut. I loved it there. The new place just seems like a shopping mall. Most of my fellow Yankee friends feel the same. A little portion of my waning interest in baseball since around 2010 has undoubtedly been the fact that old Yankee Stadium is no longer there. A lesson for everyone, I think.

Build it and they will come?

Maybe not.

For this game, we had super seats in row one of the upper tier above home plate and Glenn, bless him, had gifted my seat as an early birthday present. Unfortunately it was a dire game of baseball, quite possibly the worst I have ever seen. The visiting Angels got ahead early and eventually won 4-0. But I loved it, and I loved the tales that Mike and Steve shared. Mike used to work for the Yankees as an intern in 2001 and 2002.

It was my thirty-first Yankee home game; twenty-three in the old Yankee Stadium, eight in the new stadium and my record stands at 20-11.

More importantly, Glenn absolutely loved it. And he is now a Yankee fan.

Dodge In Brooklyn.

On the Wednesday, our last full day in New York, the sun came out and we enjoyed another full day out walking and sightseeing. We took a cab to “DUMBO” ; Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass. I guess “DUMB” would have been just, er, dumb.

What a great setting. With the East River laid out before us, and the skyscrapers of the financial district to our left and the midtown skyscrapers to our right, I was lost in a world of my own, with a George Gershwin song only a few heartbeats away. Even here we were surrounded by Palmeiras fans. We walked back into Manhattan, over the gorgeous Brooklyn Bridge, and I can honestly say that in the hour or so that we were in Brooklyn and on the bridge we saw around five hundred Palmeiras fans. Like in Abu Dhabi, they were everywhere.

In 1989 and 1990, Chelsea fans were nowhere to be seen. As we descended towards the City Hall, we passed the spot in May 1990 where I met the only Chelsea fan that I had seen in the ten months of me being in North America. This fact still staggers me. He was an ex-pat who was wearing a Chelsea training top. I shared this story with Glenn. As I told the tale, I could hardly believe what I was saying.

One Chelsea fan in almost ten months.

There should be a royal blue plaque to commemorate this too.

One Vanderbilt.

We took a subway up to the gorgeous interior of Grand Central – what a space – and while Glenn chilled out, I ascended one of the newer skyscrapers in midtown, right opposite Grand Central and the famous Met Life building. A work colleague had recently visited it and recommended it to me. I loved it. It’s roughly the same height as the Empire State Building and towers over the nearby Chrysler Building. There are three observation decks, and each one is magnificent.

The lowest one is full of mirrors which make reality a difficult concept but enhance the feeling of space and light. The middle one contains a room of constantly moving ballons, facing north and the pencil thin new builds overlooking Centeal Park, and this just made me laugh and smile. The highest one is outside, just you and Manhattan.

“Good luck, enjoy the view, don’t fall off.”

The Last Night.

My friend Dom invited us up to his apartment on West 52nd Street for some last night beers and this was a lovely and relaxing evening. We met up at around 7pm and watched as the sun set over Hoboken and The Pallisades in New Jersey, and then night fell with the skyscrapers of Manhattan a fantastic backdrop. I last saw Dom in Wroclaw. We spoke about Manhattan, Chelsea fans in the US, work, mutual friends, and it was a perfect time.

From here, we visited another rooftop bar, this time overlooking Times Square. We chatted to some ES Tunis fans, and we told them that we had seen quite a few of their supporters, too, in Manhattan, in their red and yellow stripes. We spoke about numbers of fans, and I was asked how many Chelsea fans were coming from the UK. I stalled, gulped, and embarrassingly said “about one hundred.”

Suddenly, we didn’t feel like a very big club at all.

Rio de Janeiro.

Ahead of our road trip from Manhattan to Philadelphia, here is a small recap of the only other time that I have seen Flamengo play.

“I again took a cab to the Maracana and was deposited in the same spot as on Thursday for the Fluminense vs, Internacional match, but immediately the mood seemed different. More noise. More supporters. More banners. It seemed that Flamengo really were the city’s team. I felt a little conflicted.

Flu over Fla for me, though.

I had paid a little more for my ticket – £40 – but was rewarded with a sensational view high on the main stand side. I took a lift to the top level and the vast bowl of the Maracana took my breath away. I bought myself a beer – alcohol is allowed in the stands in Brazil – and raised a toast to myself.

“Happy birthday young’un.”

I really loved this game. It was a lot more competitive, and the noise was more constant, and quite breath-taking. Cuiba, from the city of the same name, only had a few hundred fans for this match and I didn’t even try to hear them. Surprisingly, Cuiba scored early on when Derek Lacerda waltzed through and struck a shot into the massive Maracana goals. For aficionados of goals, goal frames, stanchions and goalposts, these are beauties.

“Deep sag.”

It was a decent game. My view of it made it. Maracana, dear reader, is vast.

At half-time, I trotted out to the balcony that overlooked the city. I took a photo of a section of the Maracana roof support, pocked and cracked through time, and contrasted it with the lights shining on a nearby hill. Rio is surrounded by huge rising pillars of black rock. And here I was inside the city’s mammoth concrete cathedral.

The second half began, and the intensity rose and fell. All eyes were on David Luiz. It was so good to see him play again. I last saw him play for Chelsea at the away friendly against St. Patrick’s Athletic in Dublin in 2019. The Fla – or ‘Mengo, take your pick – support never waned and were rewarded when Pedro tucked in an Ayrton cross on the hour. One through-ball from David Luiz will stay in my mind for a while. He was arguably their best player. It ended 1-1. The gate was 54,000. I was expecting more. Flamengo’s support is so huge that I was soon to liken them to Liverpool’s and Manchester United’s support in the UK combined

But there was one more thrill to come.

Whenever I saw photos of Maracana as a child and in later years, I was always mesmerized by its exit ramps, and I tried to imagine how many millions of cariocas – Rio’s inhabitants – had descended those slopes over the years. After the game, I walked them too.

The whole night had been a wonderful birthday present to me.”

Philadelphia.

And here we were, not too long before my 60^th birthday, on a Flixbus from just outside Madison Square Garden to the heart of the City of Brotherly Love, or perhaps – when I visited it with my dear Mum in 2010 – The City of Motherly Love.

I love the American road, and I had driven back from The Bronx in 2010 with my mother on this exact same route that Glenn and I were now taking. In fact, it almost mirrored the bus trip that a few of us took in 2012 after the game at Yankee Stadium against PSG, travelling down to Philly for the MLS All-Star Game in nearby Chester.

That was no ordinary journey, though.

On that memorable trip, my good friend Rick – a history buff – did some research into my relatives’ history and found out the details of their crossing of the Atlantic. The City of Philadelphia steam ship left Liverpool but was ship-wrecked off the coast of Newfoundland at Cape Race on 7 September 1854. Additionally, it was its maiden voyage, a fact that nobody knew until then. Rick found my great great grandfather’s brother listed on a passenger list, and that was good enough for me. The shipwreck was part of our family’s aural history, though the exact facts were never known.

I loved the fact that I was exposed to the intimate detail of that journey, previously only faintly written and quietly whispered in family folklore, for the very first time as I was travelling to Philadelphia over one hundred and fifty years after the crossing.

Like Benjamin and Barbara White in 1854, we were nearing Philadelphia.

We had earlier passed the town of Newark and we spotted the Red Bull stadium – I had sadly watched a Chelsea loss there in 2015 – but then pushed on past the airport, over the Delaware River and headed on into the city. We were deposited in the wonderfully named area called Northern Liberties.

It was superb to be back.

We soon arrived by Uber at our rented house in South Philly, about a mile or so from Steve’s house, at about 3pm. That evening, there was a planned meet at the “Tir Na Nog” bar in the city centre. We knew that we were in for a heavy evening with the game less than twenty-four hours away, so we chilled out for a while. Our house was magnificent, a clean and cosy, yet spacious, terraced house, just perfect.

It’s number on Pierce Street?

2025.

It seemed very appropriate.

We took an Uber to “Tir Na Nog” and we arrived bang on 7pm.

Have I ever mentioned that I work in logistics?

Phackinell.

The hours we spent in “Tir Na Nog” were super. Friends from both the UK and the US mingled and laughed and joked. I met a few Facebook acquaintances for the very first time and it was a blast.

I’d like to thank everyone who bought me a drink, or seven.

Steve from South Philly rolled in. It was here that I first met his wife Teri and their daughters Linda, Elizabeth and Cassidy in 2012. Cassidy, now fourteen, would be with Steve for the Flamengo game. All three daughters love football, and Chelsea of course.

Back in 2012, I remember that I yelled out a full “Zigger Zagger” and scared the girls to death.

No such foolish behaviour this time.

Johnny Dozen was sat, unmoved, in a corner spot the whole evening. It was as if the whole bar was built around him. He is a good mate, and after we closed out the bar at around midnight, we sloped off to “Con Murphy’s” just around the corner.

Here, we go back to 2012, the day before the game in Chester, when I visited “Con Murphy’s” with some other mates.

We were relaxing outside on the pavement, having a bite to eat, supping some ales, when a taxicab pulled up outside the bar. A chap exited the cab with a couple of friends, and I immediately remembered him from a post-baseball game pint the previous night. I had remarked that he was a doppelganger for Carlo Ancelotti. On this occasion, we couldn’t let the moment pass.

As he approached the bar, I started chanting

“Carlo! Carlo! Carlo!”

This elicited further song from The Bobster, Lottinho, Speedy, Jeremy “Army Of One” Willard from Kansas, plus Shawn and Nick from the Boston Blues –

“Carlo, Carlo, Carlo.
King Carlo Has Won The Double.
And The Shit From The Lane.
Have Won Fuck All Again.
King Carlo Has Won The Double.

2, 3, 4

Carlo, Carlo, Carlo.
King Carlo Has Won The Double.
And The Shit From The Lane.
Have Won Fuck All Again.
King Carlo Has Won The Double.

2, 3, 4

Carlo, Carlo, Carlo.
King Carlo Has Won The Double.
And The Shit From The Lane.
Have Won Fuck All Again.
King Carlo Has Won The Double.”

We were roaring with laughter and “Carlo” approached us with an increasingly bemused look on his face. I explained to him about his uncanny resemblance to Carlo and guess what? He was a Scouser. To be fair to him, he took it all in great spirits and even posed for photographs with us. He said he had been mistaken for Jay Leno the previous night.

As one, all of our left eyebrows arched in disbelief.

The look on the faces of the other customers at the tables was priceless.

I felt like saying – “yeah, we serenade random strangers like him all the time back in England.”

Back to 2025, and the little gang of friends that had continued drinking – Johnny Twelve, Hersham Bob, his mate Paul, Glenn, Matt and his wife Rachel – shrunk to just Johnny Twelve and little old me. We chatted to Nicole, who ran “Tir Na Nog”, and it seemed that Chelsea Football Club had not exactly held out the arm of friendship to the Chelsea signature pub in Philadelphia. No contact, no promotions, no merchandise, no nothing.

A shame.

At gone 2am, I took an Uber back to 2025. I was starving so the driver opened his boot and gave me a huge pack of zingy “Cheetos” that I devoured on the way home. There was a further stop at a convenience store for more snacks.

I made it home, but I would soon be up in the morning for the game against Flamengo.

The match against the Brazilian giants was to kick-off at 2pm, which meant that we didn’t really have too long for pre-match drinks. We had planned a little splinter group meet-up at “Oscar’s Tavern”, a cracking little dive bar. Glenn and I were starving so wolfed down a breakfast that did not touch the sides. There were a few drinks with great friends Bob, Alex and Rob from England, Dom from NYC, Alex and his girlfriend from Brooklyn, Kathyryn and Tim from DC, Josh from Minnesota, Johnny Dozen from Long Beach, Jaro and his son Alex from Virginia, his neighbour Joe and his son Luke, and Steve from his house just two miles to the south.

We caught a subway down to the stadium, the sun beating down as we exited, and headed for a quick drink at a huge and impersonal “super bar” that sits close to both the Phillies’ baseball stadium and the Eagles’ NFL stadium. The Flyers’ NHL and the 76ers’ NBA shared stadium is close-by too.

There has always been sport stadia in this part of the city, and it once housed the long-gone JFK Stadium where the US section of “Live-Aid” took place forty years ago.

I wasn’t sure of the numbers involved but as expected, Flamengo fans outnumbered us. It was lovely, though, to spot familiar faces from home and the US as we drifted in and among the crowd.

Time was moving on and there were lines at both the North and West gates. Flamengo fans were everywhere. We joined the line at the West gate. QR codes had appeared on our mobile phones earlier and I was just glad that mine hadn’t disappeared into cyberspace somewhere.

Glenn and I made our way up the various ramps to reach the M11 section, which was a middle-tier just above the large TV screen at the southern end of the stadium. As soon as we reached our row, we saw Andy from Nuneaton, a friend of thirty years.

There was all sorts of hoopla and nonsense happening on the pitch and on the PA as the kick-off approached.

The northern end was full of Flamengo red, but with odd pockets of blue at the edges. The rest of the stadium was dominated by the colour red. Down below us, the Chelsea lower tier was only a third full. The stadium capacity is 68,000 and it looked around two-thirds full.

My initial thoughts about this tournament were ringing true; too many games, tickets too expensive, we are reaching saturation point but FIFA wants more, more, more.

I had mentioned to others that my ideal format for this would have been sixteen teams, four groups of four, the winners to the semi-finals, then the final. Five games maximum.

Is the US getting tired of European teams? I remember a great game in 2009 in Baltimore between Chelsea and Milan, both teams stacked with talent, as many Chelsea as Milan fans in the crowd and a gate of 71,203. And that was a friendly.

Yet this game in Philly was no friendly, it was an official FIFA game, only Chelsea’s second-ever non-friendly match in North America, yet the Chelsea section was a third full. It seemed that, as I knew, many of our US fans had said “no thanks” to this one.

The teams were announced.

Us?

Sanchez

Gusto – Chalobah – Colwill – Cucurella

James – Caicedo

Palmer – Enzo – Neto

Delap

Or something like that. It would take me a good few minutes to notice that Cole Palmer was on the pitch, and even longer to work out his position and role.

Flamengo, now managed by one-season wonder Felipe Luis, were now without David Luiz but boasted the arrival of Jorginho, who – from one hundred yards away – resembled Phil Cool.

I think the heat was getting to me.

Our section seemed to be where most of the UK fans had decided to buy tickets, which were at the cheaper of the two price ranges, and this did not surprise me. We love a bargain in the UK. As is the case, not many of us were wearing Chelsea gear, old habits die hard. I added a muted pink Paul Smith to the array of designer schmutter on display.

On the pitch, we were in the mid-‘seventies inspired semolina white with thin central feint red and green stripes.

The game began, and we played towards the Flamengo fans to the north.

The Brazilians attacked us early, with two shots that did not trouble Robert Sanchez, whose presence between the uprights troubled us.

On five minutes, a great through-ball from Enzo Fernandez gave Liam Delap the chance to run freely at the goal, memories of him at Portman Road in December, and his strong shot tested Agustin Rossi in the Flamengo goal. I think everyone in the stadium and beyond was thrilled by that one play and we hoped for more.

It was an eagerly contested match and on thirteen minutes, after a Flamengo free-kick was cleared, Pedro Neto put pressure on a Flamengo defender. The ball cannoned between the two players, and the ball spun forward, and so did Neto. We watched from afar as he raced away. Sadly, I didn’t have my SLR with me due to restrictions on what I could bring into the stadium, and my pub camera was not called upon to record his fine finish past Rossi.

I didn’t care.

We were 1-0 up.

GET IN YOU FUCKER.

Pandemonium in South Philadelphia.

I snapped the boys celebrating, and that was enough for me.

I whispered to Glenn :

“Back in England, there are fans of other teams saying ‘fucking hell, Chelsea are going to win this too’…”

Flamengo were fluid with the ball and ran at us from all angles, but we generally kept our shape, though it did seem that the heat was hurting us. Flamengo, used to the sultry heat of Rio, were not so deterred.

A long shot from Malo Gusto that did not trouble Rossi was a very rare chance for us.

Palmer was ridiculously quiet and hardly involved.

On thirty-two minutes, there was a hydration break, sponsored by a drinks company, and you just now there will be VAR breaks with sponsors very soon. The pitch was being hydrated too, with the sprinklers on.

With half-time approaching, the typically aggressive Marc Cucurella gave away a free-kick out on the Flamengo left. A deep cross was met by Gerson and his side-footed cross-come-shot bounced high, but Levi Colwill was on the line to head away.

We breathed a hot and sweaty sigh of relief.

Our attacks had petered out by the time the first half ended but Flamengo had stayed strong.

At half-time, Glenn trotted off to get some water for us both and that cost him $15. At least they came in decent aluminium logo’d cups. Elsewhere, a lad had bought three gin and tonics and a Diet Coke and it cost him $89.

There were no changes at half-time, but shadows gave way to sun in section M11, and I was glad to be wearing my Frome Town cap.

In the second-half, Steve and his daughter Cassidy came into our section to watch the game alongside us.

Soon into the second period, with most of the play now happening up the other end of the pitch, we had a major escape, a proper “get out of jail” incident. There was a terrible mix-up between James and Chalobah, which allowed Gerson to settle and steer a shot towards the goal. Thankfully, James had managed to back-peddle and block, but we watched with our hearts in our mouths as the onrushing Gonzalo Plata appeared, ghost-like, at the far post. Incredibly, his touch took the ball wide of the post and the angle must have defeated him.

We had a rare chance when a long Sanchez punt forced Leo Pereira, pressured by Delap, to knock past the post, his ‘keeper fully committed.

On the hour, a brisk succession of passes allowed a chance for Plata but his shot was well tipped over by Sanchez. It was a fine save.

Sadly, two minutes later the game changed. Cucurella gave up space as he was faced with marking two players, and a deep cross from our left was headed back towards goal by Plata. The loose ball – shades of the earlier chance – was tucked home by Bruno Henrique.

My heart sank.

Glenn : “It was coming, wannit?”

Their players all rushed over to the north-west corner, but that area was no Sleepy Hollow. The Flamengo fans were boiling over.

I was reminded of a “Mengo” chant that I had heard continually at the Maracana last summer and now it haunted me.

Enzo Maresca made some changes.

Romeo Lavia for Enzo.

Nicolas Jackson for Delap.

In the next attack, Flamengo won a corner on their right. Another deep cross caused panic, and it was again knocked back into the same area of space by the far post. This time Danilo turned it in.

Once 1-0 up, now 2-1 down, this hurt again.

The Flamengo players raced away to the same corner, again their keeper Rossi, all in yellow, raced up field with arms outstretched and it made me squirm.

It got worse, fucking worse. I didn’t see the incident, but Jackson went in “studs up” and was shown an immediate red.

Twat.

A header – over – from Enzo was a rare chance for us to level the game.

In a forlorn attempt to stem the flow, Maresca changed things again.

Noni Madueke for Enzo.

Marc Guiu for Palmer.

The supporters in M11 were disgruntled and upset, and it got even worse.

On eight-three minutes, Flamengo burst through into our box and after a rather fortuitous bobble from a shot, Wallace Yan steadied himself and slotted the ball in, again from the same part of the box.

Again, Rossi ran forward, arms raised, and I felt ill.

The game petered out and that was that.

The gate was given as 54,019 and I struggled to believe that only 14,000 seats were empty.

More like 40,000 at most.

We slowly walked back to the subway stop and all of us reckoned that it seemed a much longer walk than before.

“Probably because we lost.”

It was only 4.30pm or so, and so we met up another exquisite dive bar (“Bring your snorkel, Glenn”) called “Bob’s & Barbara’s” which soon got us smiling again. A few beers there did the trick, and it was great to meet up and chat with my old friend Mike and his son Matthew from New York, and another Matthew from South Carolina, who is a massive fan of international football, unlike me, and was soon off to his 69^th US game in Kansas, or somewhere.

“Just make sure they change ends at half-time in that one, mate.”

We spent a good amount of time there and could have stayed longer, but Steve walked Glenn and yours truly over to South Street where we devoured our first cheesesteak of the trip at “Jim’s” where we had visited in 2012.

“Steak, onions, Whiz.”

It was phantastic.

Our first match in Philly was done and dusted, but we now had to get something from Tuesday’s late game against Esperance of Tunis to ensure our safe passage into the last sixteen of this cup.

And that, my friends, is another story.

NEW YORK 2025

RIO DE JANEIRO 2024

PHILADELPHIA 2025 : A NIGHT WITH FRIENDS

PHILADELPHIA 2025 : CHELSEA VS. FLAMENGO

Tales From The Final Tie

Posted on May 16, 2021 by Chris Axon

Chelsea vs. Leicester City : 15 May 2021.

