Crawley Away.

The conversation at the Crewe game went something like this;

“Fancy going to Crawley? … Tuesday?”

“Maybe … you?”

“Can you get to Rugeley for three ?”

“Sorry, no chance … go without me.”

“But, if you’re working in Tamworth, we could pick you up later … on the way ?”

“I’m not working in Tamworth on Tuesday …”

Sunday with my brother spent cutting mom’s hedge. In readiness for the traditional family bonfire. Clearing the space in the garden for the pile (never built until the morning in order to prevent hedgehogs being burned because they nested in the stack).

Monday morning came around – the news that Lynda Bellingham a popular TV actor is dead. She took the brave and dignified decision to stop having chemotherapy treatment for cancer so that she could be well enough to spend a last Christmas with her family. Sadly she didn’t make it.

 

 

Monday morning came around and, suddenly, unexpectedly, I was going to be in Tamworth on Tuesday. On the ‘phone …but – quite rightly others had made the decision, following the debacle on Saturday that it was a three hundred and sixty miles too far.

And the media coverage goes on, becoming parrot-like. Quotes from Dean Smith about how well the team played (essentially correct), how hard the players work (mostly), how gutted they are not to have points at the end of the games “we should have won/should not have lost.” And the one that sticks in my throat that goes something like :

“We had all the possession, played the most attractive football, built up moves from the back to the front, controlled the mid-field … but just don’t seem to be able to put the ball in the net.”

Now I can understand the argument that this is a manager keeping faith with his team, protecting them from harsh criticism and creating a positive atmosphere in the camp. It’s the way to settle players down and the way to attract quality players to Walsall (“the gaffer’s good, he’ll look after you”). But there needs to be a limit. What? Four wins this calendar year? Got to be reaching that tolerance barrier soon. Surely?

And so we have the news this week – when we are so blatantly in need of a tried and tested goal scorer – that we have Michael Cain, a twenty year old attacking midfielder on loan from Leicester City. Sorry? A striker? A goal scorer, out and out ?

No you read it right: an attacking midfielder.

Just when you’re thinking there’s no room for another mid-fielder, that you can’t move at Bescot for midfielders – we get another one in. For a month.

Let’s see what happens – without holding our breaths please.

Meanwhile, apropos Linda Bellingham:  Wilko Johnson (one time Dr Feelgood guitarist, given ten months to live, having recorded a sharp record with Roger Daltrey, and toured off the back of it has been given the all-clear … and a local teacher I was talking with said his niece has also been given the all-clear, following treatment for leukaemia at Birmingham Children’s Hospital.

Big storms in the midlands; the outer edge of Hurricane Gonzalo (wasn’t he one of the Muppets?) we are told have been circulating: a hurricane in Burton on Trent and the roof of a six garage complex blown – in one piece across the road in Merry Hill. Poor weather for the trip to Crawley.

Catching up with the scores on Radio WM while watching Dr Brain Cox’s The Human Universe. His postulation that there must be other intelligent life forms out somewhere in the universe (if not our own Milky Way) was well argued and had me thinking:

“yes and in one of them, Walsall must, by the very odds, be an extremely successful team.”

Meanwhile on this planet, the result and report were achingly familiar. Walsall played well, had umpteen chances to score, netted none of them and lost to a goal – against the run of play – two minutes from the final whistle.

So now we are firmly settled in the relegation zone, having lost valuable points and morale, against two of our fellow strugglers. This really is not what I expected and talk of the play off places being only a few games away is sounding more and more hollow by the repetition.

 

“A Number of Players Back” (Johnstone’s Paint Trophy: Rochdale Away0

 

“What can I get you for your birthday?” my friend asked at the Bristol City game.

“Take me to the Rochdale game,” said I. Sounded like a great idea, especially as the said game was actually on my birthday. Then work commitments and a Sunday night feast, with some early presents (thanks people) interrupted the plans … and I chickened out.

Going to the games means a lot to me but I also want to be doing a proper job, which means putting in extra time – and, hey, it’s only one game right?

