In writing these reports I try to give you, gentle reader, something of the feel of what it is like to be an exile (who already has to travel hundreds of miles to home games) on journeys to the far-flung outposts of the “Championship”. The difficulty I face of course is that a very substantial proportion of my life consists of staring at motorways hurling towards me at over 90 mph. We need to eke out fun from anything that comes our way. Given that, you can imagine the sheer excitement in my car as we realised that we would be coming off at junction T7 of the M6 Toll. We’d used the M6 Toll before of course to get to games in the Northwest but never before had we used an alpha numerically labelled junction. It was an experience to savour.
Having calmed down from that, our minds turned to the fact that we were supposed to be meeting some SAFC supporters from the midlands. In a triumph of hope over experience we trusted them to be able to work out the best pubs to go to. We ended up in a Yates (I bliddy hate chain pubs) waiting for them. I’d also arranged to meet a lad off the RTG message board who was travelling on his own. However, I didn’t have a clue what he looked like, what age he was or anything. It is amazing what happens if you hang around a town centre pub on a Friday night trying hopefully to catch the eye of any single men walking past. I have a date tonight with a hunky bloke with a moustache and an earring. I’ve always said you should try everything once (except Morris dancing and going on a week-end city break with Freddie Shepherd). Eventually however I did catch the eye of someone who wasn’t interested in my body but was interested in drinking beer and watching SAFC.
Steve Cram also turned up for a drink and got maybes the best blowout of a celebrity I’ve seen. As we got a phone call that the others were in the Hog’s Head a lad with us went over and did the “can I just shake your hand Steve” routine. Steve, being a sociable sort of lad, started to chat to our mate. But with us at the door waving him to hurry he had to reply “Steve, I’m sorry, I can’t stand here chatting to you, I’ve got to get on”. And so we left a crestfallen Steve Cram.
I’m going to say it now because I notice from the message board that there has been already been a fair amount of hindsight analysis. There was by now a good group of us in the Hog’s Head. Everyone I spoke to and everyone I heard said the same: “nice to win; even nicer to win by three goals and go top; but a draw would be canny”. If that was the case before the game, it was the case after. Wolves had been improving under Glenda. An away draw at a place like that is always acceptable.
And so we got to the away end. With us being in the Prem and then Wolves having a quick visit there, we hadn’t been to the home of the Yellows for a while. I’d forgot how bliddy awful it is. I can’t think of a single worse away end in the top two divisions (although we do have Brighton’s temporary home to visit next). Stuck in the lower tier of a stand. Straggled out along one side of the pitch. The stand miles away from the pitch. It doesn’t have one redeeming feature. I’ve been there plenty of times now and you just can’t get a chant going that the whole away support can join in. Someone can be bellowing out “Julio, always believe ….” ten yards to the left of you while someone ten yards to the right can be bellowing out “We’re on our way” and you wouldn’t hear either of them and would end up singing a song of your own. Still, the good-sized support tried our best. We also did have the laugh of ridiculing the Wolves supporters singing “Is that all you take away?” when we had almost three times as many as they brought up to the SoL for a non-TV match – not that more than a few hundred of them would realise that like.
Team was such that there was still no Poom on the bench (worrying) and still no Piper (I think I’m just resigned to him being finished). Mick had decided it was to be Jeff and Robbo in the centre of midfield with Tubby on the bench. Not that it is any way to manage a club but I doubt that, if we held a referendum, many would persist with Jeff and Robbo as much as Mick does. In addition Breen and Caldwell returned with Collins D getting a place on the bench, being a left footer probably helping him to get the nod over the unlucky Collins N.
The only goals came quickly. After about 12 minutes, Wright came down the right side and got the ball through to Jeff, who cushioned it nicely for Elliott. Elliott ran across the 18 yard box and, as the defence failed to get in a tackle, he unleashed a superb curling left foot shot. The sort of goal Sky just loves, so we might get to see it a lot more. Elliott’s tally is increasing and the lad is looking more and more of a gem.
Unfortunately we were still celebrating when a hopeless ball was punted into our box. Now some of you might have read previous whinges of mine about how Myrhe sticks to his line too much and needs to command his box. To defend myself, I was mainly looking for him to command his six-yard box. And when I say I want him to get out more, I don’t mean to the cinema or nice restaurants, I mean to clear the bliddy ball. On this occasion he was filled with the spirit of Lionel Perez and came charging out telling the defence to leave it. Notwithstanding how far back the stand we were in was from the pitch, I think I got closer to the ball than he did. Even then none of their players could do much and it hit the back of the head of the Korean lad. The gods of bouncebackability decided to wee on our party and so into the net it went.
Rest of the first half I thought we shaded. We’re a cautious team. I’m not going to complain because Mick’s caution has taken a pile of shite dropping out of the Prem and losing our “best” players and converted it into a team of spirit that finished a good third and is pressing hard for automatic promotion again. However, you felt that a draw might be the end result from their equaliser onwards, despite there being 75 minutes left. Stew and Elliott were looking good but little was coming their way. Arca was having a shocker (again). He very rarely has looked good at this stage of the season – in fact often he has been injured. He often comes good again as the spring appears and so that must be our hope. Whitehead was moving infield quite a lot so we were playing a very narrow game. Robbo and Jeff were harrying down balls but doing little to take control of the game from the centre.
At half time I though we had had the better of the half. The second half to be honest was fairly poor. Wolves pushed forward a lot more but we never looked too troubled. I struggle to think of a dangerous attempt from them. We looked to break but were never committing that many men. Bridges and Brown came on for Elliott and Stew but we still didn’t get them into the game enough. Bridges did send in one superb ball from the left that Whitehead looked as though he would score from – but it flashed past the post.
So at the final whistle we cheered. Remember that. Before the match we said we’d take a draw and at the final whistle we cheered the lads for getting us one. The evils of hindsight will click in and say “we should have beaten this lot” but the fact is that this was a decent point. We have a lot of home games coming up where we can get three points and some winnable away games. Getting an away point against these yellows will do me fine.
