The Diary

10 May 2004: A Disappointing Farewell To The Nationwide

You?ll have to excuse me for asking this, but did I miss something fundamental today? All my previous experience of promotions led me to believe that they were a bit like the perfect orgasm; as rare as rocking-horse shit, normally, but come the culmination of one of those all-too rare seasons where a perfect combo of astute manager, skilful players, and a large assist from Lady Luck actually conspire in synergy to give us a season to remember, for once, what generally happens? Come the final day, we normally have violin symphonies, peals of bells, dewy eyes, ecstatic moans, vague flutterings in unmentionable parts, footage of steam trains entering tunnels at speed ? the full climactic works, in fact, and with the added bonus of no G-spot to fumble for in the dark beforehand, and, what?s even better, no damp patch on the bed to argue over afterwards. Yep, it?s at - erm ? seminal moments like that football can be even better than sex, which ever way up (or down) is your wont, but this time round?

Premature ejaculation writ large, methinks, the necessary hormonal stimulation achieved courtesy of that glorious last-minute winner at The Stadium Of Light, and full tumescence thanks to Sunderland?s virtual throwing-in of the towel some three or four days later, resulting in a gushy sort of climax versus Bradford City that following Saturday. Which brings me back to where I started, really; just like a couple of spotty faced adolescents fumbling in the back of a Mini, and lacking the necessary know-how to prolong things to pleasurable lengths, we came too soon, which meant everything was over in a flash, then made flaccid, and try as we might, versus Reading, Stoke and today?s Forest game, we lacked the necessary libido to make ourselves rise to the occasion once more. That?s why we were all left looking very deflated and disappointed, not to mention frustrated, come that final whistle this afternoon. If anyone reading this should happen to know of the footballing equivalent of Viagara, or good old-fashioned Spanish Fly, mightn?t it be a good idea next time to let our manager in on the secret as well, and long before our Premiership season starts, pretty please?

Today?s tale really begins in the soon-to-be-no-more Throstle Club, around eleven am, where we encountered The Noise, accompanied, for once, by both his daughters, Carly and Bethany, and the pair of them looking as pleased as Punch. The reason? En-route from McDonalds to the club, they?d come across a small bunch of our players, on their way to their dressing-room, presumably. Big Dave was one, Hughsie another, but what really made our teenage bag-carrier?s day was getting a whopping great peck on the kisser from Scott Dobie! As The Noise told me later, both Hughsie and Big Dave were wonderful with those kids, taking time to sign autographs, talk to them, that sort of thing; in fact, our defensive man-mountain even managed a few inspirational words with The Noise himself! And, in one of those conversations where you say one thing, and infer something quite different, The Noise wished Hughsie ?luck over the summer?, but the huge grin that split our follicularly-challenged striker?s face from ear to ear afterwards made it perfectly clear he knew what our garrulous co-editor was alluding to. One disappointment for the Lewis clan, though; young Bethany, who?s absolutely besotted, couldn?t get Bernt Hass?s signature. Oh ? and before I forget, another interesting tale from The Noise; while he was lurking in the vicinity of our finest, he happened to overhear a prominent media-person fuming like stink because our leader had just called him a ?muppet?. Allegedly.

Not much to sell, today ? we had only 20 or so Dicks to our name, and Steve The Miser was only left with around 90 copies, all told ? but the relative calm did give us the chance to converse at length with our clientele for once. Before that, though, there was the sight of Clem rushing over the road like a bat out of hell, and returning some minutes later with a mineral water bottle in hand; as he went back into the ground via the players? wives entrance, I can only assume one of his family was the intended recipient. Then came the first of our ?visitors?, John Keogh, from Heysham, which is one hell of a way to come to see us lose, when you think about it. He had with him his daughter, and guess what? It was her first ever Albion game! Blimey, what with her and the Lewis clan, don?t kids serve their Hawthorns apprenticeship watching truly awful Albion sides perform any more? Next up, though, was Marion Brennan, she of the E and S, daughter in tow also, but there in a strictly civvy capacity only. By the way, Marion, your secret is perfectly safe with me, provided you leave the necessary wonga in a plain brown envelope on our front doorstep before Tuesday morning! Those were the two that stuck principally in my mind, but there were many, many others, and for their kind words, I thank them also.

