Manchester United vs. Chelsea : 20 September 2025.
In the short few days of build up to our game at Manchester United, one thought kept bouncing around inside my head.
“Twelve years. We haven’t bloody won at Old Trafford for twelve years.”
That 1-0 win in May 2013 was the last time we had returned south with a full three points. A Juan Mata shot that nutmegged the gurning giant Phil Jones, deflecting slightly off his left kneecap, gave us the three points. I remember that I took a photo of that exact moment. It affected Sir Alex Ferguson so much that he announced his retirement the next day.
It all seems so long ago now. Our team that day reads like a list of Chelsea giants :
No Terry, though, jettisoned to the sidelines under Rafael Benitez. Torres and Ake were the two playing substitutes.
My closing paragraphs in my “Tale” from that that day sums up the joy of that moment.
“I glanced at Alan, who was screaming, his cheeks red, his face ecstatic. I spotted Juan Mata sprint down to the corner flag. It was his moment to tease, torment and tantalise. I clicked away. I was surprisingly cool. After taking around ten photos, my time had come. I clambered onto the seat in front and screamed.
YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES! GET IN!
That was it. It was time for some bombastic, triumphant chanting.
“Amsterdam. Amsterdam. We Are Coming. Amsterdam. Amsterdam. I Pray. Amsterdam. Amsterdam. We Are Coming. We Are Coming In The Month Of May.”
Our battle song of 2013.
The Chelsea fans around me were full of smiles and joy. I stood on the seat in front for the next few minutes. I was only vaguely aware of the late red card for Raphael as I was still full of song. I felt my throat getting sore, but this was no time to relent.
“Champions Of Europe. We Know What We Are.”
Despite a few last-ditch United chances, we held on. This was my eighteenth visit to Old Trafford with Chelsea and only the fifth victory. It wasn’t comparable to the pivotal win in 2009-2010, but it was a close second.
I raced back to the waiting car with the United fans moaning away all around me. I listened to “606” on the drive through Sale and Altrincham. Dave Johnstone’s voice was the sole Chelsea voice to be heard. Many United fans were phoning in.
They weren’t happy.
How dare “United” lose a match.
To be honest, I could hardly believe my ears at the ruthlessness of some of their fans. They were irate with Ferguson for playing a second-rate team (I hadn’t noticed) and one chap was so fed up with Fergie’s dictatorial nature that he wasn’t renewing his season ticket next year.”
Twelve years on, we had been lured back to Old Trafford once more.
I collected PD at 10am and Parky at 10.30am. I was well aware that this would be my thirtieth visit to Old Trafford to see Chelsea play Manchester United, the most-ever visits to an away stadium, but my record was rather humble.
Played 29
Won 5
Drew 10
Lost 15
To make it worse, two of those paltry five wins were way back in 1986, my first two visits. So, stretched out over almost forty years, just three wins in twenty-seven games tell my own personal story of misery.
For those of a certain age, Chelsea always used to have a decent record at Old Trafford, with our most successful period between 1966 and 1986. In thirteen league visits in that twenty-year span, we were unbeaten. It all came to a crashing end on a hot bank holiday Monday in August 1987, a game that I sadly watched from a cramped away enclosure.
Anyway, enough of the past. This was 2025, and I – worryingly – was travelling north with a smidgeon of optimism. As we all know, Manchester United have been quite awful so far this season under Ruben Amorim. I had no doubts that the four Manchester United supporters that co-exist alongside me in our small office of ten were nervous of the weekend’s game. I had kept my lips tight, not wishing to tempt fate, but was hopeful.
With the game kicking off at 5.30pm, a four-and-a-half journey stretched out in front of me.
The skies darkened as we advanced past Birmingham. We became enmeshed in slow-moving traffic, partly caused I think by teeming rain and copious surface water, and so we had to reappraise our pre-match plans. Rather than stop off at a pub en route, we decided to aim straight for the stadium.
In the last hour or so, the rain didn’t stop, and the clouds were so low that it seemed we had to duck to avoid them.
The Sat Nav sent me towards Old Trafford via a different route than usual, avoiding the M60 Orbital, past Didsbury, through the massive Southern Cemetery, a sombre experience in the Manchester rain, through Chorlton-cum-Hardy – a district that always makes me chuckle like a twelve-year-old – and then on towards Old Trafford. For a few minutes, I found myself driving on Kings Road in Stretford, where Morrissey once lived. In 2004, I saw Morrissey in concert at the Old Trafford cricket ground, a genuine home coming, and he opened with the line –
“Hello, Weatherfield.”
Due to my two co-passengers’ issues in walking, I dropped them off outside The Bishop Blaize pub on the Chester Road at around 4.15pm, then turned around and headed down to my usual parking place near Gorse Hill Park. As they exited my car, the rain lashed against them, my car, the roads and the pavements. I had left my house at 9.45am, and I had dropped the lads off six-and-a-half hours later. It was, despite no end of laughs between the three of us, a real slog.
I paid my £10 – it was £15 last season, are United now worth 66% of their 2024 value? – and zipped up my jacket, donned my baseball cap, and away I went, fearing the worst. The rain still lashed down, and I expected to be drenched by the time I reached the familiar slope of the forecourt underneath the Munich clock.
Thankfully, the weather lightened on my twenty-minute walk to Old Trafford, and I decided to take a few photos from a couple of fresh angles, with the huge steel structure of the stadium looking over the terraced houses below.
I noted the “20 Zone” street sign next to The Bishop Blaize and quizzically wondered if that was a nod towards the local team’s title haul. Maybe I would have been happier if it had said “20 Limit.”
They have won enough, surely.
On the busy corner of Chester Road and Sir Matt Busby Way, there was the usual agglomeration of United fans from many parts of the British Isles and further afield. For a few moments, all I could hear were Irish accents.
After a slight wait at the security check, and with Chelsea fans shouting about flutes, and a lone United fan shouting about rent boys, I finally reached the cramped away concourse.
Phew.
It was just before 5pm.
The rain had recommenced and – my goodness – Old Trafford looked as quintessentially Mancunian as it is ever likely to.
A depressing wash of clouds overhead, the grey steel of the roof, the mesmerising sight of millions of speckles of rain lashing down and across the massive void of the stadium.
I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry that my seat, in row 2 above the corner flag, had just missed the drip, drip, drip from a hole in the stand a hundred feet above me. Even worse was the fact that two of the disabled spectators in the section right in front of me were experiencing the full effect of a leaky roof too. It seemed that their red United rain jackets would be in for a tough assignment during the early evening’s entertainment.
Shocking.
Both the home and away sections took a while to fill.
At 5.25pm, I recognised a song.
“This Is The One” by the Stone Roses started and would welcome the teams onto the pitch. Flags and banners fluttered in The Stretford End, looking like a less colourful Kop, and I took a few photos.
I posted one on “Facebook” with the words “This Is The One.”
And please God, let this be the one, a win at last in rainy dreary Weatherfield.
Then, next up, a John Denver / Pete Boyle mash-up.
“Take me home, United Road.
To the place I belong.
To Old Trafford, to see United.
Take me home, United Road.”
I had sensed a quiet nervousness both outside and inside from the home support, and there had been little pre-match jousting on the terraces from either set of fans.
As always, we attacked the Stretford End in the first half.
However, in the first six minutes, we didn’t attack the Stretford End. It was all United in this opening period.
It didn’t take long for the goal at our end to be the central focus. New signing Bryan Mbeumo forced a decent save from Robert Sanchez after only two minutes, and then Reece James was on hand with a timely interception very soon after, saving a likely opener.
This understandably roused the home support, whose noise then stirred the away support into life.
“Just like London, your city is blue.”
Around this time, we were treated to two Sanchez miskicks to United players, but very soon there would be an even bigger calamity.
Just as I was reviewing how wet the seats were to my right, and where my away pals Gary and John should have been standing – where were they? – I had momentarily looked away as the United ‘keeper had walloped a ball forward. To be honest, I didn’t see the build-up, only the ill-timed rush out of our penalty area by Sanchez and the catastrophic swipe at Mbeumo.
Oh bollocks.
The referee issued a straight red.
What a mess.
It seemed that those little hopes of success on this miserable day had been immediately washed away.
But then, as the United players crowded around the site of the free kick that would follow, Maresca chose not to make one substitution but two and we all scratched our collective heads.
Filip Jorgensen for Estevao, Tosin Adarabioyo for Neto.
Bloody hell, our two wingers, our two “out balls”, what was the manager thinking?
“That just invites them on” uttered a local Chelsea fan, who I am sure stood in front of me at Old Trafford on a recent visit.
From the free-kick, Bruno Fernandes thankfully wasted the chance to take the lead.
We struggled to put two passes together, and on fourteen minutes, a cross came in, and Patrick Dorgu’s header fell nicely for Fernandes to sweep the ball in. He raced away to the far corner and as the home fans roared, I felt ill.
“Well, that was too easy.”
Here we go again.
Unbeknown to me straight away, there was a VAR review, but that amounted to nothing.
Just after, Gary and John arrived, soaked, the victims of slow-moving traffic on the M6.
We were awful. I had to wonder who on Earth thought that it was a smart move to knock it about nonchalantly at the back when United had a spare man and who could put us under great pressure. It was nonsense tactics. Especially, when we had nobody to hit if we ever managed to play it past this press.
After twenty-one minutes, a further substitution, Andrey Santos for Cole Palmer.
I texted some mates.
“White flags.”
I was utterly perplexed. But then the rumour went out that Palmer was injured.
Down below us, a move developed and Casemiro bundled the ball in from an Amad Diallo cross, but the ball had gone out behind the goal-line in the build-up.
On thirty-four minutes, a very rare excursion into the Stretford End penalty box, and Joao Pedro tumbled. It was too far away for me to judge.
On thirty-seven minutes, a cross to the back post, a header back into the six-yard by Patrick Dorgu wasn’t cleared. James attempted to do so but only added to the panic. A Luke Shaw header then dropped down and Casemiro was on hand to nod in. His race towards our corner was just horrible to witness.
Fackinell.
In injury-time, a coming together of Santos and Casemiro, and they ended up on the floor. The referee took his time, seemed to review what he had just seen, then signalled a yellow.
The Mancunian next to me, bless him, had remembered another yellow.
“Second yellow. Off.”
I roared.
For a few seconds I overdosed on positivity.
“Now we have some space. We’re back in it.”
Or so I thought.
The half-time came and went, with much muttering and moaning from the faithful.
The second half began, and we tried to get at United, but at times we were rather pedestrian.
It took a while for us to build anything of note.
I expected a lot more from Enzo.
Wesley Fofana headed in from a James corner but there was an offside flag.
Soon after, a double substitution.
Tyrique George for Fofana.
Malo Gusto for Cucurella.
The addition of George was a head-scratcher.
Alejandro Garnacho, who had been booed by the Stretford End while he was warming up, would have been many Chelsea fans’ choice for a late appearance. Here was a player that had an extra dimension to his game, and a massive point to prove. A moment like this does not come around too often. The moment was meant for him. Alas, Maresca chose not to gamble, perhaps the story of his managerial life thus far.
God knows what must have gone through Garnacho’s head as he sat down on the bench, overlooked.
For all of the change in personnel, and for all of the possible variations of attack, Reece James stuck with what he knew, out wide, making angles with overlaps, and became our only effective attacking threat.
It was his cross that was ably headed down and in by Trevoh Chalobah with ten minutes to go.
The Mancunian next to me : “3-2, you watch.”
I wished that I shared his optimism.
We kept going, but without much of a clue as to how to get into areas that would hurt United.
At the other end, a flashing shot from Fernandes was ably saved by Filip Jorgensen.
The rain had relented slightly but then came on strong again in the closing minutes.
At the final whistle, I turned and headed up the steps, bracing myself for a long and wet walk back to the car. First, that bloody slope on the forecourt which is always a fun experience, being serenaded by the home fans.
I had to laugh as I walked back in the darkness when I was overtaken by a United couple. Despite the win, they were as morose as we were.
“Ten versus ten, we lost.”
That’s the spirit.
With PD and Parky unable to walk quickly, we did not get back to the car until 8.30pm, and by then I was absolutely soaked.
We hit the M6 at 9.30pm, the road conditions awful.
I stopped at Stafford Services for junk food – Scottish themed, Tunnocks tea cakes and Irn Bru – and we bumped into Allie and Nick from Reading again. There was a final stop at Strensham for some petrol, and at last, nearing Bristol, the rain finally relented.
Well, I didn’t watch any international football, that’s for sure.
Thankfully, the fortnight was over and Chelsea were back on the agenda. We were due to complete our “London Series” with the fourth match in a row against teams from the capital with a game at Brentford’s Gtech Stadium.
Unfortunately, PD was unable to get hold of a ticket, so it was only Parky who accompanied me up to The Smoke for this one.
“It’ll be just like the old days”, he chirped during the lead up to the weekend, harking back to those days from around 2008 when the Chuckle Bus consisted, in the main, of just the two of us.
With the game in West London not beginning until 8pm, I had decided to give any notion of a long day shuffling around a succession of pubs a miss and picked up Parky at 2.45pm. I am not getting any younger and I am beginning to feel the burden of arduous hours on the road.
Soon after collecting the old rascal, I was well aware that Frome Town were kicking off their FA Cup match at Shaftesbury in Dorset at 3pm. I had toyed for the idea of attending both games but decided that it was all too risky. Chelsea would be the priority on this day.
On the previous Saturday, I had driven down to the cathedral city of Winchester to see Frome meekly exit the FA Trophy. Winchester City, from the same division, had beaten us 2-0. Shaftesbury play in the same division as Frome too and I was hopeful that my hometown club would be victorious in this scene-setter to the evening’s main event.
I stopped at Membury Services near Swindon to check the score; losing 0-1.
I stopped at Heston Services near Heathrow to check the score; losing 0-1.
Bollocks.
It’s a very familiar drive into West London on the elevated section of the M4 and the sights are oh-so familiar. Rising to where John Prescott’s ill-fated “bus and taxi lane” used to terminate, I never fail to get a little shudder of excitement as I see the skyscrapers of the city in the distance. Closer in, the vast expanse of gleaming windows of the now vacated GSK Building occasionally reflects winter sunsets as I drive into London for evening games.
It’s quite a site and quite a sight.
Way to the north, I always peek to see the Wembley Arch, and in previous years I would always look to spot the floodlight pylons at Griffin Park just south of the M4.
I always check for what I call “the Seven Sisters”, a line of tower blocks to my right, a title that is a little off since there are only six of them, but I figure it’s the thought that counts. Also in view is what Parky calls “the pepper pot”, the tall tower that forms the centrepiece of the London Museum of Water & Steam.
Then, just a little further along, the expensive car dealerships, perched and overlooking the motorway.
It was at this point that I exited the M4, swung around the roundabout where the North Circular, the M4 and the A4 meet, and then turned back westwards to drop Parky off outside the “Bell & Crown” pub on the banks of the River Thames at Chiswick.
It was 5pm.
I had left my village in Somerset at 2.15pm.
Job done.
I edged further west to park up at Ferry Quays, and just as I did so, a score flash from Shaftesbury made me smile.
In the one-hundred and second minute of play, Sam Meakes had plundered a very late equaliser for Frome Town.
Lovely.
There would be a replay at Badgers Hill on Wednesday evening, and on that occasion, Frome would take precedence over watching Chelsea in Bavaria on the TV.
I met up with Parky, Salisbury Steve, Jimmy the Greek and Minnesota Josh for an hour or so of chuckles, laughs and banter as the sun began its slow dip beyond Kew Bridge.
Within seconds of arriving, a beer was spilled from the low wall, and Josh’s sunglasses were knocked into the murky Thames below. In stepped Parky who hooked them out of the water with his trusty walking stick. I was hopeful that this moment would not be the most exciting few seconds of the entire evening.
We bumped into a smattering of other friends and acquaintances, and it was a gorgeous way to idle away around for an hour and a half.
Not much was said about the upcoming game; no point spoiling the moment, eh?
I left them to it as I fancied taking a few “mood shots” of the stadium. The walk up to the Gtech Stadium took me right along the border between Chiswick and Brentford, which are both covered by the London Borough of Hounslow.
Everything is so cramped at the Gtech Stadium, nestled underneath the M4, shoved between train tracks, narrow roads, and new high-rise flats. There is a splash of red at the box office and at the main entrance, but grey steel, grey windows, and grey cladding otherwise dominate the structure. The box office is recessed underneath offices to generate an extra little space, and the main entrance is inconspicuous. Blink and it will be missed. There is almost a sense of claustrophobia in this intimate part of West London.
I walked back out onto the main road and approached the away entrance, which is tucked away underneath the towering high rises that soon shot up in the void between the stadium and the M4. There was a ticket check, then a cheerful pat-down, and I was through. I had my Sony “pub camera” clasped in my fist and it was not spotted. I will only be able to bring my Canon SLR to games once the weather worsens and I can smuggle it under a jacket.
Down the steps to the away entrance, then into the surprisingly roomy concourse, then up the stairs to the upper concourse. Not a square inch of space is wasted at the Gtech.
I was inside the away seats at around 7.15pm. The Chelsea players were warming up a few yards away. This was a view that would cost the Dugout Club Wankers at Stamford Bridge thousands of pounds, but in the away section at Brentford it cost me just £30.
I was alongside Gary and John in the fourth row from the front and level with the corner flag, an excellent spot.
The team that Enzo Maresca had chosen was a head-shaker alright.
Sanchez
Fofana – Tosin – Chalobah – Hato
Caicedo – Fernandez
Neto – Buonanotte – Gittens
Joao Pedro
The defence seemed ridiculously unfamiliar.
“Have you chaps met each other yet?”
The manager chose a first start of Jorrel Hato, a debut for Facundo Buonanotte, and persevered with Jamie Gittens.
On the bench, sadly, were the more esteemed Cole Palmer, Marc Cucurella, Reece James and Malo Gusto.
Was Maresca over-thinking, being too smart, resting players ahead of Bayern on Wednesday and United on Saturday?
Only time would tell.
There was the usual Premier League intro of “Insomnia”, forced darkness, strobe lights, them mosaics from the slender stand to my right.
Next, a shared “Hey Jude”, with both ends singing along.
The teams appeared to our left.
At 8pm, the referee Stuart Attwell whistled.
Rather than dilly-dally with a methodical pass back to a central defender, a Brentford player sprinted to receive the ball and walloped it forward. All of a sudden we were watching Wimbledon from 1988.
It came to nowt.
The Chelsea choir were in a noisy mood at the start of the game, and there was a particularly loud rendition of “OMWTM” that must have sounded decent on TV. We paraded a few of the old favourites but then fell into the predictable trap of singing about former players from years ago when the players from 2025 needed support. Frank Lampard, Dennis Wise and someone called Solomon Kalou were serenaded.
“It’s Salomon!” I shouted a few times.
On the pitch, there was a brisk start to the game with the debutant Buonanotte looking lively in the central position just behind Joao Pedro, who wasn’t really playing as an out-and-out centre forward because, you know, modern tactics, and all that, and instead played in the half-spaces that seem to exist in managers’ minds, if not on the pitch itself. As the half would progress, Joao Pedro got himself lost in these half spaces, while on the left Jamie Gittens seemed reluctant to exploit even quarter spaces.
