The Diary

21 January 2007: Albion Consolidate Their Play-Off Place In Hard-Fought Elland Road Tussle.

WHOO-EE! At long last, an away win, and our first since the Ipswich 5-1 slaughter. At the expense of poor, moribund Leeds United, of course, and morally, at least, a bit like lying in wait for your grannie in some dark alleyway somewhere, then hitting her over the head with a blunt instrument and making off with the contents of both purse and handbag. Only the footballing equivalent of the few limp-looking veggies she?d purchased half-price from Tesco just before they?d finished for the day, ?tis true, but three points is three points, ain?t it? Just like any common or garden Dingle accepting what are stolen goods by any other name into their detritus-strewn household, I?m not going to put up much of an argument regarding the ethics of their provenance, am I? Just rejoice in the fact we?ve got ?em, and leave it at that.

In fact, so taken was I by the fact we?d actually got something right away from home for a change, once we?d dropped The Fart off at his gaff, a strange feeling of complete and utter fatigue overwhelmed me, and once home, the very last thing I wanted to do was sit typing this missive into the wee small hours of the morning. So what did I do instead, dear reader? Sleep, that?s what, and for about four hours solid, the slumber of the near-dead, if you really want to know, and finally waking up with a start, still sitting on our living-room settee, at around three in the morning.

So there you go. That?s what the shock of an unexpected win away from the comforting arms of The Shrine can do to you, and I?ll leave it to all those nice physiologists and psychologists out there in Clever-Clogs Land to sort out the messy details of precisely why I reacted in that strange manner to our much-needed three-pointer. And while they?re sorting that one out, please accept my apology for the lateness of this piece.

There was another factor to take into account when doing the maths, of course, and that was the presence of a certain regular diary-reading John Peckham in our midst once the final whistle had gone. Meeting up with him at a nearby bus stop, the only one in the area with a shelter still intact after the recent storms, believe it or not, we then shifted ourselves to a Wetherspoons pub in the city centre, and proceeded to dissect not only our steaks and fish (that was me!), but also the finer detail of what we?d just witnessed with our very own eyes.

That?s when I discovered just how serious things are at Elland Road these days, from someone who?d spent the greater part of his life - not to mention disposable income! ? following Leeds both home and away. Believe you me, it didn?t half make for grim listening ? but as per usual, I?m getting way, way ahead of myself. More about the domestic affairs of Leeds United later.

Other than that wonderful result, yesterday was definitely one of those days when neither one of us should have been allowed out. No matter what we tried to do, be it of great benefit to the human race or otherwise, we invariably ended up making a complete and utter Horlicks of it. That?s why I?d thought a Leeds three-pointer a nailed-on shoo-in: the sheer talent of our lot for managing to shoot themselves in the foot is truly wondrous to behold. As things turned out, the Elland Road caper was about the only thing that went completely right for us that day.

It all started when Norm, he of the central heating boiler repairs, rang us that very same morning. He was sending his son and heir over, to sort out the panelling for our brand-new central heating boiler, and pretty tout-suite, too. And, as requested, starting work on our own decrepit kitchen door, a useless bit of wood, even at the best of times, than replacing it with a brand-new glass-panelled number. Guess who forgot to mention it to hubby, then?

Mind you, for sheer idiocy, you couldn?t get much better than my other half, who somehow contrived to insert a mobile phone simcard the wrong way, then couldn?t extricate it to save his life again. Help, in the form of my stepmother was quickly attained: daft as it might sound, a pair of tweezers was favourite to do the job ? and it did. Today was also the start of poor Tigger?s pills ? and boy, what a battle we had getting the rotten things down him. This, from an allegedly-ill feline? Blimey, I?d hate to try it when he?s supposed to be well!

The solution was easy, though: crush the leetle sods to powder, then dissolve it in water: once that had been done to complete satisfaction, draw up the solution into a large syringe barrel, grab cat, wrap in huge towel, get hubby to hold while I let the cat have a syringe full of the stuff. Could have ended up messy, sure ? but not half as messy as this column getting bitten and/or scratched.

