 | Forum
Thread | Blimey - Sheffield Wednesday might not be competitive next season then
at 18:15 16 Apr 2025
Just heard from a friend that they had a supporters trust meeting yesterday with their owner, Dejphon Chansiri, and 'may be going into administration with at least a 15 point deduction before the season starts'.
He can't afford to pay players all summer apparently. Sounds like we got off lightly with Marcus Evans? |
| Forum
Thread | The Warky On a Thursday Report
at 21:24 10 Apr 2025
A Warky Report on a Thursday? What? Yes. I know. But it's been a while and I have some news.
The biggest news is that Tel and Mrs Tel have put their house in Halstead on the market. The honeymoon period wore off, sadly. They didn't like Halstead as a town. Tel frequently moaned to me before the footie that he couldn't stand it. They were driving to Braintree and Colchester a lot for shopping and to meet with her brother and his wife. He missed the closeness of the sea and his old friends from Dovercourt. They're both well into their sixties now, no kids, and I think the relationship with Tony and Sandy has cooled a bit from his point of view, although Mrs Tel seems to spend more time with both.
I asked where they'd be looking to move, but Tel couldn't answer that and, instead, took refuge in the age-old distraction of belittling Halstead to me once again. "No bleedin' shops, not any yer'd wanna use in yer right mind anyway". I wondered if it was just him? "Nah, the wife can't stand it eiver. Iss 'er that wants the move". He chewed reflectively on his beer and said he could feel a cold draught somewhere. We were sat in a pub in old Harwich. He'd come to look at a house in Little Oakley. He invited me. It wasn't suitable. That much became clear before we'd even met the estate agent outside (he was running late and Tel nearly b*ggered off without even giving him the courtesy of an audience when he saw the house).
"Tony wants to move ter Spain" said Tel as we drank on, the light in the pub flickering as a cloud drifted over the sun. One of the bar staff crept into the hiatus and asked if we wanted a menu. Tel shook his head and then said, almost an afterthought, "fanks anyway" to her retreating back. I asked him if he knew where and he said "Place called Carmona, near Seville". I asked him if he'd been and he shook his head again. "Nah. Seville's not our cup'o'tea. Surprised it's theirs to be 'onest. Well, 'is anyway. She's always been a bit la-di-dah. Architeck stuff an' all that. She loves it". He sipped again and added "She was one of the only folk I've met who enjoyed wotchin' that Time Team". He shook his head at the iniquity of it all.
So the house is on the market. Ipswich are heading back to the Championship. We're both renewing because, as Tel said, "Why wouldn'tcha? Best bit of goin' up if yer can't stay there is comin' down wiv cash and the chance of whipping a few". He reflected as I went to the bar with our empties, looking for another refill as it was only 4pm. "Specially the scum" he added with a seraphic grin that exposed brown teeth and five 'o'clock shadow on his cheek.
I don't know. It all seems a bit hasty. Mrs Tel didn't come with him on the house viewing and he only saw one house, so it's hardly urgent. I can't imagine he'd buy a property without her say-so. We took a cab back to mine from the pub later and passed by his old bungalow and I noted he pressed his face against the side window as we passed, a longer-than-uncaring glimpse. And I felt sad. I don't know why. This was the place of memories, the first official 'item' dinner with Paula all that time ago, the scene of parties, sleep-overs, piss-ups, emotional meets and tears and laughter, And now it's just someone else's home. Almost a warning to the curious.
Life does carry on, just the same. We just get older and more reminiscent and nostalgic for things that, in the moment, were actually the cause of great pain and ongoing confusion. Terry remembers things in a negative way that I only remember being positive, and vice versa. He ages ungracefully, as though dragged unwillingly through the years towards his epitaph. His black has long-since turned grey. Sometimes I think he's aged alarmingly, and I worry. Then he opens his mouth and I realise he's still in there, the barrack-room-barrister without a jury. I'm fifty-one soon. I feel it. Blokes died in their late forties when my Grandfather was a nipper, not just through war or pestilence, but of age worn stuff. It was accepted. I'm still hanging on. Barely.
Thanks for listening. Or reading. Dunno why I told you all that now? Oh well. Match reports will come back eventually, but the constant beatings do get on yer wick, as Tel has said, so perhaps we'll be a bit choosy until the Championship starts in August? You never know your luck.
|
| Forum
Thread | Oh well......
at 18:09 5 Apr 2025
roll on Coventry at home in August.....should be a cracker! |
| Forum
Thread | Apologies
at 16:54 16 Mar 2025
Got a bit too into the old drink yesterday
I was just so angry, disappointed, pissed off and generally too drunk to post anything decent. Hope this hasn't ruined reports for you all.
Cheers
Warkers |
| Forum
Thread | Sorry to say it.....we need better than McKenna
at 15:49 15 Mar 2025
He's been brilliant but this just feels like capitulation.
We need better when we're back in the Championship or I genuinely think we'll be like Luton. We just go to pieces. |
| Forum
Thread | The Warky Premier Report: Once in a Blue Moon (A)
at 11:02 9 Mar 2025
I lived in South London in the early 1990's. Tooting Broadway to be precise, in a student hovel that was as dirty and as hectic as it was cheap. A bay-windowed house down an avenue of nondescript other bay windowed houses, converted into two fair-sized flats, each as mouldering as the next. A Pakistani landlord, Sumid (pronounced Soo-mit) who liked to be called Sammy, and smilingly ignored our requests for new boilers and new appliances. He collected the rent on a Friday. Someone had to be in to pay him or he'd wake us up at the unearthly hour of ten a.m on a Saturday.
Student life was great in the 1990's. My fellow flatmates (three blokes, their on-off girlfriends who moaned about the cleanliness and made noises like Pinky and Perky during sex) were an engineering MA, a Theology undergraduate who was on a doss for three years, away from the parental yoke only as much as his overdraft would allow and a bluff Yorkshire 20 year old Business and Economics undergraduate who supported York City.
Amidst the oft-related tales of cheap beer, missed lectures and primitive sexual liaisons was the footy. We both worked part-time jobs, me and the lad from York, him in retail for some 'cheap-as-chips' food retailer, me at St George's Hospital as a temporary admin assistant, which paid really well. Town were in the Premier League and I returned home about as often as I needed clean clothing, but home was still miles from Ipswich and I saw precisely one game, the home win over Spurs when Alun Armstrong scored two.
I went to Spurs away (Dozzell had just moved there) and Arsenal away and Chelsea away and Wimbledon away. Selhurst Park was an easy bus journey from Tooting. It was a dump as well. Thornton Heath was always just that bit rougher than home.
The York lad accompanied me on these trips. Starved of our fix, we started watching Fulham, then in the old fourth division and attended by drips and drabs of support. It cost eight quid to stand on the Cottage Terrace. We would drink in Putney at the Wetherspoons before walking down. We once met Dennis Waterman, the actor, in his sunnies on a grey November morning in the pub on the river whose name I've forgotten (edit: the Star and Garter) near Putney Bridge. He was drunk. He was off to watch Chelsea away at Wimbledon. His driver was a nice bloke, sat in a corner reading the Mirror and smoking, a barely-touched tonic water in front of him.
I say all this because I've done my time at Selhurst. We rarely ever won there. It was a rubbish ground. Tel didn't fancy it (he doesn't fancy Forest at home next Saturday either but he'll be there. Already paid, innee?). So I spent yesterday enjoying the pre-spring sunshine on a walk between home and Wrabness, all along the seafront, stopping at pubs for a quencher along the way.