Besides my sister was coming over in the “early evening” and I could listen to the game on BBC Radio WM couldn’t I and weather forecasts were for (still more) heavy showers.

So I came home, did some work, waiting for my sister and brother in law. Who didn’t turn up until after I had started listening to the usually entertaining if not always strictly accurate commentary. Where it was mentioned that the M6 was due to be closed in many places on the route home, meaning the return journey would –at very best – be a greater adventure (know what I mean?).

I left the radio on, knowing that I would hear raised voices if there was a goal, but the talk was good and I suggested going “down the road” for a beer or two. Not the Oak (there’s that quiz there every Tuesday) https://saddlersfan.wordpress.com/2014/08/14/gurroles-in-pub-quiz-drama-southend-away/

So to the Wheatsheaf. Quite empty. Last time I was here I was drinking a local micro-brewery ale called Beowulf (was it Boxing day?). This evening I decided to try Mad Goose, but the barrel needed changing, so I settled for Wheatsheaf Blonde. It sound s like part of a stand-up routine I have to admit, but a tasty beer. My nephew jack admitted that he rarely drinks ale when he’s out (“What’s the Matter lager-Boy, scared you might taste something?” says the Hobgoblin advert as I remember).

Some talk at the table, then the “menfolk” drift away to the unoccupied pool table (fiver deposit for the cues and only the dartboard chalk). Modesty forbids me from revealing the result of the game. Suffice it to say I was not embarrassed (although the black did not go into the pocket I nominated!)

Got back home – and Walsall are through to the next round. Manset’s first (please let it be of many this season. For Walsall.)

 

 

Playing with six changes from the Bristol game we had enough to get through to the quarter final. I have to add that’s the Northern region quarter final to add grim reality. But it’s another momentum-building result –and we have injured players now queuing up to strengthen the efforts and reinforce the team.

Meanwhile, with over four hundred deaths in Africa as a result of an Ebola epidemic the first person to contract the disease in Europe is a nurse in Madrid who was treated missionaries in a hospital there.

This raises the question of if – or when – it will spread even further. And questions about the ability of our medical services to cope. Currently we are sending a number of servicemen to set up treatment and training bases in Africa (Sierra Leone is one of the countries suffering most at the moment). I certainly wish everybody dealing with this all the best – and find their bravery staggering.

Back to a sporting note and Coventry City Football Club, now playing back in their own city at the Ricoh Arena will be (let’s say) sharing the venue with Premiership Rugby Union team Wasps. Wasps are – or were a London based team and have bought Coventry City Council’s share of the Ricoh Arena. Interesting to think how the wasps fans might feel, being relocated some eighty or so miles north, especially bearing in mind the Sky Blues’ fans revolt (https://saddlersfan.wordpress.com/2014/03/09/coventry-away/) when being asked to support their own team playing at Northampton (about sixty miles south) … oh and those distances are one-way and approximate of course.

Good for Coventry – and so the midlands to have a top rugby club up here, joining Leicester Tigers and Gloucester of course. And worth a mention that the home of the game – Rugby of course – is not so far from Coventry.

Talking about “tigers” I should also add that Hull City Football Club’s chairman’s request to change the name to Hull Tigers has been turned down by the authorities. In a forthright TV interview he said he failed to understand the decision and, when asked what he would say to the fans who appreciated the “heritage” of the name he simply said:

“Pay for it then!”

Fair point perhaps?

Packwood House and Rotherham (Away)

15^th March

Had bangers an’ mash (sausage and mashed potato) for dinner yesterday. Bit slovenly, eating them of a tray on my lap, while watching TV (the mysterious disappearance and no-traces found of a Malaysian Airlines passenger plane).

Bangers ‘n’ mash needs pepper right?

So fetched the pepper mill off the dining table and left it on top of a pack of playing cards by my left elbow. Coming downstairs at around 6.30 to get a cup of tea I realised the portentous error. Rotherham (a.k.a the Millers (pepper mill get it) and the pack of playing cards is one from a sponsored match (thanks I.C.A.D.) at Bescot. An omen ?