With two cats now in isolation, I also had to splash out on a new litter tray and big bag of kitty-.litter, which I fetched from the pet shop just down the road from our place. On entry, I heard a wolf-whistle, and a pretty loud one, at last. For a minute, I thought my luck had changed, but no dice: turned out to be one of the owner?s blasted birds, in the end. Just one snag: boy was that sack heavy, and I still had to lug it home, with all the contents intact. A huge great Megson Death Stare for the bloke who saw me struggling manfully to bring everything through the shop door: expecting him to be one of life?s gentlemen, I waited for him to hold the door open ? but he went and disappeared into the gathering gloom, never to be seen again! Dearie, dearie me.

Still, the most peaceful aspect of our trip yesterday was the trip up the M1, a golden vista of fields, meadows and woods in the wintry sunlight. Not that The Fart noticed much, mind. He was resting safe in the arms of Morpheus for almost the entire length of the journey. And he didn?t stir either when I played a hefty dose of Steelye Span on our CD system. That?s what supporting the Baggies ever since the days of Florence Nightingale does to you, so beware!

Odd, though, listening to the dulcet tones of Maddy Prior at first then, as the journey unfolded, getting various interjections in an Aussie accent, the overall tone of which suggested the speaker was around three or four tinnies of Fosters in front, by then. That was our satnav system, of course, yet another toy for my great big boy to play with. And it really would appreciate being left to do the job properly, instead of the driver ? ?Im Indoors! ? trying furiously to override the route our Ned Kelly soundalike was suggesting to us at that particular time.

The rest of the trip being fairly uneventful, we arrived at Ground Zero at around ten past one. The Fart, deciding he needed a bit of a blow in the fresh air, elected to go for a pre-match walk, and was last seen disappearing into the middle distance. As for us, sustenance beckoned, but with the nearest licenced watering hole about a mile distant (not good for the old legs and back), where to go?

The answer? Break our self-imposed embargo of MacDonalds! They had an outlet very conveniently (suspiciously so, in my opinion) placed just a matter of yards away from our turnstile ? no contest, really. And it being years since I?d last set foot in one of their places, I was absolutely astonished to see how greatly they?d taken up with the football theme. Everywhere you looked, it was all Leeds United, and those who played and managed there, around the time of the Revie era, back in the sixties and seventies. Most unlike the usual corporate crap, it was, a particularly clever touch being their big stools transformed into footballers? legs, complete with socks and boots! So taken I was by this, I took a crafty picture on my mobile phone, then saved it as ?wallpaper?. The results you can see there, if you want to.

Once we?d sorted out the ?inner man?, it was off to the away turnstiles we went (I?d forgotten they were automatic, a bit like ours). Once inside, I happened to bump into Jean Homer, other half to John, Supporters Club MC to the parish. But it wasn?t the game on her mind, right then, just Zoltan. Her cat, I mean, the enormous furry beast currently eating her out of house and home. It?s now seven or so months old, which means?.(Sensitive males should look away now, folks!) Time For The Dreaded Operation! Aw, you know, the one where Puss goes into theatre a man, and comes out ? errrr?. Booked in for next Tuesday, he is, according to Jean. ?Ooooh, I am nervous about it!? commented the dear lady as she was about to go in search of her other half, nattering like it was going out of fashion, somewhere else in the away end.

?Never mind about you getting nervous,? I commented, ?Spare a thought for the bloody cat!?

As you will have guessed by now, Elland Road is one mighty sad place, these days. That became clear as soon as we emerged from the tunnel accessing our particular bit of stand. With around 10 minutes or so to the start, there were an awful lot of empty seats to be seen, scattered all around the ground. Hardly any noise coming from their Yorkshire admirers, either, the greater part of any discernable noise emanating solely from our end, not theirs. What the likes of the late Billy Bremner would have thought on seeing this pitiful sight for the very first time, I really shudder to think. And it will be a dark day for the city also should they fall into the snake-pit come season?s end: as for our part, we?ve been there, done it, won the tee-shirt, even. Remember Bath, 1991? Our thoughts back then are theirs to the present day.

With the start only a matter of minutes away, a sense of profound unease suddenly crept right over my body. The reason? The name of the ref for our game: Rob bloody Styles, that?s who, our matchday Nemesis back in the days when we were a Premiership side. I also allowed a twinge of sympathy to creep in the direction of their stadium announcer, who was trying just about everything he knew to try and get the Elland Road faithful whipped up into some semblance of a passionate frenzy.

