Pride? Restored? Shrewsbury at Home.

Still smarting from the thrashing we had up at Bradford I am driving home on Tuesday evening. Unlike the previous week when I was hungry and frustrated by traffic and – let’s face it – just plain late and generally behind a tight schedule …

Where was I?

Oh yes, unlike last week, this time I am foddered, not dehydrated – as I worked out how the damned coffee machine worked – and very early. Just setting out ten minutes earlier and the traffic is slim. All the way home. Along the A5. The road works. The Roman road. The one that leads from London to Holyhead. The traditional route, before the upstart M54 interrupted, from my house to Shrewsbury – or, as you will, Shrewsbury to Walsall (give or take a mile or two).

Shrewsbury, tonight’s visitors. Shrewsbury: the next banana skin? Shrewsbury, still struggling against relegation – and likely to be fired up and scrapping for every morsel on that pitch tonight!

And looming on the horizon, like a plague of Old testament proportion there is, most definitely a storm. In my poet’s mind it is coming from Shrewsbury: a storm that will test our mettle and go a long way to sorting stuff out. For example; do we have the necessary cojones to get over the Bradford fiasco? Will we still be in with any chance of automatic promotion when the dust settles?

But it won’t be actual dust. It will be hail!

I eat, saddle up mentally and drive beneath glowering skies – no precipitation yet – to my usual parking nest. My parking is clumsy – I am, let’s face it, more famous for abandoning cars than parking them. One wheel is on the kerb, three not. But I am not blocking anyone’s access – and I should be in good shape to make a speedy get away.

From here it is a fifteen minute walk to the entrance of the savoy Lounge (if that). I am just three minutes into that walk when the very heavens open. Lightning crackles and thunder rolls long and hard across the skies. There is a plane on final approach to Birmingham International. Bet they got a good view of that one!

But most of the downfall is not simple rain. It is hail – coming down in bullets! That over-tall privet hedge provides some shelter, but I skip and cringe across the car park – a good few visitors from Shrewsbury, all sheltering in the lee of the stadium (what there is of it), some smoking.

All of us nervous. A lot to play for this evening!

I catch up with the day’s news on the big screen in the Lounge. Read that the Hillsborough Inquiry jury has come up with a landslide number of verdicts around the main one of “unlawful killing.” Damning!

 

Then I notice Cully, Andy and Jack. I am still thinking of the Hillsborough disaster, the stories in the media at the time, the wonderful long, long, proud fight put up by the families against massive institutions (press, police and general public perceptions in the days when to be a football fan was to some degree to be an enemy of society).

We do discuss the findings; in no doubt that there were mistakes made, but unsure where this will lead. That ordinary coppers were as sickened as we were, then and now and tried to help but were held back obeying orders. Mostly we are disgusted that this didn’t all come out in the police investigations carried by our very own West Midlands Police Force. That this was, almost certainly covered up*.

But talk soon turns, as it must to this game; to the Bank Holiday Monday mid day kick off, by which time Burton Albion will have played against Gillingham – and we’ll have a better idea of what we need to get done. And our final scheduled game of the season at Port Vale (I have my ticket already!) This is also a mid-day ish kick off.

Then we creep out to take our seats. There is still hail on the pitch, filling up little depressions in the playing surface – and cold!

Kick off and we escape a couple of times; poor back passes. And we go on the attack. This is a side of attacking players, but still we spend an awful lot of time in our own half. Sawyers is back on form. He is out on the left wing, picks out Kieron Morris running through the middle, a couple of strides and he pulls the trigger on a shot across the keeper. Goal!

Relief!

We need a few more, so set about it, but Shrewsbury manager makes a tactical substitution that closes up the defence.

But not enough to stop a long run from Rico Henry going on and on and on. Past defender after defender. Eventually he tries a shot which is deflected off one defender, then comes back off another and beats the Swiss goalie who flaps at it.

Second half kicks off and Shrewsbury with absolutely nothing to lose but face step up and drive us back. Just one point would keep them in this league; they just need to get one goal back to be in it again.