Since We Last Spoke.

My match report for the home game against Everton in March of last year – a really fine 4-0 win – ended with a typical few words.

“Right. Aston Villa away on Saturday. See you there.”

Then, as we all know too dearly, life – and football – changed. The corona virus that had first been spoken about just after Christmas in 2019, almost in a semi-humorous way at the start, took hold and started claiming victims at an alarming rate. A global pandemic was on our hands. Very soon the United Kingdom was placed in lockdown, a situation that none of us could have ever envisioned witnessing in person during our lives.

Suddenly and without too much thought, football seemed of little real relevance to me.

The trials and tribulations of Chelsea Football Club in particular seemed small compared to the news appearing on my TV screen, on my phone and laptop. As friends found their own way of coping with the surreal nature of lock down, and then being furloughed from work, I quickly realised that football, Chelsea in particular, was way down my list of priorities.

I simply had other, more serious, issues to deal with. And this is how my thought process, my coping mechanism, remained for weeks and weeks. While others pushed for football to return I simply asked myself :

Why?

It was irrelevant, for me, to concern myself with millionaires playing football.

Eventually after a prolonged break, when the football season began again in the middle of June, I had become emotionally distanced from the sport and from Chelsea too. I had simply turned inwards, as did many; working from home, travelling as little as I could manage and trying not to impact – socially – on the outside world. I joked that I had been practising for this moment my entire life. Earlier in my life, I was the ultimate shy boy.

But the noisemakers in the game and the media were adamant that it would be a major moral boost for the nation to see football return.

How?

It just didn’t sit well with me, this notion of football to be seen as the great saviour. Other priorities seemed to overshadow it. I just could not correlate what I was hearing in the media about football and what I was feeling inside.

I will not lie, I absolutely hated watching the games on TV, with no fans, in silence, and I became more and more distanced from the sport that I had loved with each passing game. I watched almost with a sense of duty, nothing more. What had been my lifeblood – to an almost ridiculous level some might say, and with some justification – just seemed sterile and distant. I have very few memories of those games in the summer.

The FA Cup Final seemed particularly difficult to watch. On a hot day in August, I mowed the lawn, and even did some work in my home office for an hour or two, and then sat alone to see us score an early Christian Pulisic goal but then be over-run by a revitalised Arsenal team. That result hurt of course, and I was annoyed how some decisions went against us. The sad injury to Pedro – a fine player for us over five years – in the last kick of the game seemed to sum up our horrible misfortune that day. However, and I know this sounds funny and odd, but I was pleased that I was hurting. That I still cared.

But by the evening, the loss was glossed over.

Football still didn’t seem too important to me.

The one positive for me, and one which combines my own particular brand of OCD – Obsessive Chelsea Disorder – married with a possible smidgeon of shallowness, was the fact that I didn’t have to delete the games I had witnessed in 2019/20 from both my games spreadsheet and – gulp – this blog site.

A small victory for me, and I needed it.

Off the field, work was becoming particularly stressful for me. In August I came oh-so close to handing in my notice. The workload was piling up, I was battling away, and I was getting some worrying chest pains again.

In mid-September, the new season began and I openly hoped for a new approach from me. There was nothing up in the air here; we knew games would be played behind closed doors, we knew the score from the start. I renewed my NOWTV package to allow me to see most of our games. We began the league campaign at Brighton. For some reason, I didn’t see the game, I can’t remember why not. The first match I witnessed on TV was the home defeat to Liverpool.

It was no good. I could not deny it. I was as distanced as ever. The hold that Chelsea Football Club had on me for decades was under threat.

Conversely – at last some fucking positivity – as soon as my local team Frome Town started playing friendlies and then league games, I was in football heaven. I especially remember a fantastic pre-season friendly against Yeovil Town two days before Chelsea’s game at Brighton. A warm Thursday evening and a capacity 400 attendance, a fine game with friends, just magnificent. In September and October, I attended many a Frome Town game including aways at Mangotsfield United in Bristol – it felt so good to be back home in my living room uploading photos just an hour after the game had finished, a real positive – and on a wet night in Bideford in North Devon. Home gates were significantly higher than the previous season. There was a magnificent sense of community at the club. There had even been a tremendous crowd-funder to raise £25,000 in April to keep the club going. We even had a little FA Trophy run – before being expelled for refusing to play an away tie in an area with a high infection rate. Soon after, the club’s records for a second successive season were expunged and that early season flourish was put on hold until 2021/22.

But for a month, I was felling inexorably closer to Frome Town than to Chelsea. It seemed that my entire world was turning in on myself.

Was the world changing?

On Saturday 10 October it certainly did. For the second time in a few days I experienced chest pains. There had been a similar attack in my bed and breakfast in Bideford on Thursday morning. That drive home was horrible. I wanted to be brave enough to phone for a doctor. On the Saturday, I knew I had to act. I phoned the emergency services and – to cut a very long story to a quick few lines – I was whisked into a local hospital in Bath. On the Sunday, I was told that I had suffered a mild heart attack, and on Monday I underwent an operation to have two stents fitted into my heart. My Tuesday afternoon, I was home again.

I remained off work for five weeks, and slowly returned in stages. A half-day here, a half-day there. I remained calm throughout these weeks. I knew, deep down, that something had been wrong but being a typical bloke, decided to let things slide and hope for the best. Since then, I have improved my lifestyle; decaffeinated coffee – boo! – and healthier food, more exercise and all of the associated improvements that go with it.

With all this going on, Chelsea seemed even more remote. I was momentarily cheered when fans were allowed back inside Stamford Bridge, and that for a few hours we were top of the table after Leeds United were despatched. For a fleeting moment, it seemed that Frank Lampard, who had teased a very creditable fourth place finish in July out of his youngsters, was now able to similarly nurture his new signings too. But there had been failings in 2020/21 too. Our defence was at times calamitous. But I was solidly behind Frank all of the way. I really felt for him. Back in March, with Billy Gilmour the new star, we had enjoyed quite wonderful wins over Liverpool and Everton. There was positivity, hope and the future looked utterly pleasing.

Then the pandemic struck. Damn you COVID19.

In December and early January our form dipped alarmingly. I watched Frank’s interviews through my fingers. It was not pleasant viewing. It saddened me that so many rank and file Chelsea supporters, across all demographics – from old school fans in England to younger ones abroad – had seen fit to kindly forget the “I don’t care if we finish mid-table for a couple of seasons, let’s build a future with our youngsters” mantra in August 2019.

It got to the stage where I didn’t want Chelsea to simply win games but to simply win games for Frank.

I had returned full-time to work in mid-January. To their credit my employer has been first rate throughout my ordeal. While I was in the office on a day in late January, it was sadly announced that Frank Lampard had been sacked. I was numbed yet not at all surprised. I firstly hated the decision for reasons that are probably not difficult to guess. So much for long termism, eh Chelsea?

My interest in the exploits of Chelsea Football Club probably reached an all-term low. Or at least since the relegation season of 1978/79 when we were shocking throughout and I was being pulled away from football with a new interest in music and other teenage distractions.

Thomas Tuchel?

A nerdy-looking chap, skeleton thin, probably a diamond with Powerpoint and with a marginally worse hairstyle than me? I wished him well but football again seemed distant.

Our form improved but the football itself seemed sterile. I was still struggling.

On a Saturday in March, I debated whether or not I had time to go off on a ten mile walk to a local village and get back in time to watch play at Elland Road. I considered binning the football in favour of my new found enjoyment of walks in the surrounding winter Somerset countryside. In the end I compromised; I went for a walk on the Sunday.

I know what I found most enjoyable.

Of late, our form has really improved. Again, I haven’t seen every game. But we look a little more coherent, defensively especially. Apart from an odd blip, to be honest, the results since the new manager took over have been sensational even if many of the ways of getting those results have lacked a certain “I know not what.”

Pizazz? Style?

I’m being mean. The bloke has done well. I like his self-effacing humour, his humble approach. He has started to grow in me (Parky : “like a fungus”).

Of late, our progress in the latter stages of the Champions League has been the most impressive part of our recent resurgence. And yet this competition has been haunting me all season long. In a nutshell, the thought of us reaching our third European Cup Final and – being selfish here, I know it – me not being able to attend is a nightmare.

(OK, not a nightmare. I know. I know 127,000 people have lost their lives due to COVID19. That is the real nightmare. I realise that. This is just football. Just football.)

I shrugged off last August’s FA Cup Final. I coped remarkably well with that. I soon decided that I could even stomach missing a second-successive one this year. But the thought of us lifting the big one for a second time and me – and others – not being there is bloody purgatory.

So, it was with a heady mix of genuine pride and impending sadness that accompanied the glorious sight of us beating a hideously poor Real Madrid side over two-legs to reach the final.

But that spectacle, or debacle, needs another chapter devoted to it. And it doesn’t seem right to talk too much about that at this time. In fact, going into the weekend I assured myself that I would not dwell too much about the 2021 European Cup Final. Let’s be honest here; the twin crushing of the hated European Super League and the farcical and immoral desire of UEFA to send 8,000 UK citizens to Portugal in the midst of a global pandemic warrants a book, a Netflix series even, all by themselves.

Let’s talk about the FA Cup.

For those readers of this blogorama who have been paying attention, I have been featuring the visit of my grandfather Ted Draper to Stamford Bridge for the 1920 FA Cup Final between Aston Villa, his team, and Huddersfield Town. This is a work of fiction since I only know that my grandfather once visited Stamford Bridge, but was never able to remember the game. Suffice to say, in the report of the home game against Liverpool last March, I continued the story.

After a break of fourteen months, a re-cap.

On Saturday 24 April 1920, on this very same site, if not this very same stadium – but certainly one which was in situ for the 1982 game, those lovely packed terraces – my grandfather stood on the great slug of the West terrace with his old school friend Ted Knapton alongside him. It was half-time, and the score between the two teams – Aston Villa, who he favoured, and Huddersfield Town – was 0-0. It had been an exhilarating game of football for my grandfather, though the spectacle of seeing fifty-thousand spectators in one sports ground had proved to be the one abiding memory that he would take away with him.

Fifty thousand people.

And virtually all were men, and so many had fought in the Great War.

My grandfather was twenty-five years old. He silently gazed out at the main stand on the far side, the open terraces behind each goal, and looked behind him at row after row of fellows in caps and hats, some with the colourful favours of the two competing teams. A claret and blue rosette here. A light blue hat there.

Fifty-thousand men.

It struck home.

My grandfather had just that week spotted a local girl, a few years younger than him, who was beginning work in the manor house of his home village. She was a young cook, with a lovely smile, and had caught his eye.

My grandfather was a rather quiet man. He looked out at all those faces. He did not speak to his friend Ted, but he – at Stamford Bridge on Cup Final day 1920 – had decided that the stadium, indeed the whole of England was full of men, and the thought of one of them asking the young cook out before he had a chance to utter a shy “hello” ate away at him.

He had survived the Great War. He lived in a great village and now this great spectacle had stirred him in a way that he had not expected.

“You had better get your act together, Ted Draper. On Monday at lunch time, I think I will ask Blanche if she would like to accompany me to next weekend’s village dance. I can’t be second in that race.”

I was so annoyed that I could not continue this story last season. The team did their part, defeating Manchester United in a semi-final, but of course there was no Cup Final Tale in which I could tie up rather conveniently tie up the end of my 1920 story on the centenary.

Thankfully, good old Chelsea, the team defeated Manchester City in this season’s semis to enable me to continue and to honour my grandfather again.

The quality of the play down below on the surprisingly muddy Stamford Bridge pitch deteriorated throughout the second-half. But Ted Draper, along with his friend Ted Knapton, were still enthralled by the cut and thrust of the two teams. The players, wearing heavy cotton shirts, went into each tackle with thunderous tenacity. And the skill of the nimble wide players caught both of their eye.

“Ted, I wonder what the crowd figure is here today. There are a few spaces on the terracing. I suspect it would have been at full capacity if Chelsea had won their semi-final against the Villa.”

“I think you are right. What’s the capacity here? I have heard it said it can hold 100,000.”

“Bugger me.”

“Trust Chelsea to mess it up.”

“Yes. Good old Chelsea.”

The crowd impressed them. But they were not too impressed with the swearing nor the quite shocking habit of some spectators to openly urinate on the cinder terraces.

“To be honest Ted, I haven’t seen any lavatories here have you?”

“I’m just glad I went in that pub before we arrived.”

The play continued on, and the crowd grew restless with the lack of goals. The programme was often studied to match the names of the players with their positions on the pitch. With no goals after ninety-minutes, there was a short break before extra-time, and more liquid cascaded down the terraces.

“Like a bloody river, Ted.”

After ten minutes of the first period of extra-time, Aston Villa broke away on a fast break and the brown leather ball held up just in time for the inside-right Billy Kirton to tuck the ball past Sandy Mutch in the Huddersfield goal. There was a mighty roar, and Ted Draper joined in.

The Aston Villa supporters standing nearby flung their hats into the crowd and many of the bonnets and caps landed on the sodden floor of the terracing.

“Buggered if I’d put those things back on my head, Ted.”

There then followed a period of back-slapping among the Villa die-hards, and Ted Draper was very pleased that his team had taken the lead. The game stayed at 1-0, with both teams tiring in the last part of the match. The crowd stayed until the end, transfixed. There was just time to see the Aston Villa captain Andy Ducat lift the silver trophy on the far side. The teams soon disappeared into the stand.

With a blink of an eye, the game was done, the day was over, and Somerset was calling.

As the two friends slowly made their way out of the Stamford Bridge stadium, Ted Knapton – who favoured no team, but had picked the Huddersfield men for this game – spoke to my grandfather.

“That goal, Ted.”

“What of it?”

“It looked offside to me.”

“Not a chance, not a chance Ted. The inside-right was a good half-inch onside.”

“Ah, you’re a bugger Ted Draper, you’re a bugger.”

On Cup Final Day 2021, I was up early, a good ninety minutes ahead of the intended 8am alarm clock. One of my first tasks was to swab my mouth and nose. Now there’s a phrase that I never ever thought that I would utter on a Cup Final morn. Part of the protocol for this game, the biggest planned event to take part in the UK since lockdown in March 2020, was that all attendees should take a lateral flow test at an official centre from 2.15pm on Thursday 13 May. I was lucky, I was able to work a late shift on the Friday and I travelled to Street for my test. The negative result soon came through by email. We also were advised, though not compulsory, to take a test at home on the morning of the game and five days after the event in order for data to be gathered. A small price to pay.

This felt odd. To be going to a game after so long. I took some stick from a few people that saw me comment that my love of football was being rekindled.

“Chelsea get to two cup finals and all of a sudden Chris Axon loves football again.”

I laughed with them.

The joy of football had been rekindled because I was now able to see a live game. There are many ways for people to get their kick out of football. By playing, by writing, by watching on TV, by refereeing, by betting, by coaching, by fantasy leagues. By I get my kick through live football.

It has been my life.

I posted the carton with the vial containing my swab at Mells Post Office just after I left home at 10.30am. I was genuinely excited for the day’s events to unfold. Outside the same post office a few days earlier, I had announced to two elderly widows of the village – Janet and Ann – that I was off to the FA Cup Final a few days earlier.

“I have missed it badly.”

They both smiled.

And I realised that this final tie of the Football Association Challenge Cup represented a final tie to my childhood – I am known around the village as a Chelsea supporter – and it also represented a nod to the tie that Chelsea Football Club has on me.

But did it really represent one last chance to bring me back in from the cold?

I know that I needed something to help me regain my love of the game before my dislike of VAR, obscenely-overpaid players, ever-changing kick-off times, blood-sucking agents, the continuing indifference to game-going fans despite the limp platitudes that might suggest otherwise, the threat of the thirty-ninth game, knobhead fans, the disgraceful behaviour of UEFA and FIFA in so many aspects of their stance on so many things (I have already decided I am not watching a single second of the Qatar World Cup) all combine in one horrible mixture to turn me away even more.

I have aired all this before. As well you know.

No pressure, Chelsea.

Vic Woodley.

On my way to collect Lord Parky, my sole companion on this foray back to normality, I passed near the village of Westwood. Until recently, I was unaware – as were many – that this is the final resting place of our former ‘keeper Vic Woodley. There is a group on Facebook that actively try to locate the graves of former players and on occasion headstones are purchased if there are unmarked graves. It is an admirable cause. Two Saturdays ago, I placed some blue and white flowers on the grave. Although it is open to debate, I would suggest that until 1955, Vic Woodley was our most successful player at Chelsea.

Hughie Gallacher was probably our most famous player, George Smith had played more games and George Mills had been our record goal scorer.

But Woodley had played 252 games for Chelsea and 19 for England. He was in our team for the Moscow Dynamo game in 1945 too.

I vote for Vic Woodley.

I soon passed The Barge pub, on the outskirts of Bradford on Avon where he was a landlord in later years.

We must pay a visit when normality returns.

Parky soon reminded me that he had heard of his Uncle Gerald, a Derby County fan, talk about Vic Woodley – who played thirty times for Derby before moving to Bath City – living locally when Parky was younger. Parky also recounted meeting a chap in nearby Melksham who had been at that Moscow Dynamo game just after the Second World War.

1994 And 2021.

I had collected Parky at 11am. His first task had been to replicate a photo of me setting off outside Glenn’s house in Frome before the drive to the 1994 FA Cup Final. I wanted a little comparison. Me at 28 and me at 55.

This would be my eleventh FA Cup Final that I will have attended. The twenty-eight year old me what have laughed at such a notion.

We had a lovely natter on the way up. We hardy stopped chatting. Sadly, neither Glenn nor PD could make it up but we promised to keep them in our thoughts. Our route took us towards High Wycombe before we doubled back on the M40. This was quite appropriate since a very well-known and popular supporter at Chelsea, Wycombe Stan, had recently passed away. He was well-loved by all and will be sadly missed at Chelsea. Stan has featured in these reports a few times. A smashing bloke.

RIP Wycombe Stan.

I had purchased a pre-paid parking slot for £20 only a ten-minute walk from the stadium. Traffic delays going in meant that we didn’t arrive much before 3pm, but it felt good, for once, to not have to race like fools to get in to a Cup Final. Those “last pints” on Cup Final day are legend.

The environs around modern Wembley Stadium are much different than as recently as 2007, the first final at the new place. Flats and hotels abound. It is very much a retail village first, a sporting venue second. We bumped into two Chelsea fans on the walk to the stadium. Gill B. said that the place was full of Leicester, that there were hardly any Chelsea present yet. I knew of two Leicester City season ticket holders who were attending the final and one had said that most of their fans were arriving on an armada of coaches. Gill R. wasn’t planning on meeting up with anyone, but as we turned a quiet corner, she shouted out : ”Chris!”

It was so lovely to see her. We chatted for quite a while, talking about the surreal nature of the past year, the sad departure of Frank, the whole nine yards. We both admitted we had not missed football as much as we had expected. Strange times.

At the southern end of what is now normally called “Wembley Way” – but was really called “Olympic Way” – the rather unsightly access slope has been replaced by steps, which I must admit remind me of an old style football terrace. But it is rather odd to see steps there. One supposes that crowd control has improved since the Ibrox disaster of 1971, but the straight rails, with no cross rails to stop surges, did bring a tremor to my memory banks. At least the steps do not immediately start near the stadium.

At the base of the steps, we scanned our match ticket and showed our test result email to Security Bod Number One.

In. Simple.

We neared the turnstiles at the eastern end – not our usual one – at around 3.30pm. Hardly anyone was around. We went straight in.

Thankfully, Security Bod Number Two didn’t react negatively to the sight of my camera and lenses.

Result. In.

For an hour and a half – the equivalent of a match – and by far the most enjoyable ninety minutes of the day, we chatted to many friends who we had not seen for fourteen months. I was driving, of course, so was not drinking. In fact, as I never drink at home, my last alcoholic intake was way back in September. But Parky, himself almost teetotal since June, was off the leash and “enjoying” the £6 pints. I updated many friends with the latest news regarding my health. I summed it up like this :

“I’ve had a good six months.”

There had been rumours of the whole game being played under constant rain. We were low down, row three and right behind the goal. If anyone was going to get wet, we were.

It was soon 5pm. A quick dash to the loo, things have improved since 1920. Within seconds I was spotting more familiar faces and I added to the gallery.

A Chelsea Gallery.

The Game.

The Cup Final hymn – Abide With Me – was sung and I sang along too. It is always so moving.

A quick look around. Most people in the lower tier. Team banners all over the south side of the top tier. A few people dotted around the middle tier and the north side of the top tier. Altogether surreal. Altogether strange. We had been gifted a Chelsea flag and a small blue bag was placed beneath the seat too. I didn’t bother to look in for a while. Time was moving on. I was starting to gear up for my first Chelsea game of the season and, possibly – only possibly – my last. Some fireworks, some announcements, the entrance of the teams. I spotted Prince William, a good man, and snapped away as he was introduced to the two teams.

