Football Poets

Notes:
Many – because – unusually – I was there!

One of the sad facts of being an exile – very few opportunities to see the team you love and cherish.

This poem more personal than most, because I was there, with family, including sons, godson, brother & brother-in-law.

My thanks to two wonderful sets of fans who gave it socks up in the Itchen stand.
** intended pun in the poem

I come from a generation when we’d fear a breakout of violence, whether home or away.

The language is still coarse, of course, but that underlying threat is very much abated.
To the extent that beneath the bared teeth and bitter baiting, there was an undercurrent of humour and respect between the Saints and the Champions of Europe (we’ll sing it til May!)

My thanks to the stewards, who made no attempt to get either sets of fans to sit down – so we stood all match long – I’m convinced that helped with the atmosphere. Fortunately, my 10 year old son was still able to view the match in comfort.
I’m sure my brother represented some fans of the ilk “I paid good money for a seat……” (– he didn’t, it was a birthday present!)

Wearing the wrong colours? I wore a red t-shirt underneath my coat just to camouflage myself amongst the Saints fans. Little realising how close I’d be to my brethren.

Astonished by the noise? I haven’t been to many games live in the last decade, but those that I have been to, have been slightly disappointing in terms of atmosphere, compared to my memories of growing up in and around The Shed!

Contentious substitution? Oscar, Chelsea’s biggest threat, subbed off for the other useless Benny – Benayoun. *

One thing was certain – we all witnessed the natural successor to the Cashley / Baines England left back spot – and it’s not Ryan Bertrand.
Hopefully the successor to Ashley Cole at both Chelsea and England will be Luke Shaw – just as impressive in the flesh as he has appeared on tv lately.

And to round off the day – outside the ground, the boys were able to get an autograph – that of Artur Boruc (leaving ahead of the pack – he was substituted at half time, feeling dizzy). Pity, as his replacement Kelvin Davies made a brilliant save from a mis-hit shot.

No sour grapes – better team won on the day – but hey……

this is football…….

I was disappointed in the MotD highlights later, that didn’t show two major plays: Torres had a goal ruled offside, or so we thought, though it didn’t look offside – the newspapers the next day said handball – but it wasn’t obvious, it was certainly worth a highlight review – as was a stonewall penalty not given, Hazard wriggled his way into the box and was bodily blocked.

Typical true fan – couldn’t let it lie 😉