Deadline Day, Ipswich. The lack of activity. The knowledge that this is it, this bunch of cheaply bought and clearly not quite match-fit has-beens, never-were's and once-might-have-beens are YOUR team for the next four months. The wondering how Keane/Jewell/Mick/Hurst/Lambert would make a dish from the underwhelming, slightly battered and bruised bunch of ingredients that no-one else really wanted. Or were paying too much to have sat permanently on the bench or the injury table.
I wondered if we'd bother after the Barnsley game. So did Tel, although he was pissed and conversation was conducted with the frequent wiping of eyes and cheeks from the spittle that he seemed to exhale as freely as his cockneyed opinions.
I sat with Tel for Barnsley. I had a perfectly good Season Ticket in SBRL as well. But he bought two adult tickets for SAR Upper in anticipation of talking one of his neighbours into joining us, only for said neighbour to retract quicker than a hard-on in sight of Liz Truss and claim he was "doin' me 'osses fer the racin' on telly". As excuses went, it was lame. Tel excused his neighbour by hinting at dementia ("aint bin the same since 'is wife frew a seven, 'as Ray, an' that was a good ten year or so ago. Caught him 'avin' a gipsy's in 'is garden compost 'eap once an' 'e's always walkin' round in the 'otwevver win one ball 'angin' out 'is shorts"). So it was just the two of us in the end.
Tel was adamant he wouldn't waste the ticket, but, short of touting it outside for 50% off, which he did consider in the pub, it was always going to be me accompanying him in the Stand of Make Believe, possibly knocking someone's thermos over or engaging in eye contact with a bloke who then thought we were mates for life. I left SAR for that exact reason. I haven't stood/sat/stood/been moaned at for standing by some old girl in a tweed skirt and Norah Batty tights since 1999 in SAR.
It was a good view as these things go. Higher than SBRL (obviously) and we were sat in a row with people who looked like they'd tut at any language coarser than 'Crikey", and climbing the stairs does nothing for the slew of beer and brandy lurching in the old gut, but it was enjoyable, if a bit quieter and more polite. Miss Marple would have been happy there, and my mum would've been in her element, swapping cookery tips and bits from The People's Friend. She wouldn't have liked the football much, but then from the looks of them, several didn't, and just carried on their chats as though the sound of "The Delia Song" faint in the background was a perfectly normal setting for police conversation.
I'm sure Tel farted a bit in the first half. The row behind us wilted. He denied it and looked accusingly at the bloke next to him who, oblivious, was berating Evans for his passing. We ended up drawing a game we should have won, anyway. We left the ground for the walk back to the pub a bit deflated. Tel's only seen us draw this season. Bolton and now Barnsley. "Won't bovver again" he muttered as we crossed the Portman car park. Then he stopped briefly and a noxious whiff rent the air around my nose. Bastard.
So that was then. He's now in Braintree for a week, coming back on Sunday for a week before he and Mrs Tel head there again to leave their car on Tone and Sandy's drive in preparation for their Miami holiday on the 9th. He's away for three weeks, so I've got the keys to his bungalow and a stern promise not to drink all his decent brandy. These pages will be poorer for his absence, I know. But I'll try and make them readable.
He said something about deadline day and a need for a decent striker and I groaned inwardly and tried to remember our last successful deadline day and remembered Paul Cook spending a wedge of GameChanger's Arizona Pension pot on absolute dross. I wondered if we'd bother at all this year. It's like Christmas used to be at my ex in-laws in Southsea. Their parsimony and their belief in not spending more than a fiver on any single gift made it feel like the office Secret Santa, only shorn of any joy or laughter at pants made of Swizzle sweets or inflatable mini-wives in a box.
So you'd go and it would be spartan, little glasses of cheap sherry and Co-op cheapest mince pies and a turkey so small it could've left the seven dwarfs texting Just Eat for a Big Mac meal. And every year I'd swear I'd cut it altogether and we'd go to my parents instead, who knew the rules and made sure no-one left without gaining half a stone and a very sore head. And then she'd say "Oh go on, I've hardly seen them this year and they'll be so disappointed...." and I'd nod bleakly and we'd be off driving down the M3 in a faux jollility at least one of us didn't feel.
And that was Deadline Day at Portman Road. Waiting forlornly for a loan, when everyone else strengthened like it was going out of fashion, and feeling elated when we signed Leon Best, or Keanan Bennetts, or Glenn Pennyfather. Waiting, refreshing pages online, waiting as the clock ticked and Paul Lambert was forced to say he was happy with his squad.
And we've just signed the League One midfielder of the year 2021 and a bloke who has scored loads for Burton, and suddenly the future feels very rosy. Very rosy indeed. Course, time will tell, but I think we might just have done something very good indeed this season. Fingers crossed eh? |  |
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