For a football fan whose preferred over used phrase of choice is “Put it WIIIIIIDE!” I could feel the early onset rumblings of disappointment when I surveyed Leicester’s team for the game against West Brom. Four central midfielders didn’t fill me with hope. I was by then though quite full of curry, having had a pre-match meal at the very brilliant Spicy Haandi….and very handy it is too (BOOM!) being a mere onion bhaji throw from the ground. Sinuses were most definitely cleared, optimism was in all honesty low…possibly not helped by Mr TLF’s farewell that morning, “I don’t fancy your chances much.”

But there was a spring in my step as I made my way to the ground, only my second game of the season (having eschewed, not boycotted the mighty Saints trip to Bath – a distinction that is more important than you may first think) and my first time back on the terraces in the seat that has been MINE since we moved into Filbert Way/King Power Stadium/Walkers Crisp Bowl. Added bonus was the expansion of the TV camera platform behind me, which is a requirement or our lofty (and at this rate very short) Premiership sojourn. That small extension has meant the removal of a couple of seats behind me and so I have lost the curmudgeonly gits who sat behind me for years moaning and slagging off every single Lesta player and also most of the opposition. Perhaps they were doing heavy duty irony and it passed me by…but I doubt it. All hail the power of television!

The icing on the cake though was the lady sat next to me, “Are you Sophie? Now I am always a bit suspicious of why I am being asked that question, but in the end I fessed up that yes I was. “Good. Because I’m Pete’s wife.” Mrs Pete! Bloomin heck. Pete, who had looked slightly terrified all those years ago when me and my mum descended on the seats next to him in the first ever game at the newly opened Filbert Way/King etc etc, who told shocking jokes, made me laugh, was always lovely and who died last September. Whose wife never came to the games, and I couldn’t make the funeral and so I had never got to meet. Crikey. One of those moments that makes the day worthwhile and briefly makes football seem a bit less important. Cue a bit of a natter, a few tears and the the football was again the thing and it was time for kick off.

At which point Mrs Pete and I were not left with much to be cheerful about. It was all a bit huff and puff and no end product, although I did at least show that I can adapt, “there’s no bloody WIIIIDTH”, I shouted on a regular and pointless basis. That was as high as my discontent got but there were more pronounced grumblings from the left hand side of the stand. This went something along the lines of:

“Mr Pearson, old boy, we were wondering if you wouldn’t mind awfully, popping down from your preferred seat in the stands and perhaps lending a hand on the bench to see if you might find your way to helping the chaps grab the bull by the horns and perhaps put their shoulders to the wheel and produce a performance that an association footballer might be justly proud of. If it is not too much trouble. Otherwise we may, sadly, be compelled to suggest that your unfortunate demise might be of assistance to the aforementioned chaps in what will shortly become a battle against RELEGATION.”
They were standing about 5 seats away and a row back but I am pretty sure that’s what I heard.

Talking of discontent, things were taking a distinctly wintery turn on the mighty saints front, with some people clearly getting the hump. Turns out that John Frendo, no glorious son of York (road) had indeed popped off to Spain rather than playing in the FA Cup. His punishment was viewed by some as not severe enough and that combined with a decision to charge £15 for entry into the Hertfordshire senior cup game at home on Monday evening (not a competition to get the heart racing) had opened up a gulf between fans and club somewhere along the size of Bosworth field. Hence a boycott by some of our terrace singing all stars of the weekend Bath game, followed by a meagre turnout of 57 for that home cup game game. We won apparently (once again I cannot be seen to be a proactive protestor. I was at yoga), with in a case of irony of which the bard would have been proud a hat trick for…..yes of course Mr AWOL Frendo.

Roll on Satday for new skirmishes

TLF the Third

Greenwich mean time? Greenwich mess with your head time more like. I really don’t think that ONE extra hour in bed makes up for the nonsense foisted on my little lost fox head this weekend. When I was a kid and first heard that ‘extra hour in bed’ schtick, I thought they meant an extra hour in bed every day until British Summer Time popped up all bright eyed and bushy tailed. Yeah I was a pretty naive (and optimistic) kid back then.

Anyway it all started well; on the agenda was the theatre, a home game for the mighty Saints and Lesta on Sky. A veritable smorgasbord of entertainment.

Friday evening sees TLF off to Stratford (that’s home of Shakespeare not home of the Olympics) for a bit of kulture. Double bonus was that the TLF Parentals had coincidentally booked for the same play, on the same night with seats on the same row. That means dinner at their expense afterwards plus my mum is a dab hand with an empty Oasis bottle and some interval rose wine (if you get my drift….I hope that doesn’t sound rude). In my opinion every weekend should start with some Jacobean tragi-comedy. One minute you’re laughing yer head off at some innuendo and the next you’re watching a bigamist murder his very sweet second wife having been possessed by the devil. Keeps you on your toes.

