As we prepared for Liam Rosenior’s first home game as manager of Chelsea Football Club, I was reminded of another League Cup semi-final against Arsenal almost twenty-eight years ago.
This one took place at Stamford Bridge too. And it was also the first home game for another new manager, Gianluca Vialli.
After a 0-2 loss in the league at Highbury on 8 February 1998, chairman Ken Bates dispensed with manager Ruud Gullit – despite the Dutchman securing our first silverware in twenty-six years the preceding May – and installed the Vialli as player-manager on 12 February. As fate would have it, Vialli’s first game in charge of his old teammates was against Arsenal on 18 February in a League Cup second leg after we lost the first game at Highbury 1-2.
Before the game, in the dressing room, Vialli arranged for the players to toast each other with glasses of champagne, and on a very memorable night goals from Mark Hughes, Roberto di Matteo and Dan Petrescu gave us a wild 3-1 win and a 4-3 triumph on aggregate. It was a bloody fantastic night.
I was confident that there would be no champagne in 2026; isotonic sports drinks were more likely.
We met Arsenal in the 2017/18 semi-finals too; a dull 0-0 at Chelsea was followed by a meek 1-2 loss at Arsenal.
What would happen in 2026? I, for one, was not too confident.
This was a standard midweek trip to Stamford Bridge for me. After I dropped my two fellow travellers off at “The Eight Bells”, I visited “Koka” restaurant on the North End Road. The waitress asked me if I had any allergies, and I wondered if I should have replied :
“Yeah, I fucking hate Tottenham.”
A bowl of French onion soup and a peperoni pizza later, I was on my way to West Brompton and then Putney Bridge.
During the day, I had messaged my friend Mark – a Chelsea supporter from nearby Westbury who I first met on the day we beat Leeds United 5-0 back in 1984 – and who is now the chairman of Westbury United. While Chelsea would be playing Arsenal, the re-arranged Frome Town vs. Westbury United game would be taking place over one-hundred miles to the west. I wished him “all the best for tonight” but was surprised to hear that he would be at Stamford Bridge instead.
As I walked into the pub, Mark was with Parky and PD, who he has known since around 1979, and I sat myself down for a good old chat about Chelsea and the non-league scene on the Somerset and Wiltshire border. It is an odd quirk that I am good friends with both clubs’ chairmen; even more that they are both Chelsea.
I was inside Stamford Bridge at around 7.20pm, and I was suffering with a recently acquired sore throat. There would be no singing at all for me on this night in SW6.
We had heard that Arsenal had the whole Shed End, but I soon spotted that there was a “no-go” area towards the left-hand side of the stand. This immediately confused me. I then presumed that Arsenal had not been given the rumoured 6,000, more like 4,500, and that Chelsea fans – 1,500 of us – were sat in the area usual reserved for away fans. It seemed odd and looked even odder.
We have had some strange sights over the years at Stamford Bridge since the renovations began in 1993. We have had away fans positioned in the East Upper. We have had away fans in the East Lower. We have had away fans in the uncovered West Stand. We have even had away fans in the Matthew Harding Lower. And of course, away fans in the Shed End. But this was the first time I could ever remember Chelsea fans in the away section of The Shed.
As I waited for the game to begin, I spotted a few visitors from The Shed who were unable to take up their usual seats due to the Arsenal invasion and were now sat in the Matthew Harding Upper. I spotted Long Tall Pete, then Cliff, then Martin from Glocester. Again, it was odd seeing unfamiliar faces in this section. Parky and Salisbury Steve, two other Shedenders, were in the tier below.
The team that Rosenior had picked surprised us.
Sanchez
Acheampong – Fofana – Chalobah – Cucurella
Santos – Fernandez
Estevao – Joao Pedro – Neto
Guiu
Several big names were out; we presumed injured.
On the Monday, we had sadly learned that former player and manager Eddie McCreadie had passed away at the age of eighty-five. Eddie stopped playing for Chelsea just before I began going to games, but he was a key member of the 1970 and 1971 cup winning teams in Manchester and Athens. I remembered him more as an intelligent manager, galvanising a team of mainly youngsters to gain promotion in 1977 after the desolation of relegation in 1975. That he failed to agree on a deal at Stamford Bridge in the summer of 1977 is always seen as a massive failure by the club at the time. In an era when Chelsea did not sign a single new player in 1975, 1976 and 1977 – are you listening, Clearlake? – the eventual success of McCreadie’s youngsters were testament to his prowess in nurturing young talent.
I always remember hearing the story of how he went on a mazy eighty-yard dribble in the home leg of the League Cup Final in 1965 and scoring past Gordon Banks in the Leicester City goal. The game had been tied at 2-2 after Chelsea went 1-0 up, then 2-1 up but the away team equalized on both occasions. This wondergoal from McCreadie won the game, and ultimately the tie, since the return leg finished 0-0.
But he will always be remembered for 1970, above all.
I absolutely think that the 1970 FA Cup winners are still regarded as the most-loved of all our teams, despite the glories of the past twenty-five years.
Peter Bonetti
Ron Harris
Eddie McCreadie
John Hollins
John Dempsey
David Webb
Tommy Baldwin
Charlie Cooke
Peter Osgood
Ian Hutchinson
Peter Houseman
Sadly, just three of this cherished team remain with us; Ron Harris, David Webb, Charlie Cooke.
Before the game, there was a respectful moment of applause in memory of Eddie McCreadie.
REST IN PEACE
Kepa was booed as his name was announced and I shook my head. He was, after all, part of the team that saw us embarrass his current team 5-1 in Baku. I am sure others rolled their eyes when they heard that.
Soon into the game, we had already witnessed a long throw into the mixer from Declan Rice from down below us, and soon after I snapped as the same player dropped a corner into the six-yard box.
The action seemed to go into slow-motion. I saw Sanchez rise, I saw Sanchez flap at air, I saw the ball drop onto the head of Ben White, I saw the ball squeeze in past an Arsenal player on the line.
Chelsea 0 Arsenal 1.
Maybe there had been champagne pre-match, and Sanchez had drunk more than his share.
I slumped into my seat, with the back of my head nestling in the palms of my hands, crestfallen and silent. I don’t think I moved for the best part of a minute. The Arsenal players – I call them “the robots”, and they don’t deserve capital letters – swarmed together and very soon the Arsenal lot in The Shed began singing.
“Set piece again.
Ole, ole.
Set piece again.
Ole, ole.
Set piece again, set piece again.
Set piece again, ole ole.”
Was this tiresome chant a replacement of the equally shite “1-0 to the Arsenal”?
No, because that was soon aired too.
Bloody hell.
Ten minutes had passed, we were 1-0 down to the Woolwich Wanderers, they had scored via a set piece, and we had already been treated to pieces of kamikaze distribution from Sanchez.
“This could be a long night, this.”
However, Enzo rattled a powerful drive at Kepa, and we all hoped for more.