“Oh bollocks. The teams. Who’s playing?”

I had been so busy chatting in the concourse that my mind had not given it a moment’s thought.

James in the middle three, Kepa in goal, Ziyech? Oh dear. I was amazed that Havertz was not playing. I was reminded last week that the young German’s first ever appearance at Wembley was in late 2016 against Tottenham. He came on as an eighty-sixth minute substitute for Bayer Leverkusen as they won 1-0. It was memorable for me too; I was there, tucked away among the Leverkusen hordes with my childhood friend Mario.

So, yes, the team.

Kepa.

James. Silva. Rudiger.

Dave. Kante. Jorginho. Alonso.

Mount. Werner. Ziyech.

I always say that I need a few games at the start of each season to get used to watching football again. To learn the habits, strengths and weaknesses of new players. To pace myself. To try to take it all in. Sadly, such a staggeringly low viewing position was of no use whatsoever. Everything was difficult. There was no depth. I really struggled.

And I really struggled with the latest dog’s dinner kit that the wonder kids at Nike have foisted upon us.

Does anybody like it?

To be honest, with players in motion the bizarre chequered pattern is not too discernible. It is only when players are still that the mess is fully visible. That the nasty pattern is continued onto the shorts without the merest hint of an apology makes it twice as bad. After getting it so right – sadly for one game – in 2020, the Nike folk thought that the yellow trim was obviously worth repeating.

Right. Enough of that. I’m getting depressed.

With only 12,500 fans of the competing clubs in the vastness of Wembley, it was so difficult to get an atmosphere going. For the first time in fourteen months, my vocal skills were tested. I joined in when I could. But it was all rather half-hearted.

The game began and we edged the opening spell quite easily with Mason Mount busy and involved. A couple of very early attacks down the right amounted to nothing. The rain was just about staying off.

Our loudest chant in the game thus far had been the statistically inaccurate “We’ve won it all”, a comment that Corinthians of San Paolo will note with a chuckle, as will the Saints of Southampton.

After a full quarter of an hour, an optimistic effort from Toni Rudiger flew tamely wide of the Leicester goal. A rare foray into our half saw a cross from Timothy Castagne for Jamie Vardy but Reece James blocked well. Chances were rare though. Mount advanced well but shot wide. An effort from Timo Werner replicated the curve of the arch overhead as his shot plopped into the area housing the Leicester fans.

We were clearly dominating possession but after a reasonable start we became bogged down with keeping the ball and trying to force our way in to Leicester’s well-drilled defence. I could almost hear the commentators describing the play. And it’s maybe a subtle new type of play too, possibly a side-effect of having no fans at games for over a year.

Watching on TV, and I admit I get so frustrated, I get bored to death of teams sitting back and letting teams pass in and around them. I watched some old footage from the ‘eighties recently, highlights of the 1982 and 1988 Scottish Cup Finals, and from the kick-off the teams were at each other. It was like watching a different sport. It was breathless, maybe not tactically pleasing, but it had me on edge and dreaming of another era.

Today there is just so much I can take of commentators talking about “the press, a low press, a high press, a high block, a low block, between the lines, transition, the counter, little pockets, passing channels.”

It seems that football is – even more – a sport watched by experts and critics rather than supporters. Yes, everyone seems more educated in tactics these days, but the repetition of some key phrases surely grates on me.

For the high priests of the high press, I sometimes wonder if they are even aware of how often they use this phrase during a normal match.

Players have always closed space and targeted weak spots, just as teams have in the past been happy to soak up pressure when needed. It just seems that teams do it all the time now. In every bloody game. And with no supporters in the stadium to inject some passion and intensity, I get drained watching training game after training game on TV.

A few long crosses and corners from the right did not trouble Schmeichel in the Leicester goal. His father was in the Manchester United goal in 1994. It infamously rained that day and just around the half-way mark of the first-half, the heavens opened. The omens were against us. My camera bag got drenched, my jacket was getting drenched. The blue cardboard bag from Chelsea was getting drenched.

Someone asked: “what’s in the goody bag?”

I replied “a return air ticket to Istanbul.”

Tuchel hurried back to the bench to get a blue baseball cap from his goody bag. Not sure if he had a metal badge too, though.

For twenty minutes, my photos stopped. I couldn’t risk my camera getting waterlogged. Leicester had a few rare forays towards us at the eastern end. I liked the look of Thiago Silva. Bizarrely, of course, these were my first sightings of Werner, Ziyech and Silva in a Chelsea shirt.

The rain slowed and I breathed a sigh of relief. I was in no mood for a “Burnley 2017.” Around me, the rain had dampened the fervour of our support. Leicester were beginning to be heard.

“Vichai had a dream. He bought a football team.

He came from Thailand and now he’s one of our own.

We play from the back.

And counter attack.

Champions of England. You made us sing that.”

Thankfully no mention of a high press.

The last real chance of the half, a poor-half really, fell to Caglar Soyuncu but his effort dropped wide of the far post.

At half-time, there were mutterings of disapproval in a Chelsea support that had quietened down considerably. Throughout that first-half, neither team had managed a shot on goal. But I tried to remain positive. I was buoyed by the pleasing sight of blue skies in the huge rectangular window above us…I hoped the clouds would not return.

No changes at the start of the second-half. I prayed for a winner at our end, just yards away from me.

The first effort of the second-half came from the head of Marcos Alonso, a surprising starter for many, who rose to meet a cross from N’Golo Kante but headed too close to Schmeichel. Leicester showed a bit of life, some spirit, but it was dour football.

Sadly, this was to change. Just after the hour, the ball was pushed square to Youri Tielemens who advanced – unchallenged, damn it – until he was around twenty-five yards out. As soon as the ball left his boot, from my vantage point, I knew it was in. Not even Peter fucking Crouch could have reached it. The Leicester end erupted.

Bollocks.

Five minutes later, Christian Pulisic for Hakim Ziyech and Ben Chilwell – loud boos – for Marcos Alonso. Pulisic immediately added a little spice and spirit. He seemed positive. Two more substitutions, Callum Hudson-Odoi for Azpilicueta and Kai Havertz, the slayer of Tottenham, for Jorginho. Our attack had stumbled all game but with fresh legs we immediately looked more interested.

The Leicester fans were in their element, raucous and buoyant. We tried to get behind the team.

“COME ON CHELSEA, COME ON CHELSEA, COME ON CHELSEA, COME ON CHELSEA.”

It didn’t exactly engulf the Chelsea end in a baying mass of noise.

Kante was strangely finding himself engaged as a supplier of crosses and one such ball was met by Chilwell but his strong downward header, coming straight towards me, was palmed on to his post by a diving Schemichel.

I was right in this game now; it had taken so long for us to get any momentum, but with time running out my eyes were on stalks, watching the ball and the players running – or not – into space.

“COME ON YOU BLUE BOYS.”

With eight minutes’ left, The Charge of the Light Brigade as Olivier Giroud raced on to replace a very disappointing Werner. It was the fastest any Chelsea player had run all game.

The Chelsea pressure increased. I didn’t even think about the stresses that might be induced should we score a late equaliser. But that’s good. I felt fine. No problems.

A delicate cross from James was knocked back to our Mase. He steadied himself momentarily and then let fly with his left foot. I was about to leap in joy. But Schmeichel flung himself to his left and clawed it out.

I called him a very rude name. Twice. Just to make sure he heard me.

In the closing minutes, a lofted ball – into space, what joy – found a rampaging Ben Chilwell. He met it first time, pushing it into the six-yard box. In the excitement of the moment, I only saw a convergence of bodies and then…GETINYOUFUCKER…the net bulge. I tried my damnedest to capture him running away in joy, but I needed to celebrate. I brushed past Parky and found myself in the stairwell. King Kenny virtually slammed me into the fence at the front – ha – but I kept my composure and snapped away. The results are, mainly blurred. A second or two later, I looked back and Kenny was screaming, his face a picture of joy, and the scene that I saw me was a virtual copy, with less people, of the aftermath of Marcos Alonso’s winner in 2017, a mere thirty yards further south.

I heard a voice inside my head.

“Fucking hell, Chris, we’ve done it.”

And then. Someone mentioned VAR. At first, I thought someone was being a smart-arse. Didn’t seem offside to me. Nah. And then I realised as I looked up at the large scoreboard above the Leicester City fans that the awful truth was for all to see.

A red rectangle…

VAR : CHECKING GOAL – POSSIBLE OFFSIDE.

My heart slumped. How often do these end up with the advantage being given to the attacking side?

Ironically, on the car drive in to London, both Parky and I quoted a recent game when Harry Kane’s toe was deemed to be offside and we both admitted that we felt for the bloke. When Chelsea fans are upset with a VAR decision is given against Tottenham, something is definitely up.

A roar from the other end, no goal.

King Kenny wailed : “what has football become?”

I had no answer.

Has anyone?

There is a chance that this might be my last report this season. It depends on how Chelsea Football Club looks after its own supporters’ hopes of reaching the Portuguese city of Porto in a fortnight.

Tales From One Billy Gilmour And One Decent Scouser

Posted on March 7, 2020 by Chris Axon

Chelsea vs. Liverpool : 3 March 2020.

In the pubs beforehand, there was not one Chelsea fan that I spoke to who thought that we would be victorious in the game with Liverpool.

“They’re so far ahead in the league that they can afford to play their first team, rather than rest players.”

“They’re light years ahead of us.”

“We’ll be lucky to get naught.”

“Expectation level is nine below zero.”

“Could be another Bayern.”

But complete and total negativity was not the order of the evening.

There were a couple of pluses.

In “The Goose”, Parky, PD and I chatted to some of the lads from our home area. Does anyone recollect the story of Sir Les, and a few others, getting stuck in a lift before a home game before Christmas? They were stuck in there for virtually the entire first-half. Well, I am pleased to report that Chelsea rewarded these fans with a corporate style package for the Everton home game which is coming up in Sunday.

Well done Chelsea Football Club.

There was also some good work from the club regarding the pricing of this FA Cup fifth round tie with Liverpool. Initially, as with previous seasons, it was announced that all FA Cup ties would be priced at £30. When Liverpool came out of the hat, the club decided to up the tickets to £40. There was an immediate uproar and the Chelsea Supporters Trust, alongside the original Supporters Club I believe, soon petitioned the club to re-think. Within twenty-four hours, there was a statement to the effect of the club getting it wrong and the price returning to the £30 level.

Well done again Chelsea Football Club.

We made our way down to Simmons to chat with the others. It wasn’t as busy as I had expected. As I waited for friends to arrive, I spotted that the 1970 replay – often a favourite at “Simmons” – was being replayed on the TV screens. It is still the fifth most viewed TV programme in the UK, ever.

That’s right. Ever.

During the few days leading up to the evening’s game, it dawned on me that the last time we played Liverpool at home in the cup was the famous 1997 game. Many of my generation mention the 1978 third round win – 4-2 – when an average Chelsea side surprisingly defeated the then European Champions. I was not at that game, but can remember the joy of hearing about our win as the news came through on the TV. Next up, in the story of games in the cup at Stamford Bridge between the two teams, was the equally memorable 2-0 win in 1982. Chelsea were a Second Division team that season, and Liverpool were again European Champions. I was at that one. And I have detailed that game on here before. It was seismic. What an afternoon.

Next up was a fourth round tie in 1985/86 that we lost 2-1 which is probably best remembered for Kerry Dixon injuring himself and, probably, not quite being the same player ever again.

It’s worth noting that we haven’t played at Anfield in the FA Cup for decades.

The last time was in 1966.

Then came the fourth round tie on Sunday 26 January 1997.

It is a game that evokes wonderful memories among most Chelsea supporters; it was a real “coming of age” moment for club, team and fans alike. Chelsea, under new manager Ruud Gullit, were still finding our collective feet under the talisman and Dutch legend. During the league in 1996/97, we had lost 5-1 at Anfield in the autumn but a Roberto di Matteo strike gave us a deserved 1-0 on New Year’s Day. In October we had suffered the sadness of the loss of Matthew Harding. We were winning more than we were losing, but by no great margin. Liverpool were a better team than us in 1996/97. They would go on to finish fourth, we were to finish sixth. We had easily defeated First Division West Brom at home in the third round.

We – Glenn, my mate Russ and little old me – watched the Liverpool game unfold from the last few rows of the Matthew Harding Lower. It was a terrible view to be honest, the overhang meant that we watched the game through a letterbox.

Chelsea started with Gianfranco Zola and Gianluca Vialli up front. We played with Scott Minto and Dan Petrescu as wing backs. Liverpool fielded players such as David James, Jamie Redknapp, John Barnes, Steve McManaman, Robbie Fowler and Stan Collymore. They were a tough team. But, with us having the home advantage, it was evenly matched. Or so we thought. With Liverpool attacking the temporary seats in The Shed in the first-half they soon galloped to a 2-0 lead after just twenty-one minutes. I think it was McManaman who missed an easy chance to make it 3-0. Chelsea were out of it, and the atmosphere in Stamford Bridge had quietened severely after the early promise.

It was as flat as I had ever experienced.

At half-time, Gullit replaced Scott Minto with Mark Hughes, went to a 4/3/3 formation, and Sparky proved to be the catalyst that sparked a revolution. He turned and smashed a long range effort in on fifty-minutes.

“Game on.”

Then Gianfranco Zola slammed in an equaliser eight minutes later.

The atmosphere was red hot by then.

Despite the gate being just 27,950, the place was booming.

Gianluca Vialli scored on sixty-three and seventy-six minutes – euphoria – and we ended up as 4-2 winners. Liverpool, their fans all along the East Lower in those days, did not know what had hit them.

I would later watch that second-half on grainy VHS again and again and again.

Up until that point, my two favourite Chelsea games – out of the then total of two hundred and sixty-five – were the FA Cup games in 1982 and 1997.

Lovely memories.

That win over Liverpool in 1997 gave us confidence and with further games against Leicester City at home (I went), Pompey away (I couldn’t get tickets) and Wimbledon in the semi-final at Highbury (I was there) we marched triumphantly towards Wembley for the 1997 FA Cup Final with Middlesbrough. And through it all, Matthew Harding’s presence was with us all.

Heady and emotional moments?

You bet.

My friend John, a lecturer at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, arrived at about 6.30pm. I last saw him at Ann Arbor for the Real Madrid game in 2016. He was visiting London, Liverpool and Manchester for a few days with some students who were on a “Soccer: Media, Art & Society” course that would go towards their various degrees.

“Soccer: Media, Art & Society.”

Yeah, I know. What a course. Where can I sign up? It sure beat the “Cultural Geography” and “Transport Geography” sub-courses I took at North Staffs Poly from 1984 to 1987.

John was keen for me to talk to his six students – three lads, three lasses – for a few minutes about football, its heady sub-culture, its fads and fancies. I enjoyed it, though I can’t see myself as a lecturer in the near future, not without a bit more practice anyway, and not without a script.

I briefly mentioned the story of my grandfather attending a match at Stamford Bridge, and how I genuinely think it could well have been the 1920 FA Cup Final, one hundred years ago this year.

I hoped that the atmosphere would be good for them on this night in SW6. I always remember a League Cup semi-final in 2015 between the two teams and the noise was sensational all night. I hoped for a repeat. Apart from John, who comes over every season, this was the students’ first ever game at The Bridge.

At about 7.15pm, I downed the last of my two small bottles of “Staropramen” and headed off to Stamford Bridge.

There were six thousand Scousers in the area, though I was yet to see one of them. I guess they were doing their drinking in the West End and Earl’s Court.

Alan and I soon realised that the place was taking an age to fill up. There were yawning gaps everywhere. Even with ten minutes to go, we wondered if the paranoia over the Corona Virus had deterred many from travelling into The Smoke.

“Chelsea will be the death of me.”

The team news came through.

Arrizabalaga

Azpilicueta – Rudiger – Zouma – Alonso

Gilmour – Kovacic – Barkley

Willian – Giroud – Pedro

So, Kepa back in, an enforced change in personnel, a rather aged front three, and a start for young Billy Gilmour.

Like the 1997 game, this was live on BBC1.

I spoke to a few friends close by in that period before the pre-match rituals kick in and, again, nobody was hopeful.

Nobody.

Within the last few minutes, the place suddenly filled to capacity.

There was more 2020-style pre-match nonsense. The lights dimmed, almost darkness, fireworks, the teams appeared.

Blues vs. Reds.

South vs. North.

Chelsea vs. Liverpool.

(In the slightly off-kilter parlance of the modern day: “Chels vs. Red Scouse.”)

As the floodlights returned to full strength, I spotted white socks. As the tracksuit tops were taken off, I spotted the dogs’ dinner of the normal 2019/20 kit. Where was the promised 1970 kit, the beautifully understated blue with yellow trim?

Where the fuck was it?

My heart sank.

It seems that Chelsea Football Club – two steps forward, one step back – had been less than truthful about our 1970 kit.

Who thought that we would be wearing it throughout this season’s FA Cup campaign?

Everyone?

Yeah, thought so.

What a fucking disgrace.

So, this season – three kits, and one kit to be worn just once.

I only bought the shorts, and I am yet to wear them, but I felt for those significant others who bought the range. They shot off the shelves, didn’t they?

And, the sad thing is, I was really looking forward to seeing us in that kit once again.

I vented on “Facebook.”

And here are a few responses :

Michelle : So wrong I’m sure it was marketed as an FA Cup kit ! The club have taken the fans for mugs yet again,

Lottinho : Absolute joke. Pathetic on the club. Strictly for £££.

Karn : It’s bollocks. Still, glad I bought it though – lovely shirt.

Alex : As predictable as it is disappointing

Kelvin : So cynical how Chelsea avoided making that clear when they were marketing it.

Jake : All about the money, mate. That was a class kit

Lee : Utter bastards

The game began.

Liverpool were an instant reminder of another team in all red from last Tuesday. I silently shuddered. The away team, with a heady handful of familiar players but also a couple of unfamiliar ones, began the livelier and moved the ball in and around our defence. There was an early, relatively easy, save from Kepa following a strike from Sadio Mane. But at the other end, The Shed, Willian drove at the defence and forced a good save from Adrian in front of the Liverpool hordes.

They had their usual assortment of flags, including one of Bill Shankly who – I cannot lie – I used to love to hear talk about football was I was a mere sprog.

The game heated up.

A Willian corner from our left was glanced on my Dave, and the ball spun wide. Only on the TV replay were we able to see how close both Olivier Giroud and Antonio Rudiger got to adding a decisive touch.

Liverpool, despite their large numbers, were relatively quiet and it surprised me.

We enjoyed a great little spell. Ross Barkley thumped centrally at goal, but Adrian saved.

A lovely flowing move, instigated by the poise of young Billy Gilmour, cruising through a pack of red shirts before coolly releasing Pedro, resulted in a fierce shot from Willian, but Adrian was again able to save well.

“Gilmour. Excellent there, Al.”

This was turning, early, into some game. It had all of our full and undivided attention. I wondered what John was making of it in the West Upper.

After twelve minutes, I leaned over towards PD.

“Open game, innit?”

There was a reassuring nod of agreement from him and also Alan alongside me.

Barely after me commenting, the game stepped up a gear. Attempting to play the ball out of defence, we put pressure on the wall of red. Barkley forced a slip and the ball fell to Willian. His optimistic shot flew at Adrian, but whereas just thirty seconds before he had saved well, this time the ball bounced off him, and flew into the goal.

GET IN.

Willian danced away and in front of the livid Liverpudlians.

Livid Liverpudlians. Is there any other type?

Stamford Bridge was bouncing. What joy.

Alan : “They’ll have to come at us now, like.”

Chris : “Come on my little diamonds, la.”

Could we make it three out of three in the FA Cup against reigning European Champions?

1978, 1982 and 2020?

We were going to give it our best shot by the looks of it.

The game continued to thrill, and we could – ever so slightly – begin to enjoy it all with that slender lead.

Gilmour, getting into it, tackling hard, kept the ball alive and helped win a free-kick after a foul on Ross Barkley. A fine effort from Marcos Alonso sailed narrowly wide.

On around twenty minutes, pure pinball in the Chelsea box as shot after shot tested Kepa. A double save, a save, another save. All within a few seconds. It was dramatic and glorious stuff, though in the light of day two of the shots were hit straight at him.

What a game.

Mane, the biggest Liverpool threat by some margin, wriggled through our defence like a little eel and forced another excellent save from Kepa who was, dramatically, the centre of attention. Williams made a poor effort to connect with the rebounded shot. We had survived another scare.

