London Calling

Monday morning. I woke up in my own bed but there’s been so much travelling recently that it took a minute or two to work out where I actually was! Bet it’s not like this for the players…

Sunderland.

It was a lovely morning that turned into a lovely afternoon. I’d got back to Newcastle about 4am Sunday and then gone straight out to an all night bar because I just couldn’t sleep. You’re probably wondering why I’m sharing this, but coupling that with only a couple of hours sleep on Sunday night left me feeling (for want of a better phrase) jet lagged. I had the twitchy eyes and everything! Luckily there wasn’t going to be much travelling today - which was probably for the best.

In fact I spent the afternoon just relaxing and watching the Arsenal Ladies spank Leeds 4-0 in their FA Cup Final (thus winning the female double). It was just like watching the men with a mixture of sparkling moves sometimes leading to one pass too many. It really was about as one sided as you can get and it was quite fun sitting there texting friends with updates as THEY schlepped up the M1 for a change.

I drove down to Sunderland rather than getting the Metro as planned because it just seemed easier. There was no way I was going to be drinking so there was just no point in getting the train down, and as it was by now raining I didn’t fancy the walk to the station anyway. The Mazda had a slow puncture and since I really couldn’t be bothered to fix it I took the Peugeot instead (rather fortunately as it happened) and by 5.30 the car was in a car park and I had met up with Mac and co in the bowling alley near the ground. Sunderland is an easy place to drink in on match days because a lot of the places are mixed, and from what I’ve seen it never causes problems.

Incidentally, just as I entered Sunderland I ended up behind a car with blacked out windows for a while. Nothing too unusual, except for the number plate - AC03 AFC. Hmmm. Although with her being a northerner it was probably his girlfriend I couldn’t help thinking maybe Arsene wouldn’t let him on the team coach anymore! Whilst I think we should get him fit in case we need him for the final as far as I’m concerned he’s an ex-player already, and not one I have any respect for to be honest. Cole for Baptista in the summer anyone?

A couple of OJ’s and lemonade and we were on the way to the (farcically named) Stadium of Light to play record breaking Sunderland (ok not the records they’d like to set but…). They also had two games left to avoid becoming the first team to go a league season without a home win and I don’t think any of their fans expected one against Arsenal!

Now I like Sunderland and (for the most part) their fans. Much more honest and knowledgeable than Newcastle fans and they also don’t have a chip on their shoulder. When I first moved up here I was running a firm in Durham and the staff was about 50:50 between Newcastle and Sunderland. Only one 50% was worth talking to though! You’ve also got to feel some sympathy for a team that somehow walks the championship then drops like a stone. There’s no money and from the start of the season they knew they’d probably go down but it doesn’t stop the fans supporting the team with a fervour few clubs can match.

And what fervour. Fans favourite Niall Quinn is mounting a take over for the club and they were singing about his ‘Disco Pants’ for most of the match. In fact, whilst you might have expected the Arsenal fans to be giving it large about Paris we just couldn’t compete. Apart from anything else when a team has done that badly and it’s got to the stage where their fans are almost laughing at the situation you can’t chant anything that’ll matter to them! So for the most part we let them get on with their party while we got on with winning the game (although a lot of Arsenal joined in their songs about Alan Shearer!). And we even joined in with the ‘Mexican Wave’ that kept going round the stadium! I think the atmosphere is summed up by the fact that the only segregation was a 2-foot high barrier and that fans were chatting with each other at half time.

We didn’t really get out of first gear, but then again we had no real need to. Apart from Jens pulling off one wonder save we were never in any real trouble. Sol had a mare as his timing is still well off but he’s always needed a few games to get it together. It was noticeable how much Kolo was ordering him around during the game but I think it was purely a matter of timing as he was certainly putting in the effort.

Thierry was substituted and received a standing ovation. Not just from the Arsenal fans, the whole ground rose to applaud him. Very rarely over the years have I seen home fans acknowledge an opposition player like one of their own but it seems to be happening more and more with Thierry. He is one of the incredibly select band of players who are special enough to almost transcend the tribal rivalries. As he left the field he applauded the whole ground and did a slight bow. How on earth can anyone that skilled be that humble? Man or player – they’re both admirable. Then the Sunderland fans started chanting ‘Henry for Sunderland’ which got some catcalls from the Arsenal fans who seconds later were in hysterics as the Mackems changed it to ‘Kyle for Arsenal’.

With about 15 minutes to go the heavens opened and it suddenly got very cold indeed. With the game won I think most people would have been happy to have heard the whistle then, especially poor Diaby.