A strong run from Viktor Gyokeres into the box, trading paces with Trevoh Chalobah, allowed him to wriggle free and create space but his shot was deflected away for a corner. There was something in that old-fashioned contest that somehow warmed me; two players in a good-old duel, a real blast from the past.
I noticed that every seat in the house was occupied, and where there are usually empty seats in most areas, this night Stamford Bridge looked crammed. I have to say that the £60 ticket for this game shocked a lot of us; until recently the club has charged significantly less for League Cup games, even semis. We wondered how much the away ticket would cost. It was odd that the away game was not yet on sale; the first instance I could ever remember of this happening. On the way up, we wondered what the likelihood of purchasing a second-leg ticket would be if we were trailing 0-3 from this game.
The consensus was this :
“3-0 down. £60 a pop. Won’t get home until 2.30am. Let someone else have our tickets.”
Estevao looked lively as we tried to get back into the game. The best move of our match came on twenty-seven minutes as Enzo set up Joao Pedro but his low cross bobbled across the six-yard box but there was nobody close in to finish.
Leandro Trossard weaved his way into the box down below us, but his shot was blocked.
At the other end, Enzo played in Estevao who forced a fine save from Kepa at his near post.
Arsenal were plainly a well-oiled machine with players who knew how their system worked. Chelsea kept battling away, but without a great deal of penetration.
On thirty-nine minutes, William Saliba dropped a shot on the roof of Sanchez’ net.
Two bookings followed for Estevao and Cucurella, and the first half ended.
At half-time, no changes from Rosenior, and I was quietly expecting another half of decent possession but no final product. Marc Guiu had not had a sniff.
During the break, I was relieved to hear that Sam Heal had given Frome Town a 1-0 lead against Westbury. A healthy gate of 814 would soon be announced
The second half began, and after just four minutes, the action switched to the West Stand touchline. Pedro Neto lost the ball to Bukayo Saka, Cucurella fell and tried to recover, and raced back trying to track Saka, but the ball was played outside to the free man White, racing on the overlap, nobody tracking him. I know that Neto usually does this; not on this occasion. The ball was fired in low, and from over one hundred yards away, it was not clear to me how it had evaded Sanchez. Gyokeres had the simplest task.
Chelsea 0 Arsenal 2.
The visitors began singing about Wembley.
Eight minutes into the second period, the new manager made two substitutions.
Benoit Badiashile replaced Acheampong, while Alejandro Garnacho replaced Guiu.
We approached the hour mark, and we seemed to be more direct, more cohesive.
On fifty-seven minutes, a poor Arsenal clearance failed to clear their half. It annoyed me that the bloke behind me was quick to berate Enzo, but as he spoke his words of disgust, Enzo chased down the ball from one player and then continued to fight for the ball, not once but twice. The ball broke to Joao Pedro who set up Neto on the right. The ball was crossed to the far post, where Garnacho waited. The ball bounced, he chested it down, then lashed it in from an angle. I was impressed with this finish.
Chelsea 1 Arsenal 2.
Game on.
Garnacho soon realised it was no time to sit his arse on an advertising board and raced back towards his own goal.
Arsenal had been singing along constantly all game, but it was now our turn. Stamford Bridge was engulfed in a deluge of vibrant noise.
Heart-warming stuff.
We created a few half-chances, with Estevao and Garnacho causing problems.
Sadly, on seventy minutes, Saka initiated a move on the right, and the ball was neatly played between Mikel Merino and Gyokeres. Fine footwork from Martin Zubimendi inside our box allowed him to create space and fire home, high into the net.
Chelsea 1 Arsenal 3.
The Gooners went into orbit.
On seventy-five minutes, Jorrel Hato replaced Fofana.
I wasn’t particularly confident about anything.
“It’s going to be a long quarter of an hour.”
An Estevao shot was blocked. At the other end, Sanchez denied Merino with a stunning piece of goalkeeping, flinging out a leg, and stopping a goal-bound shot with his boot.
From the corner, Gabriel headed a cross down and up and over the bar.
Fackinell.
On eighty-one minutes, our last two changes.
Tosin Adarabioyo for Cucurella.
Shim Mheuka for Joao Pedro.
…also Kai Havertz made an appearance, and Porto 2021 seemed such a long time ago.
Estevao enjoyed a fantastic run down the right, forcing a corner. Neto delivered the ball in, and it was flicked on towards Garnacho, again at the back stick. An instinctive finish, but well controlled, and we were overjoyed to see the net ripple.
Fackinell.
Chelsea 2 Arsenal 3.
Garnacho again raced back to his half; no time for celebration fripperies.
The last ten minutes of the game were played out, and half-chances came and went. PD set off early to begin the slow walk to the car. No more goals ensued, and as I joined the masses attempting to vacate The Sleepy Hollow, tempers were raging among a few players down on the pitch.
Out into the night, I muttered to myself:
“Now I’ll have to fork out for a ticket for the bloody second-leg.”
I met up with the chaps. We were pragmatic. We hadn’t played brilliantly but we never gave up.
“The tie is still alive.”
After a predictable detour down the A4 from Hungerford to Melksham, I eventually reached home at around 1.45am.
This match at Craven Cottage would be the first of six consecutive games in London, and for this I was truly thankful. There have been some long hauls over the past month or so, including Leeds, Newcastle and Manchester, and I was looking forward to this spell in the capital.
These games are coming quickly in the month of January, and the club will play a total of nine matches this month.
On the Monday after the game at the Etihad, the club interviewed Liam Rosenior, and on the Tuesday morning it was announced that the former Fulham player who was in charge at our sister club Strasbourg would be unsurprisingly joining us. The length of the contract, of six years, baffled me, but much of modern football leaves me baffled so I tried not to dwell too much on it.
Liam Rosenior, then.
I remembered him from his time at Fulham, but struggled with his spells at other clubs. My first ever game at Craven Cottage with Chelsea was in the 2004/5 season and I quickly checked to see if our new manager was playing on that day over twenty-one years ago. In fact, he was a non-playing substitute. As an aside, I really enjoyed that match, with Arjen Robben on fire, and we won it 4-1. I chuckled when I realised that I recognised virtually all the Fulham team that day. The surnames were listed and I quickly barked out their first names.
Mark Crossley
Moritz Volz
Zat Knight
Zesh Rehman
Carlos Bocanegra
Steed Malbranque
Mark Pembridge
Papa Bouba Diop
Luis Boa Morte
Tomas Radzinski
Andrew Cole
The only two I struggled naming were Carlos Bocanegra and Andrew Cole; I thought it was Andy. Of course, these days I would bloody struggle to name many of the Fulham team’s first names. Sigh.
Anyway, enough of this shite.
Welcome to Chelsea Football Club, Liam Rosenior.
Best wishes for a long and successful career on the Fulham Road.
…stop sniggering at the back.