A lot of the standard Chelsea and Liverpool songs were getting aired towards the end of the first-period and it absolutely added to the occasion.

“Fuck off Chelsea FC, you ain’t got no history.”

“Steve Gerrard Gerrard, he slipped on his fucking arse.”

There was gutsy defending from our players, and this was turning into a rather old-fashioned game of football with a lovely balance of cut and thrust, raw energy and honest attacks. Pedro was as involved as anyone, and after a few early miss-fires, was causing all sorts of problems. Giroud was a one man battling-ram. But the undoubted star of the first-half was young Billy Gilmour. Billy the kid was everywhere. An absolutely stunning performance.

Mateo Kovacic was injured, to be replaced on forty-two minutes by the fresh legs of Mason Mount.

Liverpool, after a string start, were visibly starting to become less of a threat.

As the first-half came to a close, I had a question for Alan.

“Wasn’t Lalana in the Teletubbies”?

At the break, all was well with the world. Previously worried faces had changed. There was a lovely buzz in the air.

On Saturday 24 April 1920, on this very same site, if not this very same stadium – but certainly one which was in situ for the 1982 game, those lovely packed terraces – my grandfather stood on the great slug of the West terrace with his old school friend Ted Knapton alongside him. It was half-time, and the score between the two teams – Aston Villa, who he favoured, and Huddersfield Town – was 0-0. It had been an exhilarating game of football for my grandfather, though the spectacle of seeing fifty-thousand spectators in one sports ground had proved to be the one abiding memory that he would take away with him.

Fifty thousand people.

And virtually all were men, and so many had fought in the Great War.

Fifty-thousand men.

It struck home.

He had survived the Great War. He lived in a great village and now this great spectacle had stirred him in a way that he had not expected.

“You had better get your act together, Ted Draper. On Monday at lunch time, I think I will ask Blanche if she would like to accompany her to next weekend’s village dance. I can’t be second in that race.”

Almost one hundred years later, the players of Chelsea and Liverpool reappeared on the pitch. Could our lively form continue into the second-half? We bloody hoped so, but there was another enforced change early on. Willian, injured – oh our bloody injury list – was replaced by Jorginho, and there was a shift of Mason Mount out wide.

The game continued with the same noisy support cascading down from the stands. The Matthew Harding seemed particularly up for it, no doubt aided by some interlopers from The Shed who had been displaced by the northern hordes. The game had lost little of its attraction in the first half. On the hour, a fine cross field ball from Dave opened up the Liverpool defence but Mount was scythed down. I honestly thought that the position of the resulting free-kick would be too central, too flat. But to my surprise, Mason dug one out. Sadly, the fine effort bounced on top of Adrian’s bar.

So close.

On the hour, too, a loud and beautiful chant was aired for the very first time.

“One Billy Gilmour. There’s only one Billy Gilmour.”

Just three minutes later, with Chelsea defending, Pedro – bless him – nipped in to win the ball and Giroud jumped so well to move it on. The ball fell at the feet of Ross Barkley, still in his own half. I reached for my camera.

“Here we go.”

I sensed a huge chance.

Barkley ran on, and on, and with Pedro in acres to his right, I half-expected a slide rule pass. But he kept running, despite being chased by two defenders, and with one recovering defender goal side. He kept going. A shimmy, a shot – CLICK.

Adrian was beaten.

A goal.

Oh get in you bastard.

I was full of smiles, but clicked away. I had only recently mentioned to Alan that “I bet Barkley would love to score tonight.”

His slide was euphoric.

Up the fucking Toffees, up the fucking Chelsea.

Chelsea 2 Liverpool 0.

Just beautiful. The goal had come at just the right time. Liverpool had been clawing their way back into it a little.

Another lovely chant was bellowed from the lungs of the Matthew Harding Lower.

“One decent Scouser. There’s only one decent Scouser. One decent Scouser.”

Bliss.

Incredibly, from a Liverpool corner, Rudiger headed strongly out and Pedro – bless him – picked up the pieces, and his little legs went into overdrive. I reached for my camera once more.

“Here we go.”

His legs pumped away, but as he ate up the ground I sensed he was tiring. His shot, after a long run, lacked placement and Adrian easily saved.

In the last segment of the match, with Liverpool fading, Giroud capped a very fine performance indeed by forcing himself to reach a lovely pass from Dave, strongly fighting off challenges, but Adrian was able to touch the effort onto the bar and down.

Liverpool were chasing a lost cause now. Late substitutions Firmino and Salah added nothing.

It was Chelsea who finished the stronger, with shots from Mount and Giroud continuing to test Adrian. Gilmour had a quieter second-half, but one dribble late on made us all so happy.

“One Billy Gilmour.”

Indeed.

Reece James replaced the fantastic Giroud in the final few minutes.

The final whistle signalled the end.

“One Step Beyond.”

It had been a game for the ages.

As we bundled down the steps, and onto the Fulham Road, everything was fine in our world.

Into the last eight we went.

Yet another FA Cup appearance? It’s a possibility.

In 1920, the FA Cup Final stayed at 0-0, and Aston Villa – much to my grandfather’s approval – won 1-0 in extra-time with a goal from Billy Kirton.

However, as my dear grandfather Ted Draper travelled back by train with his pal that evening, back to beautiful and bucolic Somerset, he had another match on his mind.

On the Monday, he met with his new love, and nervously chatted.

He would later marry Blanche in the summer of 1925. My mother Esme would arrive in 1930, and the rest, as they say in Liverpool, is history.

Tales From Three Generations

Posted on January 7, 2020 by Chris Axon

Chelsea vs. Nottingham Forest : 5 January 2020.

On the train back to Lewes on New Year’s Day, after our 1-1 draw at Brighton, Glenn set me a question to consider.

“Who did we play in the first game of the last decade, then?”

It got me thinking.

“2009/10, the double season…mmm, I don’t think it was an away game…”

It took me a few seconds, but the memory of the day – if not the opposition – soon came to me.

“I know. I can remember. We were at home in the FA Cup on Saturday 3 January. It was my mother’s eightieth birthday, and we had stayed at the hotel at Stamford Bridge on the Saturday night. Can’t remember the opposition, though.”

It was Watford and we won 5-0. And it would be my mother’s last visit to Stamford Bridge.

On this day of our game with Nottingham Forest, a day when Chelsea Football Club would be looking back fifty years to our first ever F. A. Cup win in 1970, it seemed right that I would be looking back ten years to a game in the F. A. Cup too. Season 2009/10 was my second full campaign of these match reports and here are a few notes from that lovely day.

“Mum has been to Chelsea many times before and I guess she has been to The Bridge around twenty-five times…mainly in the 1974 to 1979 period, when Dad would drive us up from Somerset twice per season. Mum also went to games at Bristol Rovers, Bristol City and Swindon Town. The last game that Mum saw at Chelsea was the Birmingham match in 2005, our centenary championship. Happy memories.

I peered out of our hotel room down at the old Shed wall, the winter sun lighting up the South London horizon beyond. A few fans were already clutching Megastore bags.

With the cold weather showing no signs of letting up, we sat in the hotel foyer / bar area from 11am to 2.15pm. It was a lovely time. The place gradually filled-up with Chelsea fans. My two mates Glenn and Parky arrived at about 11.30am and we sat in a cosy corner with Ron Harris and Peter Bonetti, chatting about all sorts. Peter was there with his daughter and grand-son. We spoke about our shoddy form of late, but we didn’t let it spoil our time.

We left the hotel, coats buttoned, scarves on. We battled against the crowd. The 6,000 away fans were out in force. The weather was brutal, but Mum wasn’t complaining. There was the usual ten-minute wait to get inside the MHU. We managed to take the lift up to the top tier. Mum is in good health, but six flights of stairs is too much (sometimes for me). Once inside the stadium, it didn’t seem so cold. A full Shed End of away fans, but only three paltry flags. They didn’t make much noise. No balloons.

The big surprise that Anelka wasn’t playing and I wasn’t sure of the formation…was it not a “Christmas Tree” (with Malouda and Joe behind Sturridge)? To be honest, after three early goals, I was far from caring…whatever formation it was, it was definitely working. What attacking options down the left with Ashley and Zhirkov and Malouda. I was very pleased that Sturridge scored his first goal for us, but the other two goals were scrappy. Not to worry – coasting. I think I counted just two Watford shots in the entire first-half.

At half-time, more congratulatory handshakes and kisses for my mother. Anna brought us some coffees and Russ gave some mince pies. It was a lovely feeling for Mum to meet my match day mates.

Loads more Chelsea pressure in the second period and what a strike from Frank – especially for Mum. I was really impressed with the cool finish from Sturridge for his second goal…very nice. We all thought it a shame that Carlo took the lad off when he was “on” for his hat-trick.

The Chelsea support was quiet and were only really roused after each goal.

I was so pleased when I glimpsed Mum singing along to “Chelsea, Chelsea” to the tune of “Amazing Grace.” How sweet the sound. She could teach a few JCLs a lesson or two.

Carlo made a few substitutions but it stayed at five. I shan’t make any further comments about our performance because – after all – it was only Watford. I was impressed with Sturridge and Zhirkov. JT seemed intent on going on more mazy runs in the attacking third. Maybe he’s a frustrated striker. I’m convinced that one day he’ll score a goal of the season contender from forty yards. Towards the end, our former left-back Jon Harley (he of the scuttling runs) came on as a Watford substitute and was given one of the noisiest songs of the game. That was a nice touch. The “referee has added on a further five minutes” announcement was met with frost-bitten groans.

We walked back to the car, stopping off for a good old-fashioned plate of pie and chips and a mug of tea on the North End Road. We eventually thawed out. On the drive back home to Somerset, we listened to the FA Cup draw and I was elated that we face an away jaunt to Preston. At last a new stadium to visit (well, actually a very old stadium, but a first-time visit for me.)”

So, 1970, 2010 and 2020 linked already.

But there is more.

Going back to the notes for the game with Everton last season, played on the one-hundredth anniversary of the cessation of hostilities in the First World War, I introduced the story of my mother’s father, my grandfather, and his link to Stamford Bridge.

“My grandfather was a good sportsman. He played football for Mells and Vobster United and cricket for Mells. I remembered the black and white photographs of both sides, taken in around 1925, on display in a bedroom when I was a child. He was, apparently, the star of the cricket team, and after studying the scorebooks from that era – priceless items – I can vouch for this. However, a family friend would not be afraid to tell me that he had a mean temper on a cricket pitch. Quiet off the pitch, a bit of a demon on it. A familiar story for many I suppose.

For all of his adventures on both football and cricket pitches, though, there is one sporting story involving my grandfather that I have been enchanted about for decades. Once I chose Chelsea as my team in 1970, I can remember my grandfather telling me that he once visited Stamford Bridge with his great friend – and fellow Mells sportsman – Ted Knapton. It was, I am pretty convinced, the only football stadium that he ever visited.

My grandfather, however many times I pressed him, could not remember the teams involved though. But I know that he said he favoured Aston Villa – possibly a first love – as a child, and then latterly Newcastle United – through a friend. And I have often wondered if the two Teds, because of their association with Mells football, were gifted tickets for the 1920 FA Cup Final at Stamford Bridge between Villa and Huddersfield Town.

I am no detective, but that might be the answer.

Heaven knows, I have visualised his visit to Stamford Bridge in the ‘twenties so many times.

In later years, whenever I stood on The Shed, as part of that unhindered mass of terrace that originally swept all around the stadium, including the small paddock in front of the old East Stand, I had a wonderful feeling of being a physical part of the history of the club. Of a link with the past. I miss that terrace. It was immense, in more ways than one.

I wonder if my grandad stood here.”

I like the fact that, in addition to the club’s official celebration of the 1970 victory in 2020, I am going to be having my own private centenary celebration of 1920 too. This was the first of three consecutive years that our beloved Stamford Bridge was chosen to host the final tie of the Football Association Challenge Cup.

So, 1920, 1970, 2010 and 2020 all linked-up now.

I love the fact that I am the third generation of my family to have seen football at Stamford Bridge.

That feels just perfect.

As last season progressed, we were gifted three home ties in the F. A. Cup and so I was able to add to my flight of fancy concerning my grandfather. I include these below, taken out of the Nottingham Forest, Sheffield Wednesday and Manchester United match reports.

“My grandfather, being careful not to walk into the onrushing crowds as he picked his way along the pavement from the Walham Green tube station to the main entrance of Stamford Bridge, was approached on several occasions by Cockney ticket touts, offering the chance to watch from the main stand. His ticket, and that of his friend Ted, had been given their general admission tickets by the Somerset Football Association in lieu of their role in the running of their local team Mells and Vobster United, for whom they had both played for a few seasons. My grandfather’s brother Christopher also played both sports for the village. My grandfather wondered how the touts had managed to get their hands on these tickets. It was a surprise to him. This was his first football match, and he was simply unaware that such tickets would be available.

“No thank you. We have tickets.”

“OK governor. You want to sell them to me?”

This confused and surely bemused my grandfather. He thought to himself, simplistically, “how would we get in without tickets?” and he paused for a while with a look on his face which probably was more serious than it really should have been.

“No. No thanks. No – they are ours.”

His long-time pal chipped in :

“We’ve come from Somerset for this match. Why would we give them to you?” “

“On the Fulham Road, as I stopped for a bite to eat at the al fresco café, I looked up at a tablet of stone containg words that commemorated a visit by the Duchess of Wessex to the Oswald Stoll buildings – for ex-servicemen – in 2009. It mentioned a respect for the “fortitude and resilience” of those soldiers of both World Wars. I looked up and saw the sepia figures – “ghosts” – of Ted Draper and Ted Knapton marching purposefully towards Stamford Bridge for the 1920 FA Cup Final.”

“Almost one hundred years ago, on Cup Final day 1920, my father Ted Draper and his long-time friend Ted Knapton made the slow ascent up the damp terraced steps – being jostled by other fans, some drunk already – at the rear of the great slug of terracing on the West side of Stamford Bridge. The air was expectant ahead of the Aston Villa vs. Huddersfield Town tie. It would be the only professional football match that my grandfather would ever attend. He had remembered, as a ten-year-old boy living in Somerset, how he had been astounded when told by others that a mighty crowd of 67,000 had attended a game at Stamford Bridge in Chelsea’s first-ever season in 1905/06. It confused him. How did a new club such as Chelsea suddenly have 67,000 supporters? And for a Second Division game too. It was an unheard of figure at the time and was the talk of the schoolyard for many a day. It had captured the imagination, wildly, of my dear grandfather. The visitors on that day in April 1906 were Manchester United and it was a promotion-decider of sorts. My grandfather was convinced that the vast number of spectators had been Chelsea fans, since Manchester was such a long way north, but how was it possible for so many to be lured to the new stadium? Chelsea had mainly played to crowds in the mid-teens throughout that inaugural campaign after that first-ever game at Stockport County. It was one of the biggest league crowds that England had ever seen, although FA Cup Final attendances at Crystal Palace sometimes reached six-figures. Apart from being a fan of the sport, my grandfather soon realised how magnificent it would be to part of such a spectacle and for many years he had daydreamed about being in a similar sized crowd.

In April 1920, he had his wish.”

We sometimes moan, as Chelsea fans, that we always seem to end up playing the same old teams in European competitions, and this often seems to occur in domestic cups too. This annoyance came to light when, for the second successive year, we were drawn at home to Nottingham Forest in the third round of the F. A. Cup. And, taking the biscuit this, the game would be played exactly one year later.

2018/19 : FA Cup Round Three – Chelsea vs. Nottingham Forest, 5 January 2019

2019/20 : FA Cup Round Three – Chelsea vs. Nottingham Forest, 5 January 2020.

Talk about Groundhog Day.

Additionally, we played the Tricky Trees at home in the League Cup in 2017/18 too.

We were in the boozer at just after 11am. Inside “The Famous Three Kings” at West Kensington, all was quiet. The pub – a first visit for us this season – has had a recent re-fit, and it’s to our approval. There was a familiar clink of glasses as Parky, PD and I sat on the high bench seats and waited for others to arrive.

“Cheers.”

Dave from Wellingborough – one of the lads that I used to sit with on The Benches in 1984 and 1985 – soon arrived and it was a pleasure to see him again. Ironically, we bumped into each other for the first time in years at the F.A. Cup away game at Norwich almost two years’ ago. There was positive talk of our form so far this season, and there was talk of the special commemorative kit that Chelsea are using on this – hopefully long – F. A. Cup run this season. It is an almost exact replica of the blue, blue, yellow of the 1970 replay, and we all agreed that it looks the Mutt’s Nuts.

For those who don’t know (and I know many do, so please bear with me), the reason for the yellow trim is because both Chelsea and Leeds United played in white socks. In the first game at Wembley, Leeds were forced to wear the odd choice of Lancastrian red socks as we kept to the white. In the replay it was our turn to change; in came the yellow. To be honest, it could have been easy for us just to don some yellow socks, so fair play to the club for opting for matching yellow trim on the shirt and socks too. The kit re-surfaced for the 1972 League Cup Final too – minus the two blue rings on the socks – but has not been seen since.

Writing in these reports in the Spring of last season, I commented :

“Chit chat about kits came to the fore in recent days. There was a leaked image – as yet unconfirmed – of a truly horrific kit for Chelsea next season. I am sure everyone has seen it. It’s garbage. But it got a few of us thinking. Going into the fiftieth anniversary of the iconic 1970 FA Cup win at Old Trafford, it would be nice to honour that occasion with a one-season only kit of royal blue with yellow trim, including yellow socks.”

Looking back, I liked the fact that our kit in 1996/97 came with a little yellow trim for the first time ever. And we know how that season ended-up; our first silverware for twenty-six years, our first FA Cup since 1970.

We found ourselves talking about European trips. Dave mentioned an away game in Copenhagen in 1998. After the game, at the airport, he was feeling a little worse for wear, and was choosing some items for breakfast at the airport departure lounge. The cashier tallied up his purchases and he found himself a few “krone” short and so shouted over to a mate to see if he had any spare.

Dave heard a voice behind him.

“How much do you want mate? I’ll sort you out.”

Dave looked around and it was none other than Peter Osgood.

Just beautiful.

It seemed that 1970 was going to dominate the day. As if anyone needs reminding, my love of Chelsea Football Club began in April or May 1970, and I am wondering how many more bloody anniversaries will make an appearance in this edition.

Here’s one more.

In May 2000, we beat Aston Villa 1-0 to win the last-ever F. A. Cup Final at the old Wembley Stadium, and we will soon celebrate the anniversary of that triumph. Oh, and guess what? We played Forest at home in the Cup that season too.

Andy and Kim – the Kent lot – arrived unannounced, and the laughter was upped a few notches. They are off to Newcastle in a fortnight, like us, but were looking for tickets. I was glad to be able to assist with the search.

We caught the 28 bus down the North End Road and joined up with Alan and Gary in a very quiet “Simmons”.

Glenn, back in Frome, texted me :

“Chelsea – 9 changes, Forest – 10 changes.”

I replied :

“Chuckle Brothers – 1 change.”

There was just time for a last bottle of “Peroni” and we were off to the game. It was a mild day. We walked ahead of a few Forest fans, who were mulling over the inevitability of the changes announced by the Forest manager. Sadly, it is all about the Premier League these days, and promotion to it. But they seemed to have a “whatever will be will be” attitude. We hoped that our “B Team” would be better than Forest’s.

I bought three copies of the commemorative programme for friends, and caught the lift – like in 2010 – with PD, who struggles with stairs these days.

With not long to go to kick-off we were in. Alan and Gary were down in The Shed Upper for a change and I soon spotted them in row six. So, just PD and little old me in The Sleepy Hollow. There was a mix of usual season ticket holders and new faces which was good to see. I noted a smattering of children nearby which is a very rare sight in The Sleepy Hollow.

It usually resembles a SAGA day trip.

1920 returned to my thoughts.

He was inside Stamford Bridge now, and the enormity of it all hit home. The closeness of everything. The colours of the rosettes. The clamour for attention of the programme sellers, official and otherwise. The sellers of iced lemonade, of ginger beer, of cigarette salesmen. The shouts of the crowd. The Birmingham accents. The Yorkshire dialect. The smoke. The Londoners and the spivs, the touts, the brashness of the city. The musty aroma of overcoats. Caps, bonnets and hats. The swell of the crowd. The bands marching before the game. The huge advertisements adorning every spare inch of space, on hoardings at the back of the huge curve of the terrace, and on the backs of the houses on the Fulham Road. The appearance of the teams. The surge of those on the terrace as a chance goes close. The unstable nature of the terrace beneath the feet, of wooden risers and of mud and cinders. The clouds of dust. Pockets of cigarette smoke drifting over the spectators. The trees in Brompton Cemetery. The smoke rising from chimneys. The wounded Chelsea pensioners – that vivid splash of red – watching from the side of the pitch in antiquated wheelchairs, some without limbs, some without sight. My grandfather, wistful, lost for a moment, a flashback to Amiens or Ypres or Valenciennes.

