What a great, long-weekend and day at Wembley! Enjoyed it immensely…but it’s a tiring one and I’m still recovering in many ways today.
And I can’t believe it’s March already!
Okay, our weekend ‘in brief’…
Preparation…
Dog put into kennels on Friday morning;
attended a funeral of a friend in the afternoon. Not too much drink in the after-events of the funeral; big
weekend ahead of course. Mostly packed on the Friday, finished-off on the
Saturday morning.
Departure / travel…
We were staying in a village in Buckinghamshire on Saturday & Sunday night
(travelling by train to & from Wembley on the Sunday) and intended to set
off in the car from home at 10:00am. Bit of a lazy, slow morning ‘coming round’
and actually set off just before 11:00am; stopping-off locally to get a couple
of supplies, top-up the petrol and check the tyre pressures. Sat Nav on and we
were away for about 11:20am with the Sat Nav showing an estimated arrival time
of about 2:35pm. Stopped off once, arrived ‘down South’ just before 3:00pm.
Arrival / settling in…
Lovely welcome, lovely hotel, lovely area.
Got into a pub for just-turned 4:00pm and
got crackin’ seats just in front of a big screen to, hopefully, watch the Premier League results filter in whilst sampling a
few real ales. Pub was filling-up nicely and as the Norwich City v Leicester City game was
showing 0-0 with a couple of minutes to go – CLICK! Over the
channel went to the start of the England v Ireland rugby match, which both my
wife & I had no idea was on. Didn’t find out the ‘0-1 to
Leicester’ score until the next morning…
My wife, supporting Ireland [me England]
along with another 2, possibly 3 other green, white
& golds, ended up staying in the now cram-packed
pub for the whole game. Afterwards we supped-up, moved onto the pub attached to
our hotel, had another beer (my wife a fizzy water) and an evening meal and then
‘crashed out’ asleep about a very
reasonable 10:15pm.
Before we left the first pub, however, I got talking to
some locals and when they discovered the route I was planning (and was given by
National Rail when I was investigating and
booking our train tickets weeks ago) to Wembley; they strongly suggested
that we get the Metro Underground service to
Wembley Park station, rather than the train line to Wembley Stadium via Marylebone.
Well I wasn’t to know where we were staying
was in ‘Zone 9’; the final zone covered by
the underground system for London! Fortunately, our pre-bought tickets covered
all systems / networks…
I also picked up some useful, local
knowledge about which of the two curry houses to go to for our post-match meal (celebratory
or otherwise) the next day…
The next morning…
Decent night’s sleep, showered, dressed and
down for breakfast about 8:45am. Went back to the room for a brief period but
shortly decided to do a drive-reccy to the train station not-only to see if it
was ‘walkable’ but also due to the previous night’s train information.
The very kind information given to us in
the pub actually caused us to look on-line the next morning and to our utter dismay
the internet was showing signs that there were some fairly messy service
interruptions due to signal failures in the early hours of Sunday morning!
So…we drove there – wasn’t really walkable, especially as I was suffering a little with a
sore ankle – and got the exact same advice from the information desk as we
were given the previous night in the pub. Underground system it was then (even
though it didn’t ACTUALLY go underground at any point) and we had a direct service that stopped
only 5 times and took a mere 35 minutes; as opposed to our earlier train option
that took about an hour with one change.
‘The start’…
We dropped the car back off at the hotel,
got changed into our colours (more
to follow on that) and meandered around the town
in the cold, sunny morning to ‘take in some air’, see more of the place…and
to wait for a pub to open (hopefully by 11:00am). As if pulled by the gravity
of a black hole; we drifted to the pub where we had watched the rugby game,
which was not only open but already had 5 or 6 blues in who had clearly just
finished a pub breakfast and, who, were already on tea, coffee, lagers, ales
and Guinness. A family of Liverpool fans
entered about 30 minutes later.
Ever-so-very-slightly
sluggish from the previous day’s / night’s drinking,
I managed to ‘down’ 3 lagers in just 1 hour and 15 minutes as ‘a cure’, before
ordering a rather expensive taxi [for a short, steep drive] to take us to the
train station. Once there, we got chatting to a Leeds United fan on the platform whose brother lived in the town and, who, was
‘going corporate’ for the match through work. As a neutral he said he was
looking forward to a good, entertaining game…and some quality
football, he bemoaned; referring to his own team.
Wembley ‘here we come’…
In the final 10 minutes of our journey to
Wembley Park station I got a text from my mate, Steve, who said that he’d just
arrived at the Wembley Tavern; giving us directions from, fortunately, the station we were now arriving at.
I’d chosen to wear a 1960s, replica red
& black top with a red & black scarf. Why? Well I knew it’d be mostly a
sea of blue & white on our side and, so, why not bring another colour into
it. And, more importantly, it’s an almost forgotten, classic Manchester City
away colour in
addition to an equally almost forgotten, classic maroon.