Incidentally, I used to feel haunted every time that I heard the Rosenior name, including when Liam first came to my attention when he played for the local Bristol City team in 2002. You see, dear reader, his father Leroy played – and scored – against us in a 1-4 defeat at Upton Park on a Bank Holiday Monday in May 1988. That defeat effectively consigned us to a play-off position in a fight to avoid relegation that season. And we all know how that worked out.
In twenty years’, time, I hope that the name Rosenior doesn’t haunt me further.
I worked an early shift and collected PD and Parky at 2pm. I updated the lads on Frome Town’s fine win at Bishops Cleeve the previous night. I fuelled up at Reading Services, and enjoyed a good run in. I dropped them off at “The Eight Bells” at just before 4.30pm.
After parking up at 5pm on Gowan Avenue, I trotted the fifteen minutes down the Fulham High Street to meet up with the lads. A group of five slow-moving Fulham fans were in my way and I sped past them. I hoped it was a metaphor for the evening’s match. I peered into “The Golden Lion” with its “Home Fans Only” sign, then crossed the great divide as I passed “The Kings Arms” and “The Temperance” – away fans – and approached “The Eight Bells” with its “Only Away Fans” sign.
At 5.15pm, I was in, and shot round to join up with PD, LP, Salisbury Steve, Jimmy the Greek and Texas Aleksey. I stayed about an hour, and it was lovely to see so many other Chelsea faces appear in our local. It seemed like we were having a little party in the front room of our house and word had got out. It was splendid.
I found it funny that Scott, Gerry, Martin and I were last together in a bar outside Yankee Stadium in the South Bronx in July, and here were all were again in a pub near Craven Cottage in South Fulham in January.
Things, sadly, would take a turn for the worst.
My friend Chris in North Carolina – formerly of Windsor – messaged me at 5.45pm to inform me that a mutual friend, Mick Collins, had passed away after heart surgery the previous night. I was shocked and stunned. I first met Mick, who retired a few years ago, in Chicago in 2006 for our game against the MLS All-Stars, and our paths would cross on many occasions, in the US and in England. He was a lovely man and will be sorely missed.
RIP Mick Collins.
This was the last of Texas Aleksey’s run of games on his trip and this would be his inaugural visit to Craven Cottage. We all left the pub within a few minutes of each other, but while Jimmy walked ahead with PD and LP, I wandered through the park with Aleksey. It was a bitterly cold night alongside the River Thames.
I took a few photos outside the familiar red brick frontage on Stevenage Road.
I was in at 7.15pm.
Such is the benign nature of Fulham’s support, that it is only at Craven Cottage where home and away fans can walk side-by-side once through the turnstiles and inside the concourse behind the stand.
Very Fulhamish.
However, I wasn’t impressed with my view; although I am an away season ticket holder, I was right down by the corner flag alongside the lower tier of the Riverside Stand.
This little area is full of tourists – It’s easy to tell – and I wondered which ones I would become fixated upon as they looked across at the travelling support, open-mouthed, at the volume and humour of our support. It’s a game I always play at Craven Cottage if I am towards that stand.
Of course, it was the Tyrique George chant that got us all energised last season, and I wondered if the youngster might be included in the squad to act as a catalyst for noise if no other reason.
Well, no. He wasn’t even on the bench.
With Liam Rosenoir watching in the stands, Calum McFarlane took charge for his second game and chose this team :
Robert Sanchez
Malo Gusto
Trevoh Chalobah
Tosin Adaradioyo
Marc Cucurella
Andrey Santos
Moises Caicedo
Pedro Neto
Enzo Fernandez
Cole Palmer
Liam Delap
So, Enzo in the hole and Cole out wide. I suspected some abuse from the home fans for Tosin.
Was it just me, or did others feel like we would be treading water in this game as we waited for the new man to take over? I expected a hard game against Fulham and predicted a tight 1-1 draw.
Pre-match, some flames flew up into the sky in front of the Riverside Stand while the PA played what sounded like an ACDC song. What could be further from Fulham than ACDC? I think a song by the Brotherhood of Man would have been more fitting. The players marched across the pitch from the cottage, and yet more flames and fireworks zipped up into the cold black sky. The bloke on the PA was even more “shouty” than our dickhead at Stamford Bridge.
Fackinell.
Fulham play in an all-white kit these days, so it was a nice-and-simple whites vs. blues battle on this evening in deepest SW6. The home team attacked us in the Putney End in the first half, and they engineered a shot on goal in the very first minute when Harry Wilson shot low at goal, but Robert Sanchez saved easily.
Just after, the first of many Roman Abramovich chants got going in the away section of the stadium.
Then, the usual chants for players who were not on the pitch, what an odd custom.
I barked out “It’s Salomon.”
In the first fifteen minutes, we dominated possession but with no real effort on goal.
Then, as we neared the twenty-minute mark, two corners on our left in front of the Hammersmith End from Enzo caused a few problems for Bernd Leno. After the ‘keeper clawed at the ball to save it from reaching Liam Delap, another corner swung in and he watched as an Andrey Santos header hit the bar. Another corner was not so problematic and went behind for a goal-kick. With Chelsea having camped out in the Fulham box for a few minutes, Leno spotted a one-on-one and smashed a long ball forward towards Wilson. He was in a simple battle, a running duel, with Cucurella who had been his usual combative self in the opening quarter of the match. To our horror, Cucurella pulled at an arm and Wilson went down.
It was on the edge of the box, and Cucurella was the last man. We were rather unsighted, but the referee gave a straight red. Phone messages arrived to say the same thing.
“Stupid defending. Definite red.”
Thankfully, a VAR check denied Fulham a penalty. Wilson only hit the wall with the free kick.
Calum McFarlane replaced Santos with Jorrel Hato, who slotted into left-back.
Fulham then penned us in for the next period of the game. They dominated possession but didn’t really hurt us.
On thirty-five minutes, more Roman Abramovich chants, quickly followed by one demanding that Eghbali went forth and multiplied.
The mood was getting fractious in the Putney End.
On forty minutes, a decent break involving the hard-working Delap and Enzo, but a tepid shot from Palmer at Leno.
The game deteriorated and I pondered how truly awful the Fulham badge truly is. It sits there atop the gable of the old Leitch stand, now the Johnny Haynes Stand – an exact replica of our old East Stand – and I just shook my head. It looks like it was designed by an eight-year-old in a school detention.
A Fulham effort from Emil Smith-Rowe flew over the bar.
Six minutes of injury time were signalled.
Fulham put the ball in our net via Wilson, but Raul Jiminez looked offside to everyone around us. The Fulham fans roared as the players raced away, and after what seemed like ninety seconds, a VAR sign was flashed up on the screens. Why it took so long I will never know. It seemed to an increasingly cynical me that they waited for the Fulham players to finish celebrating – “great TV, let’s not spoil that” – before VAR was signalled.
All part of the modern football experience, all bloody shite.
Thankfully, VAR ruled offside.
Phew.
Being so low down – the bottom fifteen rows have a shallow rake – I couldn’t get many decent photos at all. As Chelsea attacked us in the second half, I hoped for an improvement.