But the start was decent enough, and a Joao Pedro shot was blocked, while at our end the lanky frame of Tosin similarly blocked an effort from the home team.
Moises Caicedo was his usual self, blocking, tackling, passing, a dream.
After a quarter of an hour, it was all us, and we were camped inside the Brentford half. However, all of the meaningful attacks were streaming down our right with Pedro Neto always available. On the left, Gittens was lost in the evening murk.
Brentford struggled to piece together much of their own, but then our form dropped and we struggled too.
On thirty-four minutes, I sighed as a ball from Trevoh Chalobah to Neto just didn’t have enough speed on it to give Neto the needed momentum. With that, the move broke down, and the ball was then played to Jordan Henderson. Now then, I have never thought too highly of Henderson, but I had to gasp at the excellence of his long ball towards Kevin Schade. It was absolutely on the money.
Fresh from his whistle-stop tour of Arabia and Amsterdam – talk about different ends of the spectrum in which to live – his decision to retire to Hounslow surprised me, but here he was with the ball of the game.
Schade was able to wriggle past the scrambling Tosin, and when the striker came inside, I only expected one outcome.
I did not see the ball hit the net, but I heard the roar.
Bollocks to you Jordan Henderson.
El-Ettifaqinell.
Just after, there was a rare chant from the home end.
It’s the one thing that has surprised me about Brentford in their new stadium. This is the time of their lives, their high-water mark, playing in a tight and compact stadium, set up for noise, but they are so quiet and timid. It was honestly a shock to be able to hear them.
We struggled to get back into the game in the last part of the first half, and the sight of a corner from Enzo grazing the post raised hardly a flutter.
This had turned into a hard watch.
I turned to Andy from Nuneaton.
“You wouldn’t cross the road to watch this if it wasn’t Chelsea, would you?”
There were multiple changes at the break, and a few of us were surprised that Gittens re-appeared for the start of the second period.
So, Mister Maresca, what you got?
Marc Cucurella for Hato.
Reece James for Fofana.
Tyrique George for Buonanotte.
It took me a few minutes to work out if there had been any fine tweaks to the positions. Was George now the striker, the half-striker maybe, with Joao Pedro behind? I wasn’t sure.
Soon into the second-half, George was released and did well to get a shot away from an angle. The reliable Kelleher was down well to touch it away for a corner.
Then came the first in a succession of “Reece James taking a corner” photos from yours truly and I don’t, thankfully, include them all.
Gittens then enjoyed his best run of the entire game, forcing a corner, but was then ironically substituted. On came the hopeful saviour, Cole Palmer.
God knows where everyone would play now.
Ah, I think I got it. Tyrique George moved over to the left, and Palmer moved behind Joao Pedro.
Am I right?
From row four, it wasn’t easy to slot everything into place.
Fackinell.
I captured a shot from Cucurella that was straight at Kelleher.
Our play improved immeasurably.
I, and probably hundreds of thousands Chelsea fans who were watching in TV Land thought the same thing.
“Funny that. Playing our best players. Playing better.”
Neto looked especially spritely down the right, away on that far side. On the hour, a cross from Enzo – improving after a dreadful first half – lofted a hopeful ball towards a leap of Joao Pedro. The ball broke to Palmer who swept it in with the minimum of fuss.
A roar from the Chelsea faithful, but no self-aggrandising celebrations from the scorer. He raced straight back to his own half.
Get in.
Just as I was jotting down a few notes on my phone, I looked up to see Robert Sanchez fall to his right and tip and effort from Schade around the far post, a magnificent stop.
I loved a run deep into the box in front of me, lots of flicks and touches, but the run from George just ran out of steam.
On seventy-four minutes, a clean run from Neto on the right and a perfect pass to Palmer. With the goal gaping, I absolutely expected the net to bulge even if I wouldn’t see it.
He shot.
A block, or a save, I know not. I just saw Palmer hold his head.
Ugh.
On seventy-six minutes, one final change.
Alejandro Garnacho for Joao Pedro, and so Tyrique George again moved into the middle.
Now then, Garnacho. Who remembers his first game for Manchester United? His debut was against us at Old Trafford in April 2022 when a late Cristiano Ronaldo goal gave them an undeserved 1-1 draw. Our new signing came on as a late sub in that game, and I remembered how a memorabilia collector who featured Garnacho among the players in his portfolio was happy to pay me £50 for my ticket stub knowing that he would later sell it on, autographed, as a memento from that debut.
I have called the young Argentinian “the peroxide plonker” in the past, and as he lined up on our left, I could not help reminding myself of this.
To his credit, the former United starlet impressed me greatly in the short time that he spent attacking our end. I kept thinking back to Jadon Sancho, another United mis-fit, and his promising debut at Bournemouth last autumn.
On this day, Garnacho – at least – showed plenty of desire to get past his marker and create havoc in the danger areas. More of the same please.
On eighty-six minutes, the debutant shimmied and rolled the ball back towards the penalty spot, but there was nobody there to meet it. I remember thinking “where is Frank Lampard when you need him?” but a Brentford clearance was far from perfect. The ball ended up rolling towards Caicedo. There was a touch to create space and to set himself up, and he then drilled the ball goalwards.
Did I see the net ripple? Of course not.
But I heard the noise and saw the gorgeous celebrations.
GET IN.
My camera was on hand, after I had punched the air a few times no doubt, to record the scene down below me.
Limbs, limbs and more limbs.
Beautiful stuff.
I spotted Enzo walking away, his arms around the shoulders of Garnacho, no doubt whispering words of encouragement in Spanish but with an Argentinian twang.
Soon after, Sanchez was able to scramble across his goal to maintain our slender lead.
Whereas there had been time-wasting from the home team at 1-1, now there was none of it. There was a renewed urgency in their play.
The away end was buoyant, and we were hoping that we could hold on. However, in the fourth minute of extra time, a long bomb of a throw-in on their left caused chaos inside our six-yard box and Fabio Carvalho pounced to stab home, the far post unguarded.
Oh bollocks.
Just after, Garnacho set up Palmer but he lofted the ball over.
A second winner was not forthcoming.
Time ran out.
Ugh.
This felt like a loss and all the other well-used cliches.
On a slow walk back to the car with Parky, I mentioned to a few friends that because of our poor first-half showing, perhaps we never really deserved the full three points on this day in West London.
And I suppose it was time to be pragmatic.
Whereas others were full of rage, I guess we all need to practice a little patience here. After all, it is just the start of another long season.
However, the irony of an extra-time equaliser saving Frome Town but of an extra-time equaliser robbing Chelsea was not lost on me.
We stopped at Reading Services at 11.45pm – what a crap time to be halfway home – and I finally reached my house at 1.30am.
With the semi-final against Fluminense won, and with surprising ease, the third day of my eight days in Manhattan began with a lovely positive feel. I woke in Dom’s flat at around 9am, suitably rested after the football-related wanderings of the previous day, and for a while I just chilled out.
However, there was no rest for the wicked. This day was all about securing my ticket for the final on the Sunday. Tickets were to go on sale at 10am local time on the FIFA CWC App. Unlike the previous game, I was thankfully able to navigate this correctly. To cut a long story short, the $195 tickets in the upper deck, what the Americans call “nose bleeds”, soon went, leaving me to buy up one of the remaining tickets in the lower deck for a mighty $358.
Of course, this was much more than I wanted to pay, but I needed to guarantee a ticket for the final. After all the tickets disappeared on the FIFA App, more than a few US-based friends had missed out and I felt terrible for them. Their route to tickets would be via the secondary market, namely “Ticketmaster”, but there were many who were hoping that FIFA, in their desire to fill the stadium, would again offer free tickets to US-based supporters clubs as they had done for the semi-final.
After chatting to many friends about the ticket scenario, I eventually set foot outside at midday. It was another hot day in Manhattan. I devoured some pancakes at the “Carnegie Diner.”
“Take a jumbo across the water.
Like to see America.”
I chatted with a mother and daughter from Philadelphia who were all dolled-up and about to see a show. They were sat at the counter alongside me, and I entertained them for a few minutes with my tales of football fandom. I had to stifle a groan or two when they asked me, full of glee, about Wrexham.
Americans and football. It’s still a conundrum to me.
I then set off on a leisurely excursion down to the tip of Manhattan and took the – free – ferry to Staten Island. While I enjoyed the journey and the fantastic views of the harbour, I was aware that the second semi-final was taking place at The Meadowlands no more than ten miles away.
Who did I want to be victors?
Here was a dilemma, but not much of one. From a football perspective, it would undoubtedly be better for Chelsea for Real Madrid to win. I think that everyone involved with football would have agreed that PSG, the newly crowned European Champions, could claim the title of the greatest current club side in world football. Therefore, if we fancied our chances of winning this whole tournament, a game against Real Madrid would be preferred.
But with Real Madrid’s massive fan base – a former line manager from Latvia was a supporter, go figure – there is no doubt that this would induce a price hike on “Ticketmaster” and FIFA would have no problems in shifting all possible spares via their App. In a nutshell, Madrid reaching the final would mean less tickets becoming available for the Chelsea supporters.
So, my mind was easily made up. I wanted PSG to win so that more of my friends, mainly in the USA, could get tickets for the final.
It was simple as that.
On that ferry trip across the harbour, I soon heard how PSG had obliterated Real Madrid, scoring three goals in the first twenty-six minutes, and had eventually won 4-0.
So, the final on Sunday 13 July would be Chelsea vs. Paris St. Germain. This would be a very tough game, a very tough game indeed. Honestly, I was worried, as worried as hell. Secretly, I was just hoping that we would not get embarrassed. I hated the thought of a 0-3, a 0-4 or worse. PSG were an established team, while we were still growing.
Later that afternoon, I overcame some personal anxieties and visited the area that is now called “Ground Zero”; the memorial that now marks the footprints of where the twin towers of the World Trade Centre once stood prior to the terrorist attack on 11 September 2001. I had walked around the bases of these two skyscrapers in the June of that year and had witnessed the events unfold as I was at home on the afternoon of the attack. In the intervening years, I had avoided re-visiting the area as it was all too difficult for me. However, while returning to Manhattan the previous evening with Alex, he had told me that he had lost no fewer than twelve friends on that day. That fact alone stirred me to visit. I did not regret it.
That evening, I rested in the apartment. I needed it. A lot had happened over the previous five days.
I decided to try not to think too much about the final on the Sunday. After all, in addition to following the team, I was of course on holiday. I owed it to myself to try to relax a little, to put negative thoughts about the final to one side, and to enjoy myself in – probably – my favourite city of them all.
From the Thursday to the Saturday, life was great.
I was in no rush to get up too early on Thursday. For starters, I had no real plan of what I might do with myself. This was now my nineteenth visit to the city in the past thirty-six years and there wasn’t too much left that I wanted, or needed, to see.
There had been historical landmarks, cathedrals from the inside and out, breathtaking ferry trips, towering skyscrapers, famous department stores, shopping sprees, walking tours, bridges, verdant parks, visits to Madison Square garden and five individual baseball stadia – and the site of one former ball park, Ebbets Field in Brooklyn – beaches, art galleries, museums, sports bars, dive bars, restaurants and diners. That I have been able to spend so many days in New York with many top friends, plus even one day in 2010 with my mother, makes all these memories all the more sweeter.
So, what was left?
Thankfully, I soon came up with a plan. Not far from where I was staying in Hell’s Kitchen was the Museum of Modern Art on 53 Street. I had only visited “MOMA” once before, and that was during the first few days of my very first trip to New York, and the US, in September 1989. I was long overdue a return visit.
I was out at 11am. It had rained overnight, and everything was a little cooler. I dropped in for another breakfast, this time at the “Roxy Diner” and at last found a decent coffee.
“Take a jumbo across the water.
Like to see America.”
I reached MOMA at just after midday and stayed for three hours. At times it was almost too overwhelming. I loved so many of the pieces on display, but especially some work by Gustav Klimt, Edward Hopper, Vincent van Gogh, Claude Monet and Andy Warhol. The place was busy, almost too busy, and I needed time to myself on a few occasions.
I remembered that during that first visit in 1989, my college mate Ian and I were rather perplexed by the number of visitors who – rather crassly in our eyes – took great happiness in being photographed in front of their favourite paintings.
I also remember myself taking a photo of just one painting, Marilyn Monroe by Andy Warhol. I tried my best to locate it in 2025, and had almost given up, but eventually spotted it.
With an ironic nod back to 1989, I recorded a video of myself in front of this iconic painting and sent it to Ian via Messenger. He then quickly sent a video back to me of him in his kitchen in Fareham with a painting over his shoulder.
This was great. It felt like Ian was with me at MOMA after all these years. With that, I exited out through the museum shop just as “Blue Monday” by New Order was being played.
Perfect.
Back at the apartment, there was some Chelsea stuff to sort out. We had heard that Claude Makelele was to make an appearance at “Legends”, the large bar on 33 Street that hosts the New York Blues, on Saturday evening. It was ticket only so I spent a few moments sorting out that, more Apps, more QR codes, oh boy.
I passed this news on to a few Chelsea supporters who were making their way over to New York for the weekend. I looked forward to seeing more familiar faces from England in the city.
That evening, I fancied a very chilled and relaxing pub crawl around Manhattan. I was out early at 4pm and started off at “McSorley’s”, seven blocks from where Glenn and I had stayed on East 14 Street in June, and just one block where my friend Roma and I had stayed in 2001. It was great to be back; I made it my fifth-ever visit.
Next up was a visit to the Chelsea Hotel. I had twice stayed in the Chelsea district, in 1989 and in 2015 but this would be the first time inside. Of course, those of us of a certain vintage remember the infamous nature of this hotel in 1978 and 1979; Nancy Spungen, Sid Vicious, what a mess. It’s a cracking hotel, though, and I loved spending the best part of an hour at the bar, but I made sure that the small bottles of Kirsch lager, at $14 a pop, took ages to drink. I wanted to savour every drop.
Just along from there, on the same street, was a very funky place called the Trailer Park Lounge, and I popped in for a drink. This had the feel of a southern dive bar, maybe jettisoned from Florida or somewhere, and was a nice distraction.
Next, “Grey Bar”, a reasonable bar, but nothing special. Here I chatted to the barman, a Yankee fan, while messaging many folk about tickets for the game on Sunday. It seemed that Chelsea would not let me completely relax.
Lastly, I dropped into “Legends”, underneath the towering Empire State Building. Here I chatted at the bar to a guy from New York, Jeff, who was an Arsenal supporter, and whose main claim to fame was that he was, rather fortuitously, at the last-ever game at Highbury in 2006. My friends Leigh and Ben, from England, called in for the last few beers. We could hardly believe it when Jeff said he wanted us to win on Sunday.
“Mate, there’s no Arsenal fan back home that wants us to win the final.”
“I know, but I’m an American.”
Yes, it was still a conundrum alright.
I had enjoyed this relaxing amble around Manhattan, with two bars in Chelsea, but as far as pub crawls go, this was all very sedate. I was back inside the apartment at midnight.
Friday was to be busier. I was up early and was soon on my way to meet my friend Stacey at the “Tick Tock Diner” outside the Port Authority Bus Terminal. I have to say that of all of Manhattan’s fine sights, there is no nothing worse than seeing the arse end of the Port Authority as you approach it on foot from the west.
No surprises, I devoured a mighty fine breakfast at this lovely diner which I last visited with Stacey, to my reckoning, almost thirty years ago.
“Take a jumbo across the water.
Like to see America.”
The agenda for this morning’s activities was set as soon as my return visit to New York took shape. Back in June, we wanted to drop in to the International Centre of Photography, but it was closed until 19 June. We took a subway and then spent an enjoyable ninety minutes inside its interior. It was, amazingly, very quiet. At times it felt like we were the only visitors. We are both keen photographers and so this was just right. The main exhibit was by Edward Burtynsky, who takes magnificent photographs of the many various landscapes that he visits. I loved the scale and the clarity, and the composition of many of his photos.
Sadly, and much to my annoyance, the FIFA World Club Cup kept getting in my way. It seemed that, without warning, FIFA had removed tickets in the top tier from friends’ Apps, and in doing so had caused widespread panic. My ticket, in the lower level, remained. While at the photography museum, I had to spend many a moment messaging various friends.
Meanwhile, I heard on the grapevine that either FIFA or Chelsea – or both – had been contacting US Supporters Groups to offer free – yes, free – tickets to the game on Sunday.
On the one hand, I was happy for those that had not yet been able to secure tickets.
On the other hand, I was fuming that I had forked out $358 for mine.
So, in a nutshell, it appeared that in a move to make the lower tier as full as possible, FIFA were moving people down from the top tier – but without telling them first – and were offering up free tickets too.
Fackinell.
I had arranged to meet another old friend Lynda near Ground Zero, so said my “goodbyes” to Stacey. I hadn’t seen Stacey for almost ten years and had then saw her twice in three weeks.
I first met Lynda in 2010 when she came over to Stamford Bridge for a game and we have stayed friends ever since. When Chelsea played New York Red Bulls in 2015 I stayed one night with Stacey and her husband Bill in Flemington, New Jersey and then spent two nights with Lynda and her partner Tee in River Edge, New Jersey.
The night before the game in Newark in 2015, there had been another get-together at “Legends”.
It was Tuesday afternoon – around 5pm – and we sped over the George Washington Bridge into Manhattan. Our excitement was palpable; we would soon be meeting up with many friends in a bar under the shadow of the Empire State Building, but there was an added – and wondrous – twist. Not only would former players Bobby Tambling, Mario Melchiot and Paul Canoville be making an appearance, but arrangements had been made – hush hush and all that – for Frank Lampard to make an appearance too.
What excitement.
My friend Roma, with her friend Peggy, from Tennessee arrived at about 6.30pm. Roma is a familiar figure in these Tales and has been a fantastic friend over the past twenty-six years. Roma has attended games at every one of Chelsea’s previous eight US tours (she is “one up” on me, since I missed the 2013 tour), and was doing all three of this summer’s games. However, when I calmly informed her that her hero Frank Lampard would be in the bar later in the evening, her reaction was lovely. To say she was excited would be an understatement. She almost began crying with joy. Bless her.
What a lovely time we all had. In addition to being able to reconnect with many good Chelsea friends, including the usual suspects from the UK, we were treated to an hour or so of valuable insights into the four guest’s views on various subjects. Munich often dominated the questions. Frank was very gracious and answered each question carefully and with wit and sincerity. I loved the way that he listened attentively to the other players. Near the start, the New York crowd began singing :
“We want our Frankie back, we want our Frankie back.”
Frank smiled and responded :
“I’ll be back.”
Lynda and I chatted at a restaurant next to the Hudson River for an hour or so, and it was lovely to see her again. Lynda was a keen footballer when she was younger, and I was reminded of the time when Chelsea and PSG first met in New York.
No, dear reader, it wasn’t the game on 22 July 2012 at Yankee Stadium.
Oh no.
The day before, on the Saturday, the various supporters’ groups within the US had arranged a six-a-side tournament involving supporters from across the US, but there was also, as a finale, a game between the supporters of Chelsea and Paris St. Germain.
