blades blogGod and Anne Davies - a steel City derby diary |
Posted: February 10th 2009
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Friday 6 February
Anything earlier than this – ie the lack of sleep, canvassing views of people who couldn’t care less, updating personal records of derby matches watched over the years – is embarrassingly obsessive and introverted and cannot be noted for general consumption. Suffice to say we secured tickets at the back of the Kop so we’re in to see the Blades and the Owls go head-to-head and there’s just 28 hours to go . . .
08:00 – arrive at work, log on, focus hard on the computer screen.
08:01 – worried that the weather will cause a cancellation, I check the BBC website, BBC South Yorkshire and the United site – the match is still on due to the under soil heating and there are some general tickets left on sale. Pity about the under soil heating - quite fancied watching a match with an orange ball.
08:02 – Begin ruthlessly hunting through personal back catalogue to find last time I watched a match played with an orange ball.
08:29 and 10 seconds – end fruitless search for the orange ball info to prepare for a meeting in 50 seconds for which I’m ill-prepared. Will wing it by introducing a spurious filibuster conversation about matches played with orange balls and whether there’s any psychological advantage for players with a keen sense of colour.
09:31 emerge from meeting having filled a good 20 minutes with footy talk and find texts from brother-in-law and nephew also going to match with me. They tell me what I already know and I text them with stuff they probably know as well.
09:32 – Worried that the weather will cause a cancellation, I check the BBC website, BBC South Yorkshire and the United site – the match is still on.
11:15 – nip into the press office to read the sports pages of every paper I can find and drink in all the build-up. There’s precious little because there’s so much more going on in the world of football this week than the Steel City Derby. I feel spurned that no-one’s in the slightest bit interested in what is patently obviously the most important football match in world football this weekend.
12:05 – finally find team news on website. Jeffers suspended for Wednesday is great news but Henderson similarly suspended for Utd – who the hell are we going to aim for? Will the team understand that they’ll have to change a style of play they’ve employed, reasonably successfully, all season long, in order to play in balls behind defenders for the speedy midget front row to chase? The forums are full of either aggressive boasting and taunting or trite ‘let’s make it a great day for Sheffield’ stuff. I yearn for an intelligent conversation about the match.
13:00 – nip home for lunch and listen to last night’s Football Heaven on BBC Radio Sheffield (BBCRS) on the web. Wendy fans are buoyant and confident, Blades seem unsure of formations, incoming players, lack of consistency at home etc and seeds of doubt which have lain unfertilised begin to sprout and take root in the darkest recesses of my mind.
14:01 – Worried that the weather will cause a cancellation, I check the BBC website, BBC South Yorkshire and the United site – the match is still on.
15:10 – Begin an elaborate piece of writing for work but can’t concentrate due to ghostly lunchtime phrases from Hillsborough haunting me . . . turned the corner . . .really up-for-it . . . this is the one . . . everything’s changed . . .
16:20 – Watching the clock now like a schoolboy waiting to play a game after school. Begin mental preparations for what time I’ll set off tomorrow morning. Should I go over tonight and stay with my mum in case the weather’s bad on the roads. Should I leave right now? Am I too late already? Would I walk if I had to? How long would it take to walk 38 miles? Would I get there for kick-off if I set off now? A steady five miles an hour would do it but what if I tired on the long slog up the Chesterfield by-pass?
16:21 – take deep breaths and go for a pee to calm down and rid myself of some toxins.
16:55 – Worried that the weather will cause a cancellation, I check the BBC website, BBC South Yorkshire and the United site – the match is still on.
16:56 – Don’t trust anything I don’t hear for myself so ring the club and ask for the latest news. Weary woman says of course it’s on – ‘don’t you read the website?’ Feel guilty for fretting – resolve to chill a little and think about something else for the rest of tonight.
18.05 – drive home from work listening to Tony Agana and David Hirst on BBCRS. The reception’s rubbish in Nottingham but I lean close to the radio speaker in order to hear what they’re saying. This often causes me to veer wildly to the left which, when in a right hand lane, causes consternation among fellow drivers. All incoming Wendy callers are confident saying they have nothing to lose.