In the first minute of the second period, a break and Pedro Neto fired over. Just after, a daisy-cutter from Wilson was deflected wide of Sanchez’ goal for a corner. Enzo sent in a corner, but Hato’s header was glanced over.
I found myself momentarily checking some scores – “United losing, Tottenham losing” – and looked up to see a Jiminez leap, alone, that resulted in his header nestling into the corner of the goal.
Fackinell.
Fifty-five minutes had elapsed.
I liked the way that our support responded with the loudest chant of the night from us.
“And it’s super Chelsea.
Super Chelsea FC.
We’re by far the greatest team.
The world has ever seen.”
Well, in New Jersey in July maybe, perhaps not in Fulham in January.
A Fulham shot whipped past Sanchez’ left post. Many home fans presumed it was in. Thankfully, the side netting rippled from the outside only.
On the hour, more Roman Abramovich chants.
And then the other one.
“Fcuk off Eghbali, fuck off Eghbali.”
A pass from deep from Tosin, and Palmer intelligently stepped over it and allowed it to run to Delap who cantered away at the Fulham goal. The young striker went for placement and not power, but Leno got an arm to it and a covering defender headed away.
I want to see more early balls to Delap for him to run onto; surely it is his strength?
Then, the chant of the night, perhaps of the season, or at least the recent weeks.
Zeitgeist at Fulham.
“We don’t care about Clearlake.
They don’t care about us.
All we care about is Chelsea FC.”
On sixty-five, Reece James replaced Enzo who, apart from those flighted corners, had done little.
Then another chant aimed at Clearlake but one man in particular.
“You’re not wanted here.
You’re not wanted here.
Fcuk off Eghbali.
You’re not wanted here.”
A low shot from Moises Caicedo, who himself had been unusually quiet thus far.
From right in front of me, no more than twenty feet away, Neto – minus ‘tache these days – floated in a near-post header. Under pressure from the leaping Gusto, Antonee Robinson could only flick the ball on, and it smacked against the far post. I could not see a jot, but I saw the reactions to a Delap goal.
GET IN YOU FCUKER.
I tried to take some worthwhile photos of the players celebrating but only really succeeded in snapping us fans.
We’re the important ones anyway, right?
It was 1-1, my prediction on the night.
On seventy-five minutes, Josh Acheampong for Gusto and Joao Pedro for Palmer. Unfortunately, Cole had struggled and didn’t look his old self. He seemed frustrated too, which is clearly not a good sign.
Of the two teams, it was Fulham who then upped their challenge, and we had to resort to some desperate defending, hacking away balls, blocking shots and throwing bodies at crosses. There was one absolutely magnificent “star fish” jump from Sanchez that foiled an effort from close in.
“There’s only one Robert Sanchez.
One Robert Sanchez.
He used to be shite.
But now he’s alright.
Walking in a Sanchez Wonderland.”
This was tense stuff now.
On eighty-one minutes, Sanchez dropped quickly to save well from Smith-Rowe but the rebound fell nicely for Wilson, who had been a threat all night, and he shot low past Sanchez.
I screamed “OH NO.”
Bollocks.
Interestingly, I looked over to my left to the tourist section and only a very small proportion of the one hundred or so fans closest to me were up and celebrating.
Were many of them Chelsea supporters?
Maybe, but perhaps unlikely.
I suspect most just happened to be in London and fancied a game of football to add to their list of boxes to tick. A Premier League game these days sits right alongside a Harry Potter studio tour, a coach trip to Stonehenge, a visit to Harrods and a plate of fish and chips.
£150 or more later, they sat in stoney silence and perhaps wondered what all the fuss was about.
Nine minutes of normal time and four minutes of injury time did not result in any worthwhile Chelsea effort on the Fulham goal.
This ended as a 1-2 loss.
It was Fulham’s third win against us in the past eight encounters after being winless in the previous twenty-one games.
For a club that has never won a major honour in one hundred-and-forty-seven years, this might be the nearest they come to anything worthwhile.
Bless’em.
As I made my way up the steps at the Putney End, and out into the concourse, the PA system played “Good Times” by Chic and I mouthed an obscenity.
One Chelsea lad barked “the Fulham lot are buzzing. One of them has cracked open a cheeseboard” and I had to smile.
I raced off to collect my car from Gowan Avenue and soon picked up my two mates on Findlay Road. We were soon on our way. I reached home at 12.45pm, a relatively early finish compared to recent trips.
It was a weak performance and nobody except Sanchez really shone. The reason for this malaise? Who bloody knows? We are, as ever, a confusing club and a confused club, and I can churn out the usual platitudes about hoping that the new manager can sort everything out, but he is untested at this level and will find himself under huge pressure if things do not go as Clearlake wish.
I wish him well, but…
Our next match is against Charlton Athletic in the FA Cup Third Round on Saturday, one of the great days in the football calendar. It will be my first visit to The Valley since the opening day of 2002/3.
I wasn’t happy that there was no Chelsea match on Boxing Day 2025. I was also annoyed that there was no Frome Town game on Boxing Day 2025. It seemed that the natural laws of football in the festive period were being flaunted.
At least, I suppose, travel was easier on the Saturday.
I was able to enjoy a little lie-in and picked-up PD at 9am and Lord Parsnips at 9.30am. Outside, it was bitterly cold.
I did admit to PD that a substantial part of me wished that I was off to watch Frome Town play a local derby at Shaftesbury at 3pm rather than drive the three hours up to Fulham yet again for the match against Aston Villa. Frome had won eight league games in a row and, after a fine win at home against Exmouth while I was in Newcastle last weekend, were now five points clear at the top. A visit to a new ground, just forty minutes away, did seem really alluring.
We breakfasted “on the hoof” and made our way to London. Above, no clouds. Ahead, not too much traffic. I dropped the chaps off at 11.50am near “The Eight Bells” and then drove through Fulham to park up at midday. I had a few moments to myself. I had to decide between my warmest coat and my small camera or another coat and my SLR. I didn’t fancy suffering for my art and dropped my Sony “pub camera” in the pocket of my “K-Way” jacket and slowly walked down towards Stamford Bridge. I stopped off at “Café Ole” for a cappuccino. There was another, small, bite to eat too. I then spent a few moments outside the West Stand, taking photos of the pre-match scene. Although the game was still four hours off, the place was getting busier by the minute.
I spent a few minutes talking to a few folks in the bar area of the Copthorne Hotel, then made my way back to Fulham Broadway to catch the tube down to “The Eight Bells” where the usual suspects were crowded around our usual table. It was a tight fit; eight of us were crammed in on chairs, stools and a settle. My friend Eliot – last seen in NYC in July – arrived with his son Skinny, and we caught up a little.
We spoke about the difficulty in obtaining tickets these days, and this turned into a memory of playing Barcelona away in 2000 when we both shared stories about how we got in that day. Eliot managed to get in without a physical ticket – it’s a long story based on bravado and luck – while I had managed to obtain a ticket from Chelsea’s official allocation – only 1,500 – using that long-forgotten piece of antiquity called a fax machine.
