The Diary

27 December 2004: Pool Of Despond

It will come as no surprise to most of you to know that by the time tonight?s game finished I was feeling just about as low as I could be, despite my pre-Christmas prediction of a ?cricket score? being absolutely spot-on. Unless you?re someone toting a particularly sad personality defect in your wallet, I defy anyone to derive much pleasure from that sort of self-fulfilling prophecy hitting the button smack-on. Defeated, and heavily, disillusioned, depressed, downhearted, despondent ? with just a smidgen of hypothermia chucked in just to make it a wee bit more interesting. Until we slipped and slid our way through a scattering of well-frozen snow back to the Dickmobile, that was; turning our radio on for the news as soon as we got within its welcoming confines, we discovered the Beeb to be pulling out all its enormously-resourced stops to give us awful news of a monumental natural disaster in South Asia, triggered by a powerful earthquake somewhere off the coast of Indonesia, and that followed by an almighty tsunami, which seems to have affected places like Sri Lanka, Thailand, and, of course, Indonesia itself, very badly indeed.

Thousands of people killed, many injured or just plain missing, and a lot of them tourists, as well. As power in those places seems to have gone out as well, there?s precious little news leaking out at the moment, only the bits and bobs the Foreign Office have been able to ascertain for themselves. I can only assume the earthquake that triggered the trouble must have been a pretty big one; it had to be simply to do that much damage via the tidal wave, which must have resembled that one depicted in the closing reel of that disaster movie Hollywood made a few years back ? the one where a comet slams into the globe. That bulletin certainly helped us put things into sharp perspective, all right; what say the rest of you?

Returning to the game once more ? mind you, you could make a quite cogent argument for saying what we saw tonight bore more of a resemblance to a ninety-minute long cavalry charge, the word ?game? implying an equal encounter, more or less, which it most certainly wasn?t ? what can I say? I?m finding it very difficult right now, the prime reason being most of my store of righteous indignation was used up during the Blues game; to be fair, though, before the visitors hit us for those first two goals, I did detect something of a resurgent spirit about our finest, some good old-fashioned piss-and-vinegar if you like. Gutsy tackles going in, balls, formerly dismissed as lost causes, being chased enthusiastically, and our faithful responding enthusiastically to this more bellicose attitude ? trouble is, though, we were let down, and monumentally so by our absolutely abysmal marking, plus a little bitty assistance from the referee, shall we say.

But, before we look more closely at what went wrong tonight, let me hit the rewind button, and bring the GD video player screeching to a halt somewhere in the vicinity of half-two this afternoon, and our house. That?s about the time things began to unravel for my other half; his ?other? side, Hereford, were getting absolutely hammered by Exeter City, of all people, sending his chin crashing to arse-level in a matter of seconds. A shame, that, because had The Bulls managed to make capital of that game, instead of ending up on the worng side of a 4-0 tonking, what with other top-six Conference sides making an absolute Horlicks of their games as well, the cider-slurpers could have really cashed in. That defeat meant that ?Im Indoors wasn?t in the best of moods to start off with, and it?s also fair to say neither of us could get sufficiently enthused about a game that was to kick off at six in the evening, was being shown on live TV anyway, and one where the result was a foregone conclusion, more or less. Couple all that to our most recent form ? heavy defeats, all of ?em, pretty much ? and, unlike Forrest Gump with that famous box of chocolates, we knew precisely what we were going to get as soon as we entered the ground; all there was left in the box were the ones described on the lid as ?embarrassing home defeat?. Seems that?s the only flavour we can dig out right now; oh, well, at least it makes a change from the ?Hawaiian Truffle?, ?Orange Orgasm? and ?Strawberry Sensation? thingies you normally come across, I suppose.

As per usual, first off, it was into the somewhat sparsely-populated Supporters Club bit of the Hawthorns Hotel, which was just gearing up to show the Blues-Boro encounter live on their big-screen TV. Already in there were The Noise, plus Carly, plus their (presumably incurably-deaf by now) mate, Paul Smith. The one we nagged The Noise about over a 12-month period of time ? shared lifts, remember? It turned out that Santa had done both Lewis offspring very well indeed yesterday; Number One Daughter found herself the proud owner of a DVD player, while Number Two took delivery of a CD jobbie. It?s at times like these I don?t half get envious; when I was that age ? around fourteen ? the most I ever got was a record player, and that probably second-hand, or on tick.