It was one of my greatest honours to be named as the captain of the Chelsea team that day, and I include some words and pictures.
As the fans’ tournament, involving four teams of Chelsea fans from throughout the US, was coming to an end, I was as nervous as I have been for years. I had been chosen to captain the Chelsea team to play in the Friendship Cup game against Paris St. Germain.
When I had heard this news a few weeks back, I was very humbled, certainly very proud, but the over-riding feeling was of fear. I hadn’t played for two months, and I was genuinely concerned that I may pull a muscle, or jar my once troublesome right knee, or give away a penalty, or run out of gas after five minutes or just look out of my depth. This is typical of my times in various school football teams over thirty years ago when I would tend to be shackled by fear and a lack of confidence in my ability on the pitch.
Once the game began, my fears subsided, and I thoroughly enjoyed myself. We lead 3-1 at the break but soon allowed PSG to scramble some goals. At 4-4, I managed to squeeze in a goal and my heart exploded. Could we hang on? In the end, PSG went 8-6 up and my disappointment was real.
Lynda played in the Chelsea team, along with my long-time friends Steph,Pablo and Mike, too. The game was refereed by Paul Canoville and Frank Sinclair. Watching upstairs in the gallery was Ron Harris. I couldn’t help but sidle up to him after and tell him, with a twinkle in my eye, that I saw him play around fourteen times for Chelsea, but I was still waiting to see him score a goal. And yet he had seen me score for Chelsea after just twenty minutes.
Lynda, and Tee, and their two children Tori and Kai, had attended the Fluminense game on the Tuesday, but were off on a family trip to the coast at the weekend. We said our “goodbyes” and hoped to see each other in London again soon.
This was a busy day, and I caught the subway from one end of Manhattan to the other, and beyond. I was off to see the New York Yankees play the Chicago Cubs in an inter-league game in the South Bronx. Dom’s mate Terence had bought some tickets for this game and, luckily, had a spare. We were to meet, as always, at “Stan’s.”
I arrived at 4.30pm, perfect. I had arranged to meet up with Scott, Paul and Gerry and they were stood drinking at one end of the bar. The three of them had been based in Philly for the entire tournament apart from the last day or two. They were with a chap, Martin, who I had only seen for the first time on Tuesday afternoon at the Fluminense game. This surprised me since he lives in Sherborne in Dorset, just twenty-five miles away.
It was lovely to see some Chelsea faces in “Stan’s”, following on from my visit with Glenn, Steve and Mike in June.
“A “Rolling Rock” please, mate.”
Dom, Terence and three other lads arrived, and we had a grand time. Scott and Gerry became fans of baseball around ten years ago while seeing Chelsea in the US, and Scott is a Cubs fan. This was his first visit to Yankee Stadium. “Stan’s” sits right opposite where the original Yankee Stadium stood – the first version from 1923 to 1973, the second from 1976 to 2008 – and of course I regaled them with the fact that Ray Wilkins made his England debut “across the road” in 1976.
I got talking to Martin about baseball and Chelsea in equal measure. He has visited tons of baseball stadia over the past fifteen years or so. I mentioned how my love of the game has sadly diminished since around 2008.
I mentioned that the game against PSG on Sunday would be one hundredth live game of the current season, and I trotted out the numbers.
“54 Chelsea games, 42 Frome Town games, 3 games in Rio de Janeiro and 1 game at Lewes when we played Brighton in the FA Cup.”
Martin smiled and replied, “I went to that game, too.”
Fackinell.
Seeing a few Chelsea supporters in “Stan’s” took me back to that PSG game in 2012. I had stayed in Portsmouth, New Hampshire for a week, then came down to New York for the game at Yankee Stadium, meeting up with tons of good friends in the bars of Manhattan and then the stadium.
First up, “Legends.”
Despite the game against PSG not starting until 7pm, I had arrived at Legends bang on midday and awaited the arrival of friends. I soon bumped into Tom, a fellow Chelsea home-and-away season ticket holder, who was revelling in his first ever visit to the US. His comment to me struck a chord.
“This is the most surreal experience I’ve had, Chris. This pub is full of Chelsea, but I don’t know anyone.”
Of course, to Tom, this was akin to supporting Chelsea in a parallel universe. I think he was amazed at the fanaticism from these people who he didn’t personally know. For Tom, it must have been unnerving. This scenario is so different to our experiences in the UK and Europe where the close-knit nature of the Chelsea travelling support has produced hundreds of friendships. In Wigan, in Wolverhampton, in Milan, in Munich, there are faces that are known. On this afternoon in the heart of Manhattan, fans kept entering the pub, with nobody leaving. I wondered if it would collapse with the volume of people in both bars. Thanks to my previous travels to the US with Chelsea, wherever I looked, I managed to spot a few familiar faces. I was sat at the bar, chatting with Scott from DC, his brother David from Athens, Phil from Iowa, Mark from England, Andy from California, Stephen from New Orleans. The blue of Chelsea was everywhere. Down below in the basement, a gaggle of around twenty-five PSG fans were singing, but their chants were being drowned by the boisterous chants of the Chelsea fans.
It dawned on me that the Chelsea fans that I would be encountering were not just English ex-pats or not just Americans of English extraction, but Americans with ancestors from every part of the world. Just the previous week in Portsmouth NH, I had met a young lad who had seen me wearing a pair of Chelsea shorts and had declared himself a massive Chelsea fan. His birthplace? Turkey. I asked him if he was a fan of Galatasaray, of Besiktas or of Fenerbahce, but he said that Chelsea was his team. This frankly amazed me. It confirmed that Chelsea has truly gone global.
The simple truth in 2012 is that people like Tom and me, plus the loyal 5,000 who make up our core support at home and away games in the UK and Europe are in the massive minority amongst our support base. For our millions of fans worldwide, the typical scenario is just what Tom had witnessed at first hand in NYC; a pub in a foreign land, bristling with new Chelsea fans, fanatical for success.
From “Legends” in 2012 to “Stan’s” in 2025…
We left “Stan’s” and moved further north along River Avenue and into “The Dugout” bar. Time was moving on and I seemed to be the only one who was keeping an eye on the clock. First-pitch was at 7.05pm, and with a logistical precision that I would be proud, despite missing the “Star Spangled Banner”, Dom and Terence finally sorted out their QR codes and ushered us in. We arrived in our seats in the front row of the top deck just before the final out of the bottom of the first inning.
That will do for me.
I even saw the end of the famous “roll-call” from the fanatics in the Bleachers, an echo of The Shed back in the ‘seventies.
Our seats, six of us in a row, were magnificent and only around fifteen yards from where we were sat against the Angels in June.
It was lovely to be back again.
At the PSG game in 2012, we were in the lower tier.
“The hardcore of the Chelsea support – maybe 2,000 in total – were spread out along the first base side, like different battalions of confederate soldiers at Pickett’s Charge in Gettysburg, ready to storm the Yankee lines.
Down in the corner, behind home plate, were the massed ranks of Captain Mike and his neat ranks of soldiers from New York. Next in line were the battalion from Philadelphia and the small yet organised crew from Ohio. Next in line were the wild and rowdy foot soldiers of Captain Beth and the infamously named CIA company. On the far-right flank stood the massed ranks of the Connecticut Blues who were mustered under the command of Captain Steve.”
In that game, Paris St. Germain went ahead in the first but Lucas Piazon – remember him, he only appeared on foreign tours – equalised in the second half.
So, the two games in Manhattan and the Bronx in 2012 had not given us a win.
Chelsea 6 Paris St. Germain 8.
Chelsea 1 Paris. St. Germain 1.
I wondered how the third game across the river on Sunday would end up.
The baseball game played out before me, and it was a fine night to be a Yankee fan. Cody Bellinger hit three home runs as the home team walloped the Cubs 11-0. It was my sixtieth major league baseball game, my 41st Yankee game, my 32nd Yankee home game and my biggest Yankee victory.
Two-thirds of the way into the game, we walked down to the centre-field Bleachers, the very first-time that I had watched a game from the Bleachers in either Yankee Stadium.
After, we decamped to “The Dugout” and then “Stan’s” before heading back to Manhattan.
It had been a fine night in the South Bronx.
On the Saturday, after the beers of the Friday night, I succumbed to another lie-in. I met up with Dom and Terence at the nearby “Jasper’s” on 9th Avenue just as the women’s final at Wimbledon, being shown on the TV, was nearing completion. There was a bar snack and I then caught a cab to the Guggenheim Museum. Although the temperature outside wasn’t too oppressive I just couldn’t face the walk up through Central Park. This was my second ever visit to this museum, and I loved it. It’s a remarkable building, and there was the usual array of fine paintings inside.
In the evening, we reconvened at “Legends” once more, and – as to be expected – the place was packed, although surprisingly maybe not to 2012 levels. I think there are quantifiable reasons for this. The 2012 summer tour was announced in good time and gave many supporters the chance to plan and attend, unlike the knock-out format of this competition. Also, I still sensed an innate reluctance to support this “money grab” of an extra FIFA tournament from many Chelsea supporters in the US.
And I can understand that.
But here we were, in Manhattan on a Sunday night and it felt like a gathering of the clans. Outside I chatted to Lorraine and Colin from Toronto and Pete from St. Petersburg In Florida. Ex-footballer Troy Deeney was flitting about in his role for “Talk Sport” and inside I spotted a few from the UK that had just arrived including Big John, who sits in front of me in The Sleepy Hollow, and Kev from the “South Gloucestershire Lot”.
There was an insipid Q&A with Claude Makelele, but it annoyed me that there were so many people chatting that I found it difficult to hear what the great man was saying.
It was quieter when Frank held court in 2015.
After fifteen minutes of excruciatingly banal questions, I decided to go downstairs to the “Football Factory” for some respite and some beers. Here, I spent a fantastic time talking with Alex, who has so many funny stories up his considerably long sleeves, but there was also great fun seeing folk that I had not seen for ages. Most importantly of all, it seemed that everyone who needed tickets for the final, had them. Fantastic.
It’s funny, my modus operandi for the Saturday night was “don’t have too many beers, don’t want a hangover on Sunday.”
Well, I failed.
Many beers were sunk at “Legends” and I even had to time to slope off to “O’Donohue’s” near Times Square where I met up with a gaggle of lads from the UK who had arrived to join some chaps who had been out in the US for a while.
I met up with Neil, newly arrived via Rome, with Big Rich, plus Tommo, Tombsy and a few more.
At 2am, I made it home.
Sunday arrived, and I was only nursing the very slightest of hangovers. By the time I had left the apartment at 9.45am, it had disappeared. I took the subway down to meet up with Kathryn and Tim from DC, near “Macy’s” to catch the PATH train to Hoboken at 10.30am. Outside Penn Station, at the exact spot where Glenn and I had posed for photos in the drizzle in June on our first few minutes in Manhattan, I took a photo of Cole Palmer on an electronic billboard with the Empire State Building in the background.
What an image.
It wasn’t like this in 1989 when I only met one other Chelsea fan in almost ten months in North America.
I could hardly believe it all.
The plan was to get over to “Mulligan’s” again for a brief pre-match gargle and then heading out to the parking lots that surround MetLife to meet up with the New York Blues for a tailgate.
Delays with the trains meant that we only arrived at “Mulligan’s” at around 11.30am. But the usual crowd were inside again, and it was excellent to bump into Kristen and Andrew from Columbus, Ohio, and Adam from Texas, but also Ian, Kevin – who sits a few feet away from me in “The Sleepy” – and Becky, who had experienced a nightmare trip out via Istanbul.
Dom and Terence were with Alon at the bar, everyone together. With a couple of “Peronis” inside me, I was buoyed, and a bit more confident about the game. I was able to relax when the QR code for the game suddenly appeared on the FIFA App.
We needed to get moving, so Kathryn ordered a large uber to take Kristen, Andrew, Tim, herself and myself over to the stadium. As we tried to enter a main road, a police car blocked our entrance, and we waited for ages as the traffic on the main road cleared and a cavalcade of cars drove ahead of a coach carrying the Paris St. Germain team. I cannot confirm nor deny if there were any requisite hand signals aimed towards the passengers in the coach.
We were dropped off near Parking Lot D at around 1pm; just right. I spent just over an hour here, drinking with some friends from all over the north-east of the US. It was a pleasure to see Sid and Danny from Connecticut, Tim from Philly and Steve from Staten Island especially. The weather was hot, but the beers were cold. It was a perfect mix. There wasn’t much talk about the game. Deep down, I was still concerned about us getting hammered. The New York Blues had provided a great array of beers and food. I gulped down a hot dog; just enough to stave off hunger pains, my only food so far during the day.
The younger element was getting involved with some singing, but I left them to it. My days as a willing cheerleader on these occasions are in the past now.
With about three-quarters of an hour to go before the 3pm kick-off, I made my way towards the stadium. We heard the buzz of three helicopters circling overhead, and with news that the President of the United States was to attend the game, many match-goers looked towards the heavens. I cannot confirm nor deny if there were any requisite hand signals aimed towards the passengers of the helicopters.
I was making good time, and I knew exactly where to aim for; the Chelsea end was now at the northern end of the stadium, opposite from Tuesday.
The security check and the QR scan was easy. I was in.
I spotted my mate Callum with a few of his mates from London, and I took a photo of them with their St. George’s flag. They had come over for the final, though Callum was at the two Philly games too.
Time was moving on, but I wasn’t rushed. This was just right. I got to my seat location at around 2.40pm. I was in a great location, around half-way back in the lower tier, just to the right of the goal frames. There were clouds overhead, and it didn’t feel too uncomfortable.
Then, what a small world…I suddenly realised that Rich, the guy that I had lambasted at the Manchester City game at Yankee Stadium in 2013, was stood right in front of me. I tapped him on the shoulder, and we virtually collapsed with laughter. I was in front of him in 2013, he was now in front of me in 2025.
Fackinell.
Pretty soon, the pre-match kicked in. First up, a set of musicians – dressed in the gold and black of the tournament – and mainly drummers as far as I could tell, and yellow plumes of smoke. Were they a college marching band? I immediately entertained memories of the “Marching Mizou”, from the University of Missouri, who were also dressed in gold and black, at Stamford Bridge against Derby County in 1975.
Next, a singer appeared out of nowhere, gold lamé suit, silver hair.
I turned to the two local lads to my right.
“Who’s that prick?”
“Robbie Williams.”
“Bloody hell, I was right.”
I had fleeting images of seeing him at Stamford Bridge in 1995, and his album cover that featured the Matthew Harding Stand that came out a few years after.
The boy from Burslem belted out a song that I had not heard before.
“Aim high, fly by, destiny’s in front of you. It’s a beautiful game and the dream is coming true.”
One of the lads to my right, both dressed in Chelsea paraphernalia, asked me for my prediction, and I had to be honest. I looked him in the eye and said “we’ll lose 0-2.”
This obviously took him back, and I said what I needed to say. We chatted a little about his Chelsea story and he said that the memorable 3-2 at Goodison in 2006, all three goals being belters, was a key moment in him becoming Chelsea.
By now, my senses were being pummelled visually and audibly. Not only was the sky full of plumes of smoke, but the PA guy was booming out over the speakers. This idiot wasn’t just talking loudly either; he was shouting, and the PA was turned up to eleven.
“Let’s see who are the loudest fans!!!”
I turned to the bloke to the right.
“None of us are as loud as you, you prick.”
It was all too much. The noise was deafening.
Next up, the American national anthem was played out and there were immediate boos. The natives squinted over to the left to see if they could see the president.
Awesome.
With all this hullabaloo, it was somewhat difficult to come to terms with what I was part of here. I looked around and it seemed that the stadium was virtually sold out. There was a knot of PSG fans grouped together in the lower tier opposite, though it was later pointed out to me by Callum that their ultras had been forced to evacuate their prime seats behind the goal by some law enforcement agents.
Things were happening so quickly now. The players walked on to the pitch, and were introduced one-by-one, how crap.
Our team surely picked itself.
Sanchez
Gusto – Colwill – Chalobah – Cucurella
James – Caicedo
Pedro Neto – Enzo – Palmer
Joao Pedro
At last, Chelsea in blue, the first time for me in this competition. The Paris kit, all white, included an image of the Eiffel Tower.
I turned around and spotted Karen and Feisal, whose wedding I photographed back in 2021, just a few yards away. They looked confident. I wasn’t so sure.
Next, Michael Buffer and his ridiculous “Let’s Get Ready To Rumble” bollocks. He had appeared at Stamford Bridge a few years back, and I was impressed then as I was now.
Next, a countdown to the kick-off.
I snapped as Enzo played the ball back to a teammate and the FIFA Club World Cup Final 2025 began.
It was surreal, it was mad, it was preposterous. Thirty-two teams had entered this inaugural expanded competition, and I bet hardly any Chelsea supporters expected us to get to the final. Yet here we bloody were.
And you know what, we began incredibly well. We seemed to be first to the loose ball, fitter and faster than the lauded opposition, and soon started to construct fine moves that stretched PSG in all areas of the pitch.
After five minutes, it was virtually all us, and I was so happy. Moises Caicedo took my eye at first, robbing players of the ball, and moving it on intelligently. But very soon it was obvious that Cole Palmer, being afforded more space than usual, was “on it” and the Chelsea supporters all around me sensed this.
After just seven minutes, a lovely passage of play featuring a few players moving the ball down our left resulted in Joao Pedro setting up Palmer right on the penalty box line. His shot was clean, curving slightly, and only just missed the left-hand post. Many thought it was in.
“A sighter” I chirped.
The guy to my right was still asking if I thought it would be a 0-2 defeat, and I smiled.
With Pedro Neto running back to provide valuable cover for Marc Cucurella, with Enzo Fernandez probing away with neat passes, and with Caicedo taking on the role of enforcer with aplomb, we were on top.
But PSG threatened on a couple of occasions. There was a great block from Cucurella, and a great save from Sanchez.
After a quarter of an hour, I leaned forward and spoke to Rich.
“Great game of football.”
On twenty-two minutes, a sublime kick out from Sanchez was aimed at Malo Gusto. The tracking defender Nuno Mendes was confused by the proximity of Gusto and took his eyes off the flight of the ball. With a degree of luck, the ball bounced on his head but released the raiding Gusto. He travelled into the box and set himself to shoot by coming inside. The shot was blocked, but Gusto received it back and calmly played it into the vacant Palmer. He seemed to immediately relax, and stroked the ball in, past the dive of Gianluigi Donnarumma.
The Chelsea section went wild.
There were bodies being pushed all around me and I lost myself.
I screamed.
I shouted.
I yelled.
“FUCKING GET IN YOU BASTARD.”
Bloody hell mother, we were 1-0 up.
Fackinell.
Rich’s face was a picture.
It seemed that I was indeed right about Palmer’s “sighter” a quarter of an hour earlier.
It was all Chelsea now, and PSG looked tired. Was our extra day of rest really that important?
During a break in play, I popped over to say hello to a gaggle of lads from England to my right. None of us could believe what we were witnessing.