The group left the pub surprisingly early at around 4.15pm. There was a noisy group of Villa fans on the same train.
The news from Shaftesbury was varied. The home team had a player sent off early on, we went 1-0 up, they equalised, we went 3-1 up with a quarter of an hour to go but the home team scored two in the last ten minutes to share the points.
Balls.
I was inside Stamford Bridge at 5pm.
All day long I had been saying how difficult this game would be. We were playing an in-form team here, and I probably would have been happy with a point.
The surprising news was that Benoit Badiashile was given a start.
Fackinell.
Us?
Sanchez
James – Chalobah – Badiashile – Cucurella
Caicedo – Fernandez
Neto – Palmer – Garnacho
Joao Pedro
Alongside me were Clive and PD, and thankfully the temperatures were not so Baltic as first thing. All the teams in and around us had won, albeit narrowly.
Two classic kits on show, the match began.
The game bristled to life and in the first two minutes, Moises Caicedo looped the ball towards Cole Palmer who gracefully brought the ball down. Alas his shot spun wide of Emiliano Martinez’ far post at the Shed End.
Soon after we were treated to a magnificent sprint from Reece James to win the ball from some poor unfortunate Villa midfielder, and the crowd roared its approval. The break was thwarted, just sensational stuff.
Then in the next minute, Villa’s first foray into our half, but Badiashile was strong in thought and strong in tackle, which is not always the case.
I liked the way that Alejandro Garnacho and Pedro Neto were occupying the far reaches of the width of the pitch.
“Chalk dust on their soles.”
It meant that Villa was stretched. We just needed to hit them early and hit those spaces.
Villa shouted about “empty seats” but nobody rose to the bait. The home crowd was, mainly, docile.
On the quarter of an hour, it really was all us. I could only really remember that Badiashile block.
A shot from Enzo was walloped wide.
On twenty minutes, a rapid succession of shots and stabs at goal from us in the Villa box were unrewarded as defenders lunged at balls to block.
I turned to Clive : “nice game of football this, we are playing well.”
Although the home support was hardly prolific, at least the players were awarded with the old “Amazing Grace” chant.
You know the words.
On thirty-three minutes, Garnacho to Neto and a header back to James, but the blast fizzed just wide.
On thirty-seven minutes, a corner in front of the Villa lot. Reece James curled a slow cross towards the six-yard box.
I snapped; a blur, too blurred to share.
To our amazement the ball bounced on the turf amidst a crowd of players and up into the goal, Martinez totally befuddled.
GET IN.
Had it gone straight in? I wasn’t sure. For that matter, neither were the players. For the first time that I could remember, the celebrations were split.
Joao Pedro and Enzo sped off towards Parkyville and collapsed on each other. Meanwhile, all the remaining eight outfield players rushed over to celebrate with Reece James. The goalscorer was announced in the stadium as Reece James. Or was it? My instinct to take a photo of the two rather than the eight was proved prescient; the Brazilian did indeed get the final touch.
We were in front.
Lovely stuff.
A few “THTCAUN/ COMLD” exchanges were shared.
Beautiful.
An effort from Palmer was saved by Martinez, and then Villa sent over a free kick from John McGinn that Joao Pedro hacked away. Honestly, they had hardly troubled our backline the entire half.
I spoke to a few friends at half-time in the stadium, and via messages in the US, and we had all agreed how enjoyable that had been.
One friend suggested that I had probably made copious notes on my mobile phone throughout the first period.
He was correct.
But, deep down, there was a tangible fear that we couldn’t keep it going and that this match would turn into one of our recent “game of two halves” scenarios.
What Chelsea would prevail?
It felt as though a whispered stadium announcement would not be amiss.
“Please take your seats for the Second Act.”
Within the first minute, a tantalising cross from Garnacho down below us in The Sleepy Hollow caused havoc in the Villa defence. I presumed that former Chelsea player Ian Maatsen had cleanly headed it behind for a corner, but there was a shout for a handball.
No penalty.
But then, almost imperceptibly, the away team improved.
I yelled “don’t let them get a foothold, Chels.”
Their star of the moment Morgan Rodgers shot at goal – their first real chance – but it was deflected wide.
Just after, a hell of a break; initiated by Sanchez. Palmer to Joao Pedro to Palmer, a cross to Garnacho but a sliding clearance from McGinn at the far stick. A minute later, a curling cross from James caused Martinez to twist and claw it away.
On fifty-seven minutes, Marc Cucurella set up Garnacho but the chance was spurned.
I spoke to Clive : “one of these days, Garnacho will hit the target.”
We were weakening a little now and our passing – “triangles of torture” – were tending to get the fans frustrated, and the players were losing confidence with each minute.
On the hour, Unai Emery made three changes.
Ollie Watkins for Buendia.
Jadon Sancho – who? – for Malen.
Amadou Onana for McGinn.
The Villa fans, sensing a revival, stepped up their support. I was hoping for something to match it from the home stands, to roar the boys home, but it was not coming.
A fine break from Villa, but a great block on his knees from Sanchez foiled Boubacar Kamara.
On sixty-three minutes, a poor clearance from Badiashile was easily intercepted and the ball was worked from Rodgers to Watkins. Sanchez raced out, but the ball was edged home.
Bollocks.
I was impressed that there was an immediate and loud response.
“COME ON CHELSEA.
COME ON CHELSEA.
COME ON CHELSEA.
COME ON CHELSEA.”
But Villa were on top now and we had to rely on two excellent saves from Sanchez. Efforts from Maatsen and then Watkins were blocked by our ‘keeper.
“CHELSEA – CHELSEA – CHELSEA – CHELSEA – CHELSEA – CHELSEA – CHELSEA.”
Now it was time for Maresca to retaliate.
Three substitutions of our own.
Malo Gusto for Cucurella.
What? Alongside James, our best player. I was dumbfounded.
Estevao Willian for Palmer.
What? Cole had a mixed game but is always a threat. Unless injured, he had to stay on.
Jamie Gittens for Garnacho.
Garnacho has tons of tantalising potential, but I do wonder if he is going to be labelled as another Phil Driver, Jesper Gronkjaer or Mykhailo Mudryk.
Then, another one.
Liam Delap for Joao Pedro.
Within two minutes, Delap was given a yellow and then ran around a lot without really ever getting involved.
A couple of chances were exchanged. Enzo tumbled in slow motion and a weak free kick was given to us in prime Reece James territory, but his shot thumped against the wall.
Again, I was pissed off that there was no wall of noise to roar us home.
On eighty-two minutes, PD left to walk back to the car. I left my seat and sat on the step above the walkway to allow him space to leave. Just as PD walked by, I saw a corner float in from the left and I shouted “FREE HEADER!”,
Not only a free header, but a free-goal, Watkins again.
Bollocks.
The Villa contingent roared again and I looked around in bewilderment.
“Bloody hell, Chelsea.”