“There but for the grace of God, go I.”

Forest had 3,000, the same as last season.

The teams entered the pitch – yellow flames, how in keeping – with Chelsea wearing blue trackie tops over the shirts. But the yellow trim looked magnificent. Off came the tops, and we all fell in love with the iconic 1970 Chelsea kit all over again.

It was, quite simply, stunning.

It was a vision in blue and yellow.

Everything was beautiful. The old style crest, the very subtle sponsorship branding in blue, the yellow stripe on the shorts, the shade of yellow, the two blue stripes on the socks, even the font of the numbers. Oh, and the lack of players’ names? Superb.

Not sure of the little yellow tab at the rear of the colour, though.

The team lined-up as below.

Caballero

James – Tomori – Christensen – Emerson

Jorginho – Barkley – Kovacic

Pedro – Batshuayi – Hudson-Odoi

Chelsea in blue and yellow, Forest in red and white.

They were soon singing “Champions of Europe, we won it two times.”

At 2.01pm, the game kicked-off.

For a change, we were attacking the North Stand in the first period. How ‘seventies.

“Come on Chelsea.”

In the first few minutes, Callum and Reece were dribbling down the right wing and I was dribbling all over my top as I looked on with awe at the amazing kit on show. I wasn’t paying attention, but PD was purring as Reece sent over a tantalising cross.

Before we knew it, Callum was played in by Pedro after a lovely interchange of play and found himself in the inside right channel, though with noticeably more space than in recent league games. He cut inside, picked his spot and rifled low past the Forest ‘keeper. After only six minutes, we were on our way to Wembley.

GET IN.

Very soon, a text from The Shed appeared on my dog and bone.

“THTCAUN.”

I replied.

“COMLD.”

We were all over Forest, and two more excellent crosses from the increasingly trustworthy boot of James caused panic in the Forest six-yard box. Alas, despite the lead, the atmosphere was unsurprisingly wank, and – like last season – the away fans were asking us if Stamford Bridge was a building in which books could be temporarily loaned out and then returned free-of-charge.

We had no reply really.

At least nobody retorted with “you’re just a shit Derby County.”

Ah, Derby. Because of last season, there was a largely indecipherable ditty about Our Frank and his former charges throughout the first half, but it is not worth any more comment.

Michael Dawson was booed by some in the home support, all very tedious.

Against the run of play, Forest were awarded a penalty when Fikayo Tomori was adjudged to have fouled a Forest striker. The tedious VAR was called into action and, lo and behold, no penalty but an offside instead.

“FUCK VAR” shouted Forest and I wholeheartedly agreed.

A shot from Tomori, a shot from Pedro, a shot from Barkley, a shot from Michy Batshuayi. Our chances were piling up. Behind, Jorginho the prompter was having a fine game. On around the half-hour mark, a lovely move set up a shot for Our Callum which was only half-saved by the ‘keeper and Ross Barkley was on hand to tap in with almost an involuntary action. Ross had already wasted a few early moments of possession, irritating some, so perhaps if he had time to think about his finish he might not have fared quite so well. We immediately stood up and applauded and, as I snapped away, there was no thought of a VAR involvement. It looked a perfectly sound goal to us in The Sleepy Hollow. Ross celebrated with his team mates below.

VAR?

No offside, well on. Goal.

“Surely it’s safe now, PD. Mind you, we were 2-0 up against Bradford City in 2015.”

Another cross from Reece, but a glancing header from Michy was sent just wide of the post. We had totally dominated the first-half, and it had been a breeze.

At the break, as I had predicted, we were treated to the appearance of five of the 1970 twelve.

Ron Harris.

Marvin Hinton.

Tommy Baldwin.

John Dempsey.

John Hollins.

Of course, sadly Peter Osgood, Peter Houseman and Ian Hutchinson are no longer with us, and Peter Bonetti is very poorly. PD made the point that it was a shame that there was no 1970 goalkeeping kit on show. Bearing in mind that The Cat is struggling with his health it would be a lovely gesture if this can be remedied. A “Bonetti kit” – green cotton gloves, too – with proceeds going to his medical requirements. It would sell I am sure. Over to you, Chelsea.

Of the remaining players, Eddie McCreadie and Charlie Cooke are in the US, and David Webb – the maverick – never seems to be invited to these sort of occasions, a real shame.

The second-half began. There was not quite the same drive and intensity as the first-half and I got the distinct impression that Forest were looking at this as some sort of training exercise. We created a few chances, though, with a header from Barkley after a fine dribble and cross from Hudson-Odoi grazing the post below Alan and Gary in The Shed.

From a Forest free-kick down below us, Ryan Yates rose in the six yard box to head home but, as he taunted us as he celebrated, the flag was raised for offside, which VAR upheld.

The crowd went mild.

Still the atmosphere was poor. Only a rousing “Stand Up If You Hate Tottenham” chant on the hour united the whole stadium. But that’s another chant that is over-worked these days.

Oh how the Forest fans loved it when Mason Mount – Derby County last season – replaced Kovacic on seventy minutes. He was roundly booed every time he received the ball. There was also an appearance for Tariq Lampty replacing Pedro, who might have been playing his last game for us if his clapping of all four stands was anything to go by. Lampteys number “48” took up the entire back of his shirt.

The game dwindled a little, but it was still Chelsea who dominated throughout. Late efforts from Batshuayi, Emerson and Hudson-Odoi did not increase the score. But this was as easy a win as I can remember.

Groundhog Day again, even the scores were the same.

2018/19 : FA Cup Round Three – 5 January 2019.

Chelsea 2 Nottingham Forest 0.

2019/20 : FA Cup Round Three – 5 January 2020.

Chelsea 2 Nottingham Forest 0.

Frank Lampard soon raced on to the pitch to thank us, but by then my mind was elsewhere, and I was pondering what sandwich to buy on the walk back to the car, and which away venues were up for grabs in the next round.

And I wondered what next as this homage to 1970 continues on in to the next stage; sideburns for the players, perhaps?

On the drive home, or at home, I found out that this was our twenty-second successive advancement into the Fourth Round. Now that is some achievement (the less said about what happened in 1998, when we were F. A. Cup holders, the better.)

Wembley – here we come?

It would be nice. We certainly like our fiftieth anniversaries and our centenaries at Chelsea.

Next up, we have a run of the mill league encounter at home to Burnley next Saturday. Before that game, I might even pop into the Megastore to purchase a pair of blue and yellow shorts for an Argentinian summer.

I have some missionary work to do in Buenos Aires.

Tales From A Shocker

Posted on February 1, 2019 by Chris Axon

Bournemouth vs. Chelsea : 30 January 2019.

Another tough match report. Are you sitting uncomfortably? Let’s go.

At half-time, I went on a little wander to meet up with Parky and PD who had travelled down independently and were in fact staying the night in a Bournemouth town centre hotel. I soon found them, full of giggles and laughs, and we gave each other a hug. They had enjoyed a good old pre-match at the usual pub we frequent on visits to the town, and were not particularly bothered by our performance thus far. They had been sitting next to Alan and Gary towards the corner flag. My position had been towards the half-way-line of the stand along the side of the Vitality Stadium, in the back row all but one, and I had driven down with Young Jake. I bumped into a few other Chelsea mates during the break. I assured one set of friends that things would improve in the second period.

“We get one, we’ll get a few” and my comment was met with nods of agreement.

Well. That shows how much I know about football, or rather this current Chelsea football team.

Fackinell.

So, The Chuckle Brothers had taken two Chuckle Busses to Dorset. PD had collected Parky at around 10.30am and at around 12.30pm they were ensconced at “The Moon On The Square”, no doubt enjoying the freedom of a midweek drink-up, and they had unsurprisingly bumped into a few of the travelling Chelsea army during their six or so hours of guzzling. I left work at just after 4 o’clock, and collected Young Jake in Warminster half-an-hour later. He had taken a half-day holiday from his warehouse job in Salisbury. His last game was the Manchester City game when he took my ticket at the last minute. He was nice and excited to be ticking off another new away stadium. This was an ideal midweek away game for me. I didn’t have to leave work early. Just a sixty-mile drive. Perfect. Despite a pre-advised bottleneck on the main road into Bournemouth, I guessed that I’d be parked up outside the stadium in a private driveway at around 7pm. We stopped at Shaftesbury – a town which is home of the cobbled hill which was famously featured in the famous “Hovis” commercial of the mid ‘seventies – and grabbed a burger and some fish and chips, sustenance for the evening’s predicted cold weather. Just south of our pit-stop, the usual route was closed, so I was sent on a diversion south-east across the hills and fields of Cranborne Chase. It was a route that I have never taken before, but it was a fine drive, alongside lanes with high hedges, and little traffic. There were signposts for Melbury Abbas, Tarrant Gunville, Tarrant Hinton, Tarrant Launceston, Tarrant Monkton, Tollard Royal, Gussage St. Michael and Three Legged Cross. I have said it before; Dorset has the best names. We drove past several magnificent country pubs. On another day, with more time, we would have been tempted to stop I am sure.

We hit the expected traffic snarl-up on the main Salisbury to Bournemouth A338. But as expected, at just after seven o’clock, I edged into my pre-paid parking space on Littledown Avenue, just a five-minute walk from the stadium. Another Chelsea car was parked alongside me. This would be my sixth visit to the stadium that used to be called Dean Court. We have garnered three wins in the last three seasons. I have enjoyed them all. The floodlights at the Vitality Stadium are on four poles, how old-fashioned. It was a photo opportunity that I could not avoid. The weather was cold, but not drastically so.

To be honest, the Cherries of Bournemouth have been in my thoughts more this past year or so than in other times. We played them in the League Cup at the same stage in 2017 and 2018. They walloped us three-nil in January 2018 – three second-half goals, mmm – and I have been impressed with Eddie Howe’s team this season. Out in Australia, I was reunited with Uncle Brian, Bournemouth-born and a Bournemouth supporter and match-goer in his youth, who I had last seen on an evening in 1994 when I watched a Chelsea League Cup game at Dean Court with him and his brother Peter. His son, Paul, was born in Bournemouth but became a Chelsea supporter when he heard about my fanaticism for the club on a visit to England in 2008. Paul’s children and grandchildren support a mixture of Arsenal, Chelsea and Bournemouth. I know Paul has an understandable soft-spot for his home town team.

So, I have family ties on my mother’s side to Bournemouth.

But I have much stronger links on my father’s side. My father was born in Wareham on the Isle Of Purbeck. Dad did not grow up as a football fan and his childhood footballing memories are rare. I always remember him saying that Wareham’s kit consisted of a shirt consisting of brown and yellow halves, maybe like one of those mint humbugs, or perhaps a two-tone toffee, that might well be purchased in one of those old-fashioned sweet shops that are rare these days. His mother was a native of Parkstone, nearer Poole than Bournemouth, and it saddens me that I only have one very scant memory of her since she passed away when I was only two years old. But my father told me that his mother was a very passionate football supporter, and a very outspoken Labour supporter to boot, and I often wondered if my footballing passions came from her, maybe more so than my football-playing grandfather on my mother’s side, who liked football, but to no real degree.

Outside the away end, I met up with my friend Paul from nearby Poole – for whom I had a ticket – who I last saw in the summer of 2012 when he very kindly put my name on the guest list of a Buzzcocks gig in the musical venue that he helped run. On the night of the gig, we met up in a pub for a pint before heading off to the venue. It was a fantastic gig, the first time that I had seen the band, and it was an excellent night. I saw the same band with Parky last summer in Bath, another enjoyable night. With the recent sad passing of Pete Shelley, there will be no more.

A few years ago, my Canadian cousin Kathleen – whose grandfather Bill and my grandmother Gladys were brothers and sisters (they had the magnificent surname Lovelace) – shared the marriage certificate of my grandmother and grandfather. Well, lo and behold, not only was my grandmother Gladys living on Britannia Road in Parkstone at the time, her house was no more than a two-minute walk from the pub that we had visited, and my grandparents were married at St. Peter’s Church, which sits no more than fifty yards from the venue where we saw the gig. Who knows, my grandparents might have even had their reception in the pub itself.

In addition, my father’s cousin Julie – she went from an Axon to a Loveless through marriage, there is a lot of love in my family it seems – lived in Bournemouth and left my mother and myself a nice little sum in her will when she sadly passed away in 2004. It funded my first trip to the US with Chelsea, thus opening up a whole new chapter in my life, and I owe dear Julie so much.

So, yeah – Bournemouth, and Dorset. I have ties with the area.

There was a quick line at the turnstiles and after a bag check – “don’t tie that security band too hard, my leg will fall off” – I soon bumped into Alan and Gary. Alan was talking to Welsh Kev about the horrible thought of Liverpool winning their first title since 1990.

Alan had contingency plans : “I’m booking a flight to the furthest place away from England if they win. Tristan de Cunha looks the best bet.”

“Love it Al, never thought that I would hear the words Tristan de Cunha at a Chelsea away game.”

Tristan de Cunha I thought, sounded like a striker that Newcastle United might buy.

Paul had mentioned that Chelsea had gone through a morning training session at Poole Town Football Club. The team play in the same division as my local lot Frome Town and, having left their old stadium, now play on a make-shift pitch adjacent to a junior school that Paul’s granddaughter attends. The players – maybe not all of them – popped into the school apparently. A nice gesture, though I had to wonder why Maurizio Sarri was so keen to continue this practice. Surely there is no need for a training session on game days?

I was happy with my position high in the stand. My camera was poised.

Right, the team.

Arizabalaga.
Azpilicueta.
Emerson.
Jorginho.
Rudiger.
Luiz.
Pedro.
Kante.
Higuain.
Hazard.
Kovacic.

For Bournemouth, Artur Boruc and no Asmir Begovic, but no Callum Wilson either. Nathan Ake was in their defence. Dominic Solanke was on their bench.

The ground took a while to fill. Is there a more unassuming football club in the top division than Bournemouth? They have a small and homely ground, are managed by a genuinely decent and softly-spoken manager, and seem to be ridiculously happy just to be there. Even their stadium is painted pretty pink, the corporate colour of the sponsor.

No threat?

…mmm.

“Sweet Caroline” was played on the PA before the game – it was played right after our defeat at The Emirates a few weeks back – and has somehow made its way from Fenway Park in Boston to these shores.

I despise it.

How is it remotely a song that is seen to be suited for football stadia?

Sigh.

The teams entered the pitch, Chelsea in dull grey and day-glo orange. While the Chelsea supporters to my left tussled with the bright yellow “CHELSEA HERE CHELSEA THERE” banner the home fans – those in the stadium – chimed in.

“You don’t know what you’re doing.”

As the flag disappeared down the seats, I noted that the red staff of the lion was on the wrong side. It had been hoisted completely upside down. A metaphor for the evening? We would find out later.

The game began with many empty seats in both home and away areas. I struggled to understand how we, as a club, can’t fill out every one of our 1,200 seats at a stadium just one hundred miles from Stamford Bridge. It surprised me to be honest, midweek game or not. In the concourse, at least, I had spoken to a few fans from my home area that had previously been unable to attend any of the three other games at the Vitality Stadium due to the dearth of tickets.

In the first few minutes, David Luiz was painfully struck in the face from a shot and he stayed down for a while. But Chelsea began the strongest, if measured in terms of possession. Within five minutes, most of the previously unoccupied seats in the home areas were filled.

The away support boomed : “Here For The Chelsea.”

An early chance, the first of the game, presented itself to a lunging Mateo Kovacic who just about reached a cross from Pedro. The header flew towards goal, but Boruc finger-tipped it on to the bar. It was, sadly, a stunning save.

We then dominated for long periods, with the trademark passing that we have got to love – cough, cough – this season. Amidst the constant passing, if not constant movement of our players, N’Golo Kante was excellent, tackling and breaking up play. I absolutely adore his economy of movement; how he can intercept a ball and touch the ball once but with absolutely the correct amount of firmness and direction that his next touch is in space, moving forward, effortless. He is a magnificent footballer. I promised myself that I would pay extra attention to Gonzalo Higuain, and I watched his off-the-ball movement and active participation throughout the first-half. I liked what I saw. He made a few blind runs, but a couple were offside, though the fault was with the passer rather than him, as there was often a delay after the optimal time to release the ball. He looked like he has goals in him. It is just difficult to gel immediately with a new set of players. There was no space in the areas that Higuain was attempting to exploit, but at least he was trying his level best to find pockets of space in preparation for a ball. Jorginho was breaking up play more than usual, and there were bursting runs from Emerson on the left. David Luiz attempted one or two long bombs from defence, and at least this meant there was a variation in our play. Too often this season we have only been interested in half-hearted attempts to pass the ball in the way that the manager craves.

Not too long into the game, someone must have heard that Tottenham were losing.

Out came a song, lamenting the joyful failure of them to win the top division.

“Spurs. Spurs Are Falling Apart Again.”

There was a shot from Pedro, a shot from Hazard, a shot from Dave. But all were easily cushioned by Boruc.

“Keep knocking on the door, Chelsea” I thought to myself.

The noise from the away support wasn’t great. Maybe our song sheets were upside too.

“Not a bad game, though, Jakey-Boy.”

I was sure a goal would come. I am, undoubtedly – unlike in life itself – an optimistic bugger when I go to games.

There was the slightest of chances for the impressive David Brooks after a move on their left but it amounted to nothing. We still kept trying to break through the two banks of eighteen. It was like trying to navigate a maze. Amidst our dominance, there were two lung-busting bursts right through the centre of the pitch, the first from the nimble Brooks and the second from Joshua King. The resulting shots did not threaten Kepa. Only towards the end of the first-half did the mood among our section of the away support get frustrated, with the usual moans about over-passing and the grey dullness of it all.

So, half-time and my wayward prediction for the second-half.

Oh boy.

What happened during the second forty-five minutes?

God only knows.

I was busy taking the third of only three wide-angle photographs during the game when I heard a roar from the home areas. Barely two minutes had elapsed. I had missed the goal, in reality, though the final shot is captured on my camera, but is not worthy enough to share.

Bloody hell.

Bournemouth 1 Chelsea 0.

The goal scorer? Josh King, apparently.

Someone once opined that “anger is an energy” but although there was much anger in the stand, there did not seem to be too much anger on the pitch, nor certainly any real energy from our players in attempting to battle through our set-back and stretch the defence, and run and run and run some more.

The mood in the away section worsened now.

The home fans were absolutely buoyant and it was not surprising.

Pedro set up a lovely run from Kante but the ball just evaded him. Where is Frank Lampard when you need him?

We didn’t really huff and puff, we just pushed the ball from hither and thither.

Of course we had much possession, but it led us up blind alleys. On one or two occasions, I saw Hazard break from a wide to central position, pointing behind him for the ball to be released to the overlapping Emerson. Emerson advanced but no ball was forthcoming. Instead, it seemed to me we wanted to spread the ball out to our right flank where Dave and Pedro, and then Willian as his replacement, whipped in an unending supply of poor crosses, the majority of which were low. Ironically, there had been a superb low cross from Dave in the first-half during our period of domination, but it missed everyone. But in the second-half his final ball was woeful. It was a motif for the whole second period. I felt sorry for Emerson, who at least showed willing. Our Eden was poor. If ever there was a game that he needed to gather by the scruff of the neck then this was it. But the whole team looked insecure and unsure of each other. After a reasonable start to the game, Jorginho greatly disappointed. Kovacic too.

Just after an hour of increasingly frustrating football, David Luiz attempted a clever pass but miss-controlled and the ball eventually fell to the breaking Brooks, who swiped the ball past Arizzabalaga after side-stepping a challenge from the recovering Luiz. He raced over to the corner and my stomach ached.

Bournemouth 2 Chelsea 0.

The home support now seized their chance for revenge : “Here For The Bournemouth.”

Quite.

The buggers.

This then roused the away support but I did not like the tone.

“You’ve won fuck all.”

Goodness sake, Bournemouth are a small club, with a small fan base, a minute stadium, with moderate means, and probably limited aspirations. They are quite benign, and no rival to us. They are, I am sure they will be the first to admit, over-achieving at this level. They are not an Arsenal, nor a Tottenham, nor even a Middlesbrough or a Leeds United. Mugging off their fans was a poor show. We are followed by some proper morons.

There was also the “we’ve won it all” dirge, which is plainly not true. Yokohama in 2012 is proof.

Sigh.

