Tranmere: Johnstone’s Paint Trophy

We’re in the car. On a ramp of the South Car Park of the now-to-be-called Barclaycard Arena. In a queue waiting to get on the road and heading for home after a tremendous show from The Who.

It’s not about counting the number of times I’ve seen this marvellous band, or the memories their music wakes in me … but about that actual show. Stunning! Musically. Visually. And the banter between audience and band (tonight mainly Pete Townshend) and the sheer joy they have of playing over two hours straight-off of their enormous repertoire.

Townshend: articulate, cutting, perceptive and aggressively fragile. Daltrey: almost pitch perfect, solid, dependable, full of humour. Playing with humility and passion. And that classy ending; not doing a pre-planned encore (“that’s Bullshit, that is,” Daltrey explains:” we’re doin’ this one, then we’re finished.”)

But now, we’re stuck in traffic. And not even off the car park.

If all goes to plan I will be back here for the Status Quo show on Saturday.

But after talk of the concert Cully mentions the chance to go up to Tranmere (struggling in League Two) for the Johnstone’s Paint Trophy game on Tuesday.

I am already committed (and wouldn’t have it any other way, especially with the way Walsall a re playing at the minute). A meal out on my wife’s birthday! Already arranged.

So it happens: two daughters and partners, she and I at the Trooper (Wall, just off the A5). Fine atmosphere, great service, good choice (though the pigeon (which the menu warns “may contain shot”) is not available.

We have had a few frosty nights, but it is generally still warm. Very windy tonight … the media is dubbing it a “weather bomb”.

No games this weekend: F.A. Cup games. Worcester City managing an away draw against Scunthorpe might just get through into the third round: good luck to ‘em. But we are out!

It is also a weekend when at football grounds all over the country teams posed together to remind crowds of the Great War Christmas Truce and impromptu football games in NO man’s Land between the trenches. Did that really happen?

 

Elsewhere Christmas, 2014-stylee is in full flow: the German Christmas Market in Birmingham is drawing in sightseers and pickpockets. TV is flooded with advertising: turkey, beer, toys, gadgets. Scotland has introduced a lower limit for alcohol in the bloodstream for drivers. So, for the first time you could drink to  legal limit in England, drive over the border and be breaking the law … or get breathalysed and have points on your licence (or disqualified from driving) in Scotland and be punished here in England. I have lived long enough to understand the need not to take risks with drink and driving but this seems crazy. We should adopt the same levels: in line with what, it seems most of mainland Europe has done for many years.

I do seem to recall a couple of years ago pubs would provide free soft drinks for designated drivers. Great idea! It could work again I think.

And so, so many tributes being paid by sportsmen all over to Phillip Hughes the Australian batsmen killed in the most freakish of sporting circumstances: the bowled ball striking a blood vessel in his neck during a game.

So very, very sad. And what were the chances …?

We get back. From the Birmingham car park. From the Trooper.

I get around to checking out the Tranmere score: 2 – 2 at full time is all the initial Google search reveals. We came back from two nil down at half time. Great spirit then! But the penalty shoot-out? We didn’t lose in normal time then I’m thinking. Noticing that Antony Forde and young Michael Cain scored. A few moments later I get to the penalties result: Walsall won with a sudden death Downing winner after sterling work from O’Donnell.

So we are through to the Northern Area final. We will be playing wither Preston N.E. or Notts. County (over two legs) in January. Winners go to Wembley to play in the Final and, er, Walsall have never been to Wembley (either the old one or the new) in their history.

That’s setting things up nicely for the home game on Saturday then: the I.C.A.D. sponsored game against Barnsley.

Ricoh Anyone ?

I’ve been tidying up in the  back garden. Cutting down some pyracantha – and it is savagely thorned and well named “fire thorn”… and, having tidied up the resulting debris– some cut as logs for the fire pit, some crammed into the green garden-waste recycling bin (last collection of the year on Monday) – I am late getting in and putting the radio on. Main commentary is the Burnley Villa game, but the report from Coventry’s Ricoh Arena says that Saddlers are nil – nil and dominating the game.

 

Four minutes to go until half time and Villa take the lead with a Joe Cole goal.

While I am listening I am suddenly struck by exactly how many games I have been to this season, rather than, as in previous recent years, I sat and listened to the local BBC radio commentaries. This game at Coventry was eminently reachable  but the extremely poor performance at Shrewsbury is still fresh in my memory and I need to save at least a little money. The Who concert is next week and after that Status Quo and the ICAD sponsored game…

“So far, so good” is the half time comment on the Walsall game; still goalless. I am not even sure of the line-up and wonder who is playing up front and also wondering – if the game has been as bare of “highlights” as some of the games I have been to this season- how the BBC man at the Rich finds anything to say at all. But I’ll happily take what he says on trust – and hope we get at least a goal to win the game in the second half.