Mind you, talking about Santa, a little digression: yesterday, before sampling the delights of Si?s mother?s fella?s Christmas gastronomic delights, we spent an hour or so in their local beforehand. It so happened that just prior to departure, Norm, Si?s mum?s ?significant other?, decided to put on a Santa outfit, (besides being Cradley Heath?s Town Crier, Norm also stands in for the old geezer for various good causes at this time of year) as a joke. A short car journey, and several merry ?Ho! Ho! Ho?s!? later, we were sitting in the lounge, and the chef/Santa knocking back the ale (6.5 ABV Ernest and Saunders India Pale Ale) in a manner truly startling to behold. Having quaffed to his satisfaction, about 20 minutes before we left to partake of the sumptuous feast prepared by our hero, in came a young mother, with a toddler, about 3 years of age, in tow and, to no-one?s surprise, the first thing the child clapped eyes on was ?Santa? boozing away in the corner.

I kid you not, within a matter of seconds, her eyes enlarged to the size of dinner-plates, and her little mouth bore remarkably close resemblance to the letter ?O?. Norm, of course, played along superbly, hastily pulling his beard more square to his face, and talking in a very ?Santa? sort of manner. But how to explain to the mystified child what Santa was doing putting his feet up in a Black Country local? First off, we told her that Father Christmas was feeling extremely tired what with having to work all night to deliver everyone?s toys; trust me to cap it all, though, by explaining that when Santa was passing over Iraq on his sleigh, some nasty people had fired missiles at him, so he came straight to the pub to have lots to drink because he?d been so frightened by the episode! Well, I thought it was good!

Back to today, though, and a rapid realisation we needed some pics ? my camera?s back home to Mummy, by the way ? and daylight was rapidly fading outside, so muttering some rather unladylike things under my breath, I ventured out into the Arctic twilight once more, just to keep my other half happy. About six or seven pics later, I was back ? and Blues had scored their first, sod it. Mind you, Boro should have been ahead first; a previous strike had been disallowed for offside, prompting The Noise to shriek, in tones that must have carried the entire length and breadth of the pub: ?HOW CAN YOU BE OFFSIDE FOR AN OWN GOAL?? Just as well our resident Bag-Carrier, well-used to soothing his fevered brow by now, told him to ?shut up? in tones more Stoke than a pot-bank, wasn?t it?

It was also in the pub that we heard Dawn Astle had been forced into changing the date of her next East Midlands Branch l meeting; we?d been told things would be happening on the 1st of February. Then, someone reminded her we were playing Palace at home on that date. Oh well ? swap it to the second, then, she said. Even better, said my delighted other half; that?s his birthday! Also, not long after that, in rolled The Fart, looking suitably Arctic, which would be perfectly normal for someone who?d been at the mercy of WM Transport?s Boxing Day bus services for an hour or so. Apparently, he?s also having more PC trouble ? or so we thought. Complaining bitterly about an email piece he?d tried to send to us that kept bouncing back, he was ? now, washing his hands of it in true Pontius Pilate style, he shoved the hard copy in our direction, intending one of us to type it up later. And that?s when my other half took a quick look. ?I?ve got it already, Tel,? said ?Im Indoors, ?I?ve had it a couple of days!? What happened there, then? Dunno ? ask me one on sport!

Exiting the building in true Captain Oates style ? ?I?m going out, I may be gone some time,? ? it was then a brisk (of necessity, owing to the ever-present danger of frostbite striking in some very unmentionable place or another) walk to our various flogging-points. And ?flog? is the operative word, here; for the hour and a half I sat outside the Smethwick, I really could have done with the dubious services of someone wielding a rhino-whip, or similar. Not because I?m that way inclined, far from it; just to get some blood circulating around my extremities again. Well, I ask you; in my shoes I had thermal insoles guaranteed to perform right down to the mercury plunging to minus 20 degrees Centigrade ? and, with the conditions dropping below freezing, my tootsies were in grave danger of giving up the unequal struggle already.

And it didn?t help one little bit that sales were so slow; for the entire duration of my stay, I only just managed to get into double figures. And that total includes a Japanese lady, who spoke hardly a word of English; I tried to tell her that what she was buying was the bloody fanzine and not the programme, but somewhere between my Black Country accent and hers, communications took a swallow-dive, then sank without trace. A bit like a wartime kamikaze, you might say. Oh well, at least another visitor looked quite interesting; Bryn Jones, he of Bath Uni, plus missus, and carrying something that looked suspiciously like a Frisbee. What? Around here? In there? What would the coppers say about it? But it wasn?t, of course; Bryn, suffering about as much with his back as I do, uses it as a sitting aid, it being inflatable, and everything. And, being the good egg he is, he even offered to send me details!