Right after the second goal, Higuain was replaced by Olivier Giroud. I could not believe it. I wasn’t expecting the manager to play two up front – “as if” – but I was surprised he had replaced his man. Anyway, like for like, blah, blah, the same shape, the same bloody shape as always.

“You don’t know what you’re doing” rained down at Sarri.

A lad behind me : “it’ll be 3-0 before 2-1.”

A chap commented : “it’ll never be 2-1.”

I turned around and nodded in agreement.

Did we create a single chance of note in that second-half? I think not. An advertisement for a medical product was flashed up on the TV screen.

“Kill The Pain.”

If bloody only, I thought.

Eight minutes later, another crisp and effective Bournemouth move was finished off with a clean finish from King, after being fed by Stanislas. Our defence was being cut to ribbons. Among all this obsession with passing in the attacking third and the – buzzwords coming up, brace yourself – “high press”, has the manager completely forgotten that defences win league championships?

Bournemouth 3 Chelsea 0.

The crowd turned venomous now.

I tried to condense my thoughts.

OK, Sarri was brought in to implement a new style of play, his methodology, his terms, and a part of me gets that. He needs time, his supporters say. But I have to say that he was under little pressure to win anything at Napoli. They hardly share Bournemouth’s aspirations, but there would have been more pressure at Juventus and the two Milan teams, serial winners one and all. Napoli have only won the league twice. Why not modify his ideas to make use of the players at his disposal right now – at this “half-way house” stage – to get results and then push on using his own players in the summer? I have to say, should things continue as they are, I doubt if he will have the luxury of a second season. If I totally backed his ideas – I have tried my best to comprehend his way of playing and I am far from convinced – I too could buy into his plan. But I still can’t warm to him, and I know how much results matter.

The players it seems are not on the same page. The reasons for this? I don’t know. Maybe they think they can see through him, just like a few key players who would go on to triumph in Munich saw through Andre Villas-Boas in 2011/12. At the moment, some supporters are against Sarri, while some are annoyed with some players, and some are angry with everyone. Some philosophical questions can be aired. Player power is OK if John Terry, Frank Lampard and Ashley Cole do it but not if Eden Hazard, Willian and Pedro do it? I don’t know. Who does Sarri report to on a day-to-day basis? I don’t know. These are muddied waters.

Kovacic was replaced by Ruben Loftus-Cheek, and I felt so sorry for him. Another ad on the TV screen, this time for greyhound racing at Poole.

“We’ve gone to the dogs tonight, already.”

Ruben looked up for the battle, but compared to the others on the pitch this was not an accomplishment worthy of much note. He dragged a shot wide of the far post. I looked over at the TV screen again and eighty minutes had been played.

“Come on ref, blow up, put us out of our fucking misery.”

Many had left at 0-3. A block of around forty seats to my left were empty. I could never leave early, I’m just a fool. There were four or five minutes of extra time, I wasn’t cold, I just wanted to go home. In the last very moment of the game, a cross from a free-kick out on our right was headed on – with not a challenge from any of our players – by substitute Charlie Daniels. We watched in agony as the ball looped up and over everyone and into the net.

Bournemouth 4 Chelsea 0.

Our hearts sank.

What a humiliation.

The whistle blew and I stood stunned.

Four nil.

I wondered if any players would step towards us. To be fair to us, we clapped them over. David Luiz, our only leader, walked slowly towards some Chelsea supporters down the front. He said nothing. His face said it all. He had eye-contact with a few, and tapped his chest – John Terry used to do this – and his body language just said “I’m so sorry.” It took guts to do that. I clapped him. Some players “get it” – or at least I hope they bloody do. Dave walked over but stopped a good ten yards away. Nobody else bothered.

My mind raced through time.

I quickly remembered my first-ever visit to Dean Court in the first few weeks of the 1988/89 season when we lost 1-0 to a team that was managed by Harry Redknapp. It was our first ever match with them, and they had just recently been promoted from the old Third Division after rising from the Fourth Division in the early ‘eighties. I certainly expected a Chelsea win. We were humbled 1-0 and, having not gone to the 6-0 shellacking at Rotherham United in 1981, it was – until then – my own personal “Millmoor” moment. I stood on the packed away terrace and, through a ridiculous viewing position – I can remember how packed it was to this day – looked on as we lost. The train trip home was a lonely affair that evening, and I drowned my sorrows with a few pints in a few Frome pubs. A personal nadir for sure.

But this?

This was ridiculous.

Bournemouth 4 Chelsea 0.

Only recently in one of these match reports, I had written this :

“I had reminded myself, from memory, that our last heavy defeat to any team in league football was a 1-5 reverse at Anfield in the autumn of 1996. As a comparison, we have put six goals past Tottenham in 1997, six against Manchester City in 2007, six past Arsenal in 2014, six past Everton in 2014, not to mention sevens against a few smaller clubs and even eight on two occasions. We have enjoyed the upper hand, in general, over many since that game at Anfield twenty-three years ago.”

As I exited the seats, we were one of the last to leave, I mentioned the Liverpool game – I did not go to that one – to two or three friends.

Sigh.

A four-goal defeat in the league was a long time coming, but it eventually came not against Manchester City, nor Liverpool, nor Manchester United nor Arsenal, nor Tottenham Hotspur, but bloody Bournemouth.

Altogether now : FACKINELL.

Outside, Jake – who had spent the last few minutes of the game rolling a cigarette – was puffing on it like his life depended on it.

“Bet Sarri, like you, is puffing on a fag right now mate.”

We reached our car, shell-shocked. We drove home, shell-shocked.

It had been a shocking night.

Tales From Wednesday On Sunday

Posted on January 29, 2019 by Chris Axon

Chelsea vs. Sheffield Wednesday : 27 January 2019.

Sunday Six O’Clock.

Our match in the fourth round of the FA Cup against Sheffield Wednesday was to begin at 6pm. This was just a ridiculous time for a game of professional football. As I have mentioned before, there was a part of me that just wanted to swerve it. But this was the Cup. It wasn’t just any game. Regardless, it had felt bizarre to be collecting PD and then Parky for a game on a Sunday and saying to both of them “good afternoon “as they slipped into my car. It felt bizarre to be heading to London on the M4 midway through the afternoon. And it felt bizarre to be entering the pub – “The Famous Three Kings” – at 3pm.

And it certainly grated to be watching a London derby between Crystal Palace and Tottenham on TV which had kicked-off at 4pm. Why the bloody hell that one could not have started later – virtually all the spectators would be back home by 10pm – and we could have had the earlier spot is beyond me. But it is further damning evidence that the Football Association only ever plays lip service to the needs of the match-going fan. Of course, I felt for the away supporters – six thousand strong – more than anyone who would not be back in South Yorkshire by midnight at the very earliest. The fixture was so very wrong on so many levels. I’m getting irate just typing this.

I always remember that in the middle of the match programme of my very first game in 1974, the programme editor had debated the spectacle of Sunday football, which had been trialed for a number of reasons that season, and there was a selection of letters from Chelsea fans both in the “for” and “against” camp. Those “against” often cited religious reasons – “the day of rest” et al – and so heaven knows what they would have thought about a Sunday evening kick-off.

But the three of us were there.

We decided that, should we be successful against Sheffield Wednesday, our favoured draw in the Fifth Round would be an away game at Doncaster Rovers, but please not at six o’clock on a Sunday please. We briefly mentioned Millwall. No thanks. There were comments about the scrapping between the ne’er do wells of Millwall and Everton the previous day. None of us bother with the fighting these days – well, I never did, what is the point of hitting someone who simply does not like the same team as myself? – but we had to admit that Everton earned some Brownie Points for heading straight into the eye of the needle in “Deep Sahf.” Not many firms do that. But rather them than me. We have only played away at Millwall four times in my life and I have mitigating circumstances for avoiding all of them. In 1976, I was eleven. In 1984, I was scared shitless. In 1990, I was in Canada. In 1995, my car was knackered. Maybe next time, there has to be a next time, I will run out of excuses.

We met up with a few others, and settled to watch Palace humble Tottenham with two first-half goals. We took especial glee when Tottenham missed a penalty. I roared as if we had scored a goal in fact, and the pub roared alongside me. It wasn’t their week for penalties, was it? Over in the far corner of the pub was a group of well-dressed Sheffield Wednesday fans – virtually all males, but a few kids too – and I spoke to a couple of them. One lad had never visited Stamford Bridge before. How could he? He was about twenty years old, and their last visit was in the last few days of the twentieth century. It was never like this in the ‘eighties.

The ‘Eighties.

It seems odd now, and especially to our legions of new fans, but for two or three seasons the rivalry in the mid-‘eighties between Chelsea and Sheffield Wednesday gave the matches between the two teams a very special edge. Sheffield Wednesday have always been a big club – the bigger of the two teams from the steel city – but in my first ten years of being a Chelsea fan, we never met since they were mired in the old Third Division. When they eventually won promotion to the Second Division in 1979, just as we were relegated from the First, we would play them incessantly for the best part of the next twenty seasons.

The rivalry built as Chelsea, with perfect dagger-in-the-heart timing, overcame all-season-long league leaders Wednesday on the very last day of the iconic 1983/84 season to become Second Division Champions, and the mutual dislike continued the next season as we were embroiled in a famous trio of games in the League Cup quarter-finals. I went to both the league games in 1984/85, but did not attend any of the League Cup games due to finances and travel limitations. But I certainly watched on with glee as we came back from trailing 3-0 at half-time to lead 4-3 at Hillsborough in the first replay – it was Paul Canoville’s finest hour – only for Doug Rougvie to scythe down a Wednesday player in front of our travelling support at the fated Leppings Lane to force a second replay. We won that game 2-1, and we were heading to our first semi-final of any description in thirteen long seasons. In those days, under the tutelage of Howard Wilkinson – before he was given his “Sergeant Wilko” moniker by the Leeds fans, with whom he won a League Championship in 1992 – Sheffield Wednesday were known for rugged defending, no frills, no thrills, route one football, a Northern Wimbledon. In 1983/84 and in 1984/85, our more skilful and entertaining football gave us a deserved edge. We had Pat Nevin. They had Gary Shelton. It was simply no contest in the entertainment stakes. Wednesday were Friday to our Crusoe, Watson to our Holmes, always subservient. We dominated them and they disliked us for it, though there was never a Leeds level of pure hatred.

They had good gates at Hillsborough though. I remember being annoyed when our league game at Hillsborough in 1984/85 attracted a whopping 29,000 but the return fixture down at Chelsea only drew 17,000. I remember feeling let down by my fellow fans. And annoyed with myself for missing the two League Cup games at Chelsea earlier that season. A few grainy photographs of that day, inside and out, are featured in this report.

Only on rare occasions did they have the better of us. They prevailed over us during our League Cup semi-final in 1990/91, when we assembled at noon on a Sunday – another silly time, see above – and the virtually silent crowd watched as we were ripped apart by the same free-kick routine within the same half of the first game. It was a massive anti-climax that one, especially having beaten Tottenham in the previous round, as mentioned in my previous match report. We did get some sort of revenge during the 1993/94 season when we beat them away in the FA Cup on the way to our first FA Cup Final in twenty-four years. But we don’t talk about that.

So, Wednesday. Yeah, we remember you well.

I can certainly remember chatting on many occasions to a lad called Dave during my time at college in Stoke, and he was a Sheffield Wednesday supporter, from Yorkshire, and we always kept it light-hearted, even when – after too many pints in our students’ union – he accosted me, semi-seriously, and said –

“You support a fascist football club.”

It was the era of racism, hooliganism, political extremism, the miners’ strike, Thatcher and Scargill, and Dave was – like many at my college, in fact – of a socialist persuasion, and I could not summon the energy nor wit to defend my club, so I just retorted –

“Yeah, and you support a fucking shit one.”

I remember he simply smiled and hugged me.

Those were the days.

Sheffield Wednesday. Bloody hell, where have you been? It reminded me of that school friend that I once had – not a close friend – but a protagonist for the same starting spot in the school football team, and a rival in a pathetic pursuit of the prettiest girl in class, who had suddenly moved a few miles and, as a result, had been forced to change schools. I’d see him every day for four years, then all of a sudden, nothing. You wonder what sort of life he was living. In the case of Sheffield Wednesday, it has been a case of life in a parallel universe with trips for them to Yeovil Town, Burton Albion, Southend United and Bristol City rather than trips to Manchester United, Juventus, Bayern Munich and Paris Saint Germain for us.

Two Ghosts.

The three of us left the pub and caught the tube to Fulham Broadway. We changed onto the District Line at Earl’s Court. Standing on the platform waiting for the Wimbledon train always takes me back to my first visit to Stamford Bridge. I wonder if my grandfather and his pal stood on that same platform on their sole visit to Stamford Bridge in the ‘twenties. It is quite likely. Outside the Oswald Stoll Foundation, while PD and Parky went on to the stadium for another pint, I stopped for a bite to eat at the busy match-day pop-up café. Damn it, they were out of pie and mash, but I devoured a salt beef – and gherkin – roll, as I sat outside for a few moments. A slug of away supporters marched past, full of noise, but no maliciousness, singing the praises of former Chelsea youngster Sam Hutchinson, who was now a regular in their blue and white stripes. I looked up at a tablet of stone whose words commemorated a visit by the Duchess of Wessex to the Oswald Stoll buildings – for ex-servicemen – in 2009. It mentioned a respect for the “fortitude and resilience” of those soldiers of both World Wars. I looked up and saw the sepia figures – “ghosts” – of Ted Draper and Ted Knapton marching purposefully towards Stamford Bridge for the 1920 FA Cup Final.

The salt beef was thick and succulent, the gherkin was juicy, the brioche roll was soft. The evening was getting darker. I needed to move on.

Six Thousand.

I was inside Stamford Bridge at 5.30pm. Tottenham would soon be out of their second cup competition within the space of seventy-two beautiful hours. What a lovely hors-d’oeuvre before the main meal, a high tea at six. For the second successive game, Parky was forced out of his seat in The Shed. For the second successive game, I let him swap with me. For the second successive game I was behind the goal in the Matthew Harding Upper. With hindsight, I was incorrect in saying that my last game in that section before Thursday was the 1995 game with Bruges. It was in fact a year later against, of all teams, Sheffield Wednesday, when their bright orange shirts matched the rust of the Lots Road gasworks that were visible in the distance behind the slowly rising Shed. Facing me was a wall of six thousand away supporters, already noisy. There would be no doubt that this would be their day, their noise would dominate. We had matched Tottenham on Thursday, but I doubted if we could counter the Wednesdayites on this occasion. There was a smattering of flags draped over The Shed Balcony. Their nickname is due to the part of Northern Sheffield where one of their first grounds was placed, Owlerton.

“Salisbury Owls.”

“Worksop Owls.”

“Chapeltown Owls.”

Walking up from the city’s train station in the middle of Sheffield to Hillsborough on that wintry day in 1984, I was surprised how far out I had to walk, a good three miles. In the pub, we had admitted that however lengthy and arduous a replay would be, we would nonetheless go. Hillsborough is still a classic stadium – my last visit was in 1996 when we toppled them off the top of the Premier League with a very fine 3-0 win – and it is such a shame that the name will always and forever be tainted with what happened on Saturday 15 April 1989.

I soon spotted the self-styled “Tango Man”, bare chested and tattooed, in the front row.

Two Teams.

The players were announced. In addition to Sam Hutchinson – admirably recovered from a seemingly-career ending injury in our colours – the Wednesday team included familiar names Keiren Westwood, Steven Fletcher and George Boyd. The Chelsea starting eleven included Willy Cabellero – on the cover of the programme – Ethan Ampadu in the deep midfield berth, Callum Hudson-Odoi on the right, and a debut for our new striker Gonzalo Higuain. Supporters of a nervous disposition must have been squirming at the sight of current boo boys Marcos Alonso and Willian appearing on the same flank. I spotted Gianfranco Zola pose for photographs with a couple of young lads sporting Cagliari scarves in the front few rows of the Matthew Harding Lower. I get that, I like that. Despite no apparent link with us, Cagliari – because of Zola – will always be linked with Chelsea. One day I might wear my royal blue and white Moscow Dynamo scarf to a game. In the upper reaches of the East were hundreds of empty seats. Also – incredibly so, I think – five corporate boxes in a row, stretching for fifty yards or more, were completely devoid of spectators, including the one belonging to our owner. On the pitch, on Holocaust Memorial Day, was a “Say No To Antisemitism” banner.

The First Forty-Five.

Songs about Blades dominated the first few minutes as the away team carved out an early chance, with Adam Reach hardly testing Caballero from an angle down below me. We could not believe that Westwood in the Shed End goal was wearing a dark kit, virtually the same as the outfield players’ uniforms. Brian Moore would be turning in his grave; he used to love a clash of kits to obsess about on “The Big Match.” It is no bloody wonder my generation struggles with the styles and techniques of modern day football. Instead of talking catenaccio, liberos, wingless wonders and total football, Brian Moore and Jimmy Hill were forever rabbiting about teams having the same colour socks.

We dominated the early stages, and Higuain – hair thinning to match his once considerable paunch – did well to engineer a shot which drifted wide of the far post from close in. Mateo Kovacic looked lively – for once, cough, cough – as he chased balls and tackled well.

With about twenty minutes played, the ball was played through to Reach by Fletcher, and Ampadu robbed him of the ball. The referee Andre Marriner pointed straight at the spot and I immediately doubted my sanity and football-spectating skills. Surely he had got the ball? While Ethan was down, clutching his shin, and with trainers on, it dawned on us that VAR was being called into action. Marriner was wrong, no penalty. With that Marriner gave himself a yellow card and booked himself in at his local “Specsavers.”

Not long after, a move inside their box came to an end when we lost the ball to a challenge, some hundred yards away from me. There was a delayed reaction from our players, the referee and our supporters alike, but Marriner signalled towards the spot. Was VAR used? I had no idea.

“Quite a week for penalties” I whispered to the chap to my right.

Willian seemed to offer the ball to new boy Higuain, but it was Willian who placed the ball above Ossie’s ashes. Another staccato step, another successful penalty to us.

Chelsea Sunday 1 Sheffield Wednesday 0.

Out came the chorus from The Shed.

“VAR is fookin’ shit, VAR is fookin’ shit.”

Quite.

For all of the online and offline moans about Callum Hudson-Odoi, there was a considerable buzz when he had the ball at his feet. Despite our ridiculous amount of possession, we struggled to create many more chances of note. There was little service to Higuain. The away fans had provided a fair proportion of the entertainment in the first-half. There was even a Sheffield version of the Derby County chant that Frank Lampard loves so much.

“If you don’t fookin bounce, you’re a Blade.”

It must be a Derbyshire and South Yorkshire thing.

The Second Forty-Five.

The first real action of the second-half almost embarrassed Caballero, who scrambled back to protect his near post when a, presumably, miss-hit cross from the Wednesday right caught him unawares. It was only their second effort on goal the entire match.

Soon into the second period, we were treated to some sublime skill from Willian, who killed a ball lofted towards him with the outside of his right foot, before a “now you see it, now you don’t” shimmy took him away from his marker. He created enough space to send over a cross but Alonso wasted the opportunity. There was a wild shot from Kovacic shot which almost hit the roof above my head. I did notice on two occasions in quick succession a massive gap in the middle of their defensive third – enough for a game of bowls – but neither Higuain spotted it, nor our midfielders ran into it. At times, we chose to play the ball to the nearest man, the easiest option, rather than hit a killer ball into space.

There was a header from Higuain, just wide.

But the play was opening up on both flanks now; we were simply going around Sheffield Wednesday’s Siegfried Line. Willian and Hudson-Odoi were becoming the main players. Indeed, on sixty-four minutes, a great ball from Andreas Christensen released our Callum, who brought the ball down perfectly and turned inside with an ease of movement that defies description. His finish was almost a formality.

Chelsea Sundaes 2 Sheffield Puddings 0.

Ruben Loftus-Cheek replaced Ampadu, and Kovacic was realigned deeper. Still the pace of Callum and Willian had Wednesday chasing shadows. I did like the look of their diminutive number ten Barry Bannan, though. He was their best player by a country mile.

Higuain was replaced by Giroud with ten minutes to go. Jorginho replaced the quiet – again – Ross Barkley.

A pacey run from Hudson-Odoi and the ball was played in to Willian. An alert one-two with Giroud and the ball was side-footed, but with a firm prod, past Westwood.

GET IN.

Chelsea 3 Sheffield Wednesday 0.

Wednesday’s children were full of woe.

At last a forward pass from Jorginho tee’d up Giroud in the box but his over-ambitious bicycle kick was shinned wide.

Throughout the game, I had been warmed by the words issuing forth from a young lad – no more than ten or eleven – who was sat right behind me and who gave his father a running commentary.