There was a wasteful cross from Gittens, and we all moaned.
Villa had the best of the last few minutes. Caicedo uncharacteristically lost possession and Sanchez came to the rescue again. There was still time for another, superb, low save from Sanchez from a free kick. Honestly, if it was not for our ‘keeper, we quite probably would have lost 1-4 or worse.
Villa had made a lot of noise as their second half improved, and they ended the match with songs about winning the league. However, they reserved their loudest chant for their hated rivals Birmingham City. And by God, it was loud.
Ah, this was horrible. We had played so bloody well in that first period, yet we crumbled after the hour mark. What team are we? A blinkin’ frustrating one for sure.
As I trotted down the steps, I was reminded that on Boxing Day 2024, we were 1-0 up at home to Fulham yet lost 1-2 after a second-half collapse. And here we were again, experiencing the same Chelsea “fade” as twelve months previously.
I caught up with Big John, and I reminded him how we had wondered at the break if our first-half form would continue in the second, and we shrugged that Chelsea shrug.
“See you Tuesday.”
“You will.”
We now find ourselves a massive ten points behind Aston Villa and we are hanging on grimly to a fifth position that looks like being the best we can hope for this season.
At least the hot dog with onions at Fulham Broadway was bang on.
As I started to drive home on the elevated section of the M4, past Brentford’s ground, I was pragmatic and philosophical. Although this defeat had hurt – and there were real feelings of disappointment with the manager and the lack of atmosphere – I had a moment to myself thinking of all of the times that my father had driven on this section, how many times I had driven along here, of all of my mates driving these miles over the years, and how lucky we have been to be able to do all this.
Schmaltzy shite?
Maybe.
But it is Christmas.
Oh – and Martin; I made more notes in the second half.
With consecutive away trips to Cardiff and now Newcastle within five days, it was if these two fixtures were plucked out of the March 1984 football calendar for me to enjoy once again.
These two matches from over forty-five years ago still resonate.
Saturday 10 March 1984 : Newcastle United vs. Chelsea.
Saturday 31 March 1984 : Cardiff City vs. Chelsea.
These were consecutive matches for me.
And so, it would be in 2025, too.
Tuesday 16 December 2025 : Cardiff City vs. Chelsea.
Saturday 20 December 2025 : Newcastle United vs. Chelsea.
Parky was unable to travel up to Tyneside for this one. I was up at about 4.45am, and I arrived outside PD Towers in Frome just as “05:59” changed to “06:00”.
I liked that.
Just in time logistics.
You know how it works by now.
We were blessed with completely clear skies for most of the long trip north, and this of course meant dry roads, a nice plus. There were no real traffic hold-ups. We stopped at Strensham Services in Worcestershire at 7.30am. There was a McDonalds breakfast, heartily wolfed-down by us both, and I filled my petrol tank. The weather outside was sublime.
I made great time. There was a comfort break at Woodall Services in South Yorkshire. I was loving this trip. Up onto the A1(M) and a hint of clouds to the north, and a hint of a rainbow too. One final comfort break at Durham Services, and then the approach to Newcastle-upon-Tyne. The Angel of the North was at its brilliant rusty best, catching the sun, to my right. There had only been a few minutes of fine rain in the last few miles.
Jimmy The Greek had travelled up from King’s Cross, arriving at 11.30am, and had rewarded himself with a beer in the magnificent “Centurion Bar” at the train station. The plan was to collect him and then check in at the apartment I had booked to the west of the city centre.
I usually cross the river via the famous Tyne Bridge but on this occasion my Sat Nav took me over Redheugh Bridge which was further inland. For a few hundred yards, I found myself driving along Scotswood Road.
I couldn’t resist singing a couple of lines.
“Ah me lads, ye shudda seen us gannin’. Passing the foaks alang the road just as they wor stannin’. Aal the lads an’ lassies there, aal wi’ smiling faces. Gannin’ alang the Scotswood Road, to see the Blaydon Races.”
This took me right back to my first Chelsea game when my father meticulously taught me the words to this famous Newcastle United song before the teams met at Stamford Bridge in March 1974.
I collected a smiling Jimmy at 12.30pm and we were soon checked in at the same apartments that we had used back in May. By 1.15pm, we were in an Uber heading down to the city centre.
Football fanciers often talk about “game management” these days, but for my perspective this weekend was all about “drink management.” I remembered the mess that I managed to get myself into in the small hours of our Sunday game at St. James’ Park last May. The kick-off on that day was at midday, and when PD woke me at 10.30am, I was in no state for football or anything. I was rancid. I promised myself an early finish on this Friday, ahead of another early kick-off on the Saturday, and on the Saturday, ahead of a long drive home on the Sunday.
We know Tyneside well by now. And although I wanted to “take it easy” – with PD’s full backing – I also wanted to visit a few new pubs too. So, I spent a while looking at the possibilities.
The quayside had been very well explored. In fact, we had virtually visited every pub along the stretch from the Wetherspoons in the west to the “Free Trade Inn” in the east.
The Wetherspoons on the quayside, “Off-Shore”, The Quilted Camel”, Bob Trollop”, “The Red House”, “The Crown Posada”, “Colonel Porter’s Emporium”, “Akenside Traders”, “The Bridge Tavern”, “The Slug And Lettuce”, “The Head Of Steam”, “The Broad Chare”, “The Tyne Bar” and “The Free-Trade Inn.”
Fourteen pubs over one mile, all ticked off.
So, for this little session, I zoned in on the Bigg Market and I sorted out a pub-crawl that would not be too taxing.
Jimmy, PD and I started off at “The Beehive Hotel” at around 1.30pm. I had visited here in 2020 but needed to try it again. I had forgotten that this lovely pub has the cheapest drinks in the city. A trio of lads from The Eight Bells in Fulham were at a table and I shot over to say hello. My round of two “Cruzcampo” and one “Guinness” came to just £10.60.
I was falling in love with Newcastle once again.
Ryan from Stoke had seen that we were plotted up in “The Beehive” and joined us and stayed with us all night. The place was getting busy. We were perched on stools near the doorway. Space was at a premium. The last Friday before Christmas – “Black Eye Friday” – was heating up.
I had seen that my mate Foxy from Dundee had attempted to send me a message. About half-an-hour later, I then spotted that an image of a pint of Guinness had appeared on the chat. At that exact moment Foxy appeared right in front of me.
Our group was set.
Jimmy, PD, Ryan, Foxy and myself.
The five of us traipsed around five yards to a very quiet bar called “Pumphrey’s” and I supped another “Cruzcampo. Then, through an entrance between “The Beehive” and “Pumphrey’s” into the cobbled courtyard of “The Old George” and into pub number three. It was absolutely rammed, but thankfully we found a table. This fantastic pub is one of the city’s oldest and dates from the sixteenth century. It’s a rabbit warren of cosy rooms, and the place was heaving. By now, the football chat had veered off along several unexpected tangents, and the alcohol was flowing freely. From here, we edged along High Bridge to “The Duke Of Wellington.”