I’m having trouble coming up with a way of describing the tackle and that’s because it was an assault. I can not believe that he didn’t get a straight red card but even more disgusting is his manager trying to defend him. That is the sort of thing that players should be getting long bans for, not swearing at flaming refs! The whole balance is totally wrong, and I believe it’s deliberately been done by FIFA not for the good of the game, but for the good of the TV audience. In 30+ years of going I’ve never once heard a player scream like Diaby did, and it was chilling. The poor kid was a couple of weeks away from a possible appearance in Paris and now his career is in the balance. I’ve looked up his stats, and the guy his manager said ‘is not that kind of guy’ has now got 4 yellows and a red in about a dozen games… Make up your own mind.

Although we didn’t know the extent it was obvious that it was bad when they put him on a stretcher even though he was lying off the pitch. Even the Sunderland fans were a bit muted after that.

Anyway, on the way back to the car I bumped into a couple that used to work for me in Durham. They invited me back to a local pub on the coast and I ended up having more than a few beers as someone else could get me back to Newcastle. It was in a place called Whitburn, and if anyone visits there in the near future can they look out for my car please because although I was sober as a judge when I parked it nearby I haven’t been back for it yet and am not altogether sure I can remember where I put it. I might just report it stolen and let the old bill find it!

Manchester City.

I was feeling much more chipper (where did that word come from?) by Thursday – partly because I’d slept loads and partly because my application for Paris had been accepted. Probably more the second than first to be honest. With 30+ away credits on my season ticket I knew there shouldn’t be any problems but when the box office are involved you can never be absolutely certain, so it was still a relief when my booking went through…

I was taking Gina to the match and as she had the afternoon off I got there fairly early. Strangely (for Manchester anyway) the sun was shinning and it was absolutely boiling. Well, boiling for England in May anyway! There is a grass bank opposite her house so we ended up just sitting out there for the afternoon relaxing with a friend of Gina’s. As it happened she was also going to the match with her father, but they were Citeh fans. Not a problem though as for the second time in three days we were on an away trip to a club where the fans are alright. You’ve got to put them right up there with the best because when they were falling through the divisions a few years ago their attendance figures barely changed (in fact on season they were relegated with better attendances than the season before!).

Now directions and me just don’t go too well together. I can be quite scatty a lot of the time and my brain just switches off to the extent that sometimes it’s amazing I can find my way home. Fortunately Gina knew the best way to get there and we parked up a little way from the ground. Sometimes it’s better to walk for 20 minutes to the car and get away quickly than be sat in your car in a car park for an hour waiting to get out and that’s what we went for.

It didn’t get cold at all that evening and the people you saw without their tops on at the end weren’t engaged in some northern act of bravado, they were simply too hot! In fact it was probably at least as warm as it had been in Villarreal – lovely. From freezing at the Stadium of Light to sweating at Eastland’s in three days!

It’s funny how little things mean so much sometimes. Before the game a couple of guys came and sat in the seats next to us and one of them turned to Gina and asked if the team had been announced. It hadn’t but the fact they asked her not me meant a lot to her. It’s only about her eighth or ninth match and she said that was the first moment when she truly felt she belonged. She might have met most of the mates I go to games with at matches but it really meant something that a stranger had just sat next to her and assumed she would know.

Again it was a ground with little or no segregation. All that separated us from them was a bit of netting over some seats and a row of stewards, but that was more than was needed. In a classic example of your enemies’ enemy being your friend we joined in with their anti-united songs and they joined in with our anti-scum songs.

What a cameo by Jose up front! He was devastating when he came on and personally I’d like to see him playing up front with Thierry regularly. When they click they can take apart any defence in the world, and it won’t have done Jose’s confidence any harm to bag a couple of very smartly taken goals. We needed something like that and he gave us it.

As much as Jose deserves praise for winning the game, there may well have not been a game to win if it hadn’t been for Jens’ heroics earlier in the match. I’ve always thought Jens as a damn good goalie and have been quite happy about him being number 1 but there’s no doubt that he’s been even better since his sabbatical in the reserves last season. Since he came back he has elevated his game from damn good to world class and he’s making the saves that make a difference. Believe me without him we wouldn’t have been in the hunt for 4th place because he’s probably been worth at least 10 points this season, and be almost faultless. ‘Deutschland number ein’ (?) as we were singing.

Back to Gina’s after the game, then back to Newcastle Friday ready to go down Saturday to say goodbye to a dear old friend.

Come On You Red(currant)s.