Terry, like nearly all of us if we're being honest (and those of us who still think we'll be OK aren't being honest, are you?) thinks we're down. Home games therefore lose that bit of urgency. He's up for West Ham and Wolves and Arsenal, but it's the Forest and Brentford games he's lost appetite for. It seems inconceivable given that a few years ago he came and watched us play Fleetwood and Lincoln. Perhaps he too has been spoilt by our sudden and joyous rise to the rare climes?
Once in a blue moon as my grandad used to say whenever he got a bit of luck, like a Premium Bond coming good or a pools coupon getting over 24 points (Littlewoods paid him £150 - he was truly content for a week after. Now, Tel wins £400 on a footy or horse bet and sounds neutral when he tells me). Once in a blue moon do we win games like yesterday, 0-0 for a large portion but, oh b*gger they scored a late one just as the shadows lengthened and I was purchasing a pint in the local and chatting to the old boys at the bar.
It's a blow upon a bruise, now. I expect us to lose. In fact, I'm as unfussed about defeats as I was when we had Lambert here and went on winless runs in League One against sides who are now in League Two and not exactly setting the world alight there. It takes something to admit this but I miss the Championship. True the teams are rougher, the quality is much less and we'll probably lose the negligible delights of Delap and Greaves and Phillips and Cajuste and possibly Jack Clarke if Sunderland fluke promotion via the play-offs or one of Leeds or Burnley raid us in the summer. Can't say I'll miss 'em much though. And it's strange that I think like that. Spoiled I reckon. It certainly has been. |
| Forum
Thread | There's no pace or power in that side apart from Delap
at 21:41 26 Feb 2025
Philogene is a luxury - even Villa with better players couldn't get a tune out of him.
I miss Chaplin and Burns running at the back four. Playing Broady on the right? Jack Clarke is all fancy touches, but there's a quality player in there. He tried, but he's pretty paceless.
Taylor, Morsy, and I hate to say it but Davis aren't Premier quality. We can't defend for toffee. Tuanzebe has the turning point of the Titanic. O'Shea did well. Greaves was alright. I'd still like Burgess back with Woolfie though.
Relegation sadly. Hate to say it but nothing I saw tonight or last Saturday convinced me we have enough quality. We've bought Championship luxury players when we should have gone for a bit of Premier League nous. |
| Forum
Thread | The Warky Premier Report: Southampton (H)
at 10:41 2 Feb 2025
We weren’t much impressed, Tel & !. The day started well but the football just got in the way. As has been customary lately.
Welcome back. To be honest, I’m not sure why you’ve come? I can write of stuff to take minds off impending relegation, but we’re all realists at heart. We still hurt or are angry. Perhaps we all need a soothing bout of escapism? There used to be a children’s TV programme called ‘Let’s Pretend’ when I was a nipper. It comprised of a slinky looking worm on two sticks that made synthesised noises. It wasn’t Roobarb, or Camberwick Green, or Mr Benn and I could usually foment better pretends than it ever dreamed of, my nine-year-old self being used to solitary imagination by then. Only child, you see. We got good at being in our own company.
I used to pretend I was Paul Cooper in the playground or when playing for my primary school football team. This was useful when in goal, but soon became wearisome when required to play any other position, usually goal-hanger or somewhere vaguely on the wing, chatting to spectators and generally avoiding the worst of the action, which was a ‘Benny Hill’ style chase of kids with too-tight shorts running after a slightly sturdier kid who had the ball. Even the ‘Yakkity Sax’ theme tune made sense. Trouble was, I didn’t respond to being Steve McCall or Kevin O’Callaghan. Steve was a strange looking bloke. Kev deliberately volunteered to have his arm broken in ‘Escape to Victory’. They weren’t the best role models. I was more than capable of breaking my own arm, as happened twice, once on the swings when we attempted jumps from daft heights and once when roller-skating. On concrete. Very hard concrete.
Terry told me a story of a kid who had to be taken to hospital in 1971 after he jumped off the coal-shed roof and landed on his head. He exaggerated, of course. I highly doubt the blood looked like the scene in the Shining when the lift doors opened. He’d have been dead, rather than a retired executive now ensconced in the Canaries. “Blood bleedin’ everywhere” said Tel, in awe. “They ‘ad to clean it up wiv a big mop and sluice it down with Jeyes”. He also knew a young lad who ripped his scrotum on a barbed wire fence, but I won’t bother telling you that one. It evinced ooh’s and winces despite being over fifty years ago.
He arrived early yesterday; Mrs Tel had a Zumba class and then a pool exercise thing at The Lifehouse Spa. Then she and Sandy were lunching in Frinton-on-Sea. They got back OK from Turkey and are off to Marbella in April. I got a big box of authentic Turkish Delight and a bottle of vintage champagne. And four hundred cigarettes, which I paid for as they were very cheap. He moaned about the weather a lot, but was otherwise happy. They had steak or fish in the restaurants and he liked the salads and the hummus and the kebabs. Mrs Tel looked a bit taut in her T-shirt. “Got bigger blinking muscles than me” said Tel, grudgingly. She looked the fittest I’ve seen her for while and her kiss and hug were certainly firmer than I’ve previously had.
We had a pre-train ride pint in the Station Cafe at ten. Tel had a bacon’n’egg bloomer with Daddies brown sauce. I can’t eat much at the moment. I had food poisoning last week. Some friends invited me for fish and chips last Wednesday and I had the old galloping guts on Thursday. Both ends. In fact four holes if you count both nostrils. So I stuck to Guinness. Good food replacement, is Guinness. Better than those Complan things you buy in Boots. Kept me hydrated as well. Not fizzy like lager. Full of iron. That’s probably enough of that.
We did the football bet on his phone. We didn’t win. We had Ipswich in as a home victory, convinced. Tel thought it’d be 3-1. I said 2-0. It’s Southampton for god’s sake. What could possibly go wrong?
The train arrived at 11am and off we went, clutching plastic pint pots still half-full of our third pints from the Cafe. We got seats easily. There was hardly anyone about. The Town was as quiet as I’d seen it since we came up to these rarified heights. This was no Newcastle or Chelsea. It was chilly, but the rain stayed away.
The pub was eerily quiet. I got served in ten seconds flat at the bar. We retired to darker recesses for a continuation of the chat. Tel put a tenner in the fruit machine and won twenty back. It stayed like this up until about twelve thirty, when people suddenly appeared like Kling-ons in Star Trek. Whoomp and there they were. We shared some chicken wings and nachos, him eating the majority, me picking here and there, conscious of the old recent gastric trouble, one eye fixed on the bogs in case of lurching.
Left at 2.45pm. The walk to the ground was quick. I was drunk. The world swooned and wheeled like the seagulls over my head. A good omen for a nice, easy game. “Delap’ll score” drawled Tel, his own intake a happy blend of world lagers and a few glasses of adequate brandy. I thought Hutch would score first. In fact, I was surprised it was still goalless after ten minutes. Plenty of time I reassured myself.
What happened next was a travesty. A blind man’s labrador could’ve predicted we’d concede one, especially as Muric was playing. It was crap, not to put too finer point. Broadhead touched it about as many time as I would. We lacked bite in midfield. Even so, when Southampton scored a tap in that Muric should’ve saved, I regretted not signing Ramsdale in the Saints net; time waster though he was. My half-time chat to Luke, fresh from Delap’s brilliant finish, was tempered by the thought that we’d surely play better after the break. Hope Chloe’s still OK by the way, Lukey. He’s about to become a first-time father for those unacquainted. You’ll remember Luke if you ever played the TWTD Xpert Eleven game. He’s grown up since then!