Then it was time for some food. Someone mentioned “Hooters” and although I rolled my eyes we were soon at a table, with me drinking another “Corona” as I nibbled on some mozzarella sticks. By this time, we had lost Foxy. The last time I saw him prior to this was in Dortmund. He tends to show up at random places and probably disappeared from the Bigg Market into some time-tunnel portal.
We had spent around six hours in the Bigg Market. It had been a blast. The locals? Friendly of course. The pubs? Welcoming. The drinking? We were just about in control, but only just.
“Where next Chris?”
I suggested “The Strawberry.”
“Great shout.”
Not only was it next to where Ryan was staying, but it was en route to our apartment too.
We clambered into an Uber and headed off to the fabled pub right next to the Gallowgate.
I remember that in the classic gangster film of 1971 “Get Carter” which was set in Newcastle’s underworld, Michael Caine’s character says to a rival “you’re a big man, but you’re in bad shape.”
Well, for those six hours we were Bigg men, and in increasingly bad shape.
There was time for a team photo outside “The Strawberry” and in we went. Who should be sat in a quiet corner of this pub but Gabby and Noel, and we sidled up next to them. Ironically, they had left a message on my Cardiff blog the previous morning.
I was aware that I needed to watch my intake, not wanting to over-do it. But I wasn’t sure what to drink.
“Surprise me Jimmy.”
Well, this didn’t go to plan really. He brought me back a rhubarb gin.
“Oh lovely.”
We stayed in “The Strawberry” for around two hours and we returned to our digs at around 10pm.
And that, for Tyneside, was an early finish.
I slept well that night.
I could hear Jimmy and PD at various moments in the morning, but I enjoyed a little lie-in. I was up at around 9.15am. We soon caught an Uber down to the quayside and were soon tucking into a large breakfast apiece at the well-visited Wetherspoons.
I wasn’t 100% but I was certainly in a much better state than in May.
We reviewed the previous night’s activity, and I was reminded that in “The Strawberry” – beneath the girders of the Gallowgate, right behind enemy lines – we apparently were told by one of the female bar staff to “keep the noise down”, such was the volume of our Chelsea songs.
“I don’t recollect that at all. Bloody hell.”
We then caught another Uber up to the ground. As we waited in traffic, I took a few shots of The Stack that has added more revenue to match-days at their stadium. The driver, bless him, took us right up by the away end. From there, we walked through the concourse to take the lift to the heavens.
I then encountered a problem. I had seen my digital ticket appear in my Google Wallet, but as I neared the ticket check, it had disappeared. Luckily, a fellow supporter suggested that I should delete the ticket from May, which was still in my wallet, so that there would be no confusion. This worked a treat.
We shuffled into the lift after a security check.
Jimmy and I said that we were PD’s carers.
“Does he need two, like?”
“Yes, Jimmy looks after his left leg and I look after his right leg.”
“Oh aye.”
“And he looks after the rest.”
In the bar in the heavens, we met up with Kev, Rich and Matt from Edinburgh; all Hearts supporters, but Chelsea too.
I was inside at around 11.45am and took my seat in around the sixth row from the front.
It was, dear reader, bloody freezing.
And foggy.
Those of us in the away end can usually spot the high land of Gateshead behind the Gallowgate End.
Not on this day.
The light grey seats of the stadium met the light grey steel of the stand roof, and the city down below was shrouded in a clinging grey fog, while the sky above was an impenetrable grey smudge.
The vivid green grass of St. James’ Park was the only colour of note on this bitterly cold day on Tyneside.
Our team was flashed onto the large screen to my left.
Robert Sanchez
Malo Gusto – Wesley Fofana – Trevoh Chalobah – Marc Cucurella
Reece James – Moises Caicedo
Pedro Neto – Cole Palmer – Alejandro Garnacho
Joao Pedro
There was a festive slant to the pre-match songs that boomed loudly out of the speakers, with songs by Shakin’ Stevens and Wham, but also “Our House” by Madness, maybe a nod to us visiting supporters. If so, a nice touch.
Then, bizarrely, some shite by Status Quo.
The teams were formally announced over the PA system, and we then were treated to the usual selection of pre-match songs at St. James’ Park.
“Blitzkrieg Bop” by the Ramones.
“Blaydon Races.”
I can’t deny it; I mouthed along to these words.
I just couldn’t help myself.
“Ah me lads, ye shudda seen us gannin’. Passing the foaks alang the road just as they wor stannin’. Aal the lads an’ lassies there, aal wi’ smiling faces. Gannin’ alang the Scotswood Road, to see the Blaydon Races.
Aa went to Blaydon Races, ’twas on the ninth of Joon, Eiteen hundred an’ sixty-two, on a summer’s efternoon; Aa tyuk the ‘bus frae Balmbra’s, an’ she wis heavy laden, Away we went ‘lang Collin’wood Street, that’s on the road to Blaydon.
Ah me lads, ye shudda seen us gannin’. Passing the foaks alang the road just as they wor stannin’. Aal the lads an’ lassies there, aal wi’ smiling faces. Gannin’ alang the Scotswood Road, to see the Blaydon Races.”
Then, oddly “Hey Jude.”
The entrance of the teams.
“Local Hero” by Mark Knopfler.
I was right in the mood now…but still bloody freezing.
I seemed to be absolutely surrounded by Scottish lads, mainly Rangers but a few Hearts too. There must have been around a dozen beside me and behind me. Foxy was a lone Dundee United fan, but I had not yet spotted him at the stadium.
For the first time that I can remember, I was watching an away game by myself…Alan, Gary and John didn’t travel to this one. And it felt so odd.
The game began at 12.30pm and we attacked the Gallowgate. I was happy with our start, and our first chance came in the first minute as Cole Palmer attempted to lob Aaron Ramsdale from the left-hand corner of the box but although several Chelsea supporters thought it was going to drop in, it always looked like narrowly missing the target. The ball dropped on the roof of the net.
Sadly, in the next move of the game, Newcastle disposed Wesley Fofana just inside our half and moved the ball out to their right. Jacob Murphy sent over a stunning cross that Anthony Gordon met. I was purring at the excellent point blank save from Robert Sanchez, but the rebound sat up nicely for Nick Woltemade to tap in from close range.
Three minutes had elapsed and we were already 0-1 down.
Fackinell.
Two minutes later, we built a fine move down the left and Alejandro Garnacho fancied his chances outside the box, but the ball flew over the bar.
Just after, Malo Gusto was injured inside our box, and our players were irate when the referee Andy Madley let play continue. There was another Murphy cross that found Gordon again, but Sanchez leapt to produce a stunning finger-tipped save.
As the first half settled, we found it so difficult to build moves and seemed prone to collapsing into one almighty mess whenever the home team attacked.
Newcastle United managed to get the ball in the net via former Blue Lewis Hall, but Fabian Schar had impeded Sanchez in the build-up, so it stayed at 1-0.