Inevitably (this is Bescot after all and we are definitely not Bradford!) they get the goal.

But final result is a two one win. Enough to get the points. To prove the point that we are psychologically strong enough. Our problem is not of spirit, but simply the inability to make the most of our fluid play. In short, dammit we cannot score gaols. Yet we are in a great position and there is till a chance!

Bring on the Cod Army!

 

• What follows is a reasonable summary taken from Wikipedia. Needless to say there are so many, many more harrowing details; including attempted demonization of loyal football supporters and the anguish of loved ones. My respect goes to all of the people involved, not all of them seeking justice survived to see today’s momentous rulings.

The Hillsborough disaster was a human crush that caused the deaths of 96 people and injured 766 others at a football match between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest at Hillsborough Stadium, Sheffield, England, on 15 April 1989. The match was the 1988–89 FA Cup semi-final, with Hillsborough, home ground of Sheffield Wednesday, selected as a neutral venue. The crush occurred in pens in the Leppings Lane stand, allocated to Liverpool fans. Steel fencing between the spectators and the playing field prevented victims from escaping the overcrowded western stand. At the time, such fencing was commonly used in English football stadiums to prevent friendly and hostile pitch invasions. The interim report in the 1989–90 official inquiry into the disaster by Lord Taylor concluded that “the main reason for the disaster was the failure of police control.”^[1] In 2016, a new inquiry returned a verdict that the victims were unlawfully killed as a result of an inadequate response by emergency services.^[2]

Entry to the Leppings Lane stand was possible only via one of seven turnstiles, a restriction that led to dangerous overcrowding outside the ground before kick-off. In an attempt to ease pressure outside the ground, Police Chief Superintendent David Duckenfield, the senior police officer responsible for policing the match, ordered an exit gate to be opened. The opened exit gate led to a tunnel marked “Standing”, which led directly to the two already overcrowded enclosures. In previous years the tunnel had been closed off by police when the two central pens were full; however, on this occasion the tunnel was unmanned. The findings of the final report resulted in the elimination of standing terraces at all major football stadiums in England, Wales and Scotland. It remains the worst stadium-related disaster in the history of English sport, and one of the world’s worst football disasters.

Rat Runs, Jonahs and Life After Dean …

“That A5 bit at Churchbridge is the tricky bit,” Andy warned me at the game on Saturday. We were going through the complex arrangements necessary to get all of us to Greenhous Meadow, Shrewsbury on Tuesday evening.

As plans unfolded I would try to get away from work, drive to Four Ashes to pick Andy up from work, then drive on to Shrewsbury.

I know a rat run to avoid the Churchbridge islands (A5, crossing the M6 toll and the A34 and the Orbital Way which leads to an out of town shopping centre and the tip (oh and Cannock).

I have enough time as it happens to drop in to home, eat a tasty bacon sandwich, then set off. A second “alternative route” I was going to use to save time ended up with barriers closing the road. A frustratingly short distance from where I needed to be; but I had time to spare.

We compared our busy days before we remembered we are without the “ginger Mourinho” and talked about histories of managers and players leaving (in some cases, like Paul Merson) player managers indeed.

So may names have been linked to the job by the papers: Tim Sherwood, Shaun O’Driscoll, David Kelly, Dean Holden, Paul Tisdale (Exeter City), and Adam Murray (Mansfield Town). At work an Everton supporter suggested David Moyes (I think perhaps he doesn’t quite grasp what paupers we actually are).

Also linked is Mickey Mellon, currently ensconced at Shrewsbury. What a great idea: stir up things by suggesting the next manager might be working at the club you are playing next.  Between us we decide that, in reality, nobody in authority at Walsall has even thought about drawing up any kind of list, other than who to send Christmas cards to and who to buy presents for. Too, too early. Not that this will stop the speculation.