Second half and well. I’ve seen League One teams play better than Southampton. And we were just as bad if not worse. It brought a certain chill to the late afternoon. This was the realisation that perhaps we weren’t as good as we all thought? I left on 90 minutes, fed up with the constant waiting for something to happen at the SBR end, disgusted by their winner, deflated, prepared to argue the toss with anyone, angry that I’d wasted a perfectly good Saturday watching us lumber to another home defeat. Everyone, the players and Kieron especially, should be ashamed at that performance. Here I was, husky of voice, sore of spirit, walking back to the train station in a funk of embarrassed, prurient defeat at the hands of a team so bad, even Lineker laughs on MOTD.
And that was it. We’ll be back for Spurs. Tel trailed me miserably on the walk back, too browbeaten to offer a reasoned argument. I’ve noticed that these home games are no longer about the pleasure of watching Town. They’re socials for us. Perhaps we should have just stayed in the pub? After a game like that, I certainly wondered.
Mrs Tel collected us at Manningtree Rail and we drove back. She’d enjoyed her day. Swimming, fitness, lunch, a few diet cokes, the very antithesis of ours. And that’s the irony. It never begets a guarantee of a performance on the pitch. Oh well. Another week of head-shaking disbelief from Wolves fans in Birmingham, along with the tongue-lolling enjoyment of their 2-0 win over the Villa. They, at least, can be cocky next week. |
| Forum
Thread | We're f**king sh*t
at 19:51 1 Feb 2025
That is all. Second half was a masterstroke in how not to attack a poor team.
Thoroughly deserve to go down after that.
So angry.... |
| Forum
Thread | The Warky Premier NYE report: Chelsea (H) GEDDIN'!!!!
at 15:41 31 Dec 2024
There are several things which, in my old age, still warm the old cockles.
From semi-tame robins in the garden approaching me for scraps of bacon rind and old digestives,, to winning bets on the football, via giving someone a present they really want and the cats snuggling up to me in bed, purring contentedly. Set to a soundtrack including ‘Wonderful, Wonderful Day” sung by Jane Powell and something delicate by Nick Drake, perhaps a smidgeon of Kate Bush or a soupçon of Sandy Denny. I’m a simple soul. Sit me in a late afternoon pub with a pint of something foamy in front of me, ply me with a bag of dry-roasted or the occasional naughty pork scratchings and I’m in heaven. And my heart beats so that I can hardly speak. Although that might be wind. Or the scratchings.
Take last night. We got into Ipswich at 4pm, throats drier than the Sahara, Tel moaning that he’d bought about £300 worth of food for his party last Sunday and chucked about £150 of it in his food recycling. “Wife won’t touch it if it goes beyond the bleedin’ sell-by date so we just get shot” he mithered, absently kicking a stone into the road where it narrowly missed an oncoming vehicle. He should be in Ed Miliband’s lot. He thinks Net Zero is something to do with fishing.
We got into the pub, which was a quarter-full and therefore finding a table was simpler than it was when we played Newcastle. “Liverpool Street’s shut” said Tel. “Wun’t expect many from bleedin’ Chelsea ternight”, He said this with a certain relish as, like a lot of Londoners who migrate away from the Metropolis, he hates Chelsea. And West Ham. And Spurs. He’s antipathetic over Arsenal, but I think loyalties may be tested in that. One of his friends from London is a season-ticket holder at the Emirates and can get him seats now and then. There’s a limit to hatred when there’s freebies to consider.
We drank the first draught almost in one, a trick he’s perfected over the years and one which I, admittedly, still find difficult to accomplish without belching like a fat frog. Its definitely easier when you drink Guinness or a real ale. Lager’s the test.
We did all the usual pleasantries about Christmas. Tel showed me his new Calvin Klein jumper I’d bought him, with a self-consciousness that I usually deployed when my grandma used to give me a hand-knitted effort she’d made. She’d have made a sh*t fishing trawlerman. The holes in her knitting would’ve seen Great Whites escaping. I did check Tel’s jumper for length, but he’s a lot shorter than my dad, who was the original recipient, so the end comfortably swiped the top of his arse.
Tony and Sandy gave Mrs Tel and he a garden ornament. “Stachoo, that sorta fing. Italian. From Italy, like. Woman. Small tits. Not that she’s gottem on show or nuffing. Wearin’ one of them fings wot Romans wore”. A Toga? I asked. “Bless you” he said perfunctorily, without a smile. Then “Blimey you’ve got a funny sneeze incher? Wouldn’t go sneezin’ like that. Mate of Tone’s ‘ad a ‘eart attack keepin’ it in like that”.
We drank on. Mrs Tel and he are off to Turkey on the 7th, Antalya, the Megasaray Hotel. He calls it the Megasaurus. He’ll certainly be doing about as much as a fossil when he’s there, judging by his itinerary. This involves drinking, sunbathing and the odd trip into the Town for supplies. Plus eating. There’ll be plenty of that. Meat mainly.
This is why, when we broached the menu and made our choices, he went conservative and had the chicken wings in chipotle mayonnaise with a side of fries. “Carnt eat too much meat, savin’ myself for the ‘oliday” he murmured. I had the steak. He sneered at it when it came. “Get a proppah steak in Turkey” he said, self-satisfied.
He showed me his football bet from Sunday. He’d done wins for Liverpool, Man City, Leeds, Oxford, Swansea and Preston. All won. He’d won about £750. Our annual bet hasn’t been paid yet but we’re on for about £3k each he reckons. He’s paying it on Friday, which is good, as at least I’ll be able to pay my credit card off in full this month and have extra left over when I go to see us play Villa away on the 15th Feb. Decent Hotel ahoy.
We drunk up at 7.30pm and made our way through the cold and the breeze to a floodlit PR. The queues outside Sir Bobby Lower were huge. I made it in for the teams coming out, amazed we’d gone for Walton in goal and Broady on the left. Poor Sammy, I thought. But then Broady deserves his chance, I reasoned. The smell from the burger vans made me hungry again. I readied myself mentally for another Newcastle going-over. It never came.
True, Chelsea were less good than I thought, but we played like Gods, especially Delap and Walton, who looked a heck of a lot better than Muric, to the extent that several around me extolled him as the regular number one. I have to say I agree. We looked a lot different as a defensive unit and Christian brought that added stability and confidence. It reminded me of our League One days.
At the end, I tested my already-hoarse voice with a yelled celebration of K Mac. I braved the throngs of Chelsea supporters as we headed for the station. They didn’t say much to be fair. There really wasn’t much for them to say, after all.
Home with Terrance by 10.45pm, Mrs Tel collected and thanked me for her presents (she wore the Alarm vintage t-shirt I bought her paired with flat-fronted slacks and a new powder-blue blazer. Very nice. She’s lost a bit of weight as well. Must be the Lifehouse Spa, or perhaps she’s not eating. She barely ate anything at their party, you know? I was a bit worried) and drove me home and just now I’m sat here typing before getting ready for my friend’s NYE dinner party in Dedham, where the conversation will probably flow like the wine and I’ll be lumbered with his sister, who I’m sure he’s trying to matchmake me with. He did at the last NYE party two years ago. She’s nice and all that, but she’s got three kids, all aged between seventeen and twelve. Not sure I fancy playing stepdad. Still….?
Have a really happy new year folks. Here’s to Town staying alive in 2025!! |
| Forum
Thread | The Warky Christmas Report: Newcastle and all that (H)
at 13:10 29 Dec 2024
I hope and trust everyone had a very Merry Christmas - apologies for the lack of festive reports this year but I was a bit sidetracked. It’s been a hectic week. Here’s my secret diary…..