We continued to impress. Many attacks came down the right, with Gusto in fine form. On the half-hour mark, a long pass out of defence from Levi Colwill – how unlike us, maybe Enzo Maresca has been reading my notes – released Palmer. He took the ball under his control with ease and advanced, sliding in from an inside-right channel, across the box, using the dummy run from Joao Pedro as a distraction, sending two defenders the wrong way, moving into a central position, then there was one extra touch. At that exact moment, I just knew that this extra touch had bamboozled Donnarumma’s timings. I just knew that he would score. From virtually the same place as eight minutes earlier, he rolled the ball in.
YES.
We were two up.
This time there were double fist pumps – downwards – from me as I stood bewildered amongst the exultant throng, very much aware that others were losing it.
This was mad.
The rest of that first-half was a blur. Chelsea were bossing it, and the world was a beautiful place. There were honest shouts of “Come On Chelsea” permeating throughout our section and I even forgave the locals for yelling that loathsome “Let’s Go Chelsea, Let’s Go” nonsense.
Additionally, I realised that I now loved the way that the word “wanker” has permeated into US football culture.
We weren’t finished yet.
On forty-three minutes, we watched as a pass out of defence from Trevoh Chalobah found Palmer, ten yards inside his own half but ridiculously unmarked. I brought my camera up and watched him advance. Just outside the box, he split the space between two ball-watching defenders and passed to Joao Pedro who had made the finest of runs behind. As our new forward clipped the ball over the Paris ‘keeper, I snapped. I saw the ball clear Donnarumma and caress the netting.
Good God.
I simply stood still, silent, my arms outstretched, pointing heavenly, like some sort of homage to Cristo Redentor.
We were three-up.
I had this thought. Didn’t everyone?
“They can’t catch us now.”
At half-time, I contacted my mate Jaro who was watching with his whole family a few sections along. He came over to see me and we could hardly talk to each other.
This was unbelievable.
Up above us, on a stage so ridiculously high, a few acts sang, and the half-time show was rounded off by Coldplay.
“Cause you’re a sky, cause you’re a sky full of stars.”
I was more pleased to see Jaro than I was Chris Martin.
But with the sky above the MetLife, now clear of clouds, filled with fireworks and smoke, this only exaggerated the sense of incredulity in my eyes, and I am sure others too.
That first-half, let’s not kid ourselves here, was up there with the very best I have ever seen us play. It had everything.
I am shuddering now just at the memory of that moment.
I always talk about the first half when we beat Everton 5-0 in 2016 as being sensational, but Everton are no PSG. I remember the first-half against Barcelona in 2000. I remember other games, too many, perhaps, to list.
But at the MetLife on Sunday 13 July 2025, was that first-half the best?
I think it has to be.
The break lasted forever or seemed to. I think someone timed it as twenty-five minutes. That’s not football. It’s wrong for players to be kept waiting. Muscles tighten. Injuries are more likely. Stop that shite, FIFA.
But what a twenty-five minutes, though. If only all half-time breaks could be as joyful.
And I was convinced there would be no Chelsea Piers 2012-style second-half recovery from this PSG team either.
Not surprisingly, PSG started on the front foot in the initial moments of the second half. On fifty-one minutes, they worked the ball through, and a low cross was poked goalwards by Ousmane Dembele, but Sanchez reacted magnificently well to push the ball around his far post.
“Strong wrists there, Rich.”
Sanchez saved again, and although PSG enjoyed more of the ball, we were able to keep calm and limit them to few chances.
Off the pitch, I liked the noise that we were making in the stands. PSG, by contrast, over the course of the whole game, had made least noise compared to Flamengo, Tunis and Fluminense.
On sixty-one minutes, Andrey Santos replaced a tiring Enzo.
On sixty-eight minutes, Liam Delap replaced Joao Pedro.
Very soon after coming on, Delap was set free by Santos and advanced forcefully. At one stage he seemed to be running right at me. He did everything right, moving his defenders, and unleashed a cracking shot that really deserved a goal, only for Donnarumma to pull off a fine save to his left. The same player then cut in from wide but was unable to finish.
On seventy-eight minutes, two more changes.
Keirnan Dewsbury-Hall for James.
Christopher Nkunku for Pedro Neto.
I didn’t see the incident on eighty-three minutes, but Cucurella hit the deck, clutching his head. VAR was called in to action and Joao Neves had pulled Cucurella’s curly locks.
A red card was issued.
In the closing moments, we all loved Cole Palmer taking the piss in the corner away to our left in front of the Chelsea support. If Palmer was – quite rightly – the man of the match, we all soon agreed that Robert Sanchez, enjoying the game of his life, was next best.
As the clock ticked down, we all relaxed a little and began celebrating.
The gate was announced as 81,118.
And that, dear reader, was just about it.
At the final whistle, a shout of relief.
Then, with the players in blue running towards us and celebrating, “Blue Is The Colour” rang out and I almost lost it. My bottom lip was going at one stage.
“Pull yourself together, Chris, mate.”
I recorded this moment on my phone and have shared it here.
“Cus Chelsea, Chelsea is our name.”
I am not a fan of the ubiquitous use of “Freed From Desire” at virtually all football stadia these days and I am glad we no longer play it at Chelsea at the conclusion of our games but I did love the way that the players, Enzo especially, were cavorting at the end while the supporters were singing along to it.
“Na-na-na-na-na-na-na, na-na-na, na-na”
Fackinell.
On a very surreal day, things became odder still. As we all know, the President of the United States took a greater role in the presentation of medals and the trophy than anyone could have expected.
I’ll leave it there.
I loved the way that Reece James was able to lift the golden trophy to the heavens a second time, and not long after my bottom lip started behaving even more embarrassingly.
But these were joyous times.
I kept thinking to myself.
“32 teams.”
“32 teams and we fucking won it.”
And I thought back to my comment to Glenn in Philadelphia when Pedro Neto put us 1-0 up against Flamengo :
“Back in England, there are fans of other teams saying ‘fucking hell, Chelsea are going to win this too’…”
When I left the stadium, a good hour after the end of the game, I was alone, and very tired, and very dazed. I honestly could not believe what I had just witnessed. Originally, I had this notion of getting back to Hoboken and taking an evening ferry across the Hudson, with the setting sun reflecting off the skyscrapers of Manhattan. It would be a fitting climax to my one hundred games season; the World Cup metaphorically placed in my back pocket.
But I was so tired and just wanted to rest. My feet were on fire, after standing for hours. I made my way towards the lines for trains and coaches to take us free of charge back to Secaucus Junction.
In the line, I saw a very familiar face. Allie is from Reading, and I see him everywhere with Chelsea. He had the intention of attending some group phase games but decided against it. Imagine my joy when we clocked each other.
“Can’t miss a final, Chris.”
We stopped for the inevitable photo.
I took the bus to Secaucus, and I was just happy to sit for twenty minutes and take the weight off my feet.
I took the train back to Penn Station, and I snapped a photo of the Chelsea players celebrating the win on the same billboard that had depicted Cole Palmer in the morning. Now, Reece James’ celebratory roar beamed out beneath the New York skyline.
Those photos provide nice bookends to the day.
I ended up having some food, all alone, near Penn Station, and I just wanted to get back to the apartment. I was so tired that I didn’t even think to call in at “Legends” to see if anyone was around. I had heard that the Empire State Building was to be illuminated in blue in honour of Chelsea Football Club, 2025 World Champions, but this magical moment was to take place from 10pm until 11pm.
And I took a cab home at 9.15pm.
Although I was truly knackered, it saddens me that I just couldn’t hang on for one final hour and one final photograph.
Seeing the Empire State Building illuminated in Chelsea blue would have been a magical moment and a killer photograph, the perfect ending to a monumental season.
Sigh.
However, should we qualify for the next World Cup in 2029, which is expected to take place in Rio de Janeiro – where my longest ever season began last July – I wonder if Christ the Redeemer will be illuminated in royal blue after the final.
Because we never win these trophies just once, do we?
Had Frome Town needed points against AFC Totton for survival in Step Three of the non-league pyramid, there was a chance that I would be missing this Chelsea match. However, my hometown team’s presence in the Southern League Premier South was extinguished on Easter Saturday after the briefest of one season stays and so I was not required to make that heart-wrenching decision.
Chelsea won again.
It was a phrase that I hoped to be reporting after the game.
What of this day, then?
We didn’t really appreciate the 12.30pm kick-off as it would mean that the pre-match would be ridiculously squeezed into a ninety-minute period before 11.30am. Everton, revitalised under the returning David Moyes, would prove a difficult nut to crack, but after a little run of four unbeaten games, there was hope that Chelsea would prevail. Suddenly, a top five or six or seven finish was looking likely, despite my recent protestation of us finishing eighth.
I was up at 5.45am. I always aim to get to PD’s house in Frome bang on 7am and I am annoyed if I am even a minute late. I left my house at 6.43am. I still had to fuel up, but I shot over to Nunney Catch to do so and pulled up at his house in Frome at 6.59am.
Result.
After the game, the instruction from PD was to get him back to Frome as soon as possible so he could then drive down to a night of merriment in Burnham-on-Sea where he owns a static caravan.
“Should be back by 6pm, mate.”
To get to London as soon as possible, we ate our McBreakfast on the hoof to save precious minutes. We noted heavier-than-usual traffic going into the city at 9am. This was a very busy weekend in the capital; not only were Chelsea at home, but both FA Cup semi-finals were scheduled, the Eubank vs. Benn fight was taking place at Tottenham on Saturday night and the London Marathon was on the Sunday. However, I dropped the lads off on the Fulham High Street at around 9.45am. So far, so good.
I drove up from Fulham into Hammersmith and parked on Charleville Road once again, and then quickly walked to West Kensington to catch a tube down to Putney Bridge. I walked into “The Eight Bells” at 10.25am, aware that I had probably lost my usual seat at the table with Salisbury Steve, Lord Parky, P-Diddy and Jimmy the Greek.
Not to worry. I walked over to chat to two lads who I had invited along to the packed pub for their first-ever Chelsea pre-match. I have known Philip, from Baltimore, as a Chelsea mate on Facebook for a few years, and he was perched at a high table with his good friend Douglas. We chatted for the best part of an hour about all things Chelsea first and foremost, all things Baltimore, all things Philadelphia – ahead of the two games in June – and all things sport. We have a few mutual friends and so that is always nice.
The two lads loved the cosy intimacy of the pub, and we were able to regale each other of our Chelsea stories.
Phil became a Chelsea supporter right after the 1997 FA Cup Final triumph, and this resonated with me since I became hooked while at my village school around the time of the 1970 FA Cup win. I told them of how my fanaticism at an early age was remarkably intense. I told the story of me, at the age of five or six, receiving a Liverpool duffel bag from my paternal grandfather and being mortified that he had not realised my Chelsea fascination. I remember the annoyance of both parents too. Phil had a ticket for the Shed Lower during the 2019/20 season but never attended because of COVID. This would be his second Chelsea game in London, however, after the Palace semi-final in 2023. This was a game that I, ironically, did not attend as I was not allowed in with my SLR camera.
Douglas was out in Ghana in around 2006 when he became fascinated with that area’s love of Chelsea, via Michael Essien, his favourite Chelsea player, and so he soon chose us as his club. This would be his first-ever Chelsea game in the UK, though he might have seen us play a game in the US.
It was horrible to hear that both had to resort to expensive tickets in West View instead of watching their first-ever Chelsea games at HQ in the more traditional strongholds of the MHL or The Shed.
It seemed that there were coincidences throughout our chit-chat. Phil and I found out that we follow the same NHL team, the Vancouver Canucks (me very loosely), and that Douglas and I share the same birthday.
However, despite the three of us getting along so well, I did warn them.
“If we lose today, you’re not fucking coming back.”
They set off early, and then the rest of us headed up to Stamford Bridge around twenty minutes later.
I stood at the CFCUK stall for a few moments with a few acquaintances, good loyal and friendly Chelsea supporters all, as Kerry Dixon walked by. He wasn’t feeling too bright so was off home after a little spell with the hospitality team. He spotted a few faces and approached us.
“Ah, this is the hierarchy, is it?”
“More like the lowerarchy, Kerry” I replied.
With that, I took a few photos of the bustling scene outside the ground, hid my SLR, and entered via my usual “lucky turnstile.”
I was in at just gone midday.
On this occasion, Alan was up in Barrow following his Bromley in their last away game of this successful first season in the Football League. He had sold his ticket on the exchange to a lad from Latvia, proudly wearing a Chelsea trackie-top, and his sister was momentarily in my seat. Her ticket was towards the top of the stand. We moved things around and Clive took the spare seat in front so they could sit together. I sat next to PD who was eventually in Alan’s seat.
PD was the spectator-equivalent of an inverted full-back.
Rob told me that he was off to see Walton & Hersham directly after our game, another “double-header” successfully navigated. His team are, of course, in the Southern League Premier South, just like Frome for this season.
It was another cracking day in London. I looked over at the three-thousand Everton fans and wondered if this visit would end up following a well-worn pattern.
Everton’s last league win at Stamford Bridge was on 26 November 1994.
Should we win, again, today, it would be the thirtieth consecutive year of being unbeaten against them.
“No pressure, Chelsea.”
The teams entered the pitch.
No flames but flags in The Shed.
Us?
Sanchez
Caicedo – Chalobah – Colwill – Cucurella
Lavia – Fenandez
Neto – Palmer – Madueke
Jackson
I posted on Facebook : “I’m playing right-back next week.”
The game began and I wondered where on earth the inspiration for Everton’s horrible dark grey and yellow kit originated.
Right then, we attacked The Shed.
In possession, we became a back three of Cucurella, Colwill and Our Trev moving over to the right, with Moises Caicedo joining up with Enzo and Lavia in the middle, and God Help Everton.
Joking apart, we began well and apart from an Everton free kick in the first few minutes it was all Chelsea for the first twenty minutes. Apart from a noisy flurry at the start from Everton, their support soon quietened down and they hardly sung a note.
On nine minute, a great early ball from Levi Colwill found Cole Palmer in an advanced role but he could not direct a shot on goal. I love us mixing it up occasionally, to keep the opposing defence on their toes. Pedro Neto was staying wide, and I loved it. On thirteen minutes, a positive run from Noni Madueke into a good position but Jordan Pickford was able to save at full stretch, the ball tipped around the far post.
The noise from both sets of fans had quietened by now.
We dominated possession and tried to open up the Everton defence. Virtually all their grey-shirted players were behind the ball, and space was a premium. I wondered if we were in for another hour or so of tedious chess play.
On twenty-five minutes, a free kick from the right and Pickford flapped and the clearance was poor but Marc Cucurella’s bouncing effort went just wide.
On twenty-seven minutes, Everton tried to build a rare attack, but a through ball aimed at Beto was intercepted well by Our Trev who pushed the ball to Enzo. He spotted the unmarked Jackson, left up field after an attack, and in space. The striker received the ball, turned, and with nobody coming to close him down, drilled a low shot into the goal. The dive from Pickford was in vain. To my joy, I was right behind the shot. I saw it all.
It really was a stunningly simple goal, but very well executed by the often-abused Jackson.
He ran off to celebrate and the Stamford Bridge crowd purred their approval.
Alan, in Barrow : “THTCAUN.”
Chris, in The Sleepy Hollow : “COMLD.”
And all was well with the world.
The game returned to its normal pattern, but I commented to Paul that “we have played worse than this during the season.”
It was decent stuff. Noni and Neto were causing Everton some concerns out wide, Enzo was aggressive and involved, while the returning Romeo Lavia was at his understated best, a modern day Johnny B. Cucurella was as playing to his usual high standards and Caicedo was Caicedo, probably my player of the year. However, Palmer seemed to be struggling.
I said to Paul that if someone, new to our team and watching for the first time, was told that one of our players was being heralded as one of the best young players in the world before Christmas, not many would guess it was our number twenty.
In injury-time, a header that ended up going ridiculously wide seemed like Everton’s first attack in ages, maybe since 1994.
At the break, I remembered two fantastic moments.
Firstly, the Everton player Iliman Ndiaye bamboozled his markers with incredible fleet-footed skill. The ball was touched quickly between feet, down near the touchline in front of the West Stand, and it was an impressive a piece of skullduggery that I have seen for a while.
Secondly, not so far away from that part of the pitch, the ball was played quickly out of defence to Pedro Neto and he had the defender at his mercy. He was running at pace; the defender was back-peddling and was completely unsure which way Neto would push the ball. As a former right winger, I really appreciated that moment. Neto had the defender just where he wanted him with acres of space to run into. He tapped the ball a few times, just to prolong the agony. A quick shimmy one way, the ball went the other, and it was just like me against Gary Witcombe in a house football match in early 1978 all over again.
Bliss.
At half-time, my good friend Pete – from London, then San Francisco, now Seattle, I met him in Los Angeles in 2007 – came down for a few words and we made plans to see each other in Philly in June.
The game re-started.
What looked like a rotten corner from Neto on the far side, was rescued by Madueke at the near post and he almost turned and screwed a shot in, but Pickford saved with his feet.
On fifty-three minutes, a poorly executed back pass to Pickford saw Jackson one on one but Pickford was just able to clear in time. Just after, a fine Madueke cross into the danger area, but no Chelsea player was close enough to apply the coup de grace. Then just after this, Chalobah glanced a header just wide.
On fifty-three minutes, it was time for the much-maligned Robert Sanchez to shine. Beto was played in after an errant pass out of defence by Colewill. The Everton striker shot low from an angle but, thankfully, Sanchez dropped low to his right and kept it out at full stretch.
On sixty-seven minutes, Reece James replaced Lavia.
On sixty-six minutes, Reece to right back, Moises to the base of the midfield.
Once we had the ball, “budge up.”
A shot from Idrissa Gueye was straight at Sanchez. From his throw out, Caicedo ran strong and long at the defence, with defenders snapping at his heels, but his shot was wide. From the resulting corner, Cucurella forced a save from Pickford, the ‘keeper reaching up to gather.
On seventy-seven minutes, Madueke went down after a coming together of bodies, and we all thought he was play-acting. He was motionless for a while but then returned to the action. Then, within seconds, he was running at pace at the Everton defence and forced Pickford to make another fine, sprawling save.
Pickford had to save again moments later, this time keeping out Cucurella’s header from the resulting corner.
Everton’s support was roused by an upturn in their play, and we could hear them again. To be truthful, Stamford Bridge wasn’t noisy at all during this lunch-time game. During this second-half, we seemed to be a lot more sloppy, and made a few silly errors. We begged for a calming second goal.
Jackson thought he that had scored but it was chalked off for offside by VAR, no complaints.
On seventy-eight minutes, Jadon Sancho replaced Madueke on the left.
On eighty-six minutes, another fantastic save as Everton went close with a volleyed, side-footed effort from Dwight McNeil.
Two late substitutions.
Keirnan Dewsbury-Hall for Palmer.
Tyrique George for Jackson.
There was another fine save from Sanchez from Youssef Chermiti in the closing moments.
One last free kick from Everton, a strong leap from Reece James, the ball was headed away, and that was that.
Chelsea won again.
“It’s a bloody good job they haven’t got a striker…”
There was heavy traffic as I headed up the North End Road and made my way home. All eyes were on the clock.
Returning home, I was to learn some fantastic news regarding two Chelsea mates.