We slide gently onto the M54 by the new i-54 centre (Jaguar Land Rover one of our Midlands success stories, will be looking to boost production and expand their plant in the near future. Real jobs, producing something: bostin’ !

Off the M54, round  a few roundabouts to find a parking space at the Brooklands Hotel  near to the ground: traditional nesting space for some years now. And we’re early enough to get a seat in the “posh end” of the pub; clearly a couple of blokes who will not be disturbing the peace then.  And are discussing the dominoes tables when the rest of the crew arrive. JB, Jack, and, making their season’s debuts (I think) Big Mike and Matt the Painter.

Crisps, Bombay mixes and lightweight banter. Then the stroll defying traffic on a number of dual-carriageway islands to show our tickets and take our places (not even remotely connected to the numbers on the tickets!

I find out later that there are, give or take, 1,500 Saddlers fans there; noisy, witty and in good voice. Just as well; I am losing mine! It is not far, but this is still a good turnout: Tuesday night and close to Christmas after all.

We have the same team out that began the game against Bradford. Looking sharp and busy. Shrewsbury look second best but still manage to get a frustratingly good percentage of the fifty fifty balls and rebounds. Sawyers and Evans have a couple of shots that come off the posts.

Then, one on one with Etheridge Larnell Cole scores.

It would have been possible that, having been deserted by the management team and going a goal down – against the run of play  team might have curled up and given up. This team? No! They quickly regroup, stung into action. Milan Lalkovic, never short of fire and passion, takes a ball from sawyers and raps it into the Shrewsbury goal. Half time: one all.

Painterman Matt is downcast (or attention seeking), going on about being a bad-luck charm. we cannot remember the  lasttime he came to a match … and he is not famous for winter matches. we talk about work, changing jobs ( a tralerman next maybe?) and I hope I convince him he is not the Jonah he thinks he is.

But we think we will miss Tom Bradshaw, who has gone off, following a hefty tackle from  Antony Gerrard (once a Walsall player, but looking really a tad overweight now). There is no messing: Bradshaw limps off the field of play and down the tunnel.

Jordan Cook comes on. He doesn’t have the physique, the match fitness (perhaps) and we wonder how we will get a grip on the second half. While we are wondering this, however, we are surrounded by a thousand and more positive thinking Walsall supporters who have anew song or tow.

“They’ve got Mourinho,

We’ve got the physio”

Shrewsbury are being stretched by skilful passing from the whistle. Rico Henry in particular is making space and can dribble like a good ‘un. The home team sink to the  physical. The referee has let some of this go, but by seventy minutes is sending Ian Black off: second bookable offence. He doesn’t like it: argues, stands at the edge of the pitch like an unruly, sulking schoolkid.

Then Walsall are in full flight, but they would have been anyway.

Cook grows in confidence. From a corner – completely unmarked at the far post Downing rises majestically and nods in an easy goal. His first of the season. We go just a little bit crazy – and some guy in a silver jacket, who has been jeering and gesticulating at us from the Shrewsbury seats gets a full couple of choruses. He is not happy. We are. Even more so when Sawyers slips a ball to Henry who guides it towards Cook. Cook’s first touch is a little too heavy. I think he’s messed it up, but he gets to it and hammers it into the roof of the net. Satisfying!

Three one!

The magic is still with us.

This is brilliant, taking us to third place in league one … but a special note of thanks to the players and staff at the Saddlers for keeping the faith.  

Meanwhile, the Conservative government have actually decided to go to Parliament to seek approval for the Royal Air Force to carry out bombing raids on Islamic State (so called) in Syria. They have been coordinating attacks against the same enemy in Iraq after being invited by the Iraqi government, but now want to extend this to raiding ISIS homelands around Raqqa.

David Cameron’s party have avoided doing this up to now, because a no vote would, frankly, have been  embarrassing.

To make matters more interesting, the Labour (her majesty’s Opposition) leader is absolutely anti-war. The question is will he (Jeremy Corbin) issue a party whip and expect his M.Ps. to vote as he would wish or will he/dare he allow a free vote?