After the bitter pill that was Newcastle last Saturday the 21st, when even the post-match Chinese failed to light a fire in both of us (Tel remarked ‘Peekin’ bleeding duck don’t taste arf as nice when you’ve just been dicked’), we sat amongst the ruined tablecloth (‘Ah’ve never got the ‘ang of them chopsticks, might as well be eatin’ wearing bleedin’ boxin’ gloves’) and moodily drank our bottled Tsing-Tao lager, him breaking off to reach for a coagulating bit of Kung Po chicken with greasy fingers. The multitudes of geordies who’d taken over the pubs and drank like fish were thinning out. The train station was quiet at 10.30pm. Mrs Tel awaited us at Manningtree station.
Sunday 22nd - I couldn’t face Match of the Day or the early Sunday repeat. You just knew it’d be Shearer. Housework. Hoovered, washed, cleaned, dusted. Had a bash at wrapping all the odd-shaped gifts I’d purchased. Used enough sellotape to giftwrap the Orwell Bridge. Swore a lot as I did it.
It was Tel’s Christmas party in Halstead at 7pm. I’d forgotten to book the Monday off as leave, despite being reminded about the party since September. I thought I might be able to work from home. In the end, I went into Colchester for a morning of half-arsed email replies and a bit of elementary project stuff. I’m back on Thursday. It seems to be looming faster and faster.
Anyway, Tel’s party. So after a bit of gift wrapping that a child of three would have been proud of, I left home at six, presents in a Waitrose bag for life on the back seat, regretting the Anais-Anais gift set I’d got for Mrs Tel as I’d noticed she’d started using Thierry Mugler on Saturday night. I hoped this was just an aberration. Or that she’d got a bottle for use after swimming at Thorpe Lifehouse Spa. I’d also bought her a vintage Damned T-Shirt from 1978 and a thermal mug for coffee, one of those travel ones as hers got dropped a few weeks ago and the bits inside rattled alarmingly.
Tel got a bottle of VSOP Brandy, a bottle of his latest ’thing’, pre-mixed Negroni by Campari, and a dark blue Calvin Klein jumper I got my dad last year but which came up short on him and which I then forgot to return. I got Sandy and Tony a joint pressie of Hotel Chocolate chocs. I didn’t bother with their kids; one’s in Antigua with her mates, the other is snowboarding in the Alps with his. “Cost ole Tone a fortune this year” said Tel, admiringly. “Its what they wanted though. ‘Fit were me, I’d’ve told ‘em ter get savin’ but ‘e’s too soft”.
The house was nicely decorated with streamers and Mrs Tel was laying out the buffet when I arrived at 6.45pm. I got lumbered with cling-filming the cold stuff, salads, coleslaw, desserts. She’d cooked a festive ham which Tel had carved, or more accurately hacked at, plus racks of ribs, mini steak pies, potato wedges, buttered jacket potatoes and cheeseburgers she’d prepared at home with his finest Swiss Farms ground beef.
The decent Cava was resting in ice buckets when the next guests arrived. Daisy, Keith and their two teenage lads, Danny and Charlie. Danny is an Ipswich fan. He’d managed to get a ticket for the Liverpool game and the Newcastle game last week. They came from Earls Colne. I sympathised with him, not about coming from Earls Colne, although that’s obvious, but about the Newcastle game. He said “Newcastle are my second team so I was alright”. Oh. I scanned the room, looking for someone else to talk to.
The Terries had invited thirty but six had declined due to colds and what have you. Two of the others never made it. So we were down to twenty-two. In a normal house, it would’ve felt cramped, but their bungalow is like the Tardis, so no-one had to make do with the patio, which was just as well as it was cold that night.
Mrs Tel and I made use of the patio for a fag, and she switched the portable heaters on. Soon we were joined by others, several vaping, a few made of sterner stuff and lighting up Bensons. As always happens, it was a jollier party on the patio than inside the house, where Tel’s strident cockernee voice competed with Michael Buble’s Xmas Hits from their speakers.
I drank Pepsi all night. With ice. Driving back. Tel muttered, but seemed to accept I couldn’t stay. I didn’t touch a drop. It was tempting, but Pepsi Max was all that passed my lips in liquid form. It made things duller, but gave me an excuse to leave at 10.30pm, after I’d sampled a few ribs and a bit of salad, and a cheeseburger. The ice cream cake was still frozen, so I didn’t chance it.
Monday 23rd December - up at 5.30am, showered, dressed, rang Birmingham to say I wouldn’t be in, spoke to a colleague who promised to pass the message on. No call back or querying email from my boss, then learnt at work that he’d taken the day off to work from home. Stayed til 2pm. I’d already grown tired of the piss-taking from the Wolves fans. 0-4. Yeah. They’d long since forgotten we beat them 2-1 only the week before.
Came home, did some supper (cheese toasties with Branston and a few chips) watched some festive telly, groaned and switched off and went to bed.
Tuesday 24th December - Round to see Dad to stay for the period to Boxing Day. Took him to Long Melford for a pint and a desultory look around the antique shops that were still open. We had an Indian take away in the evening. He’s doing well since Mum died last year. He’s got almost a new life as a volunteer for the Essex Wildlife Trust. We had a celebratory drink during Carols from Kings, which we had on because my Mum used to love it, so it’s a sort of tradition. That and The Snowman, which we fortunately missed. It has the ability to make the old eyes and throat a bit lumpy. Memories can do that.
Wednesday 25th December - Up at 6.30am, coffee and tea, sorted out dad’s food recycling and cleaned his cooker top. Then hoovered his front room carpet. Had a drive to Walton-on-Naze and a walk around the Naze Tower. Home by 9.30, changed for church at 10.30am, the Christmas service which he loves. Sat on a hard pew listening to the vicar compare Christmas Nativity to the war in Gaza. Prayed for world peace, especially in Ukraine. Had a laugh with Dad about the bell-ringing, which sounded a bit all over the place.
Lunched. Opened pressies. Watched the King. Fell asleep. Nearly missed Wallace and Gromit. Had a light supper of cheese. Had another large glass of wine. Watched Gavin and Stacey. Dad marvelled at how I could watch that rubbish. But even he enjoyed it in the end. Got drunk on his excellent choice of wines, plus his cognac and made he and I an Irish coffee with the Jamesons he won on a Christmas raffle with Essex Wildlife last week.
And that was Christmas 2024. Now, I’m back home, due to go to Dad’s this afternoon for another cleaning session and a steak supper tonight. Probably whilst watching the darts. He loves the darts. Bless him.
I won’t wish you all a Happy New Year yet as I’ll be back with Terry after the Chelsea game tomorrow…….please no more 4-0’s or worse…... |
| Forum
Thread | The Warky Premier Report: Wolves (A)
at 11:53 15 Dec 2024
The lead up to Christmas is rarely straightforward in any walk of life. Weekends mean shopping, and the opportunity to find odd things, which, then bought in panic, will be opened in forced smile disappointment on Christmas Day, never to see the light again. Personal presents involve feats of planning, expense and the novel usage of research to see where one might purloin. Most shops in Colchester and Ipswich are rubbish at hoarding interesting stock. So it means London. Or possibly Norwich or Cambridge for the less enthusiastic provincial.
I would rather be dragged by my thinning thatch to hell than be caught shopping in Norwich. Friends say “Oh it’s marvellous” with the sort of self-indulgent disregard that any Ipswich fan would suspect meant they ‘din’t like football’. One friend found a cheap original Mouseman cheeseboard in an antique shop; paid a mere £80 because it had bits in distress, as though some ruddy-cheeked scum had attempted to use it for kindling. He’d have paid at least £180 for that in London, he told us, wide-eyed.