20:00 – text rellies in Sheff to co-ordinate timings for tomorrow morning. Still think I should have set off already.
23:00 – consider what to wear for the match . . . comfortable pants essential, nothing riding uncomfortably and distractingly up the crack, must be able to concentrate on this one. No Utd shirt, just a branded beanie, favourite jeans, favourite merino base layer, long socks, favourite shoes – sorted.
Saturday 7 February
05:23 – open eyes briefly and begin to realise what day it is. Heart thunders suddenly suspecting that I’ve overslept. Eyes suddenly wide open and ready to start the day. Determine that tiredness could be problematic today and try to get back to sleep.
05:45 – come on now, concentrate. Put all thoughts of football out of your mind.
06:05 – try to think about the girl in Marketing who wanders daily past the back of my desk leaving a vapour trail of sweet perfume . . .but who will fill in for Morgan at the back? Who will be captain and who on earth is going to thread incisive, defence-splitting passes from the middle of the park?
06;15 –Worried that the weather will cause a cancellation, I check the BBC website, BBC South Yorkshire and the United site – the match is still on.
06:53 – peer at the radio alarm clock. Jesus! Why can I not get back off to sleep, this is ridiculous!
08:23 – open eyes again. Oh my god I’m late. Fly up, hurt back in hurry to dress and make tea. Start packing bag which I should have finished last night before opening second bottle of wine. Decide must be out by 09:00.
09:25 – Still farting about, settling the dog, gathering things together.
09:26 – worried that the weather will cause a cancellation, I check the BBC website, BBC South Yorkshire and the United site – the match is still on.
09:45 – having set off five minutes ago car suddenly and inexplicably judders forward and loses all power in Compton Acres. I jam the hazards on and pull over. We come to a halt. Of all the estates in all the world I have to pick Compton Acres in which to be abandoned.
09:46 – it takes me a full 60 seconds for the enormity of what’s currently happening to sink in. Kick-off is 2 hours and 14 mins away and because of the M1 widening scheme, I’m at least 60 minutes away from mum’s house and a further 20 mins from the ground in derby day traffic. I resign myself to missing the game of the season. This is God’s punishment for being obsessive . . . and I should have worn luckier pants. It’s all my own fault. I will do things differently next time. I promise never to slag off ginger haired people again or criticise Anne Davies’s (BBC East Mids Today presenter) fashion sense. I promise to learn to love the East Midlands accent . . .I’ll do anything if I can just be allowed to go to the match. For a moment I consider hitchhiking, then a taxi but what will it cost? Perhaps a carjacking and risk a fine or suspended sentence. Would it be worth it – great football scruples question for the next time I’m in a car jam on the way back from an awayday jaunt.
09:47 – I turn the silent engine off, turn it back on again and the car kicks miraculously into life. I gently accelerate and off we go. I am a man pardoned on death row, the guillotine has stuck in its tracks millimetres from my neck, I laugh derisively, blow my nose in disgust at the fickle finger of fate. I thank God and Anne Davies for letting me off the hook.
09:48 – With all the moral fibre of a soggy Weetabix I mentally claim to have had my fingers crossed while making the rash promises, especially the one about Anne Davies.
11:05 – arrive in Sheff and park close to the ground in the B&Q car park, costing £3.
11:30 – into the ground for a quick pint. Too early for beer but it’s just something to do. Very tense, very nervous. A little excited. Every Utd fan seems agitated and pessimistic. Lupoli will make his debut in a 4-3-3 formation, but how’s it going to work Kevin?
11.35 – Nephew puts a fiver on Killgallon to score first in match at 28-1. His reasoning is that Killa, having been sent off at corresponding fixture at Hillsborough, will want to make amends and will nod in at a corner.
