Charge! Charge? Barnsley Away: Play-offs Semi-Final.

So …

Play-off it is.

We are away at Barnsley on Saturday … and there is a miserly allocation of two thousand tickets. Oakwell, home of Barnsley F.C is a twenty three thousand plus ground, at least six thousand spaces in the away end. So it’s around and about to collect season tickets and scurrying in to the queue for when the sale begins at ten on Tuesday morning.

But the tickets haven’t arrived. Cleverly there’s a second window open for those wanting tickets for the second leg the following Thursday (shucks, my German class – again!).

I stay put … and eventually, after we have cheered every white van that even looks as if it might be delivering tickets and joking about how, since it’s a Yorkshire club they probably sent ‘em down by pigeon .. they are on sale. There’s light rain, my brother isn’t answering any of his ‘phones.

And I have talked with new friends. All amazed by the wonderful game at Vale, not least by the number of shots peppered in from range: accurate, powerful and often.

“What we’ve been askin’ for all season,” as one bloke puts it.

I get the tickets, home and away – then check – was it the right number.

Saturday morning comes around and Saddlers’ Widow has spotted some wooden pallets, just right for jobs up at the allotment, so we take a saw and dismantle them and ferry them home and up to the plot. Then bacon sandwiches and off to Rugeley.

Into the back of Andy’s car, with Jack and Chris. By now this is a familiar route. A38 to Derby, then M1 with 50 m.p.h. speed limits. Talk inside the car is of exploding Agas, a trip to Barcelona, student pranks, the conservation status of great crested newts and, inevitably, the game at Port Vale. Warm roads and steady speed driving and we are negotiating the streets of Barnsley in plenty of time. The decision is to park on the away supporters’ car park: a piece of sloping waste ground between the ground and the Barnsley Metrodome. Unknown to us the cars will be packed in nose to tail, some six deep, making leaving a game of patience.

We get into the ground, find the Beer Bar, but, standing by the windows with a sweeping view of the director’s car park and the training pitches and across to the horizon, are told we cannot loiter here.

So we shuffle out into the caverns below the terraces. So many signs, in the event of a fire, refreshments, ladies (nobody has enough to buy one of these since we spent it all on getting here!) and, to pass the time Cully stacks plastic beer bottles, and makes sculptures of the pie trays and forks. It annoys some, but amuses others, including one youth who is subtly trying to blow the tower down. So subtle that he is unsuccessful.

Out into the sunshine, sitting high: good view. The crowd is massive, over 19,000, with almost three thousand Saddlers’ fans in good voice. Roused by the form since we were hammered by Bradford. Further encouraged by the fact that, according to the social media savvy in our group, former Walsall players Andy Butler, Richard O’Donnell and James Baxendale are here. Indeed I spot Butler, sporting a piratical beard after kick off.

But the game explodes into life. We look unsettled, pushed out of our passing game (unless that was the game plan). Fast enough, willing enough but not up to the physicality of the game Barnsley are playing. And it is nerve wracking. Barnsley have the ball in the net twice but both are disallowed. Maybe luck is with us; you need luck sometimes.

We have a couple of attacks, a free kick from Forde just over and wide.

Then we are one nil down. A shot from Hammill, maybe going wide is deflected into the net off Demetriou. Half time.

I am not unhappy at this point. We are struggling, but only one goal behind.

Soon we are two behind; Barnsley breaking quickly and well, catching our defenders up the pitch. The ball is swept forwards, big man Sam Winnall gets a shot away and it is deflected over Neil Etheridge by O’Connor.

Two –nil? Yeah, I’ll even take that. There is plenty of time in the tank, after all – and we are always good to sneak a goal in the last ten minutes or so.

Just as I am stupidly thinking this, that man Winnall is on another run, brushing off challenges and slotting a cool shot into our net. The fight goes out of the players. They huff and puff, but to no avail.

We are a helluva along time getting off the car park; each one of us disappointed. Whitney is quoted as saying about game management, sticking to a plan. Maybe we have heard it all before. This man is undoubtedly an inspirational speaker, truly motivating. But my grandmother might have said “fine words don’t butter parsnips.” What was the game plan? Did the players understand it?

The one reservation I have about Whitney as manager is that he doesn’t seem to have a good grasp of strategy, looking at other teams and adapting our style. Barnsley played us in a similar way to that of Bradford. Big man up front, running at us, harrying – and, again we buckled.

Here’s hoping for some stunning home display on Thursday. The fat lady might just be loosening her tonsils, but it ain’t – quite – over yet.

Drama of a different nature at Man United’s last home game. The ground was evacuated after a “bomb-type” device was found in one of the toilets.

It had been accidentally left there by a training company using the venue during the week. The game will be replayed, but my guess is there will be a fair number of United fans , who travel from all over the world, unable to make the journey a second time.