Cambridge is better, but it is also infested by students. Of the sort we had when I was one such. It appears the Nirvana grunge look from the early 1990’s never left. Indeed, grown children with posh accents and downy hair on cheeks, women with multi-colours in hair and Robert Smith mascara, all of them wear ‘Nevermind’ and that smiley face effort that Nirvana were known for, almost more so than their songs back when I was an undergraduate at one of our lesser universities in ’92. It seems modern culture is better at copying the past than thinking up its own future.
So London. Jostled by crowds. No more Hare Cheap Day returns on Greater Anglia. Liverpool Street brimming with foreigners, cheap day returners from Chelmsford and football supporters, as well as people who went for an early morn restorative pint and a brandy chaser. That was just me, actually. Wetherspoons may be universally derided for their food but they do a good cheap pint of Guinness, and their brandy isn’t undrinkable.
I always feel like I’ve been pickpocketed in London, so my walking gait is that of normal but suffused with a quick, anxious pat down of pocket for the reassurance that my wallet is still in place with my iPhone. Although pickpocketing is back to Victorian levels of scum and thievery in our capital, I managed to escape unpicked for the remainder of the day.
No Terry by the way. Not this weekend. He’s with the wife, preparing for his Christmas party next Sunday. He’ll be back next Saturday because we play Newcastle. But this weekend, we agreed, would be devoted to doing all the bits I wouldn’t get a chance to do next weekend. I’m working all week this coming week. Off on Christmas Eve until the 2nd. Birmingham’s good for shopping as well. So that’s some of the anxiety taken out.
Did the shopping and stopped in another pub for a pricier pint of the black stuff because they had Sky Sports on. Leeds against Preston in one bar. Soccer Saturday in the next. It was 2pm and I set my bags down on a chair and sat back to order a pint, mentally deliberating whether to get a steak pie or not, then seeing the food come out to another table and deciding not. It was massive. My appetite has shrunk in recent years. We don’t go for our Friday night curry any more, mainly because the last time we did, I spent the day after in gastroenterological distress. It’s my body taking fluent, devilish revenge. Terry thinks I’m just avoiding him.
I stayed for the 3pm kick-off’s and celebrated quietly as we went 1-0 up away at Wolverhampton, the sort of game when a defeat just signals we’ve accepted our lot back in the Championship. And don’t go thinking it’ll be all that easy next time, oh ho no, just look at the Scum. And Leeds.
1-0. Own goal. Comical by all accounts. I wasn’t laughing. I was gleeful. It remained 1-0 as I left, several pints later, a merrier feeling in my bones than any of the Christmas lights and constant repeats of Wham’s ’84 classic could beget in any of the stores I shopped in. The cold wasn’t even noticeable.
Back to Liverpool Street on a dirty tube train. Still 1-0 according to my phone, the natural light dimming outside and the night pouring in to the fold. Puddles reflected lit shops and Christmas lights. I debated another pint and then decided not. I’d have a few in the local. Forest v Villa at 5.30. I was on the train at 4.30. I might even get to see the end of the first half.
Manningtree-bound. Calling at Stratford, Shenfield, Chelmsford, Witham, Colchester, Manningtree, Ipswich, Diss and Norwich. Surrounded by people with rosy cheeks and expensive coats and scarves, all bagged up to the nines, discussing whether Aunt Vi would like her Penhaligons foot lotion set or why Fortnums was better than Harrods food hall for biscuits. They got off at Chelmsford and Colchester.
Checked my phone just after Stratford and balls, 1-1. The M25 hove away as I sat, disconsolate, wondering why it always happened to us. I allowed myself another check as we skirted Shenfield. 1-2. Jackie Taylor! Whaaaaat? Then I checked again. It said FT. We’d bloody won it! A quick seat-shifting celebration which made people look at me as if I’d started transforming into the American Werewolf in London. But then a bloke sat three tables down did the same thing and looked back at me and winked and I clocked his ITFC wooly hat and we shared a moment of unrefined joy.
Manningtree station has never looked so charming in the foggy darkness. The pub was half-full so I found a table easily and nodded to the locals who sat nursing their IPA at the bar. One said, apropos of nothing, ‘Bloody Town won then, lucky ole Ipswich’ and I even nodded and smiled!
It’s Christmas Time and there’s no need to be afraid. We’re only one point behind Palace and Leicester got hammered. OK, Newcastle might be difficult next Saturday but what the hell? Let’s do them as well. |
| Forum
Thread | The Warky Premier Report: Bournemuff (H)
at 20:25 9 Dec 2024
It’s been a while. I’m sorry and all that but it wasn’t really my fault. Or it was, but it was also circumstances.
People who know me said “Why are you writing a book?” and I said I didn’t know. It’s the easiest of all the easy responses. Lest you be shanghaied into then explaining plot and characterisation and the amount of shagging in it. I can’t do that. There’s no shagging. Or if there is, I haven’t written it yet. I can’t give anything away because there isn’t much to give.
Fortunately, there’s not any football in it, which is handy because I’ve been maudlin enough lately. The win against Spurs seems a long, long time ago. The draw against Man United should’ve been a win. We all know it. Yesterday should have been our third win, except that may be pushing it. Bournemouth played quite well second half.
So, book-writing. In between working full-time, housework, shopping, Ipswich Town FC and Terry and the other plethora of social functions. Emboldened by Christmas, people throw functions around like confetti. Dinner here, a concert there, a few drinks shoe-horned in for luck. It’s not that I’m a miserable anti-social outcast. But as I age, the joys of Christmas escape further out the back door and run to my neighbours. Even the Octogenarians festoon their bungalows in twinkly blue lights and fake icicles.
My neighbour (82 although she still goes for a perm every week and she won’t be needing her winter fuel payment any time soon, judging by her twice-weekly delivery from Waitrose) is shortly off to Paignton to spend Christmas with her daughter, son-in-law and grandkids and great grandkids. They’re collecting her a week on Saturday, the 21st, our home game v Newcastle. I was summoned to be asked to accept her spare housekeys so I can keep an eye on her hydrangeas and various other plants she pointed at as we toured her abode. Some need watering. She did say which ones, but I’ve forgotten. Which means they’ll all get a bit of a soaking regardless.
She’s done the local WI Tinsel’n’Turkey bonanza. That was in November. Their Xmas jumble sale and mince pie spectacular is next Saturday. She invited me; and the knowing look she gave as she did made me feel both ancient and humbug. It’s 10 til 3. I’m currently sporting a poster advertising the fact in my front window. “Might get some cheap Christmas presents for your dad” she said, kindly. Although what he’d do with a 10,000 piece jigsaw of pastoral bunnies, or a set of velour pyjamas is anyone’s guess. Still. Might send Terry. He’s the older woman’s bit of rough, after all.
Book-writing. It’s hard. Brain drain completed, it’s now a case of chronological timings and the odd funny bit which, when read back, seems less funny than intended. So out comes the faithful red marker. I wish I could do it on some of these, but I find these easier to write on Apple Mac. The book is handwritten, because that’s how it started. Too much brandy one evening and a couple of big reporter’s A4 sized notepads and a working biro and away we went.