Ian, who often drinks in The Eight Bells, was at Brackley Town for the day and saw his team beat Kidderminster Harriers 5-0 to gain promotion to the National League, the much-vaunted Step One. Like me, he had a tough decision – Brackley or Chelsea – but was rewarded.
Leggo, my mate from 1984/85, was at Bedford Town and saw his home team win 2-0 against Stourbridge and gain promotion from the Southern League Central to the National League South. It is worth noting that both Bedford and Frome were promoted from Step 4 last season and while Frome have sadly returned, Bedford have moved on. It’s an incredible story. Also, the club survived a belittling take-over bid from the moneyed, yet uncredible, Real Bedford in the past week or so.
Elsewhere, Rob’s Walton & Hersham beat Swindon Supermarine 4-1, and as for Frome Town, we lost 0-4.
To complete my review of the non-league scene, I have something a lot more local.
While Frome Town lost 1-0 to Weston-super-Mare in the final of the Somerset Premier Cup, my village team Mells & Vobster United won the Somerset Junior Cup Final against fierce local rivals Coleford Athletic 3-1 during the week.
This was a painful match to watch, and this is going to be a painful edition to write.
As is so often the case, the football managed to get in the way of an otherwise enjoyable day out.
Clear driving, perfect timings, fine weather, blue skies, good company, contrasting landscapes, interesting new pubs, friendly locals.
But also football.
Fackinell.
This would be my fifty-fifth Chelsea versus Manchester City game in all competitions and at all venues. It would be my twentieth visit to the Etihad. In the previous nineteen, we had won just five.
2003/04
2007/08
2008/09
2013/14
2016/17
The preparations for this trip north had been set in stone for a while. Normally for games in Manchester, we stop at the Tabley interchange on the M6 and enjoy some food and drinks at “The Windmill”. We visit so regularly that the landlady recognises us. However, I realised that this pre-match routine wasn’t particularly lucky for us. In fact, I can never remember us winning at either City nor United since this has been our Manchester pre-game plan. I decided we needed a change.
Rather than a pre-match spent to the south-west of the city, I decided to flip things one-hundred and eighty degrees, and head up to the moors overlooking the empire of Mancunia to the north-east of the city centre.
I explained my plans to PD and Parky, and there were no complaints.
I collected PD at 8.30am and PD at 9am. The idea was to arrive at the first of a little string of three or four pubs to the northeast of Oldham at around 1pm and to stay until 4pm before setting off for the game.
Soon on our way, PD asked me of my thoughts about the evening’s match.
I grimaced as I replied “I think we can get something today, maybe even a win.”
After all, simply put, City had not been City in the past few months. The collapse in Paris on Wednesday, I hoped, had unsettled them further.
The skies were clear, clear blue, as we headed north. We stopped for a very quick breakfast at Strensham on the M5. Our next stop was at Keele on the M6. For the last hour, New Order’s “Music Complete” accompanied us as I drove on. It got me, at least, in the mood for a few hours in Manchester.
We swept over the Thelwall Viaduct. Winter Hill, just to the north of Bolton, just a few miles north of where we won the league almost twenty years ago, was clearly visible. I curled around onto the M62 and then hit the M60 orbital. Then back onto the M62 again as we rose higher and higher. The skies were still magnificently clear. One view in particular was stunning; a wide and vast panorama of moorland, valleys, industrial heritage, rooftops.
Then, at last, a southern spur on the A672 took me to our first stop, the Rams Head pub on Ripponden Road.
We arrived at 1.15pm. A cold wind howled around me as I took a few photos of the rugged and wild moors that surrounded the pub. We settled in for the best part of an hour and befriended a local couple who had popped in for a pint or two. I was in for a shock. They informed me that pub was actually in Yorkshire, and the Lancashire border was a few miles away, but we would pass that important line soon. The log fire roared next to us. What a cosy place on top of such a wind-blown summit.
This area – Saddleworth Moor – is of course tainted with the horrific events of the mid ‘sixties and the atrocious acts of Ian Brady and Myra Hindley.
“Over the moor, take me to the moor.
Dig a shallow grave and I’ll lay me down.
Over the moor, take me to the moor.
Dig a shallow grave and I’ll lay me down.
Lesley-Ann and your pretty white beads.
Oh John you’ll never be a man.
And you’ll never see your home again.
Oh Manchester, so much to answer for.”
Not only the bitter wind chilled me to the bone.
We drove a couple of miles south-west to the next pub, The Printers, and were again welcomed with open arms by the staff. We squeezed in at a table next to a roaring fire. The beers were cheap, the pub was warming. The landlady gave us each a hug as we left and hoped we won. She was United. I had explained the need for us to break the ill-luck of visiting “The Windmill” at Tabley, and optimistically said “see you next season.”
At 3pm, we ventured further south and entered the final stop of this pre-game pub crawl, The Kings Arms. This overlooked yet more naked moorland and was a very busy hostelry. A City fan at the next table chatted for a while. Above the bar was a wooden beam that signalled the exact boundary between Yorkshire and Lancashire. The toilets were in Yorkshire.
At 4pm, we headed off to the game. From a geographical perspective, the Ripponden Road, the A672, resembled a long straight ski jump that would eventually send us hurtling into the heart of Manchester.
We were sent right through the middle of Oldham. PD remembers being in digs in Oldham while working with one of Frome’s many road gangs. But none of us had ever watched a game at Boundary Park, home of the town’s team Oldham Athletic.
The football scene in the Manchester conurbation has changed somewhat in recent years. Oldham Athletic and Rochdale are now one level below the Football League in the National League, while Bury are playing in the lowly North West Counties League, two levels below Frome Town. Going the other way, Salford are now in League Two while Stockport County are now back in League One after playing as low as the National League South in 2013/14, just one division higher than Frome Town.
Ah, Frome Town. On this day, I solemnly wished that I could be in two places at the same time. While I was two hundred miles north of Frome in Manchester, my home-town team were playing fancied Gloucester City in our first home game in more than three weeks. At half-time, I learned that it was 0-0.
My route took me from Oldham on the A62 and through Failsworth and close to United’s original home in Newton Heath. I made it to the Etihad where PD and Parky made a quick exit at a red light outside the away end. I was parked up at my usual place near The Grove pub – it memorably smelled of bleach in May 2023 – at 4.50pm.
That, I think everyone will agree, was perfect timing.
Once parked, I quickly checked the score at Badgers Hill.
Frome Town 0 Gloucester City 0.
I was happy with that.
I donned my warm Moncler jacket and slapped my black Frome Town baseball cap on my bonce and walked off in the cold along Ashton New Road to the waiting stadium.
I was inside the middle tier – block 214, three seats from the City fans, get ready for some tiresome banter – at 5.15pm.
My first-ever visit to Manchester took place in October 1984 when I visited a mate from Frome who had just started a course at Manchester Poly, and I briefly described this earlier this season. On that day, City played a Second Division home game against Oxford United in front of a very creditable 24,755 and won 1-0. I remember trying to spot the Maine Road floodlights as we travelled into town on the train. I was undoubtedly on the lookout, too, for the subtle differences between London and Manchester casual trends as we darted around the city centre. I definitely remembering spotting flared cords, flared jeans, and the seminal “Hurley’s” shop near Piccadilly.
Incidentally, just for the record :
City’s home average that season in Division Two was 24,206.
Chelsea’s average that season in Division One was 23,065.
My diary from that day mentioned us visiting a city centre pub called “The Salisbury” – I have the very feintest memory – but I have since decided that I would love to go back, as it looks an absolutely cracking boozer, right under the train tracks near Oxford Road station. Maybe next season.
Back to 2025, and I was inside just in time to see some white smoke drifting up from in front of the stand to our right. There had obviously been some sort of pre-match fanfare. The City team was being shown on the TV screens.
Us?
Sanchez
James – Colwill – Chalobah – Cucurella
Caicedo – Enzo
Madueke – Palmer – Sancho
Jackson
There was time for a little Manchester-themed music. Typically, this featured Oasis, but also James, who I had not knowingly remembered being featured at City before. I wondered if there was a yearly meeting in a city centre hotel featuring the media team of Manchester’s two main clubs, and an NFL-style draft of the coming season’s playlists.
United : “Well, you can have Oasis, as per. And the High Flying Birds.”
City. “Mint. You can have Stone Roses. It’s our turn for The Smiths this season, Marr is more a blue than Moz is a red anyway.”
United : “OK, We’ll have New Order.”
City : “Oh, that’s hard to take. OK. We’ll have James.”
United : “Deal. Buzzcocks.”
City : “No worries. The Fall for us.”
United : “Magazine.”
City : “Duritti Column.”
United : “Happy Mondays.”
City : “Given. Inspiral Carpets.”
United : “Hollies.”
City : “Thought Russell Watson was more your style.”
What an over-the-top pre-match show. The stadium lights dimmed, flashing spotlights zoomed around the stands. I found it all too much. What will this shite be like in twenty years’ time for God’s sake?
The real City are Levenshulme, not Las Vegas.
There was an odd operatic-version of “Blue Moon.”
Oh boy.
It wasn’t like this in Moss Side in 1984/85 I am sure.
Then, a mood change.
A clanging mood change.
The images of three City players who have recently passed away were shown on the screens.
Bobby Kennedy
Denis Law
Tony Book
The last man, the player then manager Book, was described in revered tones and a nice banner was draped from a top balcony. The announcer called him “Stick” which was new to me. In Frome, two-and-a-half hours earlier, there had been a minute’s silence in memory of the same man.
I remembered the lovely and respectful way that City remembered Gianluca Vialli two seasons ago.
Despite the awful kick-off time, the three-thousand Chelsea fans were in. There was hardly an empty seat anywhere. My mate David, the freelance photographer, was spotted in a pit in front of the away fans.
Both teams in blue, the game began.
And how.
There was an early City attack on the goal down below us, but on two minutes, it was Nicolas Jackson causing problems in the City half. There was rather rustic clearance from Trevoh Chalobah and Jackson chased the high ball, putting pressure on the new City defender Abdukodir Khusanov. His headed pass back to Ederson did not have the legs, and Jackson picked up the ball and flicked it to his right where Noni Madueke was level with his run. There was a simple tap in.
The Chelsea away contingent, in three tiers, erupted, and Madueke raced away and slid to his knees in front of the disconsolate City support.
After my head stopped spinning, I did my best to capture the moment.
Ci’eh 0 Chowlsea 1.
Blimey.
However, I suspect that I wasn’t the only person thinking “we’ve scored too soon, here.”
After the tap in against Wolves, Madueke will not score two easier back-to-back goals in his career. We continued our bright start and there was a free-kick from Reece James. On nine minutes, Cole Palmer was put through into acres of space after excellent play by Chalobah. He raced on, but just as we were expecting a trademark ice-cold finish from his wand of a left foot, he remarkably played the ball to Jackson. Critically, this pass was overhit and Jackson struggled to catch up with the pace of the pass. The chance to shoot had gone, and although we kept possession, the follow-up shot from Jadon Sancho was blocked by Khusanov.
Bollocks.
A 2-0 lead on nine minutes would have been a formidable position to find ourselves.
Chalobah, the player of the game thus far, was able to block a shot on goal, and we then watched as that annoying little irritant Phil Foden smacked a shot against Robert Sanchez’ left post.
But then City, energised by a couple of breaks, grew into the game and the marauding runs of Josko Gvardiol caught the eye. After drifting past Madueke far too easily, the Croatian blasted over.
After Chelsea controlling the first fifteen minutes, City effectively dominated the remaining thirty minutes of the first period. Our midfield lost its bite, the wide players did not support the defenders, it all went downhill, like us dropping down from Saddleworth earlier.
Sigh.
The noise from both sets of fans wasn’t great. It is always difficult for us to get anything going as we are split over the three tiers. There were occasional barbs aimed at City.
“We saw you crying in Porto.”
Jackson was through on goal, but the shot was saved, and the linesman’s flag was raised anyway. City had a goal chalked off for offside.
The chances for City were piling up.
I turned to John :
“If City don’t equalise this half, it will be a miracle.”
Lo and behold, on forty-two minutes, a long ball out of defence set up a chance for Matheus Nunes as he beat off a challenge from Marc Cucurella. His shot was blocked by Sanchez, but the ball ran nicely to Gvardiol who tucked it in from an angle down below us.
Bollocks.
The home support just yards away turned it on. They were looking into us and were hoping for a reaction. I just turned away.
Sigh.
City 1 Chelsea 1.
The half-time period was spent with hands in pockets, keeping warm, trying to muster up some hope from somewhere.
The second half, then. Do I have to?
Initially, Chelsea managed to create a few half-chances but never really looked like scoring. On more than one occasion, I felt myself wanting to see a niggly and obstreperous Diego Costa leading our line rather than the flimsy Jackson.
In the second half at City, that far half of the pitch always looks so huge, so full of space, and it always scares me to death. We were defending high and always seemed at risk.
I was surprised that we managed to create, somehow, some half-chances, but the City goal was not really under threat.
Erling Haaland was having a typically odd game; never too involved but always a threat. He’s like a stick insect on steroids, a powdered up praying mantis, a bundle of arms and legs.
On sixty-one minutes, Christopher Nkunku replaced Jackson and then managed to hide for the rest of the match.
“Half an hour to go, John.”
We surely wouldn’t last this amount of time.
We didn’t.
On sixty-eight minutes, Ederson went long and aimed a punt at the marauding Haaland. He met the ball, with Chalobah breathing down his neck, and managed to get a head on it. He spun Chalobah in the inside-right channel – all that bloody space – but as he sped away, we saw the worrying presence of the orange peril, Sanchez, racing out, changing his tack, and looking like a fireman who had been called out to the wrong fire.
Quite simply, this was not going to end well. We could all see it. To be fair to Chalobah, he had forced Haaland quite wide, but Haaland was no fool. He came inside just as Chalobah slipped. Sanchez was back-peddling and readjusting at the same time, going in nine directions at once, and a vain leap was never going to stop Haaland’s perfectly curled lob into an empty goal.
The City support erupted.
Fackinell.
City 2 Chelsea 1.
At last they made some worthwhile noise.
“We’re not really here.”
Sanchez, eh? For all of his decent saves and blocks, he is not good enough.
He is just not good enough for Chelsea Football Club.
The one thing that really annoys me is his really casual and lackadaisical approach to everything he does. He never seems to be tuned in, to be in step with others, to be fully aware of the situation at hand. He never seems to be ready to play the ball out. He is so slow. He doesn’t inspire confidence in fans nor players alike.
At City, he had his own low point.
I know our job as supporters is to support, but it’s fucking hard.
Some substitutions.
Malo Gusto for James.
Pedro Neto for Sancho.
We went to pieces.
On eighty-seven minutes, another Ederson long ball, this time to the substitute Kevin De Bruyne. He flicked it on towards the familiar pairing of Haaland and Chalobah. It was Haaland who got a touch, square to Foden. It was at this point that I took my eyes off the play and looked deep into the night above the stadium. I brought my gaze back to the game, and Foden slotted past Sanchez.
Last season, the Everton away game was again just before Christmas, on Sunday 10 December, and at the time it was to be our last-ever visit to the Grand Old Lady on Goodison Road. I went into that game expecting it to be so and took tons of photos to commemorate my last-ever visit. Yet, between the time of the game and the day of posting my match report, five days later, it was announced by Everton Football Club that they would be staying one more year at the revered old stadium and would move into Bramley Moore Dock in August 2025.
Ironically, another recent visit had the feel of a potential “last-ever” game too, the match in May 2022, when Everton were deep in the relegation mire. On that day, Frank Lampard’s Everton squeaked home 1-0 and lived to fight again.
It seems like Everton, or rather Goodison, has been messing about with my brain for a few years now. God knows what actual Everton fans have been experiencing.
I was pretty happy with the 105 photos that I posted for last season’s match and I had a feeling that I might well match this high figure on this occasion.
Goodison Park and I go back a long way, to a match that was shown on ITV “live” on Sunday 16 March 1986, but many fans of my generation first experienced Goodison on Saturday 22 December 1984 – forty years ago to the day – and it is the one game that I wish that I had seen. The visit in 2024 would be my twenty-fourth Chelsea game at Goodison, but the game on that Saturday forty years ago was arguably our best performance there in the past four decades.
At the time, I was so annoyed that I was not able to attend the game at Goodison in 1984. I had returned home the previous weekend from my college town of Stoke, and would be listening-in on the portable radio as I did a shift in my father’s menswear shop in Frome’s town centre. I occasionally helped out at Xmas time when things got a little busier. But I was so annoyed that I was back in Somerset. It would have been easy to travel up by train from Stoke to Liverpool had I still been in The Potteries.
My diary from 1984 explains “the saga” at Goodison Park, and how I “went wild” every time we scored, especially when a score of Everton 3 Chelsea 1 was corrected to 2-2. We won the game 4-3, with Gordon Davies getting a hat-trick and Colin Pates getting one. Graeme Sharp scored two for the home team and Paul Bracewell scored the other. I had predicted a gate of 24,000 so was very happy with the attendance of 29,800. I went out in Frome later that night and had way too much to drink. It was our first away win in the league in 1984/85 though. These things have to be celebrated surely. Those that went to the match in 1984 often tell the story of all sorts of missiles being launched at the tightly packed Chelsea terrace and the seats high above the goal from the home enclosure in front of the main stand; pool balls, flares, golf balls with nails. Friendly bunch, Everton.
For the game in 2024 we set off early. I collected PD and his son Scott at 6am and Parky at 6.30pm. We breakfasted at a deadly quiet Strensham between 7.30am and 8am. I was parked up at the usual Stanley Park car park at 10.30am – a £13 fee – but as we made our way north to Goodison, the wind howled, and the rain fell. In Almaty there was no wind chill and there was no dampness in the air, and I coped OK. After a minute of being exposed to the bitter chill of Stanley Park, I was shivering like a fool. The rain seemed to seep into my bones. I was reminded of Turf Moor in 2017. We came off the vast expanse of the park and walked alongside more sheltered and tree-lined roads.
While the others went off to find shelter in “The Abbey” pub on Walton Lane, I met up briefly with a photographer pal of mine, David. We had bumped into each other at last season’s game and had kept in touch ever since. He often takes photos pitch side at the four grounds in Liverpool and Manchester. He was queuing up, hiding from the rain, underneath the towering main stand that rises dramatically from the pavement on Goodison Road like no other stand in England. Only Ibrox come close in the entire UK. He was after a good “speck” – Scouse slang for “spot” – behind the Park End goal. We had planned for him to take a few photos of my pals and I during the game.
As I made my way to the pub, I spotted a former Everton player from my early years, Mike Lyons.
“Hello Mike.”
No answer.
That’s because I quickly realised it was Martin Dobson.
Fackinell.
I dodged the rain and made my way inside the pub that was surprisingly quiet. We stayed inside from 11pm to 1pm, and the small, thin, cosy pub soon became rammed. We were made welcome, though. I chatted to some Evertonians from Aberdare in South Wales who were staying over. Jimmy the Greek, Nick the Greek and Doncaster Pail had joined us, and Ian then arrived with two random Evertonians he had met on the train and who had subsequently shared a cab together from Lime Street.
They are a lot more friendlier in 2024 than in 1984.