And, my dears - the rain, the rain! Talk about chuck it down, as both sides were about to kick off? One of those days where you fully expected to see geese and ducks landing in close proximity to the pitch now striving valiantly to pass itself off as a pond. Had today?s proceedings been sponsored by the Water Board, I wondered, and not for the first time, either.)

The biggest shocker of the lot was the home side taking the lead within a couple of minutes of the kick-off. Sorry, but it was mostly down to the lad McShane?s poor clearance of what should have been a pretty straightforward ball for him, just outside of our box. Such is our luck these days, once he?d yielded possession to the Yorkshire lot, the ball then ran straight to one of theirs, in the middle: unsurprisingly, the startled lad pulled the trigger, a purely reflex action, I would say. Davies kicked that effort off the line, but then the stray ball ended up at the nimble feet of Thompson, whose cross well and truly put the ball back ?into the mixer? once more. On descent, it found the lurking head of new boy Flo, surprisingly getting to the ball ahead of Hoult. In it went, with minimal effort on the part of the scorer, and as it did so, the Leeds fan club rejoiced greatly, of course.

Not that the massive adrenalin surge they experienced lasted too long, mind. While we Baggies were still arguing the toss as to precisely what had gone wrong that time, defensively speaking, we managed to restore parity. That one came from an Albion free-kick, taken quite close to the box, and Leeds making a total pigs ear of clearing the thing once we?d taken it, the stray ball then running towards the lank-haired Greening, situated on the edge of the area. (The more I see of him, the more he reminds me of Frank Gallagher, head of the sorely-dysfunctional household featured in Channel Four?s ?Shameless?!) He didn?t need a second invitation: before the home end could say ?Don Revie?, even, referee Rob Styles ? yes, our Premiership Nemesis on so many different occasions over the course of the last three or four seasons! ? was directing everyone back to the centre-circle, much to our delight.

From then on, matters rested very much at the nimble feet of a gentleman known to all and Albion sundry as ?Joe? Kamara, aided and abetted by some shocking Leeds defending, also. Zoltan Gera was the controlling mind behind our second, his classy ball reaching Kamara with minimal fuss: one nifty bit of defence-wrecking ball-work and a fallen defender later, their keeper was clutching thin air, and we?d taken the lead. The problem, as ever, was this: now we?d done all the hard work, could we hold, for a further 60 or so minutes, what we now had?

The answer? Yes, and what?s more, further increasing our lead in the process, too. And what a gorgeous strike it was, from all of 25 or so yards, United?s charitable organisation of a defence granting Joe all the necessary time and space in which to successfully perpetrate the damage. I reckon the operative phrase in that away end, at the precise moment the ball zoomed right past a startled Sullivan, to be something on the lines of: ?COWIN? ELL..... YERSSSSS!?

That strike brought out some pretty wicked examples of Black Country humour, quickly dusted down, then prepare for general : did I get the impression of old scores being settled with their Leeds counterparts, following a long history of Albion sides going to Elland Road, and getting absolutely sod-all in the way of points to bring back on train or coach?

?Your ground?s too big for you!? was one, followed by the tried and tested: ?You?re S**T and you?re going down?.? ?Say hello to Walsall, say hello to Walsall?.? came next: schadenfreude, pure and simple, having a laugh at someone?s expense, in other words. Funniest of the lot, though, was ?There?s only one Peter Ridsdale?.? Not that the locals were in any sort of humour to appreciate our avalanche of ?bon mots?. Snarling, they were, probably. Neither did they our rendition of the ?panic-stricken Leeds defender?s flapping hands?!

And there were other things going on, too. Like the ?are they??, ?aren?t they?? news filtering through about the Dingles, whose game had finished already. Some were saying they?d lost to Cardiff, while others maintained the final score had been a draw. It was some minutes before someone, clearly better informed than we, managed to confirm what we?d heard already, that our local rivals had lost on their own muck-heap.

And yet another distraction was to befall us during the opening 45, and a bloody infuriating one, too. How come? Time for a quick anatomy lesson: the human bladder is largely composed of a type of tissue called transitional epithelium, which can stand an awful lot of sweating, under normal circumstances. In other words, should you badly need to go, but have to postpone your visit for any one of several good reasons, your bladder can still stretch further, and for a while longer. Bearing that in mind, why was it that as many as EIGHT people in our row of seats suddenly found a visit to the bog during the course of that opening half a matter of dire emergency? After the sixth or seventh, it starts to get a tad tedious.