It makes plotting easier. I mean, like a lot of things in life, they’re not really spontaneous. They suffer if they are. I can’t imagine McKenna just pointing the team at the pitch and saying “go on lads”, it wouldn’t work. They need training and set-pieces and other stuff I used to do in my early twenties when I played at the basic amateur level and then only got to be the sub. Usually because I had the biggest hangover. Being the sub isn’t so bad though. You can have a fag. You can nip off early to use up all the hot water in the showers. You can gently knead the old hamstrings and sit listening to your manager having his weekly anger explosion at misplaced passes or players going in two-footed on the little bloke on the wing and then costing the club a fiver in fines. On cold, wet Sunday afternoons, when the only thing that hurts more than getting the ball smacked into your chubby thighs is running out of cigarettes and having to run the five hundred-odd yards to the local shop for forty more (“oh and get us a can’o’ Irn Bru and two twixes while you’re there, here’s a twenty, I want change mind”) it was nice just to sit and idly watch others get muddy in the pursuit of manliness.
So it’s difficult. Not as difficult as some jobs I’ve had, though. Terry thinks all writers are gay. Except Andy McNab. And Jeremy Clarkson. Although he’s convinced the latter doesn’t actually write his own books.
Oh, Terry. Well, that’s been the light of days when Ipswich have drawn or lost and we’ve come out of Portman Road with that aggressive sense of belligerence that denotes frustration around these parts. He has the knack of voicing what you’re thinking, albeit you’d never actually voice because it all seems so obvious. So for weeks we’ve spent the train journey back debating two up front and “ah’d drop Sammie, me. Bleedin’ ineffective” or “That Muric needs a good kick up the jacksie. Bleedin’ ‘ell. Tellin’ me thass a Premier bleeding league keeper? We ‘ad a kid wiv that falidomide at primary school and ‘e’d’ve saved that”.
So it was again versus Bournemouth yesterday. A nice few drinks while we watched the trees do the Agadoo and then the YMCA outside; Tel sat in the window asking why we were playing Chaplin when it was obvious we needed someone taller than a dwarf up front to counter the wind. As the empty plastic glasses grew, so did his opinions. He’s had further contact from Paula. She’s moved to Colchester. Living with a bloke. Working as a temporary Assistant Manager at some crap supermarket. Her new bloke’s mum looks after the baby. Could he lend her five hundred quid for next month’s rent? Have I sold my house yet? What, not even on the market? Is he not moving then? Why? Tell ‘Im not to forget about me if he does. Blah, blah bleedin’ blah as Tel ended the tale. Still, he gave her the £500. Mug I said. “Eh?” he retorted. But he hadn’t quite heard so I kept quiet. He’s not the greatest person to argue against.
The game came and went, as did we. Mrs Tel collected him from Manningtree station and dropped me home. They wouldn’t come in. She’d been to Thorpe for her spa day at the Lighthouse there. She glowed, and smelt faintly of flower-scented creams and salves. Dressed in her so-called ‘slob sundy” stuff, she still looked almost immaculate; dark blue Clash T-shirt, pale blue leather jacket, black jeans, moccasins. She’s ageing gracefully. She’s actually sixty-one early next year. Ageless. Except for the crow’s feet and the wrinkly backs of her hands.
I’ll try to make these more regular in future. I really will. I promise, sort of. |
| Forum
Thread | The Warky Premier Report: Everton (H)
at 17:18 20 Oct 2024
“We gotter win terday” said Tel as we sprawled around my kitchen dining table, the mugs of coffee from my percolater still steaming in the gloomy daylight that filtered in through the window. The rain pattered a John Bonham drum roll on the french doors. I went looking for my Superdry rain jacket and found it hanging from a peg in my hallway, along with a 1992 Ipswich scarf I wore one of the frosty mornings we had last week. It’s now about as warming as wearing a shoelace, but it’s lucky. I don’t fancy a new one. Some bloke was outside Portman Road doing half’n’halfs before the game. Stuff that.
The Premier League experience so far is less than great, although I’m sure I’d be loving it more if we’d won. From strange kick-off times and days to VAR to the sense of greater entitlement, which is yet tinged by a fear that this is all academic; that somehow we’re destined for a season of toil at the pit face, dodging thrashings by the more vainglorious teams and hoping against hope for a decent performance and a few points here and there.
It’s not the Greatest League In The World, despite what the media say. Sure, for Arsenal, and Man City and Liverpool, it’s a chance to confirm superiority and that supercilious attitude; the chance to burst those idle weekday dreams of seeing your lads overcome the odds. Perhaps a worldie from Chappers, or a stunner from Delap, or a killer ball from Leif? And the dreams continue until the game kicks off and your team backs off and the opposition take over the midfield and duck and weave and bob better than you’ve seen, and f**k me, this is only Everton innit? They should have gone down last season, shouldn’t they? They’re skinter than a burgled Bob Cratchit.
So the coffee was drained and the mugs shoved in the sink and Tel found the washing-up liquid as I don’t have a dishwasher, don’t believe in them, our last one was rubbish and left stuff dirtier and smellier than they were when they went in. And he washed up, and I dried and put away and got my coat and we walked in the slowing rain to the railway. Mrs Tel would’ve driven us, but she dropped him at 9.30am so it seemed a bit early, even for our standards. She had a day in London with her niece and Sandy, her sister-in-law. They were off to see a matinee, or a movie, I forget which. She was parking at Manningtree for the train. Tel checked his car wasn’t already up on bricks with all windows smashed before we swung into the Station Cafe for a Guinness and a sausage and egg bap.
He had the bap, by the way. I’m back on a diet. A recent cautionary GP appointment showed I’ve somehow gained three quarters of a stone since July. So it’s porridge for breakfast, with home-picked blackberries on it. Nothing for lunch except if you count the pints I drank, and of course, you don’t. My evening meal is cooked, by me, with love and the use of many veg. I top this green and purple and orange fiesta with a bit of cod loin or a parsimonious pork cutlet, fat trimmed and flavoured with Old Bay spice. I find it deeply unfair that the weight doesn’t immediately melt off like a well-cooked bacon rasher, but it doesn’t. Well, not yet. The walks will probably do that in time.
So we meandered past the Stour and past the disused and almost quarry-like ICI plant and the increasingly zoo-like Jimmy’s Farm, where it appears they’ve got caged animals now. The train was full. The odd scouse accent betrayed an away supporter. The station was busier than I’d seen for a while and Tel said “Weekend tickits’r’cheap like” and I wondered if I might try a weekender in London next Saturday (not for the Brentford game as I haven’t got the points and only managed West Ham because a mate gave me a ticket in the home end, mind you, waste of time that was) and fancied a trip around the capital for a day, perhaps lunching somewhere respectable. On the vegetarian course, natch.
The pub was lively and we found a corner table and supped more Guinness, then Tel moved onto bottled Jap lager and I went for the ale. He found the Tottenham v West Ham game on his mobile and we sat, marvelling, for West Ham took the lead and Spurs looked awful for a while. They won 4-1 of course. It didn’t cheer me up much. Tel moaned “Gawd, made our result look worse aint it?” Then he carried on telling me the latest about Paula.
Ah Paula. Yes. You knew she’d pop up from time to time, didn’t you? Well, apparently, she and her bloke have split and she’s moved in with her sister again, from Basingstoke back to Harwich in one fell swoop. This means she’s left her job and is looking for another retail management role locally. She’s with her child at her sister’s so room must be at a premium, as her sister has (as far as I remember) only got a two-bed property and uses the spare room as a sort of junk outlet. Tel has lent her more money after she called him. “Jus’ ter ‘elp ‘er out, like, the missus’n’me both fought we’d ‘elp, win the little’un’n that”. I nodded and surreptitiously checked my phone for missed calls, just in case she got the bright idea that I could put my house on the market and “elp ‘er out” a bit more. But no. Not now. Perhaps never?