We were chasing shadows by now and were second-best in all areas.
On twenty minutes, Gordon sent over a cross from their left and Woltemade’s run was perfect and his finish flashed inside the far post.
We were 2-0 down with not even a quarter of the game gone.
Bloody hell.
But wait. VAR was called in to review a potential offside. I wasn’t convinced. We waited for three minutes. The goal stood.
On twenty-seven minutes, a stupendous first-time volley from Schar but Sanchez saved well.
The away end throughout all of this was mainly silent. There had been some very half-hearted chants at the start but as the lacklustre performance on the pitch was played out before us, we just stood, with the cold clawing at our bones.
At last, on thirty-five minutes, a semi-decent chant.
“CAREFREE.”
Just after, we somehow produced a shot on goal. It was deflected and in one of those odd moments, the ball appeared to be going in towards the goal, but in fact was rebounding out of the penalty area. A few of us in the heavens were taken in.
Pedro Neto bundled the ball in, but used his hand, so the goal was immediately disallowed.
On forty-four minutes, a chance for Woltemade went begging as he lunged at a ball at the far post but failed to connect.
What a dire bloody first-half for us.
I chatted to Andy from Nuneaton at the break.
“I’m finding this harder to do, Chris. Maybe one day soon, I’ll give it all up.”
“I know mate.”
“It’s the travelling, really.”
“Andy, I love the aways though. Love them. It’s the homes that I find a bit of a chore.”
“It’s the other way for me. I enjoy the homes. I can get to London by train from Nuneaton in just under an hour. It means I can have a few drinks. I’m not driving. Nice.”
Garnacho had been disappointing in the first half. On several occasions he had the determination to get past the full-back, but often his touch let him down. On two occasions he ran out of pitch. I would later say to Kev that “it’s not like ice hockey and he can run behind the goal…”
There were no changes at half-time. For all our deficiencies, the home team had been very very good.
Within the first few minutes, I sensed that Palmer – who had been desperately quiet in the first half – was in a lot more space, perhaps because he was told to hold back a little. After just three minutes, running at a defender, he was crudely fouled.
OK, a chance. I settled myself. My tiny “pub camera” was at the ready. Both Palmer and Reece were over the ball.
We waited.
To my surprise, Reece approached the ball and struck it towards goal. I snapped. Imagine my – our – elation when it dipped over the wall, evaded Ramsdale’s dive and nestled in the nets.
GET IN YOU BASTARD.
This signalled an awakening in the heavens. Whereas there had been moans and silence, now we sensed an unlikely comeback.
On fifty-one minutes, a fine break but the ball looked like it got stuck under Neto’s foot and the chance squirmed away.
Just after, Ramsdale made a fine save from James.
There was a rugged shoulder charge by Trevoh Chalobah on a Newcastle player that might have gone against us. Play was waved on.
On fifty-five minutes, Enzo Maresca replaced Malo Gusto with Enzo Fernandez and James moved to right-back.
We then took the game to the home team, and it seemed to be all Chelsea, with the home support growing nervous and then deathly quiet. James was now revelling in his right-back position, ably supporting the midfield when he could. Enzo just kept things moving. Caicedo looked stronger with each minute.
This was turning into a good old game of football, with attack and counterattack, time after time. There was a natural ebb and flow to it. We were all enthralled.
On sixty-seven minutes, Sanchez released a fantastic bomb of a pass towards Joao Pedro. It was inch perfect. With Malick Thiaw close, he headed the ball behind him, spun, and was away. It was a stunning piece of skill. I had mentioned in a previous blog how I liked his hold up play. Well, here he was holding up the ball for himself to run onto. I had memories of Mark Hughes heading the ball into space for him to run onto against Vicenza in 1998.
We saw him approach Ramsdale. I made the quick decision that I wouldn’t be able to grab my camera and take a snap. Instead, I concentrated on this joyous moment. I sensed a goal. After spinning away so magnificently, I knew our striker’s confidence would be rocketing as he cantered in on goal.
He steadied himself.
I steadied myself.
The shot was rolled close to Ramsdale, but past him.
We just waited, now, for the net to bulge.
PANDEMONIUM.
I punched the air continuously for what seemed like ages.
My elation, actually, surprised me. But it left me so happy.
So happy that a Chelsea goal, after 1,527 games, still means so much.
I turned the camera in on us and snapped a photograph of the screaming, gurning, cheering, shouting, smiling fans up in the heavens.
What a come-back.
And what a second half that continued to entertain us and enthral us. Chances were created at both ends. Garnacho must have had three chances to score but either missed the target or shot tamely at Ramsdale.
Newcastle United changed their attack line; they were going for it too.
On eighty minutes, Andrey Santos replaced Palmer, who had faded a little.
It seemed that we were on top, but the home team created chances of their own. We had to rely on an amazing recovery by James who sped across the Gallowgate penalty area as if his life depended on it to nick the ball just before Harvey Barnes could fully connect.
Shots from Caicedo and another from Garnacho went close but not close enough.
This was truly breathless stuff.
The game ended with a couple of Newcastle chances.
There was also a late VAR review involving a tackle by James on Barnes that I didn’t really see. Thankfully the challenge was said to be fair.
It ended 2-2.
What a second half of football.
I loved it.
And yet again we came away from a Chelsea game talking about “a game of two halves” and how we manage to get ourselves into such ridiculous predicaments.
Not to worry, we descended the steps, I bumped into Foxy – and then lost him again – and we goaded the subdued home fans as they sloped past us at ground level.
“Two-nil and you fcuked it up.”
I bumped into Andy from Nuneaton, his face gleaming.
“See you next week, mate!”
We reassembled and dropped into a huge bar to the north of the Bigg Market. We sat outside and oddly the cold air didn’t seem to bother us as much as it really should have. Later we spent two hours in a comfy bar next to “Pumphrey’s” called “The Market Shaker” and relaxed over a few beers, or “Cokes” in my case.
Saturday night in the Loony Toon was just starting to warm up and this bar, I guess, was typical. Several groups of women appeared, in various stages of undress, as did a massive line of lads in a nativity-themed fancy dress parade, all holding hands, dressed as angels, wise men, Joseph, Mary, a donkey, a star, a bale of hay: bloody impressive.
Then a bloke in his fifties began strutting his stuff on the dance floor and was dancing like a lunatic. He clearly wasn’t dancing, or even moving, or breathing, in tune to the music. I then realised that he had the incredible knack of dancing to the previous song, like some ridiculous musical interpretation of a “Two Ronnies” sketch.
I joked with Jimmy that Foxy would suddenly appear from the cellar.
Of course, Foxy eventually showed up, and he stayed for a drink or two.
The Hearts lads left to catch their train. Jimmy left to catch his train. Foxy left us to head back to his hotel.
PD and I hopped a few doors down to indulge in a magnificent hot and spicey pizza that hit all the right spots.
We were back at our digs at 8pm.
There would be an early alarm call at 6am in the morning…
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.