Mind you, Lou, the blind bloke who travels to games, caused an absolute sensation in that gents? bog, when he began to unburden himself of his own nitrogenous load. Commented one ? possibly envious? - ?admirer?: ?Blimey, you must have an industrial-strength bladder, you!?

Come the start of the second half, a positively ?retro? touch, with both sets of aficionados yelling?Smethwick!? ?Brummie!?, with a few, even older, cries of ?Tipton!? chucked in for good measure. And, for some obscure reason: ?Rainbow!? Baggies have always been an eclectic lot: the proof of that was right in front of us, and incubating a very nasty case of laryngitis, by that time. From then on in, the game became pretty brutal: unsurprisingly so, as the home side were pretty desperate not to let yet another three points slip away from their grasp, by that stage. Unfortunately, that was also the cue for some pretty strange decisions on the part of the delectable Mister Styles; whoever was the official rash enough to give him full licence to wield his whistle at that level, I can only assume they were labouring under the handicap of a total brainstorm at the time. Even a house-trained orang-utan could have done the job far better, in my opinion.

Come the second serving, the home side did manage to get it back to three-two, courtesy the lad Thompson?s free-kick. When it flew in, we in the away end were absolutely furious with our players. Why? Simple: as everyone was busily sorting out the defensive wall, we could see, as plain as daylight one almighty hole in it opening up right before our eyes. I couldn?t believe for one minute we were about to perpetrate such a monstrous defensive error, which is why I muttered, to my other half, something on the lines of ?Is it me, or is it one almighty hole I can see in that wall?....? closely followed by some pretty desperate Baggie screams in that direction. ?Cover the gap ? for Chrissake sake COVER THE BLOODY GAP!....? then, just seconds later, by: ?We could see the bloody thing from roite up ?ere: why the flamin? ?ell couldn?t yow cowin? lot??

Despite our usual tendency to complete the bloody difficult stuff successfully, then concede possession when stuffing up an easy ball, or pass to a gaping great hole where the recipient should have been positioned, no: when you looked at everything in the cold light of day, Houlty had very little to do. That first Leeds goal was partly down to him, as was their second: as I said, he should have spotted the gap in the wall opening up right in front of him: they did, so why didn?t we?

For the entire duration of that half, Leeds must have chucked the equivalent of the kitchen sink in our direction, but they still couldn?t get through. Just as well, really. Then, towards the end, Houlty got a knock, and we all saw Zoobie warming up on the touchline opposite! ?AARRGH! NOOOOOO!......?

And I?m still trying to work out which was the most hilarious: seeing Denis Wise ?sent off? for farting in church, basically, or hearing about Neil Warnock?s dismissal. For kicking a player? Oh dear, the FA have enough trouble trying to make professional players cease and desist from this unsavoury practice, never mind managers with a yen towards doing precisely the same thing!

A short period of injury time when I was convinced Rob Styles would play it out until Leeds got their equaliser ? but nope. By my watch, he actually gave the home side short measure! Loud and long were the celebrations in our end, our first away win since last autumn was certainly a moment to remember ? and savour, too. The Good? Chaplow, our Human Dynamo; our new midfielder: seeing even our strikers having a go at tackling back: grabbing a win despite being without Jason Koumas and John Hartson; the sort of smooth silky passing and movement you usually get to see in an Albion-inspired wet dream, and nowhere else. The Bad? Our defending, which can be shocking, sometimes. As for the free kick that led to their second, words really do fail me. The Ugly? Leeds, Leeds and Leeds ? they were desperate people yesterday, and it showed.

That?s all for now: tomorrow, I?ll be saying a little more about Leeds, what issues lie behind their current plight, and fun and games when we visited the Shrine to grab ourselves a small piece of the Dingles FA Cup action earlier today. And more about our old chum John Peckham. As I said before, my little doze last night put me quite some way behind. Never mind, I?ll get there in the end, eventually!

And Finally?. It?s the auld Oirish in him, ye know, to be shure, Sorr! Remark from The Fart as we made ready to park up on arrival in Leeds: ?Are you leaving your car where you park it?.....?

 - Glynis Wright

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