Elton, sorry, Sir Elton John will be playing at Bescot next summer. The news came out this week and the gig has apparently already sold out. Some press reports are saying it will be all reserved seating,  that the playing surface will be covered and seats put out.  On most levels this is marvellous news. It will be the second concert – in my memory – held at Bescot. Local band the Wonderstuff, having linked with comedian Jim Reeves in  a version of the Kinks song “Dizzy”, played there (just after Walsall moved to the ground (from Fellows’ Park). Clearly there is money being made by holding the concert at Walsall: will any of it filter in to the playing side? I certainly hope so!

 

Five minutes to go … Manset has been put on in the Walsall game, Baxendale coming off.

In the Villa game, short of something to say the commentators are reflecting that Villa have won games away from home (Stoke and Liverpool) by one goal to nil … could they win this one by the same margin … and there’s a penalty for Burnley … which is scored!

The “goal horn” is then quite active, sending the thoughts spinning: will it be a Walsall goal? A Coventry goal? No, well, not yet any way.

Meanwhile at Turf Moor, unsurprisingly, Burnley are inspired and on the attack! Hitting the post!

Wolves –in a downward spiral at the moment are three nil down at Brentford.

Blues get a controversial penalty (given apparently by the fourth official) , they score and take the lead against Notts. Forest.

Sadly and bizarrely Australian cricketer, Phillip Hughes died after a bowled ball struck him and caused a brain injury. This is weird because I had – totally wrongly – assumed that batsmen’s heads were fully protected by the helmet they wear. Obviously not! Of course I feel for the family of the man – who would have been twenty six this week, but also for the bowler. How must he be feeling?

 

 

“Cricket wraps its collective arms around the family” is a marvellous quote from a cricketer on the incident.

The Burnley game has finished.

Full time at the Ricoh: familiar story:

“Walsall looking solid at the back, but not able to put the Coventry goal under the pressure needed to score a goal that their play perhaps deserved.” Is a paraphrased version of what has been said by the reporter in an incredibly tiny piece of feedback – suggesting how little there actually was to talk about. Far more to reflect on, of course. What do we want for Christmas?

A striker of course! And the money and sense to get one in, rather than the somewhat prideful muttering about our current crop being “a work in progress”.

Ee Bah Gum, Lad: Tour’s On.

Sitting here, watching the gruelling hill-climb stages of the Tour de France (second day, Harrogate to Sheffield stage) I am trying to take the beans out of two recycled buckets full of broad beans. Outside the sun is still shining as it is on the massive crowds lining the route of the race. Yorkshire, indeed England, has taken this opportunity to heart. There are French flags, Slovakian supporters (of Peter Sagan), Cornish flags, the Union flag, writing on the roads (“Eat Yorkshire Pudding!”) in traditional Tour de France style; even a Black Country flag. It is marvellous to see such an enthusiastic response – and the camera work is excellent too. I love the way the landmarks and features are in French and the distances in kilometres and that the commentary includes good background historical, geographical and cultural references.

      

 

Our daughter featured in some “Tour de Facts” videos about the English stages and general rules of the Tour de France for English cycle sales, parts and repair stores, Halfords. I am, of course indubitably proud of her … but they are also quite informative and well made: I managed to learn things I was previously unaware of, and watching them has improved my enjoyment of the race I am now watching as broad beans bounce off the footstool around my ankles. (The “yellow jersey” is yellow because this was the colour of the pages of the newspaper that introduced it – before that the race leader wore a green armband only).

These videos are available on YouTube: if you are interested take a look at this first in the series http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvTDV2iirnk

I would have been quite happy  to have watched the Grand Depart (from Leeds, yesterday) but in the cyclical way of things in my life the very daughter that rode in and presented the Tour de Facts videos was moving house, so … a busy day not watching TV. However I am happy to report that the move, nicely timed to include a switch over overlap between rented accommodation and completion date, sees the new house well decorated and new carpets installed.

After the Grand Depart the race proceeded in blazing hot sunshine (nothing at all like the wet weather forecast!) and within sight of the finish line Mark Cavendish and another rider both came off their bikes. “Cav” most recently bandied about as an Isle of Man native is suddenly lauded as a native of Yorkshire – but, is now out of the whole Tour, having broken a collar bone – and done the decent thing by admitting the coming together was all his fault. Such sportsmanship.

In a TV interview with Ian Brailsford (manager of the ultra-successful Sky team) talked about his decision to leave out Sir Bradley Wiggins, saying that, in recent years the Sky team had been turned from “plucky losers to two-times winners” and that part of that turn around in mind-set was due to someone somewhere along the line making such calls.

In another strand of my life I have been excited by news that Roger Daltrey and Pete Townshend are together for another Who tour – and that I have managed to get tickets for the show in Birmingham. December. Something else to look forward to.