Have we only had one of each for one
season in the last 10 years? I think so. And I hate that – I hate that the club
brings out all blacks, all navy blues and an array of truly awful luminous yellows & greens.
Red & Black is not only a classic
Manchester City kit but also a classic Neil Young Wembley kit too and, so, ‘why
not?’ I thought – I’ve worn it at Wembley before.
Did I think for
one moment about Liverpool fans wearing red & white? Of course
I didn’t…and as I approached the “City fans only” Wembley Tavern, the door-person
gave me a quick look up 7 down and said, “Red? Really?”, before smiling and letting
me in.
Got in there, met Steve…and it was PACKED! A really
narrow, longish pub and, with us both
desperately needing the loo, it seemed to take for ever to fight our way through to the
small toilets.
 |
| The Gents |
Had a
chat; a bit of a sing-song, which was
instigated by the head barman, sank a couple of beers and moved towards
Wembley and to one of the outdoor kiosk bars. I enjoyed meeting our friend who
had travelled over from Spain for the match and it was a good atmos in the
tavern but…what a good move getting out was! Not only could I hear what anyone
was saying to me; not only was it far less claustrophobic, not only could you
get served far quicker but we were entertained to some fine cockney-style tunes
by a couple of lads called ‘The Gents’.
Really good fun tunes in the crisp sunshine before we set-off inside about
3:10pm.
 |
| Paul Power |
Before getting into this
cordoned-off entertainment area, however, I was met by two security fellows.
With a smile on his face he gave my shirt a bit of a stare and said I thought
they were Liverpool colours for a moment. It’s a good flippin’ job our fans
knew a Manchester City top at first sight – it was definitely causing confusion
that I found both amusing and a little sad [that it was hardly being recognised
as a Manchester City shirt].
Once inside…
We had
brought our own food; my wife ate her sandwich outside and was insisting
that I ate something before I went in (orrr…bless her for looking after me).
However, the breakfast and 7 pints that I’d already consumed over the last 4-and-a-bit
hours had filled me up. So we snuck-inside a cheese sandwich and veggie sausage
roll; both wrapped in foil but, thankfully, didn’t trigger the metal detection
searches just beyond the turnstiles.
Half-way-up the many,
many escalators a Steward held out his hand across my chest area and, again
with a smile, said for one moment, “I thought you were a Liverpool fan then”.
Jeeeze!
We were
in, did a quick reccy of our seats, had one more pint (and I shoved my veggie
sausage roll down me) and we played the usual, ‘who could we spot first who we
knew’ game.
Every Wembley
trip - and without arranging it - we’ve ALWAYS bumped into people from my work,
people from my wife’s work, people we’ve known for years / have been on holiday
with (on two or three occasions), mates (on two or three occasions) and people
from our local. In a City crowd of around 30,000, depending on the game, it’s
quite incredible really.
On this
occasion meeting Steve didn’t count, as he’d text / sort of pre-arranged that
one. Whilst we were enjoying ‘The Gents’, Paul Power was stood amongst the crowd doing
likewise, but he didn’t know us and so that doesn’t count either.
Therefore,
on this occasion, we were a little shocked that we hadn’t met someone outside
that we knew. However, it took less than 45 seconds from the start of our
search for my wife to spot the 3 people who sit right next to us at the Etihad (who were then sat just 10 rows or so below
us at Wembley)! That must have
been very long odds indeed. Before the game we then bumped into Steve again,
which was unplanned this time.
The game itself…
Although
I thought we looked confident and better than Liverpool, it was a slow, almost
chess-like game in the first half; with neither team seemingly willing to
‘sacrifice’ / ‘commit’ too much going forward…and I say that even though we had
plenty of chances (far more than Liverpool) to go ahead and then go FURTHER ahead before the break.
Half time…
So…0-0 at
half time and not feeling too nervous at all.
Got a “free”
pint at half time due to the massive confusion at one of the smaller kiosk and
that was despite (honestly) waving a fiver around like a flag TRYING to pay. I wasn’t the only one who got a freebie, which felt
like a real treat at a fiver-a-go! My wife, by then, just wanted a soft drink, which I couldn't find at the
bar I went to.
The
queue for the gents was ‘the’ worst I have ever known! Why so bad on this
occasion I just don’t know. But I was desperate and just had to go before we
took our seats for the second half. My
wife waiting very patiently for me...
So what
do you do when crammed in a gents’ toilets? Well…all you CAN do is have a bit of a
laugh to break the otherwise silence and occasional
groans of relief. One bloke said something amusing, another responded; another
added something and before we knew it, it was a toilet filled with comedians
and we were all having a right good laugh (probably not a
good thing, in a way, when needing a wee so very badly).