Following close on his heels was Norm Bartlam, he of the most awful puns ever it?s been my displeasure to listen to. Trouble was, he wasn?t exactly in a jovial mood tonight ? more worried about what would happen, I reckon. While we were nattering, I let it slip we were thinking about giving some ?aways? a miss come February ? and, did I detect a hint that Norm was thinking of doing similar? As he so plaintively wailed into my lughole afterwards: ?It?s come to a tidy thing when people like ourselves are thinking enough?s enough; if that?s the case, how rotten must the rest of them be feeling right now?? Quite.

Not so welcome was my next caller, although, let me hastily add, this wasn?t because of anything she?d done or said to me. It was just that she?d got the wrong end of the stick about some news concerning Lee Hughes ? a neighbour had told her Lee?s wife had died. The truth, in many ways, simply added yet more ripples to the distinctly unpleasant ones already sullying the water as a result of the offences Lee had committed that fateful Saturday night. No, it wasn?t his missus that died, the woman who did, sadly, was the widow of the bloke killed in that car crash just over a year ago. I daresay an inquest will reach a verdict of ?natural causes? ? assuming there is one, of course - but some might care to argue it was the lasting trauma of losing her partner that did for her in the end. Plus the injuries she received that night, for which she was still having treatment, apparently. What an awful, tragic business. When will the fallout finally cease, I wonder?

The return of ?Im Indoors from his pitch nearby signified a rapid end to my icy trauma, my frozen entry into the ground. After all the icy blasts encountered in Halfords Lane, the chilly clime underneath that stand felt positively tropical by comparison. Normally, I never bother to grab a hot drink prior to the game, but this time round, I was firmly convinced something pretty drastic was needed to get the old creaky joints going once more ? and let?s face it, you can?t get much more ?drastic? than Albion?s apology for a hot chocolate drink, can you? The taste? Well, I reckon the words ?warm? and ?wet? will suffice for the purposes of this missive.

Liverpool, bless their nicked hub-caps and bits of dodgy lead-roofing, had drawn pretty much a full-house from the icy banks of the River Mersey. Although our upwardly-mobile prospects were about as bleak as those of David Blunkett right then, one glimmer of hope we did cling to was the thought that Liverpool weren?t very good travellers away from home. ?Im Indoors reckoned their away form had been pretty mournful, of late. It?s a bit like the bit of straw a drowning man grasps just before he submerges for the third and final time, and desperation was about the only positive we had going for us tonight.

Our side? Well, the way we saw things, it appeared pretty much what supporters would have liked to see for this one. Out went Kanu, suffering from an unspecified virus, apparently ? wouldn?t surprise me at all if that?s the last we?ve seen of him in an Albion shirt, to be quite honest - and also Bernt Hass, he of fancy-dress party fame, of course. One surprise, though, was Gera, whom I believe to be one of our more creative performers. Taking their places were Cosmic Contraflow, The Horse, and Earnie. And, to be scrupulously fair about things, once the game began, it did seem as though we were going to make of a bit of a fight of things, rather than simply stand back and let the goals rack up like points on one of those old-fashioned pinball machines. Sure, the visitors did test us in those opening minutes, Gerard only narrowly missing within about a minute after the start, and they should have opened their account just a few minute later, but then play suddenly switched to the other end of the field ? and if I were one of our lot, I?d still be kicking myself even now.

What happened? Well, one of theirs seemed to slip around the edge of the box, an occurrence that made The Horse neigh mightily with delight, and with good reason; there, to his right, was Earnie, their keeper drawn already, and neatly poised to blast the bloody ball into the back of the net, and, with any luck, halfway to Smethwick, also. Trouble was, The Horse then panicked and held onto the thing for far too long. Result? Dispossessed, of course.

Well, it?s a well-known truism of the football business that ?he who hesitates is lost? and it certainly was the case with us. With around 18 minutes on the clock, up surged The Pool once more, and in a clever series of movements, we were sunk. But this is where it starts to get interesting; my other half made a point of watching the goals on Sky tonight (not wishing to succumb to repeated bouts of nausea, I passed on that one!), and told me the first was completely down to Mister Contraflow, who wasn?t doing his job properly, it seemed. Oh whoops. And there was more joy to come, although I severely doubt whether our peculiarly-named chappie would describe it that way. That, of course, was the penalty, a bitter blow indeed, after we?d managed to pick ourselves up off the floor, eventually, and run at them in pretty decent, aggressive fashion. ?Im Indoors reckons Houlty had that ball covered, and would probably have reached it had our hero not shoved his bloody great mitt in the air like a kid asking Rob Styles to excuse him. And faced with a whoopsy like that, the ref had no choice but to send him for an early (and very warm indeed: I was green with envy!) bath. Well done, though, Houlty, for saving the wretched thing, also Purse for finally doing something useful for a change,and shifting the rebound off the line.