She did contact me in the end, earlier today, just to see how I was and to ask if I could lend her some money as she wanted to pay her sister back for her hospitality and needed to find somewhere to rent in a hurry. Unfortunately, she caught me at a bad time and I fear I was terse in my answer, even though I offered her a few hundred quid, which she sounded ungracious about but accepted. It’s not my fault. It’s never been my fault. Keep repeating it.
So the game was just the crowning bit of an off weekend, but not the be all and end all. True, we looked naive and a bit headless in our play and Everton picked us off through our mistakes and we never, in all honesty, looked capable of hitting back, which was the most depressing bit as we’d done this countless times in the Championship last season. But then it’s not the Championship, is it? These teams are better organised and better equipped and we just looked like what we probably are right now, a newly-promoted team who are trying to match teams with skill but lacking that extra quality to do it.
So the train back was chastening, as matter-of-fact as I’d heard it in the Lambert end days when we hovered around mid-table in League One and were drawing with one-dimensional northern sides who set out for a point and would die to achieve it. Come full circle. I’d arrogantly dismissed a point before the game yesterday as beneath us. Surely there wouldn’t be another game where all three looked eminently attainable? And yet. And yet.
Mrs Tel was due in at six so Tel went for another pint in the Station and I joined him. No curry last night. He just wanted to get home. So did I. We sat in perfunctory chatter, sipping lager and keeping an eye out for the familiar calf-leather coated and chestnut-haired mirage from the Norwich-bound trains. She turned up on the 6.04pm. Tel went and walked her over , helping with the shopping bags from Fortnums and Burberry that she carried (a new pepper grinder and a new scarf - it could never replace my old Ipswich one, although it looked warmer. Shame it wasn’t actually a present for me). I kissed her and she ran me home.
Bloody football eh? Still, while there’s hope left, I’m hoping. |
| Forum
Thread | The Warky Premier Report: Southampton (A)
at 17:53 22 Sep 2024
Contemporaneous. That’s a word of the day. It means existing at the same time. With Tel absent, it’s felt a bit like that over the last few days.
Terry and Mrs Tel are in Marbella. They flew out on the Wednesday a week ago. Tony ended up driving them to Stansted. They didn’t ask and I, to be fair, didn’t offer, seeing as their flight was at 4.30pm and I was stuck in Birmingham. I’ve had a few mis-spelt texts from him since. “Weater good, tempriture 28, wife shoping” was one such on Thursday at 11am. I haven’t rung him as he asked me not to. “Expensive, like, calls on me phone when I’m out there” he said, almost apologetically. He does have roaming data.
I went to London last Sunday so apologise for the lack of a report following our brave 0-0 away at Brighton. I was on the fairly early train with Spurs fans and Westgate shoppers who piled off at Stratford. It was a nice day spent at Lord’s, watching one of my friend’s local cricket teams, Foxton Granta from Cambridge, win the Village Cup.
Lord’s, for those who haven’t been before, is a bit officious. You aren’t allowed inside the Victorian clubhouse (MCC only) and the site wasn’t fully open. A pint of beer was £8. Thankfully, there was a fairly decent Wetherspoons near Baker Street and we bought cans in an offie near the ground. We walked from Baker Street underground. It’s not that far to St John’s Wood and helps digest a Wetherspoons breakfast (£9.99 for the blowout including a pint).
The rest of the week was work. Dull. Birmingham, with The Villa Fans and their reminders that they are Champions League. A few went out to the Young Boys game in Bern last week. They were happy on their return. I spent Friday smiling wanly at suggestions of how many Watkins would put past us at Portman Road next week. None of ‘em are coming, natch. “Spent out in Switzerland an’ it’s a roight ole journey over dare on a Soondy” was the consensus. I really hope we win. More than anything, just to see the faces on Monday morning. Come on Town. With the absence of the scum, this is my next best fixture. This and the ‘Appy ‘Ammers, of which more soon as Tel can get us tickets. In the home end…….
The most astonishing upturn is the Birmingham City supporters. Now lower than a snake’s belly, they have nonetheless spent an astonishing ten million quid on one player, striker Stansfield, who many Championship clubs secretly fancied but clearly had no way of affording. They beat Wrexham, the other ‘Hollywood’ club last Monday night. I was offered the opportunity to come along as a neutral but had to decline. I couldn’t get a decent hotel for one reason. Still, I’m going to a game around Christmas as I promised them. I think they think I’m some sort of lucky mascot.
The Kettering McDonalds doesn’t change. Still the same greasy brown paper bag. Except I don’t any more. Well, not to eat. Their coffee is cheaper than Costa and doesn’t give me ’The Costa Effect’ which is a touch of the squits and a feeling that I’ve just consumed a pre-operation bowel prep. I don’t like Starbucks either, but not for reasons of their products. They seem to attract the sort of people that take pictures of their food. Still, each to their own.
McDonalds do that promotion where you can win more of their food, which sounds more punishment than tempter. One of my colleagues won a Big Mac Meal from it last week. He was as happy as I’d have been with three points at Southampton yesterday. Why do people love McDonalds still? When I was a nipper, it was the novelty. A quick burger’n’chips where your mum didn’t have to stand at the oven and the deep fat fryer didn’t stink out the lounge after. But now, I’m fifty and it all seems too easy. I’d rather cook and take my own packed lunch. I can add things to a tupperware lunchbox that you can’t find in any greasy burger joint and would pay huge amounts for in a restaurant. Convenience isn’t always a guarantee of taste.
So that was my week. No Friday night meet-up and curry, so my bank balance is happier and slightly fatter even if I’m not. I did meet friends at their place and bought a bottle of red and white with me, and enjoyed their simple home-cooked dinner and the conversation, which revolved as many do around memories and funny moments. Self-deprecating to the last. It seemed a pale imitation of a curry night with Terrence though. He’d have moaned about stuff and we’d have got drunk and maudlin and then gone back to his for decent brandy and frankness. He’s not getting that in Spain, even if his local bar does do Estrella for two quid a pint and his favourite restaurant does a nice rare steak for twenty notes and a bottle of drinkable red for half that.
I’ve got a week off in October. I’m thinking of booking somewhere for a change as well. Bit of walking, sightseeing, good food and beer. Might try Croatia? I’ll let you know.
Oh and a last-minute equaliser at Southampton. I thought we'd lost as well. I was out walking at the time. Happy days!! |
| Forum
Thread | The Warky Premier Report: Injured (H)
at 10:35 8 Sep 2024
Bloody International two-weeker. Just as you’re all set for the season, along it comes, the most boring break known to man (apart from smoking breaks if you’re a non-smoker, and I think I qualify, probably. Not had one for a week. This isn’t due to moral fibre; more in a mo) as you attempt to sustain the footy rush after the summer by watching the Scots and the Welsh and England and a bit of Leagues One and Two.
So it’s been walking. A lot of walking. Along the graffitied prom at Harwich, an early morn stroll after parking the car somewhere on the seafront near the old Hi-de-Hi camp, no Big Ted Bovis in his rat-catcher suit or Peggy the nutty chalet maid accompanying me, just the occasional jogger (in Harwich? They’ve done suspected witches for less) and the floaty seagulls and their raucous screeches following the fat-man-sized blur as it receded into the wind.
I like Harwich. It is the harbinger of an unfair local reputation as a bit of a sh**-hole, like much of Essex, only it’s probably done with a pinch of the truth. Most of Essex beyond the M25 is crap. New build Potton mock-Tudor and used-car sales and escaping cockneys. Compared to the North of the county, steeped in rolling countryside and Georgian townhouses and soft burrs and even softer heads, Essex is like a Starling. Raucous, wide-boy, but look at the glorious sheen on the feathers.