My last caller had much sadder tidings to relate; he?s an ex-colleague of mine, now living quite some distance from the Midlands, but still coming to games as and when time permits. It turned out that his wife had been very seriously ill indeed with what sounded like one of those auto-immune complaints, where the body?s defences attack its own internal organs, with predictably destructive results. Quite a rare condition, it was, as well, and it took eight weeks to finally diagnose, apparently, but because the condition attacked his missus?s lungs and kidneys, causing full-blown pneumonia, amongst other sundry ailments, it became a pretty close-run thing as to who?d eventually win, medical science, or The Grim Reaper. Even now, although out of hospital, she?s still taking so many pills, she practically rattles. It?s moments like that when relatively trivial ailments pale into complete insignificance, and you really count your blessings, health-wise.

Into the ground comparatively early, for once, giving us ample time to relax and take in the general Hawthorns scene. Forest, fair play to them, had brought quite a following, their splashes of brilliant red and white making a stark contrast with the blue and white prevailing elsewhere in the ground. As for the team news, well, let?s just say the announcements left us scratching our heads like crazy? Well, what would you make of Hughesie and Rob Hulse comprising our attacking combo for this one, with Scott Dobie, who?d looked really hungry for a game at Stoke, and scored, relegated to the bench once more? The other changes? In were James O?Connor, Clem and Jay Chambo, and out were Lloyd Dyer, Bernt Hass and Mark Kinsella.

After the bitter disappointment of our last two away outings, we had hoped for a much-improved home display, but it was not to be. For starters, why was James O?Connor played in a Koumas-style role, attacking midfield, with the Real McCoy doing defensive midfield duties only? Additionally, during the early stages of the first half, our rearguard looked awfully fragile, as Forest exploited our deficiencies time and time again; this was only negated when Clem dropped into a defensive slot himself, to stiffen things up, but the damage had been done by then. The first warning came just a couple of minutes into the game when Clem had to nip in pretty smartly to prevent a Forest-ite going clear on goal. We should have taken note of that, because approximately 2 minutes after that, the visitors struck oil, and we just stood there and let Williams do it, backing off and backing off, a bit like the Reading goal, if you like. No wonder they went absolutely crazy in that away end; it?s not all that often you get handed an illustrious opposition?s head on a plate, is it?

The fundamental problem was, because of the changes, we looked disjointed, ineffective, even, in the engine-room department, the inclusion of O?Connor rapidly assuming all the proportions of a complete disaster, and the more mistakes he made, the worse it became, with the inevitable result the crowd got on his back, big-time. Greegs, amazingly enough, did restore a modicum of sunshine to our gloom; his shot, around the 14 minute mark, from the edge of the box, was a real belter, and missed its target by the narrowest of margins. That seemed to encourage our finest, though, and after a succession of close ones, we actually managed to get the ball in the net, and a fine header it was, too, from Koumas, I think ? until referee Gallagher ruled out the effort because of a foul on the Forest keeper. From that moment, until half-time, we managed several other attempts on goal, but largely thanks to their man between the sticks, who was in superb form, it has to be said, our ?goals for? tally remained stubbornly pristine.

Come the half-time whistle, a nasty little interlude, which occurred just as I was making my way to the ?powder room? below. As I descended, a voice quite nearby bellowed in tones that surely must have reached the ears of James O?Connor, as he made to go down the tunnel, ?Get off, O?Connor ? you?re an embarrassment!? This was too much for a lady of similar age to myself, just behind me, and she quietly made her feelings known to the guy that such boorish behaviour was neither big or clever. It?s one thing to bawl during the game, but getting up close and personal with someone like that is a different bawl-game entirely. As I saw it, the first half had seen bags of effort, but the fundamental problem was our lack of a decent midfield to properly supply the ammo; had that been available, we would surely have got on the score-sheet long before the interval.

A few minutes later, out came our finest once more, but no changes to the current line-up, surprisingly enough. And very early, too, and on their own, as well ? had this been done as a punishment? If so, it certainly seemed to have some effect on our finest; within the first ten minutes, we?d had a couple of good chances, but once more, their keeper did sterling work to cut out the danger. Not long after that, we had the first substitution; off came O?Connor, who?d worked hard, but wasn?t really up to the job, and on came Sakiri. Then around five minutes after that, Rob Hulse called it a day, being replaced by Scott Dobie, who nearly scored with his first touch of the ball, forcing their keeper into a fine save once more.