If anything, the inter-city rivalry between Merseyside’s blues and reds has heightened and intensified and turned nasty since 1984. I joked with Jimmy and commented that Evertonians hark on about Liverpool’s fan base now residing in Norway, and Liverpool bite back by saying that Everton’s global reach now goes as far as North Wales.
David, the photographer arrived with a programme for me, but reported that his “speck” was in front of the Gwladys Street, so no candid photos of us on this day.
Tommie and Chris – the brothers Grim, Tommie Chelsea and Chris Everton – arrived in the rain and I passed over spares. Then, I got drenched on the short walk to the ground, where I was serenaded by a “Town Called Malice” – an odd choice so far north – by a band playing in the fan park behind the impressive Dixie Dean statue.
There was time for one final, sad, circumnavigation of The Grand Old Lady.
The Winslow Hotel, where I popped in with my mate Francis for a drink before a game at Anfield in 1994, and if my fictional piece from 2012 is to be believed, where my father visited on his one visit to Goodison Park in around 1942, mid RAF training on The Wirral.
To the left, Jock spotted the frosted glass windows of a local hostelry. Without any words being exchanged, Jock quickly headed inside, his two friends left outside in his wake.
“A quick pint, Half Pint?” asked Hank to Reg. “It appears our Scottish friend is in need of liquid refreshment.”
They spotted Jock dart in the bar to the right of the main entrance of The Winslow Hotel and they quickly followed suit.
“Jock’s at the bar, Half Pint – this is a rare sight indeed. Let’s hope he doesn’t forget us.”
The cavernous bar was incredibly noisy and the three pals struggled to hear themselves be heard above the din of orders being taken, jokes being shared, vulgar belly laughs, shouts and groans. A young lad strode through the bar, bedecked in Everton favours – the blue and white standing out against the dismal colours of wartime England – and attempted to sell match programmes. He was not faring well. The locals were more intent on drinking. An elderly gent, with glasses and a pencil thin moustache, spoke engagingly to Reg about Dixie Dean, the great Everton centre-forward, who once scored 60 goals in a 42 game season.
As his knowledge of football wasn’t great, Reg wasn’t sure if this was the same Dixie Dean who had been ridiculed in the schoolboy poem of his youth –
“Dixie Dean from Aberdeen. He tried to score a goal. He missed his chance. And pee’d his paints. And now he’s on the dole.”
Talk of the imminent football match was minimal, though. It seemed that just being in an alien environment, so different from each of their hometowns, was amusement enough. Hank looked at his watch and signalled to the others to finish their drinks. Outside, the rain had started to fall. The three friends quickly rushed across to the stand and did not notice that the narrow street, darkened under the shadow of the structure, was busy with an array of match day activity; grizzly old men selling programmes, young boys selling cheap paper rosettes, wise-cracking spivs selling roasted chestnuts and cigarettes and young girls selling newspapers.
The main stand, and the elevator that I took to watch a game from the top balcony with my mate Pete in 1992 when Robert Fleck scored. The church of St. Luke the Evangelist, with its café and memorabilia shop that I visited in 2022.
The huge images of Dean, Sharp, Latchford, Royle, Young and Hickson towering over rooftops.
The Holy Trinity statue.
The pavement alongside where some local scallies had eyed me up and down on my second visit in late 1986 and sneered “that jacket is so fookin’ red” and I thought I might be in for a hiding.
Gwladys Street, where I walked with Josh and Courtney in October and where Courtney took a photo of two lads, in red and blue, playing football outside two houses with red and blue doors, a perfect image.
A turn into Bullens Road and the away end. Memories of a beautiful visit with my then girlfriend Judy’s young football-mad son James, aged just ten, his first-ever game in 1998, and then a repeat in 2006 with him, the 3-2 cracker.
The rain was bucketing down and the stewards just wanted us inside, so there was no camera search.
For one last time, I was in.
The familiar steps, the crowded concourse, the wooden floorboards of the Archibald Leitch Stand, our seats in Row B, effectively the front row.
I love Goodison. It’s obvious, right? But some hate it. I thought of them when I realised that a roof support was right in front of my seat, blocking a good deal of the pitch.
Fackinell.
I was lined up with Alan, John and Gary to my left and with Eck and Steely from Glasgow to my right. After being given a word of warning about using my SLR by both the chief steward and an over-zealous ambulance woman (!), I played cat and mouse with them all game long, and Eck was able to step in front of me to avoid me being seen. I am pretty sure I relied on Eck for this superb defensive partnership against prying eyes last season too.
Like Nesta and Cannavaro in their prime.
Eck and I found ourselves lip-syncing to “If You Know Your History”, it’s easily done.
Then, the big big moment…the sirens and “Z Cars” for one last time at Goodison.
Chills.
There is nothing better.
I have no doubt that Everton will keep this tune as a key part of their match-day routine at Bramley Moore. I am sure when it is played at the first-ever game, it will seem like the torch has been handed on.
Incidentally, the new stadium :
I love the location.
I am a little worried about parking and traffic flow.
The outside looks fantastic.
The inside seating bowl looks rather bland.
But I like the steepness of the rake of the terraces.
I like that – at the moment – the blue seats are not spoiled with sponsors names or other silliness.
How I wish that a few Leitch cross struts could be repositioned at key places on the balcony wall at the new digs.
With the kick-off time approaching, I checked our team.
Sanchez
Disasi – Colwill – Tosin – Gusto
Caicedo – Enzo
Neto – Palmer – Sancho
Jackson
Everton were a mixture of footballers and former footballers, some familiar, some not and how on Earth is Ashley Young still playing?
Both teams wore white shorts. Brian Moore would be turning in his grave.
Everybody standing, the rain starting to get worse, the game began.
Whisper it, but a win at Goodison would send us top, if only for a few hours.
We began the livelier and attacked the deep-sitting Everton lines in front of the Gwladys Street. There was a shot, wide, from Cole Palmer, and a couple of attacking half-chances involving Nicolas Jackson and Pedro Neto.
The rain was heavier now and seemed to be aimed right at us in the Bullens Upper. I sheltered behind Eck. The wind was blustery and seemed to change direction at will. Playing conditions, although not treacherous, were difficult, and it made for periods of messy football. The Everton crowd, not exactly buoyed by the news of the latest take-over, soon quietened down.
Neto had began the game as our liveliest player on the right and, after good play by Moises Caicedo, he fed in Palmer, and there was a low cross towards Jackson, but Jordan Pickford saved well.
We played well in short spells, and from a corner, Jackson smacked the post from close range and Pickford closed angles before Malo Gusto could attack the rebound.
Everton had been very defensive and offered very little. It was so noticeable that the Everton support were cheering defensive clearances.
“God, I know everyone loves their clubs and their teams, but imagine turning up to watch this every two weeks?”
At last, an effort on our goal; someone called Orel Mangala forcing a very fine stop from Robert Sanchez. Just after, another Everton effort, and Sanchez thwarted Jack Harrison from close range.
It had been a poor first-half and was met with moans and grumbles by the Chelsea faithful at the break.
Neto had been my favourite, and we loved the audacious piece of skill when he controlled the ball by knocking it back over his shoulder to fox his marker. Caicedo was strong. Sancho had a lot of the ball but was finding it difficult to get the best of Old Man Young. Disasi touched the ball so many times it honestly felt like he was our main playmaker. We cried out for a little more urgency.
Just before the second half began, Eck, Steely and I were now lip-syncing to “True Faith” by New Order and we hoped our faith would be truly rewarded.
“That’s the price that we all pay. And the value of destiny comes to nothing. I can’t tell you where we’re going. I guess there was just no way of knowing.”
The weather was still wild. There were hints of a blue sky and sun, but only fleeting. At times the sky over the huge main stand roof took on a lavender hue. This was Goodison Park in the depths of winter, in the depths of Liverpool, in its unique setting. The wind grew stronger and the rain came again.
Football. There is something about it, in these old weather-beaten stadia, that absolutely stirs the soul.
Bizarrely, to me at least, it was Everton who created more chances of note in an increasingly worrisome second-half. On fifty minutes, a huge jolt to our confidence as Everton really should have scored. At last the home crowd made some noise that the old ground deserved.
Although Sancho looked a little more lively down below us – in an area of the Goodison Park pitch that always invokes of Eden Hazard twisting and turning – as the second-half continued, our link-up play was poor. Palmer was having a very average game, and this seemed to affect our confidence.
Some substitutions on seventy-five minutes.
Christopher Nkunku for Jackson.
Noni Madueke for Neto.
Everton attacked down our left, and a shot from Martin Gore lookalike Jesper Lindstrom was expertly stopped by Sanchez, but the block on the follow-up effort from Tosin was exceptional.
It was at this stage that we all began thinking that we would be happy with a 0-0, a point, and consolidation of a second place finish.
There were minimal minutes added on at the end of the ninety. It was if the referee Chris Kavanagh was happy to save us any more pain.
It ended 0-0.
As the legions of home and away fans departed, I loitered with my camera and tried my best to capture a few haunting images of my final ten minutes in a stadium that I have so enjoyed visiting over the past thirty-eight years.
My final Everton vs. Chelsea record at Goodison Park :
Played : 24
Won : 8
Drew : 7
Lost : 9
For : 23
Against : 26
I took some inevitable shots of the trademark Leitch cross struts on the balcony wall, and I was reminded of when I pinned my “VINCI PER NOI” banner on this section for our last great game at Goodison, the 3-0 triumph late in 2016/17. My words illustrate the joy of that day.
At the final whistle, a triumphal roar, and then my eyes were focussed on Antonio Conte. He hugged all of the Chelsea players, and slowly walked over to join his men down below us, only a few yards away from the touchline. With just four games remaining, and our lead back to seven points, the joy among the team and supporters was palpable. Conte screamed and shouted, his eyes bulging. He jumped on the back of Thibaut Courtois. His smiles and enthusiasm were so endearing.
Altogether now – “phew.”
The songs continued as we slowly made our way out into the street. A message came through from my good friend Steve in Philadelphia –
“Chris, the image that just flashed on my screen was beautiful. A shot of a cheering Antonio Conte, cheering the away fans, with the Vinci banner in the background. Absolutely perfect shot.”
There was time for one last photo of me with the Gwladys Street in the background, and then one last shot of the exit gate in the Bullens Upper, a photo that I had taken just over twelve months earlier.
But now, it was final.
Thanks Goodison, for the memories, from Reg Axon in around 1942 and from me from 1986 to 2024.
Saturday 14 September 2024 was going to be another big day of football for me. Fate had acted favourably once again to provide me with not one but two games of football involving my two teams. Our away fixture at AFC Bournemouth had shifted to an 8pm kick-off for the watching millions around the world, meaning that I had another potential “double-header” in my sights. I was lucky; Frome Town were drawn at home against former league rivals Larkhall Athletic, from nearby Bath, in the Second Qualifying Round of the FA Cup.
My mate Glenn said he’d attend both with me, whereas PD and Parky were to book a Saturday night on the south coast, and we would all meet up in the ground.
Games on!
And yet when I awoke on Saturday morning, my enthusiasm just wasn’t there. Where had it gone? I was sure I had it when I went to sleep. Had it rolled under my bed, or out of my bedroom and down the stairs and under the front door and away, or had it fizzled away naturally during the night? The whole day, stretched out before me, seemed to be too much like a chore. And this disturbed me. Watching football – Chelsea, Frome Town anyway – should not be a chore.
I felt that I needed to hop on to a psychiatrist’s couch in order for me to talk through my problems, but it would have been a waste of my money and their time. I knew exactly why I felt underwhelmed.
Firstly, the venue for our Europa Conference game in Kazakhstan in December had been announced on Thursday; Almaty, the capital. A part of me actually wanted to stay at home during the day to try to pick out a trip itinerary to enable me, and maybe PD and Parky, to attend. Alas, that would have to wait, but it left me a little anxious.
I have often mused how “anxious” is an anagram of “I. Us. Axons.”
Secondly, Frome Town – since we last chatted – had seen their form dip. Yes, there was a 2-1 win in an FA Cup replay at home to Easington Sports but this was an unconvincing performance. After, it got worse, much worse. I drove down to Dorchester Town’s fine stadium along with the best part of one hundred away fans, but we were rewarded with a humbling 0-4 loss, with two sendings-off to boot. Next up, a “must-win” game at home to lowly Tiverton Town, but this was a 1-2 loss, a truly shocking performance. The highlight of this one, though, was the appearance of my good Chelsea friend Phil – from Iowa – who was staying in nearby Bath, who joined me for the game. It was a wet night, a typical football night, but I know Phil loved it. I first met Phil in Chicago in 2006 and he is one of my most avid readers.
Thanks mate.
I met up with Glenn in Frome at midday ahead of our day/night double-header. We set off on a stroll around a few coffee shops before the Frome Town game at 3pm. On the walk to the first location on Palmer Street, I had a lovely surprise. Returning to his van was my oldest friend of them all, Dave, who I first met almost exactly fifty-years ago. Dave was in my school tutor group and it almost felt pre-ordained that he would chose to sit opposite me on a table for four in Mrs. Callister’s 1D class. We soon worked out that we were football daft; Bristol Rovers and Chelsea. In my first-ever “proper” eleven-a-side game for my house that term, we would both score goals in a 2-0 win for the “Blues” of Bayard over the “Reds” of Raleigh, and a friendship really flourished. Whenever we played in the same team, there was a great telepathy between us. I had to giggle when Dave said he was “off to see Rovers” later.
Fifty years after the autumn of 1974, how magical that we were off to see our two teams after all the years. What would we think of that in 1974? I think we would have been utterly amazed.
Or maybe not, eh?
Forty years ago, I would occasionally bump into Dave – sometimes with Glenn – in the pubs of Frome, and it is to 1984 I return again in my retrospective look at the 1984/85 season.
First up is our away game at Old Trafford on Wednesday 5 September, a match that I did not attend due to financial and logistical restrictions. We had begun the season with a draw, a win and a loss, and the United game was a huge test. That evening, I was out with a mate, and came home not knowing our result. On the BBC news it was announced that “Manchester United are still yet to record a win this season” which was met with a big “YEEESSS!” from me. Jesper Olsen had put United ahead on 15 minutes but Mickey Thomas had equalised on 55 minutes. In those days, everyone used to “guess the gate” and my diary noted that I predicted one of 48,000. I wasn’t too far away; it was 48,396. I have no figures to hand, but I suspect 5,000 Chelsea were at the game. Over the years the match has gained a certain notoriety in the football world as Chelsea fans say that Hicky’s mob ran the Stretford end in the closing minutes whereas the United hardcore resolutely refute this.
“Well, they would say that wouldn’t they?”
Anyway, I can’t comment as I wasn’t there.
On Saturday 8 September, another away game and – alas – another match that I did not attend. Chelsea travelled to Villa Park, while I listened at home to updates on the radio. In the words of my diary “I went through hell” every time Villa scored their three goals in the first-half. We pulled it back to 1-3, played better in the second-half, yet eventually lost 2-4. I was especially pleased with the gate of 21,494, and this surely meant that around 6,000 Chelsea supporters had travelled to the game, a really fine “take” and one which made me proud.
In those days, football was absolutely all about how many fans clubs took to away games. The season would be a massive test for our support and one which I passionately hoped that we would come out as one of the top clubs in this respect. I noted that 54,000 were at Old Trafford for the visit of Newcastle United and I wondered how many Geordies had swelled that attendance.
During that 1984/85 season, I set out to record every gate in the First Division – in the days before the internet, this involved buying papers after games, or sometimes glancing at papers in newsagents and memorising gates – as I was so obsessed with evaluating how our home and away gates compared to other teams. I have the results, on a large piece of cardboard, saved to this day.
I hear the screams of “statto” from near and far.
Fackinell.
Back to 2024.
Glenn and I enjoyed a lovely amble around Frome. It is such a different town than in 1984, in so many ways. It’s “Dodge” moniker appeared in the late ‘eighties; back then, it was a Wild West town, with gangs of tarmac workers, Gypsies and squaddies from Warminster, plus lads visiting from Westbury and Trowbridge, often making a night out eventful. These days, it has a different vibe at night time, and certainly during the day.
We made our way into Badgers’ Hill at about 2.30pm ahead of the 3pm kick-off. On the turnstile was our friend Steve, another member of that “Blues” football team from the autumn of 1974. Steve was the ‘keeper in that game and in all of the subsequent games that I would play in Frome until 1979 when my star waned and I dropped into the wilderness of “B Team” football.
Here was another “must win” game at Frome Town. Despite the local “Cheese Show” taking place at a site just outside of town – an agricultural show involving equestrianism, trade stalls, produce, livestock rosy-cheeked farmers in tweed, Land Rovers, and God knows what else, I have only ever been twice, the experience bored me to death – the FA Cup game drew a reasonable gate of 351. Alas, despite absolutely dominating the first-half, we fell apart after the break and lost 0-1. No Wembley this year. I was truly disheartened.
We left Dodge at around 5pm, and I set the “GPS” for my “JustPark” spot just outside the Bournemouth stadium. All along, I had expected us to glide in to Bournemouth at 6.30pm. The route took us past the site of the Cheese Show – it probably drew over 10,000 people – and then through some glorious Somerset then Wiltshire, then Somerset, then Wiltshire, then Dorset countryside. Despite the Frome loss, this had been a really nice day, and we were hoping that Chelsea would not bugger it up.
I pulled into the driveway on Harewood Avenue at 6.32pm.
There are some lovely houses in the immediate area of the Vitality Stadium. I fell in love with most of them. It’s such an incongruous location for a top flight football match to take place. Within ten minutes, we were knocking back a relatively tasty bratwurst at one of the many pop-up food stands that now swarm around the Bournemouth stadium. The “fanzone” – always a term that makes me nauseous – was showing the Villa vs. Everton game. I fear for Everton and their long-suffering support this season. I wonder when we might see their new stadium for the first time. There are al fresco eateries on two sides of the Vitality Stadium these days, and everything is jammed in.
Just under a year ago, we assembled at the same venue to witness Chelsea in Eton Blue for the first time eke out a dire a 0-0 draw on a rainy and grey day. There were misses from Nicolas Jackson and a second substitute appearance in a week for new boy Cole Palmer.
…little did we know.
The usual battle of wits at the turnstiles.
“Is that a professional camera?”
“No. Just been taking a few photos of the town to be honest. Probably won’t take it out of my bag tonight.”
“OK.”
I met a few friends in the concourse. PD and Parky, despite being on the ale since early in the day, were strangely coherent. Well, relatively speaking.
I spotted safe standing in the last few rows of the away section, and in the home end to my right too.
Kick-off soon approached.
Flames, flags, smoke.
“Make some noise for the boys.”
Pah.
Us?
Sanchez
Disasi – Fofana – Colwill – Cucarella
Caicedo – Veiga
Madueke – Palmer – Neto
Jackson
First thoughts?
“Not much creativity in the midfield two.”
Chelsea appeared in the “off-white” shirts, like the uniforms sometimes worn by cricketers, a subtle cream.
The game began, and we attacked the goal to our right.
The home team started the livelier and Marcus Tavernier smacked a shot from distance against our bar, a moment that took me back to a strike on the Frome goal that hit the bar when the game was at 0-0 earlier in the day.