Trouble is, though, when you?re a man light, you can play with all the skill and aplomb of Man United, Chelsea, even, but nothing?s going to replace the thundering great hole you?ve now got in the middle. Eventually (unless you?ve got as much jam as Hartleys, of course, in which case all bets are off), you?ll concede again. It was just a matter of time, of course, and although we went into the interval a solitary goal in arrears, we all knew in our heart of hearts, the reprieve would be temporary. Come the second period, then, we made a change, The Mighty Zoltan coming on for AJ, who, in true Christmas style, had run around in similar fashion to the bunny in the Duracel ads, but totally failed to see the light.

Their second, when it came, was with around ten minutes gone, their lad doing a quick double-act with a colleague before totally banjaxing Houlty with the killer strike. The third, coming within a matter of minutes, was the result of a free-kick, miles from our box, really. Certainly, I was mildly surprised to see the visitors teeing up for a long one ? and even more to see it blast through the Albion wall as if it wasn?t there, and completely evade Houlty?s grasping fingers.

Now, the game was beginning to resemble a Cecil B De Mille epic; Liverpool players everywhere, seemingly, with very noisy supporting cast indeed by way of accompaniment, and all hell-bent on participating in what was rapidly developing into a belated turkey-shoot. Houlty managed to stave off the inevitable for a short period with a couple of really cracking saves ? any other occasion, and they would have drawn well-deserved plaudits indeed from the Smethwick End faithful ? but the end came with around ten minutes to go, when Riise pretty-much busted the net with his contribution to the proceedings, followed by another with but a minute left; this time, Garcia was the perpetrator of the damage. Gallows humour? Plenty, especially after the third; I don?t think, though, that The Brummie quite realised the true significance of the ?We Are Albion, Say We Are Albion?.? chant they came up with in those last few dying minutes.

Sure, you can take it at face-value, if you wish, but there?s yet another interpretation, one based upon the inference drawn from the ?lyrics? that the ?true? Baggies were the ones to be found behind the goals, and not those sitting in the corporate bits of the ground. And that?s the interpretation I prefer to stick on it, myself. ?Laughing in the face of adversity: that?s all we have left,? said ?Des Baggie? on the mailing-list tonight, which sounds another reasonable version. As for everyone else, well, football?s a subjective sort of thing anyway, and in a ground packed with 27,000-odd people, I?m willing to bet if you asked, you?d find just as many differing opinions within it. And, as the whistle trilled for the last time ? we were in the bowels of the stand and away, by then ? in marked contrast to St. Andrews last Saturday, not a single word of abuse did I hear. They gave it their best shot, and they failed. What more CAN you say?

And finally?? Sorry, the Santa stuff aside, I simply can?t think of ANYTHING remotely funny with which to terminate tonight?s piece. We?ve now played around 19 games, and have but ten points to show for all our efforts. Obviously, there are another 19 to come, but for the life of me, I simply can?t see where our next point is likely to come from. As I said to ?Im Indoors, as we were heading off down Halfords Lane, post-match, this entire business has more than a whiff of 1985-86 about it. At least we managed to do the double over Blues, back then! Any takers on us managing to ?better?, in the worst possible meaning of the word, Sunderland?s unenviable Prem record the season we went also? Come our trip to The City of Manchester Stadium in three days time, I shall endeavour to pack a goodly supply of sense-of-humour medication, because I?m sure as hell going to need it before the final whistle! Once more, I invoke the words of war poet Siegfried Sassoon, apropos the first world conflict, still going hammer and tongs when he first said it. ?O God, please make it stop!???

And ? another parting thought. Like a good many blokes, my other half participates in one of those Fantasy League competitions, in his case, the one run by the Sunday Times. It might interest you all to know that of the bottom fourteen players in it, SEVEN of them are ours! For the record, they are Big Dave (sure, he?s injured, and therefore not blameworthy, of course), on minus 7. Carrying on down the last, we then come to Clem, currently on ?12, and Paul Robinson (also not in the side at the moment, of course), on ?10. We then encounter Darren Purse, currently on ?15 (and we all know the reason for that, don?t we children?), and two places below, Mister Scimeca, on ?16. Bringing up the rear (Ooer!), are Tommy Gaardsoe and, stuck right at the bottom and registering a stonking ?20, Russell Hoult!

 - Glynis Wright

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