11:40 – take up seat and realise I’m only feet away from where I was standing 30 years ago when the two played in the old Div 3. I think of my dad and how he would love to have been here with us, right now. We’re in a little pocket of vociferous supporters, whingers and moaners towards the back of the Kop It’s a glorious day, winter sun streaming down onto the pitch as the teams come out. Player body language is not good. We all remark how confident the Wendy players look.
12:00 – plus 45 seconds – nephew rips up betting slip as Wednesday academy and Sheffield-born Tommy Spurr fires home shot with all the time in the world to pick his spot in front of the Kop
12:01 – open-mouthed and paralysed from the head down, my mind tries to assimilate what just happened. Perhaps I’ll wake up for real and it’ll be 07:30 and time to get up. Perhaps I’m still stuck in the car in Compton Acres. But no . . .
12:05 – GAME ON!- ALL LEVEL Lupoli, of all people, nods in at the back post off the crossbar. He’s looked sharp and nippy so far. It’s almost like starting the game from scratch except that both these prize fighters have been down on the canvas already.
12.29 – Then Tudgay weaves past one defender with a body swerve and plants the mother of all beauties into the top left hand corner past Kenny’s outstretched hand. It is the proverbial screamer. The kind of shot many players only hit on the training ground. It reminds me of a couple of Champions League goals from last season. But just like the Spurr goal no-one closes him down or even puts him off his strike. Has the Southampton match taken it out of us? Can they not get motivated for this match, of all matches. We might be able to pull this back but I can’t see us getting a couple.
12.45 – boos at half time inevitable but no-one believes it will stay this way. BT saved us with his wonderboot last year but he’s gone and Henderson, even if he were not suspended, is no match anyway.
13:05 – we start the second period looking raggy and crap. It’s volleyball football, the ball continually being kept in the air by us. We look like the team that everyone says we really are - uncultured. Time and time again I yell: “Put it on the ground!” The crowd chant: “Blackwell, sort it out, Blackwell, Blackwell sort it out . . .”
13:07 – As if to answer the chants Arturo is taken off? And Ward comes on for a baptism of fire. Some of the crowd retort with: “You don’t know what you’re doing”, oh dear, shades of Bryan Robson-it is. But then, as if suddenly realising they’re booing off the new boy, there’s a sustained ripple of applause for the one lad who’s given us hope today.
13.18 – Webber is booed at every touch because he seems a yard off the pace and frightened witless of taking anyone on. All the players look frightened – where’s elbows Morgan when you need him?
13.19 – Webber comes off and Sharp comes on, looking reasonably . . .sharp. Nothing changes.
13.20 – if the match was several hours long we wouldn’t score. We’re threatening but we’re 11 individuals and not a team and the Wendies look powerful on the break and likely to bury us in the mire at any point. They hit the post and the crowd grows angrily restless.
13.24 – Hendrie comes on to replace the anonymous Howard and immediately makes an impact, looks fresher and begins to create movement in the team but surely it’s too late.
13.55 – yes it is. Even four minutes of time added on fail to offer a glimmer of hope. Wednesday have done the double on us for the first time in 95 years. A small section of the crowd chant ‘Blackwell out’ but it’s not taken up by many and it begins a series of scuffles between loyal and whinging supporters. We’re so frustrated we’re taking it out on each other.
14.25 – we sit in the car listening to BBCRS’s Praise or Grumble. Blackwell is interviewed and is angry with the questioning of his tactics by interviewer. He sounds rattled but says in the context of a season, it really is just another defeat and no need to panic. He claims Lupoli was tired but the Italian is interviewed minutes later and confirms that although he hasn’t trained all week he could easily have gone on.
So that’s it. Weeks and weeks ago I said we were the great promotion pretenders and nothing has even vaguely suggested I’m wrong. Though we’ve maintained our position, we’re not promotion material. There simply isn’t the depth of quality to suggest we could mount or sustain a campaign.
However, were others to slip up it is remotely possible that we could slip into the Prem via the play-offs. But then, stranger things have happened and God and Anne Davies do work in mysterious ways. . . .