We started slowly, but began to dominate possession, yet could not find a way to make Bournemouth feel agitated and nervous. Tavernier forced a low save from Robert Sanchez. Axel Disasi was being run ragged in front of us. Every few moments a Bournemouth cross seemed to be hit across our box from their left.
It was a pretty poor first half from us. On a couple of occasions, it dawned on me that our defence – or at least this version – doesn’t really play as a unit. Disasi was having a tough game and a tough time from the Chelsea support. He was playing without confidence and I actually felt bad for him.
Sigh.
Four lads behind me were full of noise and opinions – not always negative – and I noticed that all four of them were wearing Stone Island.
“Four Stoneys in a row, lads. Good work. Stoney Connect 4. Excellent.
Our chances were only half-chances, nothing more.
The frustration in our ranks reached a peak when Pedro Neto set off on a run into the final third, but was forced in field, and ran laterally across the pitch. Within five seconds the ball was back in the arms of Sanchez.
Fackinell.
Sanchez was being called into action and saved well from a couple of smart Bournemouth shots.
A chance for Nicolas Jackson, but his effort was saved by Mark Travers. Another chance for Jackson – an extra touch close in, just like Zac Drew for Frome earlier – and the shot was saved, but he was off-side anyway.
On thirty-eight minutes, a shoddy back-pass by the patchy Wesley Fofana was intercepted by Evanilson. He ran into the box but was upended by Sanchez.
Penalty.
One of the Stoneys behind me was adamant that it wasn’t a penalty.
“Yeah, right.”
Thankfully, Sanchez chose right and dived left. The ball was kept out. A huge roar.
It had been a very poor half. Bournemouth had surely out-shot us. Our lack of creativity was shocking.
Once or twice I moaned at Gary and John : “we’re just not very good.”
At half-time, Enzo Maresca replaced the under-par Neto with Jadon Sancho, who quickly showed a willingness to show for the ball on the flank in front of us. We are so close to the action at the Vitality Stadium. It’s pretty amazing to see everything a few yards away from us.
We looked a bit brighter but there were still some chances for the home team. Sancho feinted, and teased, and linked well with Cucarella. This was an encouraging debut.
On sixty-one minutes, a couple of changes.
Tosin for Disasi.
Joao Felix for Madueke.
The loyalists in the away end noted an upturn in our play and got going. The old second-half standard of “Amazing Grace” was pumped around the away end for a good many minutes.
Jackson was set up nicely but lent back and we all sighed as his errant shot curled over the bar.
Antoine Semenyo himself curled an effort, a free-kick, over our bar.
Sanchez saved brilliantly well from Ryan Christie. Alan looked at me and I looked at him and we mouthed “Man Of The Match” at exactly the same time.
Cucarella, finding space in tight areas set up Jackson, but his shot was blocked.
The latter part of the game truly became the Jadon Sancho Show. He grew in confidence and, despite being marked by two or even three defenders, jinked into space and linked well with Felix and Cucarella. We really warmed to him. Sancho has a rather odd place in my football history. He is, I am sure, the first player who was called up to an England squad that I had never heard of.
On seventy-nine minutes, Christopher Nkunku for Jackson.
In my thoughts : “bloody hell, Nkunku should be starting.”
The game carried on. For all our possession, I truly wondered if we would ever score. I was even preparing my post-game Facebook post.
“Thank God there is no Game Three.”
Thankfully, on eighty-six minutes, the determined Sancho pushed the ball into Nkunku, who was seemingly surrounded by an impenetrable congregation of defenders. I held the camera up and waited. This was always going to be a tough shot though, for Nkunku as well as me. I was low down, the third row, and fans were standing in front of me, hands and arms gesticulating. Nkunku had an even tougher task. However, he somehow twisted and turned in the tightest of spaces – like the child that is spun around by his father, then forced to stand, then falls in every direction – before settling for a split second, in a parcel of newly-created space, and rolled around a defender. His poke at goal was perfect.
Goal.
We exploded.
Talk about a “fox in the box.”
What a finish.
Veiga ran over to us, his face ecstatic, then Sancho and Nkunku. By this time Veiga was almost doing a Disasi at Palace or a Jackson at Forest. Pandemonium on the South Coast. The players stopped right in front of me. Supporters rushed forward. I was pushed forward. I pushed back.
“Need to get a photo of this.”
I wish that my shots were as good as Nkunku’s shot, but my view was muddled, and I was jostled.
I then spotted a blue balloon emerge and I waited for my moment.
Snap.
Phew.
I took the money shot.
There was still time for another Sanchez save.
The Sanchez and Sancho Show.
At the final whistle, the players took their time to approach us, and – in light of the mayhem after the goal was scored – kept a respectful distance.
But our applause was genuine, and one player was singled out for special praise.
“Jadon Sancho, Jadon Sancho, hello, hello.”
Maybe, just maybe, we have another gem.
I met up with Glenn – and also my friend Greg from Texas, who was over on a last-minute trip, I managed to snag him a ticket – and we were happy.
Only one mention of the referee. He deserves nothing more. It wasn’t even a dirty game. I hate modern football.
The day hadn’t been a chore at all. No need for the psychiatrist’s couch. No need for over-analysis. The twin crutches of friends and football – 1974, 1984 and 2024 – prevailed. We headed home via Salisbury, Glenn bought me the final coffee of the day, and I made it back at just after midnight.
Next up, the visit of West Ham in 1984 and a visit to West Ham in 2024.
It seemed that everyone had been talking about our run of league fixtures that were looming on the horizon, stretching into December, and how difficult they would be. I had to agree. If I was pressed, I would have said that it was only our home game with Brentford, the first of these, that I thought we would win. The away games at Tottenham, Newcastle United, Manchester United and Everton would be tough. Our recent records at St. James’ Park, Old Trafford and Goodison are horrific. The home games against Manchester City and Brighton would be difficult too. We were undoubtedly in for a testing time.
My weekend began on Friday evening with a game at Frome Town’s Badgers’ Hill against Cribbs, from Bristol, in the First Round of the FA Trophy. Despite a rainy night in Somerset, another decent crowd of 408 saw the home team squeeze it 1-0, thanks to an own goal, and the away team missing a penalty. It was a game that wasn’t great on quality but which had me enthralled throughout.
I was up early the next morning for the 12.30pm kick-off against Brentford. I realised that by the time 3pm on Saturday would come around – the usual start time for the vast majority of games throughout the pyramid in England – I would already have seen two games.
For a change, I walked to West Brompton tube in order to get myself down to “The Eight Bells” at Putney Bridge, the first time that I had walked that way in ages. From the North End Road to West Brompton, I usually bump in to one person that I know and I wondered who it might be on this occasion. Lo and behold, it was Stuart, who only lives three-and-a-half miles from my house in a neighbouring Somerset village.
“Hello mate, how are you?”
Next up were lads from Gloucester, Stoke-on-Trent and Crewe.
“Alright, chaps?”
West Brompton serves a certain type of clientele at Stamford Bridge on match days. You don’t get many tourists alighting at West Brompton on their way to the game. The pubs on the nearby North End Road, and just off it, contain mostly old-school fans. It’s like they arrive at Chelsea via the back door. I like that.
I spotted a new building on the site of Olympia – “BBC Earth Experience” – as I approached the tube station. With rumours involving the development of Stamford Bridge in whatever guise starting to generate again, it was a timely reminder that eventually all available land at Earl’s Court will eventually be eaten up. I have a feeling that Stamford Bridge’s eventual redevelopment will be a huge test for many of us, especially if we have to decamp to Wembley or – worse – the London Stadium if a total rebuild is chosen. The alternative of building “one stand at a time” would mean that the current pitch footprint would not change, thus meaning that there would be a huge constraint in expansive increases in stand sizes.
I am not thrilled that the Clearlake mob will be in charge of this process. In fact, it fills me with absolute dread. Fackinell.
The pre-match in the pub was squeezed into just one hour for me, but the boozer was as packed as ever, and the boisterous mood of the clientele did not match our current league position. On the next table were a group of six or seven Brentford fans. You wouldn’t know it from their appearance nor behaviour, but I overheard a couple of them chatting about Players X, Y and Z while I got a round in. I didn’t recognise the names, but they weren’t Chukwuemeka, Nkunku nor Ugochukwu.
On the front page of the programme – back to its normal design this week after its odd revamp last week – there was yet another version of Mykhailo Mudryk’s “Christ The Redeemer” pose after his goal against the Goons last Saturday.
I was inside the stadium – a sunny day thus far despite rumours of rain – at just after midday. There was a chat with a few of the lads – Daryl now a grandfather, Ed now a father – as we waited for the game to begin.
Last week might have seen our two-hundred and eighth game against Arsenal, but this was only our twentieth game against Brentford. For me personally, it was my ninth such game.
However, the first time that I ever saw Brentford play was not against Chelsea at all. Back in 1987, on 24 January, I was lured up to Burslem to watch Port Vale play the Bees in a Third Division game. Living in Stoke – and the town of Stoke, not just the city of Stoke-on-Trent, it does get confusing, the five towns and all that – I always tended to watch Stoke City if the mood took me. After all, for two seasons – er, years – I lived right opposite the away end at the Victoria Ground. In my third year of study at North Staffs Poly, I had yet to visit Vale Park, and I knew that I would have to get at least one visit in during my stay in the area. Why did I chose Brentford? I was lured in because Micky Droy, the ex-Chelsea defender, was playing for Brentford in 1986/87.
I took the bus up to Burslem – grey buildings, grey skies – and paid £2.50 to get in. After all that, Droy wasn’t playing. He was injured. Bollocks. I heard a voice inside my head say “why in God’s name are you here?”
I watched from the Bykers Road end, a very ram-shackle terrace, as the home team won 4-1 in front of just 3,012. The star of that Vale team that season was their young striker Andy Jones who later signed for Charlton Athletic, though Robbie Earle, now a TV pundit, was playing for Vale too, himself a local from Newcastle-under-Lyme. I counted sixty-five away fans at the other end of the ground.
I wondered how many of the buggers would be at Stamford Bridge almost thirty-seven years later.
Kick-off approached and we were treated to the usual three songs before the teams appeared.
“London Calling.”
“Park Life.”
“Liquidator.”
In the lower tier of the Matthew Harding, a large flag surfed over peoples’ heads. It commemorated the passing of our former director twenty-seven years ago.
Then, an image of Sir Bobby Charlton appeared in black and white on the TV screens and the players stood, as we all did, to applaud his memory. There can’t be too many players who are remembered on two consecutive games. The day’s programme featured photos and a piece about the great player’s last-ever appearance for United that I briefly mentioned last week.
RIP Matthew.
RIP Sir Bobby.
We had heard that both Enzo and Mudryk were out, so Mauricio Pochettino shuffled his ever-decreasing pack once more.
Sanchez
Disasi – Silva – Colwill – Cucarella
Caicedo – Gallagher
Madueke – Palmer – Sterling
Jackson
“…or something like that.”
Those of us of a certain vintage keep talking about the football bubble bursting, but here was another “near as damn it” full house at Stamford Bridge, albeit with the crowd in a very quiet mood as the game started.
Chelsea were attacking the Matthew Harding in this first-half, a situation that I am always uneasy with.
We began brightly enough, with Noni Madueke soon involved, breaking in from underneath the East Stand, unsettling his marker, creating a little space and lifting a shot high towards the goal. We sighed as the effort smacked against the crossbar. Next up, Conor Gallagher advanced and put his laces through the ball, forcing the Bees ‘keeper Mark Flekken to fling himself down to the right and push the effort wide.
The play was half-decent, but the atmosphere was dreadful. It took eighteen minutes for the Matthew Harding to generate a chant or song of note. Brentford were just as quiet.
Lack of beer before a game has this effect.
Can all games begin at chucking out time at 11pm? Oh fuck, no, best not mention that idea, someone from Sky, Amazon or TNT might be reading this.
Cole Palmer, playing deeper this week, was involved in most moves, and his quick mind spotted the burst from Marc Cucarella. His chipped pass into the six-yard box was perfection, but the improving defender’s delicate touch was right at the ‘keeper. There were a few more half-chances, but despite our dominant possession, we lacked that killer instinct. Sterling was a little hit-and-miss. Nicholas Jackson often chose the wrong option, and became a peripheral figure as the half continued.
Around the pitch perimeter there were occasional displays depicting the most recent retro-kit launch. The 1974 white kit with green and red panels – actually only worn a bare handful of times – has been well-received, though am I the only one who finds it just a little odd that Chelsea are, in fact, highlighting and honouring a relegation season?
Fackinell.
It’s nice to see 1974 mentioned though; the year of my first-ever game. I bought a red / green / white scarf a few years back and I love it.
A couple of chances from Madueke and Palmer did not threaten.
At half-time, nobody in The Sleepy Hollow was too excited. I turned to Oxford Frank and admitted “I can’t see either side scoring.”
Did Brentford have any worthwhile attacks on our goal? I honestly could not remember any.
The second-half was awful and I really don’t want to dwell too much on it. I can barely remember such a tepid and frustrating performance.
The warning signs were there. From a cross from the right, Vitaly Janelt crashed a shot at goal, but the arm of Robert Sanchez saved us.
The pace of the game slowed right down.
Then, just before the hour, another neat move down their right resulted in a high ball towards the back post and we all watched as Ethan Pinnock leapt like a lord – he had so much space that it looked like he had sent a letter to the local council for them to clear any obstacles in his way – and headed the ball in emphatically.
There were fresh memories of Brentford’s previous two visits in the league, both away wins.
Surely not a third in a row?
“This was the game I thought we could win for fuck sake.”
We had been getting slightly more joy down the left flank than the right, so the manager replaced Axel Disasi with Reece James and Noni Madueke with Ian Maatsen. On the left, Cucarella was one of the brighter elements in our team. I grimaced every time Reece went for the ball.
Unsurprisingly, Brentford defended deep and with conviction now that they had got their noses in front. Their supporters provided some verbal encouragement. It was their voices that were heard.
“Chelsea get battered…”
In the home areas, the noise was not forthcoming.
I had become the sort of fan that I once derided. I sang in support of my team only occasionally and I hated myself for it.
Frustration on the pitch, frustration off it.
Fackinell.
Two more substitutions.
Lesley Ugochukwu for Moises Caceido, the first time that I have mentioned his name.
Debutant Deivid Washington for Marc Cucarella.
This lad has played just nine times for Santos, and now he is playing for Chelsea.
Righty-oh.
A shot from Reece James was slashed high. There had been few other attempts on goal in this half. Then, a mad few seconds in the Brentford box with a cross from the right and two stabs at goal but both were miscued. I had got frustrated with Jackson’s lack of movement as the game dwindled by. He looked interested at the start of the season. Is the Chelsea malaise that deep rooted into our psyche right now?
“I have to say Al, I was more involved emotionally with the Frome game last night. This is just dreadful.”
On a break, we were outnumbered, but a fantastic stop from Sanchez thwarted Yehor Yarmolyuk. Bryan Mbeumo then went close. By now, many Chelsea supporters were heading for the exits.
PD joked with Al that he would wait until the equaliser before he would leave but, with walking painful for him now, he left just after an extra six minutes were signalled. Alan began to move towards the exits too.
“See you Wednesday mate.”
Late on, we were awarded a corner and Sanchez trotted up for it.
The ball was cleared and Neil Maupay, a substitute, was in on goal. Sanchez did well to catch up with him and he made an attempt to foul / tackle the Brentford attacker but Maupay passed square to Mbeumo, who slotted the ball in to the empty net.
Oh bloody hell.
Not even VAR – a slight hint of offside, not in my photo – could save us.
Bollocks.
There were stern faces on the walk back to the car.
We were caught in a traffic jam as we attempted to squeeze ourselves out on to the A4. A journey that usually takes twenty minutes took an hour. I was then hit with awful driving conditions as I drove back down the M4, with torrential rain and then surface water getting worse and worse as the evening progressed. There was even a nervous navigation of a surprisingly deep and lengthy puddle due to a blocked drain, in my home village, just thirty seconds from my house.
On the drive up to London early on Sunday morning, none of us were feeling confident of a pleasing performance against Aston Villa.
“Just can’t see where the next goal is coming from.”
“If we are driving back down the M4 tonight with a 2-0 win behind us, I will be absolutely amazed.”
“Tough game ahead.”
Elsewhere in my football world, things were a little better. Since Chelsea’s lifeless and underwhelming 0-0 draw at Bournemouth, I had witnessed two Frome Town games.
On Tuesday evening, in wet and blustery conditions, I watched with my Canadian cousins Kathy and Joe and a few friends – eight of us in a line – in the small main stand at Badgers Hill as Dodge met Plymouth Parkway in an FA Cup replay. Despite wet and blustery conditions, we watched transfixed as the home team won 2-1 with a great performance that included grit and determination and no little skill. James Ollis scored both goals. There was even a very late penalty save from Kyle Phillips to preserve the victory. It was, I am sure, one of the most enjoyable games of football that I have ever seen in Frome. A circle was completed that night since Kathy’s parents, Mary and Ken, met us at Stamford Bridge in August 2001 for the home opener against Newcastle United. They watched in the West Stand and loved it. Twenty-two years later, another game brought the family together once again.
On Saturday – the start of yet another two-game weekend – I travelled down to Salisbury to see Frome visit Bemerton Heath Harlequins in the FA Trophy. Here, the visitors were victors again, with another two goals for Ollis and one for the mercurial talisman Jon Davies.
I think there’s a tendency at lower level football to allow players – your team’s players, your players – a little more room for error than in the professional game; to be a little more lenient, to not get irate with every single mistake. For starters, the standard is lower, there are bound to be mistakes. Why would any spectator get on the back of such players? Of course, the gates are lower too (312 on Tuesday, 109 on Saturday) and to see a supporter glowing with incandescent rage in such surroundings would surely be frowned upon. The supporter in question would be labelled a fool. And the supporter would look stupid too.
However, at the top level of football, supporters seem to enjoy berating under-performing players at the slightest opportunity because greater levels of skill are expected. Oh, and their salaries. The salaries alone allow for constant abuse right?
I know what type of “support” I appreciate.
I arrived at “The Eight Bells” just after the pub had opened at 10am and The Smiths’ “The Queen Is Dead” welcomed me in.
“Has the world changed or have I changed?”
Quiet at first, the boozer soon filled up. The lads from Kent soon showed up, always full of smiles and laughs. They had heard that Frome Town’s next game in the FA Cup – the third qualifying round – was to be at Ramsgate next Saturday.
“Are you going, Chris?”
“Hope so, yeah.”
“Bloody hell. It’s a long way from Sevenoaks, let alone Somerset.”
Phil, Kim and Andy were all to tell me at various stages during the pre-match that the UK’s biggest “Spoons” is in Ramsgate. Kim also had a funny story from his last visit to Ramsgate.
“We were in this boozer and a bloke comes in and asks if the pub is doing Sunday Roasts. So the barman says ‘sure, I can do a beef or chicken’ and the bloke asks if there are any vegetarian options. The geezer goes ‘well, I can do you exactly the same but without the beef or chicken’.”
Howling.