“What are you DOING Willian? Why don’t we shoot more? No wonder we don’t score enough goals. Come on Chels!”

At the end of the game, as easy a match as I could ever imagine, I gathered my things and turned. I caught the father’s eye and said –

“Love your boy’s take on the game. A perfect mix of enthusiasm and frustration.”

Round Five.

Into the last sixteen we went, into Round Five, it had been an enjoyable evening.

There was a definite case of “After the Lord Mayor’s Show” after Thursday, but we could ask for no more from our players. I bumped into the trail of away supporters as I made my way slowly down the Fulham Road. They seemed a bit subdued. It is not surprising. I did not envy their trip home. I would be home, God-willing, at around 11pm.

Outside the town hall, I overheard a bloke who was chatting to someone on the ‘phone. He was a middle-aged Wednesdayite and philosophical.

“It was a good day out, that’s all.”

On Wednesday, the cups behind us and on hold for a while, we reconvene on the South Coast at Bournemouth.

I will see the lucky ones there.

1984/1985 : Kerry Dixon On The Prowl.

1990/1991 : A Rumbelows Cup Anti-Climax.

1996/1997 : The Shed Rises As Sheffield Steel Goes Rusty.

2018/2019 : A Willian Spot Kick.

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2018/2019 : A Free-Kick In Front Of The Wednesday Away Support.

2018-2019 : The Debutant.

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2018/2019 : Burst.

2018-2019 : Pace.

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2018-2019 : Nike Football.

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2018-2019 : The Third Goal.

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2018-2019 : A Winning Smile.

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2018-2019 : Together.

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2018-2019 : Duel.

Tales From The Cock Tavern

Posted on January 6, 2019 by Chris Axon

Chelsea vs. Nottingham Forest : 5 January 2019.

Along with a league opener and a Boxing Day game, an FA Cup Third Round tie was historically one of the games of the season. But, I have to be honest that the home match against Nottingham Forest was simply not exciting me as it should. I, along with many foot soldiers, had originally hoped for an away game at a new stadium such as Accrington Stanley, Doncaster Rovers or Lincoln City. But no, we were given yet another home tie, and against a team that we only met as recently as last autumn in the 2017/18 League Cup competition.

So, the tricky trees were heading to Stamford Bridge once more, and as I picked the Three Chuckleteers up in the morning, the game was simply not getting me too excited.

The alarm had sounded at 6.15am – bloody earlier than a normal working day – because I wanted to be on the road nice and early. By 8am, I had collected two Glenns and one Paul. There was a slight frost, everything was a light shade of grey outside. By 10.15am I had dropped Parky and PD outside The Old Oak, where they hoped they would be able to grab an early pint. I parked up closer to the ground and walked down to Stamford Bridge with Glenn, where we hoped to spend some time with some of the US friends that have been featured in these match reports of late.

We walked past the usual smattering of ticket touts that have been part of the match day scene at Stamford Bridge for ever and ever.

They were certainly present as long ago as 1920, when the FA Cup Final itself was held at Stamford Bridge for the first of three times.

My grandfather, being careful not to walk into the onrushing crowds as he picked his way along the pavement from the Walham Green tube station to the main entrance of Stamford Bridge, was approached on several occasions by Cockney ticket touts, offering the chance to watch from the main stand. His ticket, and that of his friend Ted, had been given their general admission tickets by the Somerset Football Association in lieu of their role in the running of their local team Mells and Vobster United, for whom they had both played for a few seasons, along with my grandfather’s brother Christopher. My grandfather wondered how the touts had managed to get their hands on these tickets. It was a surprise to him. This was his first football match, and he was simply unaware that such tickets would be available.

“No thank you. We have tickets.”

“OK governor. You want to sell them to me?”

“No. No thanks. No – they are ours.”

His long-time pal chipped in :

“We’ve come from Somerset for this match. Why would we give them to you?”

The tout uttered a couple of oaths and moved on.

In 2019, my responses to a few touts were not so wordy. I just shook my head and solemnly moved on.

We were at Stamford Bridge for 10.45am, a quite ridiculously early time. In the bar area of The Copthorne Hotel, we settled down with a couple of astronomically priced coffees – £4 apiece – and chatted to a couple of our former players. I like to do this two or three times a season; it makes a lovely change from the usual routine, and I usually bump into a few Chelsea friends while I am there. Ron Harris, who Glenn and I got to know when he lived in Warminster in the ‘nineties, but who moved away to live on the south coast for a while, now lives a mere ten miles from me. It was no surprise that Ron was there early. He always is the first to arrive.

“I’m only ever late for a tackle.”

It was the first time that I have seen him since his move.

Colin Pates, the captain of “my” Chelsea team of the mid-‘eighties chipped in :

“I heard the house prices have fallen since he moved.”

We sat there, chatting away, for a while. Bobby Tambling was another early presence, and then former players John Hollins, Tommy Baldwin, Paul Canoville, John Bumstead, Gary Chivers and Kerry Dixon arrived too. I won’t name names for obvious reasons, but a few of these former players were quite scathing of our recent play, and playing style. I found myself nodding in silent agreement.

I offered an opinion.

“If someone who had never seen a game of football ever before, and the game was not explained to them, and they watched us play, they would probably think that the aim of the game was getting the ball over to within ten yards of the white corner posts by using as many touches as possible.”

Alas, the first of my friends – Lynda from Brooklyn – arrived just after the players went on their way around the various corporate areas, but we still had a good natter about her stay. She has been lucky enough to see four Chelsea matches. Outside, at about 12.30pm, I bumped into the “London Is Blue” team again, and said I would join them later. PD and Parky had spent a while in “The Goose” rather than “The Old Oak” and had by now walked back up to “The Famous Three Kings”. Glenn had dived into “The Malt House” and had bumped into Dave and Karen from Frome. After wishing Lynda a safe journey back to the US after the game, I met up with Glenn, Karen and Dave in “The Cock Tavern.”

This was turning into a tale of five pubs.

I chatted to a few of the American visitors in the beer garden of “The Cock.”

It was the first time that they had met Glenn, so we recounted a little of our Chelsea story for their general amusement and bemusement.

“Yeah, met Glenn in 1977 when he joined his brother and me at Oakfield Road Middle School in Frome. We were one of only three or four Chelsea fans in our entire school, we were a rare bread. We always stopped and spoke about Chelsea when we saw each other at school over the years. Bumped into him on The Shed at the opening game of the season 1983. Went to our first game together at home to the Geordies in the November of that year.”

It then dawned on me.

“Talking of 1983/84, this pub is where I had my very first alcoholic drink at Chelsea, before we thumped Leeds 5-0 to win promotion.”

Ah, 1983/84. Here I go again.

I was eighteen. In previous visits to Stamford Bridge, the thought of going in to a pub was simply not relevant. Not only did I look young for my age, risking the humiliation of not being served, I was also usually broke. Very often I would not eat a single thing on these Chelsea trips to save money for the next one. I remember so much from that day. I certainly remember that this was the first occasion that I had travelled to a game with with PD, along with Glenn and two chaps from Westbury, Mark and Gary. My memory recalls a lager and lime. The pub filled up and I remember talking to a lad from Reading about some Chelsea characters, one of which I would later realise was Hicky. He also spoke about some Chelsea fans going over to the Iranian Embassy Siege in 1980 after a game, intent on “aiding” the release of the people inside, though how that might have manifested itself heaven only knows. The songs started up and “One Man Went To Mow” – which was the song of that season – was heartily roared. We all sat until “nine”, then exploded onto our feet on “ten.” We stood on the sofas, we sang our hearts out. The pub was a riot of noise. I felt as if I was coming of age, a Chelsea rite of passage. Skinhead fashions had been taken over by a new movement on the terraces, more so in that season than in any other at Chelsea. The weekend before, I had travelled to Bath to buy my first ever bona fide casual garment, a blue and white Pringle, which cost me £25 or one week’s dole. I wore that with my Chelsea shirt underneath. I felt the business. I belonged.

The team news came through. To my surprise, Cesc Fabregas was playing, and was captain too. After his apparent “wave goodbye” to the fans after Wednesday’s dull game, I had blithely assumed that his Chelsea career was over.

Caballero.
Zappacosta.
Emerson.
Fabregas.
Christensen.
Luiz.
Hudson-Odoi.
Barkley.
Morata.
Ampadu.
Loftus-Cheek.

“Happy with that.”

Once inside the stadium, Alan and myself agreed that this was a potentially very attack-minded team. It would be good to see Ethan Ampadu in a more advanced position than in his previous starts. Alongside us was a young lad, visiting from New York, who worked for NBC sports. PD arrived a little late after his sesh with Parky and was soon cursing away, and Alan told the lad that maybe he could arrange for PD to get a job commentating on games for NBC.

“A colour commentator, I think you call it. This would just be the colour blue, though, fackinell.”

Forest had around four thousand. Their simple red/white/red is a surprisingly rare combination at Stamford Bridge these days. Their white collars looked like those starched ones from the Edwardian era. I am a big fan of the Nottingham Forest badge, which appeared years ahead of its time in 1977, but still has a lower-case “E” which infuriates me a lot more than it should.

The away fans were soon snorting derision at our lack of noise.

“Is this a library?”

“It’s just a ground full of tourists.”

They had a point. I thought that the atmosphere was bad on Wednesday, but this was even worse. It was, without a doubt, the quietest atmosphere at Stamford Bridge that I had ever witnessed.

We began – again – well but I hoped that we could carry it on for a longer amount of time than in other recent games.

Early half-chances came to us. A Fabregas shot, a Morata header, an Emerson free-kick. At least we were creating more than on Wednesday and moving the ball a little quicker. There was not, quite thankfully, a huge amount of frustration or cynicism in the home support. Morata appeared to go down way too easily to us, admittedly some one hundred yards away, and no infringement was judged to have been manifested on his frail body.

“Stay on yer feet, FFS.”

Forest goaded him with being a “poor Daryl Murphy” whoever Daryl Murphy is.

I turned to Alan.

“He’s a poor Brian Murphy, let alone Daryl Murphy.”

On the half-hour, a clumsy challenge of our Ruben resulted in an easy penalty decision. Unsurprisingly, Cesc stood up to take it. But his approach was too clever by far, and his poor low shot was ably pushed away by the Forest ‘keeper Luke Steele.

Bollocks.

Morata supplied Davide Zappacosta who cut in and smashed a shot goal wards, but Steele was equal to it. We enjoyed so much of the ball. I was pleased with the contributions from Ampadu, his body language is spot on. Fabregas was responsible for a few lovely forward passes. We were well on top.

After running for a ball down below us, our Ruben evidently injured himself and was substituted by Eden Hazard just before the break.

Forest were goading us with “WWYWYWS” but there was hardly a response from the Chelsea sections, apart from a few “YNFAs.”

They then rhymed “Aitor Karanka” with “Lampard’s a wanker” as the biggest rivalry in the East Midlands was transplanted to SW6.

Chelsea responded with songs about our Frank, which only remotely seemed relevant. Where were the songs about the current players? Still in the development process, I presume.

Forest sang a version of “Mull of Kintyre” ;”oh mist rolling in from the Trent.”

How 1977.

Ah 1977.

I find it hard to believe that of the three promoted teams in 1977, it was not the teams finishing in first and second place – Wolves and Chelsea – but the third-placed team Nottingham Forest who would surprise the football world with the League Championship in 1978 and then then the European Cup in 1979 and 1980. And all of this under the unique management skills of Brian Clough.

Clough – famously – rarely used to show up on the training pitch and would let his players play the game to their own devices. Of course he set the team up in a certain formation, but his view was this :

“You are all good players. I trust you. You are not stupid. You know how to defend. How to attack. Get on with it.”

He is at the other end of the football spectrum compared to the fastidious and studious style of many in modern football. I even suspect that there are dossiers produced by modern managers on how to tie bootlaces correctly. Clough was certainly of the “laissez-faire” school of man management. But bloody hell it worked. How he won the title in 1978 with journeyman players such as Kenny Burns, Ian Bowyer, Frank Clark, Larry Lloyd, Peter Withe and Martin O’Neil is certainly a mystery to me if not others.

Soon into the second-half, with thoughts of a midweek flit to the banks of the River Trent for the first time – for me anyway – since 1999, the game changed. The ball was played out to our Callum, who showed a classic piece of wing-play, a shimmy, before running past his marker. His low pass was magical, right into the path of Alvaro Morata who prodded the ball in from close range.

It was a money-shot from inside the six-yard box alright.

Get in.

Alan : “thay’ll have ta come at us naaa.”

Chris : “Come on me little diamonds, me ducks.”

It was then Callum’s chance himself to add to the score line, advancing with pace but forcing Steele to scramble away but with nobody on hand to force home the ball. Morata then suffered the miss of the century, touching the ball over from a mere four feet, but – thankfully for him – he was offside anyway.

“Obvs” as the kids say.

Not to worry, further stupendous wing play from our Callum – shackled by two defenders now – created a few spare feet of space which enabled him to send over a most remarkable deep cross which curved and dipped to hit Morata’s forehead and subsequent downward prod with perfection.

Get in.

There were late changes, with Dave replacing Morata, slotting in at left back to allow Emerson an advanced role. N’Golo Kante then replaced Cesc Fabregas, who hugged David Luiz before slowly walking off to tumultuous applause. I carried out the eulogy for this well-loved player a game too early, but it all still stands. One of the best passers of a ball I have seen at Chelsea. And I think we are definitely dispensing of his services too quickly. He is only thirty-one. But one supposes that he needs first team football, and being a bit-part player for someone such as Cesc is clearly not ideal.

The game continued, but we were never in danger of conceding any silly late goals. Hazard was rather quiet. Emerson enjoyed a few late runs. We peppered the Forest goal with a few shots from distance.

The referee blew and into the next round we went.

Phew.

As I slowly made my way out of the Sleepy Hollow, I watched Cesc Fabregas make a solitary walk towards us in the Matthew Harding. My camera was by now tucked away, so the moment is unable to be shared. But I applauded him as he strode on the Stamford Bridge turf as a Chelsea player for one last time.

He has been magical for us.

He waved to the left. He waved to the right.

We could have sung his song all night.

Tales From The Long Road To Baku

Posted on December 1, 2018 by Chris Axon

Chelsea vs. PAOK : 29 November 2018.

As we set off for the game, with PD driving alongside Lord Parky, and yours truly in the backseat, I spoke to my travelling companions.

“You have to wonder why we’re going tonight, don’t you? We’re already through. It’s hardly an important game.”

PD soon took the bait.

“Yeah, but we love our football, Chrissy.”

Indeed we do.

Indeed we do love our football.

Guilty as charged.

PD battled the evening traffic and some appalling weather as I relaxed in the rear seats. I drifted off to sleep on a couple of occasions. I had been awake since 5.30pm. By the time we reached our usual parking spot at around 6.30pm – three hours after we had left – I was suitably refreshed.

In the busy “Simmons Bar” at the southern end of the North End Road, I met up with some friends from near and far. It was good to see Neil from Guernsey again for the first time in a while. He was with his brother Daryl, alongside Gary, Alan, Duncan, Lol and Ed and all seemed to be making good use of the two bottles of “Staropramen” for a fiver deal. On the exact anniversary of his first ever game at Stamford Bridge, Eric from Toronto soon appeared and we bought each other a bottle of “Peroni.” He is over for a few games. His enthusiasm was boiling over and he was met with handshakes and hugs from my little gaggle of mates. Prahlad, now living temporarily in Dusseldorf, but originally from Atlanta, was present too, and it was fantastic to see him once more. The Chuckle Brothers first met him for a good old pre-match in Swansea two seasons ago. He was with his wife; her first game, I am sure. Brenda, who runs the Atlanta Blues, was in the pub too, with another Atlantan, Ryan; his first game at Stamford Bridge for sure.

Everyone together.

Chelsea fans from England; South London, Essex, Somerset, Wiltshire, Oxfordshire. From Guernsey. Chelsea fans from Canada. Chelsea fans from the US.

These foreign visitors are not tourists in my book. They are Chelsea supporters. Tourists – that most derided of all at Chelsea and other football clubs in this day and age – happen to find themselves in London and decide to go to a game at Chelsea as part of the London experience. Another box ticked. Buckingham Palace. The Houses of Parliament. Oxford Street. The Tower of London. The Fullers Brewery. Harry fucking Potter. An “EPL” game. Check, check, check, check, check, check, check.

Eric joked with me; “See I am assimilating nicely. Not wearing a Chelsea shirt this time.”

We laughed.

Prahlad was assimilating nicely too. As he said his goodbyes, I tapped him on the shoulder –

“Nice Moncler jacket, mate. You thought I didn’t notice, didn’t you?”

It was his time to laugh.

Off we trotted to the game. We had heard warnings of many away fans travelling over without tickets – something that Chelsea will be doing when we visit Budapest in a fortnight – but I didn’t see any Greeks outside Stamford Bridge. As I walked with Eric past the touts and the souvenir stalls and the general hubbub of a match day, I heard voices from almost a century ago; my grandfather walking the exact same steps –

“Shall we get a rosette, Ted?”

“I’d rather have a pint of beer, Ted.”

There was a quick bag check and we were in. Eric had a ticket in the West Lower. I’d see him at the Fulham game and the one at Wolves too.

Inside the stadium, the three thousand visitors were stood, and were hoisting banners and flags ahead of the game. There were yawning gaps in the top corners of the East Upper, and similar gaps in the West Upper too. After 39,000 gates against BATE and Vidi, this one might not reach those heights.

But these tickets were only twenty quid. Here was a good chance for our local fans to attend a match at Stamford Bridge; to be bitten by the bug, for peoples’ support to be raised a few notches.

But I was sure that there would be moans about “tourists” the following morning…

For a few moments before the teams entered the pitch, I moved over to the seats to my right, which look down on the West Lower, and which give a slightly different perspective. In my desire to photograph every square foot of Stamford Bridge, it allowed me a few new shots.

The teams took to the pitch and I returned to my usual seat in The Sleepy Hollow.

The team was basically a “B Team.”

Arrizabalaga

Zappacosta – Christensen – Cahill – Emerson

Barkley – Fabregas – Loftus-Cheek

Pedro – Giroud – Hudson-Odoi

This was a chance to see how a couple of our youngsters might shape up. In the first-half, our Callum was right over in the opposite corner to me; in the second-half, he would be closer. After seeing him play in Australia, and then again at Wembley in the Community Shield, here was a rare start.

We began with all the ball, and on just seven minutes, our position improved further still. With Olivier Giroud chasing a loose ball, a PAOK defender lunged awkwardly at the ball. Giroud tumbled and the referee from Estonia flashed a red. Off went Yevhen Khacheridi. Sadly, Cesc Fabregas shot meekly from the resulting free-kick.

There were attempts on goal from Hudson-Odoi and Giroud. Very soon into the match, Fabregas began sending a few lovely balls from deep towards our forwards. Of course, Jorginho and Fabregas – although both playing right in the middle – are wildly different players, but it was a real pleasure to see Cesc pinging a few beauties to Giroud and Pedro. Pedro took one down immaculately and forced a fine save from their ‘keeper Paschalakis.

A chance fell for Loftus-Cheek and his effort was tipped wide.

The away fans, dressed predominantly in black, and overwhelmingly male and under the age of thirty-five, made a constant din throughout the opening period of the half. They were not the loudest away fans that I had ever heard at Chelsea – I seem to remember Olympiakos, their countrymen, making more noise – but this lot were non-stop. It was stirring stuff.

On twenty-seven minutes, another magnificent ball from Fabregas found Pedro, who controlled magnificently. He spotted Giroud outside him, and he rolled the ball to his right. The finish from Giroud, struck with instinct with his left foot, was perfectly placed into the PAOK goal.

Stavros #1 : “They’ll have to come at us now, peeps.”

Stavros #2 : “Come on my little diamonds, innit.”

Hudson-Odoi went close just after, his curler from distance dropping into the bar with the ‘keeper beaten. There had been a solid effort from Ross Barkley too. Ten minutes after his opener, Giroud doubled our lead. Another Fabregas ball dropped at Giroud’s feet, but his finish was made to look easier than it must have been. Another first-time finish, volleyed home at the far post, the ball squeezed in between the frame of the goal and the luckless ‘keeper.

Amid some fine quality, there was time for a wild shot from Davide Zappacosta which went off for a throw-in.

PAOK’s attacks were rare. A sublime block from Gary Cahill nulled the best chance of their half.

The half-time whistle blew and we were well worth the 2-0 lead. On every seat back, a sticker advertising “The Fifth Stand” had been applied. It seemed that a private game had been taking place in the row behind me; our mate Rousey – he was oblivious – had been “stickered” by many. He even had one sticker stuck on his ski hat. The back of his coat was covered.