Still not travelling to the game today so decided to go to National Trust’s Packwood House, about forty minutes pleasant drive away. Last time we headed to Packwood it was closed and we went, instead to nearby Baddesley Clinton (very charming with some humorous scarecrows).

The banks of the roads are alive with brilliant yellow daffodils. Hedges neatly trimmed and in one case well laid, looking pristine in the powerful, warm spring sunlight. A bit windy too.

Arrived, parked, membership (oh yes indeed!) cards scanned and a brief walk around the ornamental gardens; verdict being they will probably look good in summer. Outside introduction to the house given by a volunteer wit h a Scots accent. Very informative, great history. In a way quintessentially English. A farm leased after the Reformation, Bought and improved, passed through the ever-expanding family. Heirless neglect. Bought by a rich industrialist for his fifteen year old son, Graham Baron Ash, who re-invented it (and massively added to it) as a “Tudor manor”. The cow barn converted into a great hall and a “Tudor long gallery” built between it and the house proper in faithful-to-the–period style, with authentic furniture “saved/rescued/salvaged” from other properties during the Depression.

            

The kitchen walled garden brought back memories for me of Little Wyrley Halls’ walled garden, though was nowhere near as grand. The one at Little Wyrley hall has been turned over to grass – and, last thing I knew was a paddock for a pony. A well-spent morning, not thinking about the game: away at Rotherham, who are well in the promotion/play off place hunt.

Set out on the return journey with BBC Radio WM on in the car. Commentary of the Swansea v West Bromwich Albion game on. But every now and then the “goal horn” going off when scores came in from other games. Nineteen minutes (or so) Rotherham nil, Walsall 1 came in. Lalkovic scoring his “sixth goal of the season” and the – somehow desperate statistic that “in the last fourteen games Walsall have never lost a game they have been winning”. Can you believe the research that goes in to these things? I have been impressed by Milan Lalkovic since the first game of the season: he’s energetic, skilful and hard to knock off the ball. His Chelsea contract runs out at the end of the season, and, good as he is, I don’t imagine Chelsea will keep him. he has made loyal noises about coming to Walsall, but my guess is he will go to a Championship team – and our chances of that are running out.

Back home, unpacked the car. Radio on upstairs. I’m checking Facebook, getting the bulletins. With seventeen minutes to go, our defender, Ben Purkiss gets sent off … and some seconds before the final whistle, Rotherham equalise.

Down at mom’s half an hour later, the TV news is bringing the latest latest about the Malaysian airliner MH370 and the Russian delegate vetoed the U.N resolution that would have had tomorrow’s referendum in Crimea registered as unlawful.

Watched, as promised in an earlier post, some of the winter Olympics ice sledge hockey: the final between the U.S.A. and Russia. The two main protagonists in the Crimea/Ukraine scenario. Actually, while it takes a lot of skill (naturally), energy and guts to compete it wasn’t actually as brutal as the trailer seemed to suggest. Less so than the standard ice hockey where there’s further to fall and body slams into the wall are common and bruising. The U.S. triumphed … and in Sochi, Russia too.

Meanwhile, closer to home the Express and Star meanwhile is bewailing the fact that Walsall could do with bigger crowds. No joking? But it’s often the Express and Star that, in spreading rumours and refusing to give us fair publicity, banjaxes our potential. To whit the over-egging of the “racist” stuff during the Wolves game, giving former Wolves goalie Matt Murray a platform to report his feelings as fact, and making it seem as if Bescot is a dangerous place to go.

Now I realise that the E and S is printed in Wolverhampton, but we could ask for a little more positive coverage couldn’t we?

Also coming to bear, of course is the expense. This is an expensive month to be a Saddler’s fan, with the Football League adding the Coventry away game to our fixture list.

A small point too: why oh why can only season ticket holders go into the bar in the main stand? The story given that it is to stop those eating in the restaurant is too, too feeble. The corporate bunches – come and gone – are separated and have their own dedicated bar.