How odd that we were in the “Town of Ramsgate” pub before the West Ham away game last month. My FA Cup travels will take me from Cornwall to Kent this autumn. I love the early rounds of the FA Cup.
I was enjoying this pre-match, as always, and was sat with Parky, Salisbury Steve, PD and Glenn. I looked from wide left to wide right and saw only blokes in our half of the cramped bar. There were around fifty in view. Only one was wearing official Chelsea gear.
…talk about “old school.”
While I was waiting for a friend to arrive, I stepped outside the pub for a few minutes. My ‘phone wasn’t logging on to the pub’s wi-fi connection and I wanted to see if I had missed any messages. As I stood outside, I flicked on “Facebook” and found myself reading a post from my friend Gary, originally from Fulham but now living in Torquay, about his trip to London but also about his increasing alienation from Chelsea Football Club. Halfway through his post, I looked up to see him walking by, no more than five yards away. I never see him down this part of Fulham. What a small world. We had a little chat, a little grumble about the way the club is being run, and we centered on the abandoning of the away coach travel subsidy. It is a subject close to Gary’s heart since he used to run up to five coaches to most Chelsea away games in the late ‘eighties and ‘nineties. “Gary’s Coaches” have gone down in Chelsea folklore. We spoke about how the modern game has increasingly left us cold. Over the past few weeks, I have mentioned to many that the “warm cloak of friendship” is the major reason why I still go to Chelsea. This club just doesn’t seem like my club any more. New ownership. New players. There is not a great connection these days. It was so noticeable that those who went to the “Legends” game while I was in Italy a fortnight ago really enjoyed themselves and many mentioned the special relationship that they enjoyed with those players from that era. I find it hard to warm to this current lot, this current bunch. Funny game, football.
Not long after, my friend Phil, and his brother Richard, arrived in the now heaving pub. Phil is originally from South London, just south of the river, but has been living in the United States since 1973. I have known him since a memorable weekend in Chicago in 2006 when Chelsea played in the MLS All-Star Game. We have met up on many a US Tour though, like me, he didn’t go to any games this summer.
“Why are we playing a team with the calibre of Wrexham?”
Phil has been loyally reading these match reports since they first appeared around fifteen years ago. Phil’s “thing” is to pick one particular phrase that I have used in each report and to simply repeat it. I wonder what phrase it will be from this week.
Anyway, thanks for your continued support mate.
I had managed to grab a last minute ticket for Phil and – luckily – the seller’s father drinks in “T8B” too. It was an easy exchange to set up.
At 1pm, we set off for the ground. With the increased security at games now, I had devised a new way of smuggling both my camera and lenses into the stadium without getting stopped by the line of stewards. Large cameras are now clearly on the list of banned objects at Stamford Bridge but I won’t let the bastards win. I can’t give the game away completely, but I hid my camera and lenses using a system not dissimilar to the way that newly excavated soil was hidden from the camp guards in “The Great Escape.”
I was inside at 1.30pm.
What with the amount of injuries that had hit our squad, the team that Mauricio Pochettino chose looked surprisingly familiar.
Sanchez
Gusto – Disasi – Silva – Colwill
Enzo – Caicedo – Gallagher
Sterling – Jackson – Mudryk
With Alan absent, Rob from Melksham came down to sit next to me.
So, 2012 & 2021 vs. 1982.
The game began.
As is so often the case, we began brightly. Aston Villa looked happy to hold back allowing us the ball. Early on, a good move found Raheem Sterling in the inside-left channel. His touch let him down.
I mouthed “terrible first touch.”
My neighbours agreed.
Budgie : “Terrible first touch.”
PD : “Terrible first touch.”
I leaned over to PD.
“That needed the touch of a silk glove.”
“Like the way you’d touch a woman.”
I laughed.
“Not the way you would touch a woman mate. The ball would have cleared the stand roof and the hotel.”
PD howled.
The first quarter of an hour was all ours, but Villa had unsurprisingly led the singing.
A chant of “Chelsea, Chelsea, Chelsea, Chelsea – Chelsea, Chelsea, Chelsea” (you know the tune) was met by ironic cheering from the away fans.
On twenty minutes, much against the run of play, Robert Sanchez reacted magnificently to Lucas Digne’s rasping and dipping volley that was knocked out to him from a corner.
“Typical. All us, but they have the best shot on goal.”
Just after, a great ball from Mudryk set up Nicolas Jackson into space but his shot was well saved by Emiliano Martinez, the ball creeping past the near post.
The UK’s biggest Wetherspoons is in Ramsgate.
We dominated play with occasional bursts from the two wide players.
“Don’t forget the ball, Mudryk.”
The same player then bottled a tackle and the resultant shot was deflected wide.
The quiet atmosphere improved when a semi-decent “Cam On Chowlsea” swept around the ground.
Glenn was annoyed that Pochettino was sat for most of the game. He wanted him prowling the technical area.
“Nah, he’s paid a lot of money for that dug out seat mate. Why should he stand?”
On thirty-four minutes, a long pass from Axel Diasi found Malo Gusto who then cut the ball back to Enzo. His shot faded and drifted just wide.
On thirty-eight minutes, a long corner was headed back to Nicolo Zaniolo – who? – but his fierce volley was magnificently thwarted by a great Sanchez reaction save. Top marks indeed.
The UK’s biggest Wetherspoons is in Ramsgate.
Mudryk continued to cause a few moments of worry in the Villa defence as the half ended and at last there was noise in the stands. After a fine Sterling cross, a Disasi leap and clean header hit the back of the net but was immediately called back for offside. There was an air shot from Sterling when he found himself close to goal at an angle.
It had been a frustrating half, and the two saves had, worryingly, kept us in it.
At half-time, nobody was shocked that we hadn’t scored.
The second-half began as brightly as the first. Sterling, running on to a lovely long ball, carried it too far and virtually ran in to Martinez at the near post. How frustrating. Jackson went close from a delightful chip from Enzo but was ruled offside anyway. A great ball from Silva, splitting the atom, found Sterling but his shot was blocked again. The same player was then ruled offside again. Again so frustrating.
Fackinell.
Then, calamity. I didn’t really see it, but a tackle by Gusto on Digne. A yellow. Then the boffins in Stockley Park ruled a second look. But then the same boffins weren’t sure. Back to the referee. Back to the pitch. What a fucking farce.
The UK’s biggest Wetherspoons is in Ramsgate.
A delay. We knew how this was going to end.
A red.
Fackinell.
Surprisingly, the offence was shown on the TV screen; this doesn’t usually happen. At first glance, I concentrated on the contact between studs and leg.
If I had seen further replays, which I didn’t, I would have seen the player get the ball first.
In 1965, 1975, 1985, 1995 and 2005 it would not have been a red card.
I hate modern football.
It looked like Armando Broja was about to come on – presumably for Jackson – but the sending-off changed the plan.
Fifty-eight minutes had passed.
Ben Chilwell replaced Mudryk.
There was applause.
For Mudryk? For Chilwell? Probably for both.
I noted how Jackson was through on goal, a one-on-one, but showed no signs of being able to out-muscle his defender and glide, Drogba-like, on towards goal. Maybe that time will come. I won’t hold my breath.
Enzo, for the second game in a row, was really poor.
The two teams exchanged half-chances.
On sixty-eight minutes, some substitutions.
Lesley Ugochukwu for Enzo, oh Enzo.
Cole Palmer for Jackson.
But then a lightning-quick break from Villa. Ollie Watkins raced through and Levi Colwill managed to stay with him and block with a perfectly-timed tackle. Sadly, the ball bounced back to Watkins who drilled the ball home from the tightest of angles. I struggled to see how the ball had crept in.
Bollocks.
Just after, a fine bit of football. A searching ball from deep from Cole Palmer found Chilwell down below us. He advanced but his low shot was hacked away by Martinez.
On seventy-nine minutes, Broja replaced Moises Caicedo, his first game since another useless friendly.
“You’re getting sacked in the morning” sung the Villa support.
The last phase of the game consisted of more Chelsea offside decisions and another Sanchez save, plus half chances for Broja and Disasi. A shot from Palmer was blocked.
“Sterling has got worse as the game has progressed, Rob.”
Despite the extra eleven minutes at the end, we never looked like scoring.
The Chelsea website would call this an entertaining game.
I beg to differ.
Here’s my take on the match at the Vitality Stadium, plus a few other football-related anecdotes thrown in for good measure.
Our home loss against Nottingham Forest – that match feels like it took place ages ago – was followed by a period of inactivity for Chelsea as the increasingly despised international break took over the football calendar. It took over my calendar too; I buggered off for an international break of my own in Italy and France.
I flew to Genoa and then took a train to Diano Marina on the Italian Riviera, a town where I have enjoyed many visits – and football-related incidents – since I first visited it in 1975. On the Friday, I caught a train to Nice, passing through Monaco, the scene of our first UEFA Super Cup win against Real Madrid, a fine trip that one. I met up with my good Chelsea friend Dave, who I had not seen since Sheffield United at home in 2019. We first met up in Los Angeles while on tour with CFC in 2007 and he has lived in the South of France since around 2016. We updated each other with our recent histories while enjoying a few lagers in a couple of bars. It was a joy.
On the Saturday and Sunday, my work colleague Lorenzo from Milan, and his wife Marina, met up with me in Diano Marina, and we had a lovely time walking west to Imperia and then east to Cervo along the site of the old Roman road the Via Aurelia. There were beers, fine food and tons of laughs. That I was staying in the same hotel that my parents visited during their first holiday to the town made my stay even sweeter.
On the Monday, before my flight home, I even managed to pack in a three-hour walking tour of Genoa; such an historic, cramped and photogenic city. It left me yearning for more. As fate would have it, I used the services of the same taxi driver on two separate occasions, quite by chance. He was a Samp fan, and also favoured Chelsea as his English team. As I left his cab, we toasted the memory of Gianluca Vialli. They idolise him in Genoa.
Incidentally, on the Thursday, as I darted in and out of a couple of bars near the city’s Piazza Principe train station, I spotted many folk wearing Genoa colours. I panicked a little and wondered if I had made an error and that they were playing that night, a chance to see a game at the Luigi Ferraris Stadium missed due to poor planning. I was to find out that the fans were instead off out to celebrate the club’s birthday, formed one hundred and thirty years ago to the day. It made me think; do any British fans celebrate their clubs’ birthdays with such a show of public affection? I think not. Maybe Genoa are a special case; Genoa Cricket And Football Club, as they are officially known, are Italy’s oldest club after all.
One last comment about my mini visit to the twin Rivieras of Italy and France. Over the five days of my stay, the most popular replica shirt that I saw?
Not Juventus. Not PSG. Not Milan. Not Inter.
Real Madrid.
I hate modern football.
As the following weekend approached, I had the English Riviera in sight.
Kinda.
On the Saturday, Frome Town were playing an FA Cup tie at Plymouth Parkway. This naval city is not exactly on the English Riviera, which the tourist boards of Torquay, Paignton and Brixham have chosen as their own moniker, but not too far away. On the Sunday, I had the Chelsea game in Bournemouth. The Dorset Riviera anyone?
The FA Cup game, a keenly-contested 2-2 draw in front of almost 400, was very enjoyable. Frome Town twice led through Owen Humphries and then James Ollis, only to conceded a late equaliser. The two teams would meet again the following Tuesday at Badgers Hill in a replay. This really pleased me; two Canadian relatives were to visit my local area during the week and had been keen to see a football match, any football match, in person during their short stay in Somerset. With the draw, they now had a game to watch.
Another North American tourist came into my plans, like a last-minute substitution, when I awoke on Saturday morning before my flit down to Plymouth. Tom, from Orange County in California, was staying at a hotel only two miles from my house and was angling for a place in The Chuckle Bus for the short trip to Bournemouth on the Sunday. Some strategic logistical planning quickly took place and everything was sorted. One Chuckle Bus became two, parking was arranged outside the Vitality Stadium, and everyone was happy.
Sunday soon arrived. I picked Tom up at the hotel at eight o’clock, but before we headed down to join up with Glenn, PD, Parky and Sir Les in Bournemouth, I treated Tom to a whistle-stop tour of both my home village of Mells and my home town of Frome.
I darted around Mells, quickly combining facts about the village – “fifteenth century church”, “Manor House”, “my mother was born in that house”, “I spotted Robert Plant outside that house last year”, “Fussell’s Ironworks”, “Little Jack Horner”– with a few football-related things too – “here’s where I kicked a tennis ball against the wall opposite my house, breaking many windows in the process”, “this is the school where I first became a Chelsea fan”, “I played for my village the first time here” before then heading into Frome.
We even had time to stop off – and step inside – Badgers Hill, the home ground of Frome Town, where I watched my first real football game in 1970.
I zoomed down to Bournemouth and we joined up with the chaps in “The Moon On The Square” at around 10.20am. It was wet outside. So much for the Riviera.
A few other friends drifted in as I ordered a light breakfast, and Tom ordered his second breakfast of the morning. Glenn said he’d attend the Frome game on Tuesday. There wasn’t too much talk about the Chelsea game. It had been such an underwhelming start to the season.
And not just at our club.
In many ways, I have been struggling further with football in general. In a rare and lucid moment before a Depeche Mode concert with my mate Dennis from DC, at a pub on the River Thames in Richmond in June, I stumbled across a phrase that summed it all up.
With a nod to my deepening alienation from top level players, my dislike of VAR, of UEFA, of FIFA, even the FA, the deadening of the atmosphere at games at Stamford Bridge, the entitlement of many fans, players’ obscene wags, late changes to kick-off times, blah, blah, blah, I summed it all up.
“I am not a fan of football, but I love being a football fan.”
I love the planning of travel to games, the sorting out of tickets, the driving, the endless driving, the drink-ups in the pubs, meeting new Chelsea friends from various places, the away days, the clobber, the laughs, the piss-taking, the banter, the memories…and I like being at games, live-games, taking in all in, the architecture of stadia, the history, the terrace humour…and I’d like to think I am a good supporter too, singing and cheering as much as I can, being there for the team…then there is the photography and the words in this blog.
I enjoy it all.
I love being a fan.
The football?
Not so sure.
We got drenched – absolutely soaked – on the short walk to the multi-story car-park. The two Chuckle Busses set off :
Glenn, PD, Parky, Sir Les, Daz in Glenn’s van.
Tom, two of Daz’ mates and me in my car.
We arrived at the same “JustPark” location – a large space outside a house on Littledown Avenue – at around 1.20pm. The rain still fell.
I was soon inside, evading the eyes of the tedious “bag gestapo” at the away turnstiles.
Made it.
A few “hellos” and a few handshakes in the away concourse…before I knew it “bloody hell, it’s ten to.”
Into the away seats we went.
The floodlights were on, the sky was dull grey, the rain still fell.
The teams appeared and Chelsea were to wear the newly-confirmed third kit of Eton Blue. For once, I approve; a nice nod to our inaugural colours of 1905. Typically, I was amazed how many of our new fans were blissfully unaware of the light blue racing colours of the Earl Cadogan. It’s such a subtle shade. I think it looks fantastic.
Our team?
Definitely a back four, right kids?
Sanchez
Gusto – Silva – Disasi – Colwill
Gallagher – Uguchukwu – Enzo
Sterling – Jackson – Mudryk
There was the usual “make some noise – for the boys” bollocks from the PA, plus some social deviant yelling out “Red Army!” on the TV screens.
Oh aye.
Conor was captain.
Before the game, a minute of silence for those that perished recently in Libya and Morocco.
The game began, and it began ever so brightly as the Eton Blues attacked the goal to our right. A move down the right and some deft interplay between Mykhailo Mudryk and Nicolas Jackson set up Gallagher but he could not fully connect.
“Big game for Mudryk, Gal.”
Jackson then thumped an effort against a post after being set up by Mudryk.
We had a decent start, but the play was tending to by-pass Enzo. Both Sterling and Gallagher were combining well and creating a few solid advances into the opponents’ half. The game then struggled along, and Bournemouth slowly got back into the game. A low reaching cross towards the far post was met by Dango Quattara but Robert Sanchez made a fantastic block, spreading himself out, and the chance was fluffed.
There were songs for Frank Lampard and Dennis Wise?
Why – oh, why the fuck why?
Then, an odd moment. Sanchez was in possession just in front of his goal and as he ran through his options, we were treated to the bizarre sight of all four defenders lined up along the goal line. It was football, but not as I knew it.
The problem was that the home team weren’t necessarily taking the bait and pushing up. They stayed back. This was just hideously sterile football.
On the half-hour mark, more Bournemouth possession. They enjoyed a little spell.
But then a shimmy from Mudryk and the ball was played in to Conor in a central position. He shimmied himself. The world seemed to stop. He took aim. His shot was saved, damn it.
Damn you, Neto.
A Bournemouth effort was smashed so high into the air, and so wide of the goal – it went out for a throw-in – that I immediately Christened it the worst shot that I had seen in almost fifty years of football.
It was one of those games.
As the first-half neared completion, the noise levels had dwindled.
“You can cut the atmosphere with a shovel, Gal.”
Sigh.
There was a lack of cohesion and urgency after the initial flourish, and only Sterling and Gallagher could take much comfort from the first-half. However, Sterling’s fine touches in tight areas and purposeful spins into space just seemed to peter out as he reached the final third. He – and we – lacked a cutting edge.
Sound familiar?
Soon into the second-half, that man Sterling sized up his options at a free-kick. He struck a spectacular curler at goal, but it ping’d the underside of the bar and bounced down and across the goal. Levi Colwill was on hand to knock the rebound in, but the goal was immediately chalked off for offside.
Bollocks.
“Will be 0-0 this, Gal.”
The sun came out, and it got uncomfortably hot in the away section.
Jackson was in on goal but slashed an effort ludicrously wide. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry.
We came close after a scramble that followed a Jackson effort. However, the Bournemouth ‘keeper managed to get a strong hand to a goal bound prod while lying on his back.
At the other end, Richard Billing drilled a shot just wide of our goal from a central free-kick.
Both teams struggled.
“Their final ball is worse than ours, Gal.”
Nearing the end of the game, the home team broke down our left and engineered a chance for our former striker Dominic Solanke. Again, Sanchez saved well.
I noticed that Jackson was too easily out-muscled in many of his his one-to-ones with his marker. But we have to give him time.
There was a plethora of substitutions :
Cole Palmer for Mudryk.
He hadn’t had that good game that he needed.
Ben Chilwell for Colwell.
We all moaned when he had passed, obliquely, after a fine run, the goal at his mercy.
Ian Maatsen for Enzo.
I disliked Enzo’s slow walk off the pitch as he was substituted.
Our last chance came from a rampaging Palmer – “keen Gal, but no options” – chose to pass to Sterling rather than shoot himself. Sterling then crossed to Palmer, whose snapshot was saved well by Netto. A follow-up shot by Maatsen was blocked.
It was all pretty woeful.
“I enjoyed Plymouth yesterday more, Gal.”
It was so dull that I sighed when eight extra minutes were announced.
I just wanted to go home.
It ended 0-0.
Next up, Plymouth Parkway on Tuesday, Bemerton Heath on Saturday and Aston Villa on Sunday.
CHELSEA/esque 