I whispered to Alan :

“Not the first time Rousey is going to end up with a lot of sticky residue on his jacket.”

“I dare to think about it” replied Alan.

The match programme, a better read this season I think, produced a few interesting morsels. The news of our game in the summer in Japan was detailed. I won’t be going; Tokyo in 2012 for the World Club Championships was a pristine, sublime and wonderful memory. I won’t be going back. It would only pale, I think, in comparison. But I am keen to see where else we are headed in the summer. This was our one-hundredth and seventeenth home game at Stamford Bridge in all European competitions, and we have lost just eight. I always remember the sadness of our unbeaten record going against Lazio in 2000. But eight out of one hundred and sixteen is phenomenal. I have – sadly? Is that the correct word? – been at all of the defeats. Throughout all the defeats, though, nothing hurts more than the Iniesta goal in 2009 and the resulting draw. There were nice profiles of Tommy Baldwin and Peter Houseman, players from my childhood, and who played in the first two games that I saw way back in 1974.

Into the second-half, and our dominance continued. The away team, so obviously lacking the class to combat us, would have found it hard to prise open a vacuum-packed packet of feta cheese, let alone our defence. But their fans were still making tons of noise.

A fine run from Loftus-Cheek – looking loose and confident – forced another good save from the PAOK ‘keeper. Then, the ball was played out to Hudson-Odoi by Fabregas. He took a quick touch and then shimmied a little before striking, the ball being whipped in at the near post with Paschalakis beaten. I just missed “shooting” his shot, but I caught his joyful celebratory run into our corner.

This was just lovely to see. The players swarmed around him. I have to pinch myself to think that our Callum is just eighteen years of age.

Ethan Ampadu replaced Zappacosta and took his place in front of Maurizio Sarri and the towering East Stand.

Willian replaced Pedro.

The away fans still sung.

Olivier Giroud – a great performance – was replaced by Alvaro Morata.

After only three minutes, Cahill pushed the ball towards Hudson-Odoi. He soon spotted the presence of Morata in the box, and his cross was simply faultless. Morata jumped and timed his leap to perfection, even though he was sandwiched between two defenders. It was a classic header – why does his heading ability remind me of Peter Osgood? – and the net was soon rippling.

Chelsea 4 PAOK 0.

Perfect.

Against the bubbles, we hardly squeaked it.

The away supporters among the 33,000 crowd were still singing. Their performance throughout the night was very commendable. As a comparison, I have to sadly report that this was the first Chelsea game that I can ever remember in which I did not sing a single note. However, I wasn’t the only one. It was a sad sign of the times.

With a midday kick-off coming up on Sunday, I am not overly hopeful that the atmosphere will be much better, London derby or not.

But I’ll be there.

I’ll see you in the pub.

Tales From The Home Of Our Delight

Posted on November 13, 2018 by Chris Axon

Chelsea vs. Everton : 11 November 2018.

The Eleventh Hour Of The Eleventh Day Of The Eleventh Month.

No matter where I am on the eleventh of November, I always stop and have a reflective two minutes in silence, away from anyone, to remember those who gave the ultimate sacrifice for the benefit of future generations. I am usually at work. I usually walk over to the quietness of the company car park and stand alone with my thoughts. It was with a great deal of anger – plus frustration and sadness – that I let myself get wrapped up with work last November, it pains me to say it, thus missing the two minutes of silence. I vowed to myself to never let it happen again.

One Hundred Years.

Fate transpired for 2018. And I am careful to use the right words here. There is no reason to blithely thank our participation in the Europa League, but it just seemed right that our game against Everton should take place on Sunday 11 November, a date which would mark the end of the First World War in 1918. For whatever reason, and I can list a few, I have always linked the early history of Chelsea Football Club with the First World War. If I was not to mark the one-hundred-year anniversary of the very first armistice day in my home village, Stamford Bridge would be as good a place as any.

Our First Decade.

Chelsea Football Club were formed in 1905. The First World War commenced on 28 July 1914. At the end of the 1914/15 season – in which Everton were the Division One Champions – it was decided to halt professional football in England and Wales, although not in Scotland. The FA Cup was also stopped after that season as the war gathered speed throughout Europe. However, not before Chelsea took place in our first ever FA Cup Final on Saturday 24 April 1915, against Sheffield United at Old Trafford. We lost 3-0 and, due to the large number of servicemen in the crowd it will be forever known as the “Khaki Cup Final.” By the time football recommenced after the hostilities, Chelsea had not played competitive football in four of its first fourteen seasons. The link with the armed forces took several forms. From the earliest moments of our existence, the team were known as “The Pensioners”, named after the inhabitants – former servicemen – of the Royal Hospital. Many of the country’s new recruits would have travelled to the battlegrounds of Belgium and France via the nation’s capital and then to the channel ports. In my mind, at least, the First World War, London, the soldiers, and Chelsea Football Club will always be indelibly linked.

A Somerset Village.

Just as I always link Chelsea Football Club with the First World War, I have always sensed that the conflict has played an important part in how I feel about my home village. My mother was born in the same house, right in the centre of the village of Mells, just opposite the Talbot Inn, that my grandfather was born in 1895. And the First World War has wrapped itself around my village for decades.

Edwin Meredith Draper.

I called my mother’s father “Grandad Ted.”

He served in the British Army during the “Great War” in the ambulance service, ferrying the injured from the trenches to field hospitals as a driver. After the war, he returned to his home village to be a gardener in the manor house now owned by the Earl of Oxford and Asquith, where he would meet my grandmother who served as a cook in the same house. My grandfather rarely spoke of his life as a soldier in the Great War. I still have his medals. I remember him speaking of how he stayed at a French family’s house for a while after the end of the war. He spoke highly of the German soldiers that he met. He did not seem to be blighted too much by his experience. I remember his only physical scars were from the marks left on his skin by the leeches which inhabited the water-ridden trenches. I have no doubt that there were mental scars, but my grandfather was a quiet, private, and occasionally stern, man and I do not doubt that he chose not to air too many really personal feelings.

My dear grandfather is pictured in the series of three black and white photographs below.

Dulce Et Decorum Est.

I never studied the war poets at school, but I have become familiar with the writings of Wilfred Owen, Rupert Brooke and Siegfried Sassoon over recent years. The reason for this is simple. I have been inspired by my village. Mells was often visited by Sassoon over many decades – the Manor House would often host a variety of bohemian characters from London – and I have tried to read a little about him. So much was his love of the village of Mells that in a quiet corner of St. Andrew’s churchyard, a simple gravestone marks Sassoon’s final resting place.

As an aside, I always remember that in a Chelsea magazine from around 2004, the editor chose to illustrate a story about the Chelsea players and club staff who are buried in Brompton Cemetery with a stock photograph of a gravestone. Imagine my surprise when I spotted that the photograph chosen was of Siegfried Sassoon’s headstone. I have featured a poem by Sassoon in these match reports before (Remembrance Day 2012, Chelsea vs. Liverpool), but a poem by Wilfred Owen was brought to my attention recently. It is so honest in its grim commentary of the trenches that it always makes me smart when I read it.

“Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,

Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,

Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs

And towards our distant rest began to trudge.

Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots

But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;

Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots

Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.

Gas! Gas! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling,

Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;

But someone still was yelling out and stumbling

And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime…

Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,

As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,

He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams you too could pace

Behind the wagon that we flung him in,

And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,

His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin;

If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood

Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,

Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud

Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,

My friend, you would not tell with such high zest

To children ardent for some desperate glory,

The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est

Pro patria mori.”

Edwin Lutyens.

There is a further link between my village and the First World War. Edwin Lutyens, the great architect who left his mark on the world with buildings from England to India, often stayed at the Manor House. In addition to designing the Cenotaph in Whitehall, the war memorial in Mells was also designed by Lutyens. It is a stunning piece of work. And it includes a piece of writing which always makes me misty-eyed and reflective.

“We died in a strange land facing the dark cloud of war and this stone is raised to us in the home of our delight.”

Images of men, young boys too, breathing heavy, gasping at air, calling out to friends, calling for “mother”, imagining views of childhood, the stony path to the village school, the cobbles on the pavement in front of the village shop, the church bells of St. Andrew’s, the hay in the fields, the sunset over the woods on the hills, the cry of the cuckoo. One last breath. One last image.

“The home of our delight.”

There was one last personal gift from Lutyens to the people of Mells. In the village church, a wonderful statue of Edward Horner stands proud, featuring the only child of the Horner family, killed in action during the First World War. The statue was designed by Alfred Munnings, but the plinth is by Lutyens and it has many similarities to the large block of slightly-angled marble of The Cenotaph.

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Thomas Frederick Axon.

Dad called his father “Pop” so I called him “Grandad Pop.” From memory, he would have enlisted in his home town of Wareham in Dorset and he experienced army life in India – for sure – but I also remember the exotic sounding city of Baghdad being mentioned. He passed away in 1971 so my memory of his war tales are very scant. Thankfully, there were no injuries from the conflict. I have strong memories to this day of the time I spent with “Grandad Pop.” After the First World War, he would later marry and move to Frome, and then to Mells. Growing up, both sets of my grandparents were only a bare minute away. We all lived under the shadow of St. Andrew’s church tower.

Silence.

I had left Mells, past the pub, past my grandparents’ old home, the churchyard, the gravestones and the war memorial at 6.20am. By 7am I had collected PD, Glenn and Parky. Just before 10am, we were inside “The Eight Bells” near Putney Bridge, sipping clandestine beers ahead of the official opening time. We had planned the day’s activities around the service of remembrance which was due to take place at the nearby Fulham War Memorial at 11am. Soon, friends Peter, Liz and Charlie called in to the pub; unknown to us, they had the same plan. Alan soon joined us. Then the Kent lads. Then Diana and Ian – from Chicago – dropped in. We walked over to the churchyard of All Saints Church just as the parade, which had started at Parson’s Green, arrived. It was perfect timing.

There were representatives from the army, local dignitaries, a band, even some Mods on scooters bringing up the rear with Union Jacks flying.

Alongside us all was Parky, wearing medals from his stay in the army in the ‘seventies and ‘eighties.

As we neared eleven o’clock, we stood in complete silence. The crowd numbered maybe four hundred. Above were clear blue skies. The orange and yellow and russet of autumn hemmed us all in. It was a perfect Sunday morning in London. But thoughts drifted. To foreign fields. To a distant land.

I thought of my two grandfathers.

Abide With Me.

After the two minutes of complete silence, the introduction to “Abide With Me” was played by the brass band. I began strongly but began to fail, the words were obviously not as entrenched in my mind as I had perhaps envisioned. A gentleman to my left handed me the order of service and I shared it with Alan. We sang along. Under the words was a depiction of the famous game of football played between enemy lines at a war time Christmas. With the hymn being the “Cup Final” hymn, this was a very nice touch.

There were two further hymns. The first one was unfamiliar. The second one was a favourite.

“I vow to thee, my country, all earthly things above,

Entire and whole and perfect, the service of my love;

The love that asks no question, the love that stands the test,

That lays upon the altar the dearest and the best;

The love that never falters, the love that pays the price,

The love that makes undaunted the final sacrifice.

And there’s another country, I’ve heard of long ago,

Most dear to them that love her, most great to them that know;

We may not count her armies, we may not see her King;

Her fortress is a faithful heart, her pride is suffering;

And soul by soul and silently her shining bounds increase,

And her ways are ways of gentleness, and all her paths are peace.”

Shudder.

I felt privileged to be present.

Friends First, Football Later.

We returned to the pub. Josh and Chad and a few of their fellow Chelsea fans from Minnesota had arrived. There was talk of the game, briefly, in Belarus, but the Everton game was hardly mentioned. We wolfed down Sunday Roasts, and just enjoyed the chance to be with each other again. Diana and Ian were last featured in these reports for our game with Manchester City last season. They were wisely combining the two staples of British life – football and music – on their trip. There were ska festivals, Trojan nights, and a UK Subs gig. Wise choices all. Chad had followed up his trip to Belarus with a trip to see his “other” team York City play at Swindon Town the previous day.

I set off early with Diana and Ian to sort out tickets. Although married, they would be watching at opposite ends of the Stamford Bridge stadium; Diana in the upper tier of The Shed among fellow Evertonians, Ian in the front row of the Matthew Harding Lower alongside my friend Pam.

Stamford Bridge.

Once inside the stadium, early for once, I was able to relax a little and put everything into some sort of perspective. Although I was hoping for a Chelsea win against Everton – although far from “expecting” it – there seemed that other weightier matters were surely important. This indeed was an important day, an important occasion. And I thought again of my grandfather, Ted Draper.

My grandfather was a good sportsman. He played football for Mells and Vobster United and cricket for Mells. I remembered the black and white photographs of both sides, taken in around 1925, on show in his bedroom when I was a child. He was, apparently, the star of the cricket team, and after studying the scorebooks from that era – priceless items – I can vouch for this. However, a family friend would not be afraid to tell me that he had a mean temper on a cricket pitch. Quiet off the pitch, a bit of a demon on it. A familiar story for many I suppose.

For all of his adventures on both football and cricket pitches, though, there is one sporting story involving my grandfather that I have been enchanted about for decades. Once I chose Chelsea as my team in 1970, I can remember Grandad Ted telling me that he once visited Stamford Bridge with his great friend – and fellow Mells sportsman – Ted Knapton. It was, I am pretty convinced, the only football stadium that he ever visited.

I am no detective, but that might be the answer.

Heaven knows, I have visualised his visit to Stamford Bridge in the ‘twenties so many times.

The train trip from Frome railway station to Paddington. A bite to eat in a nearby café. The underground to Walham Green Station. The crowds of people along the Fulham Road. The closeness of everything. The colours of the rosettes. The clamour for attention of the programme sellers, official and otherwise. The sellers of iced lemonade, of ginger beer, of cigarette salesmen. The shouts of the crowd. The Birmingham accents. The Yorkshire dialect. The smoke. The Londoners and the spivs, the touts, the brashness of the city. The lines at the turnstiles. The musty aroma of overcoats. Caps, bonnets and hats. The swell of the crowd. The bands marching before the game. The huge advertisements adorning every spare inch of space, on hoardings at the back of the huge curve of the terrace, and on the backs of the houses on the Fulham Road. The appearance of the teams. The surge of those on the terrace as a chance goes close. The unstable nature of the terrace beneath the feet, of wooden risers and of mud and cinders. The clouds of dust. Pockets of cigarette smoke drifting over the spectators. The trees in Brompton Cemetery. The smoke rising from chimneys. The wounded Chelsea pensioners – that vivid splash of red – watching from the side of the pitch in antiquated wheelchairs, some without limbs, some without sight. My grandfather, wistful, lost for a moment, a flashback to Amiens or Ypres or Valenciennes.

“There but for the grace of God, go I.”

“I wonder if my grandad stood here.”

The Colour Red.

We knew what was coming. There has been a new appetite to honour the fallen in recent years. Possibly since the relatively recent war in Afghanistan, maybe even from 9/11; a resurgence to remember those injured or killed in battle and to acknowledge those who serve. Was there such a show of remembrance, say, when we played Everton on Remembrance Sunday in 2007? My diary entry from that day would suggest not.

The red poppy is the omnipresent symbol of Remembrance Day. But for this Chelsea fan, the scarlet tunic of the Chelsea Pensioner – with tricorn hat, black boots, medals – is the image that makes me tingle.

Before the kick-off, members of the armed forces carried a huge banner with the image of the poppy to the centre circle.

In the north-east corner, not far from Ian, stood the white letters “CHELSEA REMEMBERS.”

With the spectators naturally quieting now, two Chelsea pensioners strode onto the pitch and placed two poppy wreaths on to the centre circle.

The two teams stood in silence.

We all stood in silence.

And again my mind wandered.

Uncle Fred.

Although my two grandfathers lived through the Great War, and I have told their stories here, the last relative who completes my own First World War story, was sadly not so lucky.

My gran’s young brother, Francis “Fred” Hibberd served in the Somerset Light Infantry in the 1914-1918 war. He was killed, tragically, in the last few days of conflict. His face, in a large photograph, loomed over my grandparents’ living room for as long as I can remember. It upset my gran, Blanche, terribly. He was the only “close” relative of mine who was killed in the First World War. In the past few years, I happened to find a letter – written while he was recuperating from an illness – posted to my great-grandmother from a hospital in Hollywood, Northern Ireland in October 1918. It was, probably, the last letter he ever wrote. When I realised what I had stumbled upon, my heart wept. Yet I felt so privileged to be able to hold it and read it. He would soon be posted abroad one last fateful time…

In November 2014, I attended a service at the nearby village of Buckland Dinham – his home, my gran’s home, just three miles from where I sit – in which hornbeam trees were planted to commemorate the men from the village who did not return from the front.

It was a humbling experience.

“It is sweet and honourable to die for one’s country.”

I am not so sure, and I am not so sure if my gran and her sister Laura and brother Geoff were ever sure, either.

Rest In Peace.

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Red, White, Blue.

Chelsea in blue. Everton in white. And the Chelsea Pensioners in red.

Ross Barkley, our former Toffee, did not make the cut.

There had been negative comments about Ruben and Ross against BATE on Thursday. But both are runners, if nothing else, and there was simply nowhere to run on Thursday. It was a poor game, eh?

Eden returned.

The game began.

It looked like Everton had taken more than the usual three-thousand as their support stretched further along The Shed than usual. But I have noticed the emergence of some new executive boxes in the last few rows of The Shed Lower in recent weeks (not unlike the boxes which were there in 2001) so I imagine that this has resulted in fewer seats available for the away fans in that part of the tier. It is my only explanation.

I thought that Richarlison might prove to be a bit of a handful, but Everton never really bothered us much in the first-half. The diminutive Bernard went close for the visitors but the first part of the game struggled to whet the appetite. It was a messy start with mistakes and errors everywhere. For once, the Evertonians were making a fair old din, though not on the same scale as others. They have never been the loudest.

A free-kick to us just outside the box, and although David Luiz was standing close by, and Willian looked set to strike, we watched as the left-foot of Marcos Alonso swept the ball narrowly wide.

It continued to be a messy game.

On the half-hour, with the ball having been played out of the Chelsea half, and the crowd so quiet, Luiz turned cheerleader and waved his hands in the air to the Matthew Harding. The crowd replied with the loudest noise thus far. A nod from Luiz shortly after showed his approval.

On forty minutes, Willian spotted another good run from Alonso and chipped the ball over to him. It looked an impossible task, but Alonso not only reached the ball, but his volley was on target, stinging the hands of the England international Jordan Pickford.

“Great football.”

I did not see the “coming together” of Toni Rudiger and Bernard. The reaction of others lead me to believe that our defender had been dealt a bad blow by the referee; both players were booked.

At half-time, I chatted with John from California, his first visit in the Matthew Harding after a lifetime of tickets in The Shed. He too had been tempted by lower level football on the Saturday. He had watched QPR take on Brentford in the cosy confines of Loftus Road. He commented that the pre-match ceremony had included the listing of every QPR and Brentford player killed in the First World War.

A nice touch.

The second-half began with a little more quality. Luiz – rather hot and cold in the first forty-five minutes – allowed Hazard to set up a chance for Morata. Pickford was able to scramble it away. Then the visitors came into the game. Kepa Arrizabalaga was at full stretch to tip over a Gylfi Sigurdsson effort. Bernard then stumbled and missed an easy chance from close in. Eden had been quite quiet in the first-half but as players tired, he seemed to get stronger. Willian went close with an angled shot. Hazard tested Pickford from distance.

In the stands, things were pretty quiet.

Fabregas for Jorginho.

Pedro for Willian.

I had a vision.

“Barkley to come on and score the winner in the last minute” I said to Alan.

Down below us, Hazard set up Alonso whose low drive just clipped the far post. Ian must have had a great view of that one; it must have been straight at him.

Out on the other flank, Dave sent in a low cross and Morata poked it home.

“GET IN.”

I was up celebrating, but soon realised that he was offside.

“Bollocks.”

Into the last ten minutes, Ross Barkley replaced Kovacic. Very soon, there were misplaced passes and cheers from the Evertonians. His shot from a ridiculous angle and distance drew groans from everyone. He had a ‘mare to be honest.

Everton had defended well. But they had not troubled us. We played within ourselves, and were lacking quality in the box.

It ended 0-0.

Injury Time.

Just after the break, I received a message from my friend Luke, who sits and stands near Parky in the Shed Lower. Parky had stumbled and had grazed his head, and was being tended to in the medical centre. Glenn shot off to find him, thus missing the rest of the match. After realising that Parky needed to take it easy, Glenn walked slowly with him back to the car.

The old soldier had fallen, but there were friends to stand alongside him.

CHELSEA/esque

A Blue World In Black And White

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