Harwich, while a town in decline and with a drug problem more productive than Walter White’s meth labs, has an easy-going charm you tend to find a lot around here. It used to be the setting of Tel’s former career in newsagent-based retail. He still retains an affection for the place (although he’s never been back since moving, ‘Christ no, rarver circumsize meself wiv one o’ the wife’s leg shavers’) and he still knows a few local characters.
I stopped smoking. Mainly because, in the excitement of Liam Delap’s screamer last Saturday, I appear to have taken a blow to the left ribcage which has left me in pain all week and breathing has been a bit harder as a result. I guess the drink numbed it last weekend, although I definitely felt it on Sunday evening. It still hurts. Apparently, there’s not a lot the NHS can do (consulted my local pharmacist, who, in the absence of waiting two weeks to see my GP on something I suspected was spurious, confirmed he’d broken three ribs once canoeing and they took a while to heal. No ointments, unguents or strappings improved it). Tel’s apparently broken a rib gardening. He wasn’t very sympathetic either. He recommended Deep Heat if I wanted to explore the potential of the pain, particularly the increase of it. I thanked him as mirthlessly as I could.
My colleagues in Birmingham, apart from remarking that I’ve been walking like I’ve followed through, all seem to have broken ribs at various points in their lives, no doubt doing energetic and thrusting stuff rather than being the poor unsuspecting victim of a carelessly controlled elbow. The Villa fans took the Michael when I explained how I’d done it. “It’ll have well healed by the time you’ll need to celebrate again” said one. Hope they fall at the first Champions League hurdle.
Tel’s gearing up for Spain next week. Marbella for two weeks of hopeful sunshine and non-cost-of-living affected beers and food in various bars whilst admiring the sea. I can do that in Harwich, although, admittedly, the weather’s gone mercifully cooler. He leaves on Wednesday with Mrs Tel and is back on Thursday before our game against Villa. We caught up for a meal on Friday, me noticeably slower moving from the back seat of his 4x4, Mrs Tel looking slimmer in grey YSL sweatshirt and deep blue Adidas joggers (off to play badminton with Sandy).
So that was my international break. I tried to get enthused about watching non-league footy but didn’t manage to in the end. Been there and done that. Besides, it’s no fun with constant aches in the old breadbasket.
See you all after Brighton away. I’m not going. Even though I’d have liked to. Just get the old ominous feeling that we may experience another harsh PL away-day. Still, you never know. |
| Forum
Thread | The Warky Premier Report: Fulham (H)
at 09:45 1 Sep 2024
The rain began falling as I rounded the last turn by the river and headed towards home. It started with drips and then became heavier. Portentous, I thought. And I worried about the Fulham game for the hundredth time in a week. We needed the points.
There were other omens, mostly lucky ones. The last time we won a league game, against Huddersfield in May, I saw a herd of deer grazing on the edge of a wood. I saw them again yesterday, this time in a field, not as many as in May, but definitely there. Football fans hold ridiculous superstitions for their team. Lucky pants, black cats, herds of deer. Admittedly, the deer one is unusual, but mock thee not. It worked. Sort of.
There was no Armando Broja or Reiss Nelson at Manningtree station, just a gaggle of well-dressed people heading for London, and a few blue-shirted Town supporters. Tel and I were incongruous; he in grey Superdry anorak, covering his YSL black check shirt and deep blue Levis. I was more cheaply attired in Cotton Traders sweatshirt and M&S jeans. I don’t suit designer togs. Too fat for one thing.
Mrs Tel drove us and, with resignation, promised to collect us from the Indian restaurant at ten as requested by Tel. She looked good, but then she always does. New tints in her hair. Ray-Ban sunglasses. Clash T-Shirt and black jeans. She was meeting Sandy for coffee in Colchester. Away she roared after we clambered out. “Prob'ly ‘avin’ an affair” muttered Tel in jest.
No Broja or Nelson on the train either, although their ears must have been burning, the amount they were discussed. Deadline day woes: no follow-up striker (S’OK though, said Tel, Hirst and Broady’ll be back) and the relative merits of signing players in panic rather than with logic. Terry gave contemplative replies. His last, as the outskirts of Ipswich hove into view and we passed the various back gardens and allotments heading for the tunnel “when yer piddle the bed, first it’s warm, then it’s cold, then it smells. An’ we’re nowhere near cold yet”.
The pub was busy and we sat at a far table, just enough away from the bar, but also away enough that we could converse in relative ease. They had some music station playing softly in the background and Terry Hall intoned “It doesn’t matter what they say, no-one’s listening anyway” as Tel warbled on about this season’s football bet and showed me his selections. He did five quid on Man City, Villa, Leeds, Oxford United and Wrexham. I think we won three hundred or thereabouts, although neither knew the scores until later and, when we’d checked, we celebrated with another sh*t brandy in the Indian.
Still, that was later. We shared a plate of buffalo wings and another smaller plate of tacos, pulled pork if you’re interested. Very good. Three Wise Monkeys they were. We change establishments quite regularly on match-days, usually because the taverns get crowded and Tel is like Egon Ronay with pub food and doesn’t trust several to deliver what their menus insist. That’s why we stopped using The Plough. And The Cock and Pye. And The Cricketers, although he will deign to drink in the last as it’s a Wetherspoons and therefore cheap as chips.
We made the ground at 2.50pm. I don’t know what I’ll do when and if the Labour Government ban me from having a cigarette or three outside the SBRL before I take the plunge at the turnstiles. It’s become almost as much of a custom as watching the seagulls wheel around the bins down Sir Alf. How will they police it? Visions of coppers ignoring away fans kicking off and berating me for puffing on a Marlboro. Bastards. “Thass yer Labour Government for ya” said Tel in the Indian later. Then he said “Yer could always give up?”.
We all saw the game, I presume? Yes? 1-0 up, a cracker from Delap which I nearly missed as my bladder called just as he and Hutchinson were flying at their defence. Then Traore, a player who looked like he’d spent the summer with Dr David Banner, experimenting with gamma radiation, was left free at the back post for a tap-in. 1-1. We pushed and pulled and tried but the winner never came and it seemed oddly reasonable at the end, our first point. True there’s a lot of work for this team still to do but we’d competed, hadn’t made a hash at the back and looked excitingly fleet going forward.
A straggle of friendly Fulham fans at the station. We discussed the game and they felt we were miles better than Leicester, which was of some comfort, I’ll admit. The train back was therefore jolly, if packed, and when the doors opened at Manningtree, we squeezed out and headed for a celebratory pint in the local. The walk down didn’t even elicit the usual moaning from Tel.
The Indian was cathartic later. Tel’s got another job. Well, possibly. He kept the news back for later lest I somehow not appreciate the gravity. “Drivin’ for a delivery firm in Halstead, just part-time, pays ‘undred a day so it’ll give me an int'rest like and keep the wife in hairdo’s”. I congratulated him and he winced and said “Don’ get too cocksure. Aint been offered it yet. Still, no weekends, which’ll ‘elp what with the Town an’ that”. I agreed. It would be too much at the moment to miss his presence on match days.
Still, he said as we parted at my drive, least we made a point. He was right, we did. It might be important come next May. Well, we thought it might be. Anything could happen before then. It’s that type of league. |
| | Warkystache
|
Site Scores| Forum Votes: | 2750 | | Comment Votes: | 140 | | Prediction League: | 0 | | TOTAL: | 2890 |
|
By continuing to use the site, you agree to our use of cookies and to abide by our Terms and Conditions.