But it
passed the time and as I got to the urinal…GOAL! I had
missed Fernandinho’s
goal and our opener! Damn those inadequately-sized toilets…
The second half from ‘minute 50’ onwards…
Much faster-paced, even MORE chances for us and
a few for them. I couldn’t sense
a Liverpool goal coming – I wasn’t too
nervous – and, therefore, didn’t see it coming. But as it slammed
the base of our left-hand-post and came back out…the ball was then placed neatly
into the back of our net.
As the final whistle ‘on the 90’ approached,
I noted to my wife that Liverpool had used all 3 subs and that we hadn’t used
one; adding that appeared to be very wise of our Engineer manager.
And I think that proved just so – as was the case during most of the
game; we seemed slightly fresher & livelier than our opponents in the extra-time-period
too.
Extra time over – penalties it is…
Now I was nervous – not just the ‘anything can
happen’ / ‘will our penalty takers hold their nerve’ thing but rather…what we’d all been talking about most of
the time, which was about to be tested to the max! Would Pellegrini rue
sticking-with Willy Caballero in the League Cup over
Joe Hart.
Willy, in fairness, had kept his cool; looked
sharp and had made a couple of really, really good saves in open play - at one
stage in extra time he even remained calm & focussed at a shot that took TWO deflections before reaching him and
his fixated stare.
Coin flipped – our end.
Coin flipped – Liverpool chose to go first.
First pen and Emre Can
feigned slightly; sending Caballero to his knees and to his right as the cheeky
Liverpool player chipped it into the middle.
Up stepped Fernandinho, a fairly confident
striker of the ball from open play but one who can be a little erratic. A very good season so far from the Brazilian,
he stepped up and…CRACKED THE POST!
But from there on in it was the “Willy
Caballero show”! WHAT a time to put a fairly jittery City career,
performance-wise, behind you and (go out?) in a blaze of City-folk, heroism
glory! He was BRILLIANT!
Now…where do they sell family-size humble
pie? I like to cook and, so, if
someone out there can find me the recipe I don’t mind making it myself. Why?
Because I need a massive slice of it! I’m not the only one of course; in fact,
I didn’t meet anyone on the various ‘chat forums’ nor in person who disagreed
with me when I said that we should play Joe Hart for this one.
But I did stick it in my pre-match Blog posting to a large degree and, so, it feels worse and I feel, therefore,
like my slice of the humble pie should be a little bigger.
Well done – well done indeed Mr
Caballero!
Heading back “home”…
Got a little lost for which direction to head
back to Wembley Park station; asked a couple of high-vis guys who directed us
correctly and met a MASSIVE,
Police & Steward, sign-controlled crowd. Everyone – bar two, arrogant, argumentative
City idiots – were in good spirits & voice and what must have been 40
minutes to get a few hundred yards passed in good time. Needed another big wee though…
Didn’t particularly like the song some Blues were
repeatedly signing on the way out of the ground and whilst waiting in the
escort area about us, ”…winning the cup with a pedo on the wing”; making
reference to when the not-yet-convicted (at time of publication AND when the
pillocks were signing it at Wembley) Adam Johnson played for us.
I did, however, like the song,
“There’s only onnnnnne Caballero;
onnnnnne Caballero.
He used to be sh**e but now’s he alright;
walking in a Willy wonderland.
So into the station, onto the platform and nearly
everyone – and I’m MEAN
nearly everyone – appeared to get on their trains / tube-trains…apart from us.
It was cold, I STILL
needed the loo and I must have spoken to the platform staff 3 times in the 30-minutes
we were there as train, after train, after train left and the platform emptied
of Blues.
Eventually it arrived; it stopped at every
stop possible before our, ‘end stop’. We got a rather ridiculously, even more-expensive taxi back to the pub, I sank
my 10th pint of the day (my wife had a pint of lime & soda with
ice) and we bobbed over to the curry house. I had a veggie Jalfrezi as a main
with my 11th and final pint (it was over 12 hours!) and my
wife a lamb Rogan Josh with a more-sensible glass of coke (she was driving home
the next day).
Heading and getting home…
Got home Monday afternoon and just in time to
pick our doggy up a day earlier (didn’t expect that) and slipped into a more
mellow-paced, post-celebration, afternoon session of alcoholic beverages.
Spoke to a neighbour soon after getting back who
had done the day-trip, ‘coach there & back’ thing to & from Wembley and
due to the extra time & pens; she arrived home about 1:00am.
She told me that when they’d stopped off at
some ‘services’ in the Birmingham area some Liverpool moron let off a
red flare inside, setting off the alarms and half-chocking several people in
the process. Numpty.
She then enquired as to how-the-hell Liverpool
fans had managed to sneak-in and then let off 4 or 5 flares in Wembley when
they scored their goal? I shook my head
and told her I was worried about them finding a veggie sausage roll as I
entered the ground!
Great game, great win, great weekend in
general and, hopefully, now a
springboard to giving our Premier League campaign a morale-boosting rev-up; starting
with…a trip to Liverpool tomorrow!
C’mon (again) City!
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