As the half progressed, I was absolutely stunned by the fact we?d applied so much pressure, but got so little reward for our efforts, Hughsie passing up on a golden opportunity to get his name on the scorers list when his first touch let him down for once. And, not long after that, Sakiri was dead unlucky when his free kick just outside the box was brilliantly put over the bar by their keeper for a corner. Come ten minutes from time, though, our leader chucked his last hand into the ring, in the form of young Lloyd Dyer, who came on for Paul Robinson, but it wasn?t enough. Dobes and Clem missed chances they would have had for breakfast earlier in the season, then Sakiri missed a sitter from about five or six yards out; it soon became abundantly clear we were going to finish this one with absolute ziltch to show for our labours. Come injury time, Forest confirmed what we were all expecting by sticking in an absolute corker of a second, courtesy of David Johnson.

Talk about the celebratory champagne going flat on us; still the show, in the form of the runners-up medals presentation, had to go on, and go on it did, some 20 minutes later. A makeshift stage was erected in the centre circle, and once this was done, the players were called out to receive their medals, in batches of two at a time. One nice touch, though; as they emerged from the tunnel, in turn, a lot of the married or committed guys had their small children in tow. Some youngsters looked completely overwhelmed by the noise and the crowd, but once the presentations of both shield and medals had finished, and the Press catered for in the form of the usual poses, off our finest went to circumnavigate the pitch, with the older children busily kicking balls around the Brummie penalty area as if they?d been doing it all their lives! Such was the disappointment generated by that awful ending to the season, practically no-one tried to get on the pitch for the presentation, and in fact, celebrations in the seats were very muted indeed when compared to the frenzied antics that took place two seasons ago, after we beat Palace. A complete anticlimax, you might say. Now where did I put that Viagra, I wonder?

And that was it, season 2003-04, done and dusted. It only remained to shift ourselves to The Vine, where we?d promised to meet up with The Noise afterwards. We would have got there much sooner but for an outbreak of really selfish drivers on the Brummie Road, trying to turn right out of side-streets into the main thoroughfare, and by doing so, completely blocking the progress of oncoming traffic, which meant, in its turn, traffic was impeded in other directions, too. Still we did eventually get there, and as we did so, the place was really humming with last game celebrants; the bar area resembling the storming of the Bastille, but by people wearing stripey shirts and not the red white and blue of Revolutionary France. And, once things had calmed down a little, off went ?Im Indoors, for some slurp, closely followed by the purchase of some tandoori chicken, from the excellent indoor barbie they have there. And that?s when we had another surprise, folks. By that time, The Noise plus kids had arrived on the scene, so assuming that Big And Little Noises were completely au fait with Indian cuisine, we grabbed ourselves a huge plate of nosh, with the intention of sharing the lot between all five of us. Wrong! Much to our amazement, we quickly discovered that the joys of Asian fare were completely unknown to our Stokie crew. I simply couldn?t believe it; I?d previously gained the impression that such gastronomic delights were considered really cool by teenagers, and as for The Noise never having eaten the stuff, ever - well! In fact, when I asked him about it, he told me that until comparatively recently, he?d never sampled Chinese fare, either! Dearie, dearie me. Oh well ? the kids enjoyed the play area at the back, which was a bonus, of sorts, I suppose.

And Finally?. No room (or time!) to append other high and low points of 2003-04 tonight, as promised, but I will cover that ground in my final piece of the current season, tomorrow evening. Trust me, I?m a Baggie. Instead, here are a couple of snippets I was given today:

One. This comes courtesy of ?Im Indoors, who recently saw a copy of an Inland Revenue house magazine.In it was an article extolling the virtues of the government?s ?Learn Direct? scheme, where workers could pick up a new skill at little or no cost to themselves. Being interested in that sort of thing himself, my other half eagerly scanned the pages, to read it ? and guess what? As he did so, the photographic illustrations caught his eye, which will come as no surprise when I tell you that the chosen learner asked to illustrate this piece was none other than our old friend The Noise, trying to look busy in front of a computer keyboard. And he was wearing a Grorty Dick sweatshirt, as well!

Two. As I said above, many of us felt vaguely let down after those final three fixtures, but none more so than one chap I spoke to in the Vine after today?s game. Unable to get Reading seat tickets via the usual channels, our chum and his mate went down the corporate hospitality route instead. What with that, hotel bills for one night in the area, and Stoke ticket costs chucked in for good measure, it?s fair to say that those two away games cost our dynamic duo pretty much ?600 between the pair of them, and with very little to show for all that financial sacrifice. And, no, they?re not best pleased by the fact we seemed to curl up and die once we?d got promotion, either.

 - Glynis Wright

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