Which it being the second preview was clearly what the Director, sitting one row down from me was planning for the cast if his sheaf of scribbled notes was anything to go by. Although I did spot he put his pen down whenever grand queen of acting, Dame Eileen Atkins was on stage. Did he know she would be perfect or was he just too scared to give her any feedback? I think we all know the answer to that one. Anyway, one bleak but brilliant Witch of Edmonton performance later, filled with optimism and some evil incantations to hex the opposition it was Saturday morning and I was on the way back to sunny St Albans. If you ever go to Stratford can I recommend you drive? The train back to London chose to stop at every village, hamlet and golf course between Shakespeare Town and the great metropolis. The slow crawl left me very worried about any chance of a pre-match Stella and so at St Pancras I ensured some re-fuelling with a quick trip to the very posh Sourced Market for an eye-wateringly expensive can of lager, hand crafted by hipster pygamies in North London.

VERY expensive and small can of lager

There was a time that I would have put this defeat down to my attendance. Those with a long memory (from a whole two weeks ago) will remember my concern that having not been to any winning Cup games this season, any appearance by yours truly would condemn us to defeat. But in my defence, I would draw my learned friends attention to two key facts. ONE the bar had run out of bacon fries and TWO we were missing star striker John Frendo. The case for the defence rests.

The rumour on the terraces was that this absence was because he had tickets for El Classico (that’s Frendo not whoever is responsible for ordering our bacon snacks). Very strange, didn’t he realise that the Swansea, Lesta game was on telly?

No bacon fries, no clapping or singing in time (thank you HatBoy) and Saints just running around willy-nilly (copyright wolfie). Time to go home and enjoy my blue team on telly……Ah. I think they needed witchcraft on their side even more.

I should have known it wasn’t going to be my day. I’d read the Independent on the train and agreed with Janet Street Porter – TWICE! That never happens.

At least the lager wasn’t lucky – couldn’t afford it very often.

The Lost Fox of Edmonton

Match Stats
St. Albans City 0 Concord Rangers 1
Attendance 953
Losing raffle tickets A modest 5. They were on white paper but Duncan and I know that all raffle tickets are actually purple
Lager consumed 1 over priced can and 1 pint Stella
Snacks consumed NONE. And there my friends is where it all went wrong

I was left wondering last weekend what’s worse to witness on a Satday? A 2-0 home defeat? Or a 2-2 home draw with the opposition scoring their equaliser in the sixth minute of stoppage time?

Once upon a time this kind of philosophical debate was neither here nor there. I went to the home game that my team was playing and sometimes I went to the away game too, and I took the result and lived with it (wept/sulked/celebrated with excess lager). Now of course, with this foolish inability to abandon the saints or the foxes it was inevitable that sooner or later I would chance upon a Satday where both teams were at home and I would have to make a choice. Not always my forte. Mr TLF suggested finding a third team to follow on these occasions (everyone’s a comedian these days). I did consider tossing a coin or asking you lot to decide (yeah right).

In the end I waited for the stars and the fates to tell me. And lo there came not one but two signs. First I spotted the club’s owner Lawrence Levy in the Meze Bar in St Albans (he very decently said hello and I introduced Mr TLF as “a man who doesn’t come to Clarence Park often”).Then as I took a shortcut to the train station I saw Eamesy who promised me he was just making sure that the Stella was shipshape; now there is a man who knows how to prioritise. And on that basis my destination had to be Clarence Park.

Sod’s law did of course then decree that at Clarence Park it would RAIN and that we would lose. The first half we hung on, but in the time it took me to get from the bar to the terrace for the second half we were 2-0 down. Oh well I thought as defeat became inevitable…at least Leicester are winning…HA! Insult to injury and to Mr TLF’s now very unwise treble.

Gambling – it’s a mug’s game

But on reflection my choice of match didn’t seem so bad – my expectations were low from about the 48th minute. Imagine if I had been at Lesta, planning in the 95th minute how I could bore Mr TLF when I got home with details of the game and 3 home points…and then BOOM, one free kick later and it would have been a big sulk on a long journey home. Plus of course there is no Stella at Lesta.

And if I had gone there would I have had chance for a good conversation with our billionaire owners? Nope. While at Clarence Park it was a second conversation in a week with our owner, whose enthusiasm for the beautiful game and the mighty Saints came through in spades. From the Meze bar menu to the financial challenges of non-league football and how to meet those challenges to how brilliant our fans are; a really welcoming and interesting conversation. Fortunately I was only one and a half pints through my regulation Stella ration so I might even have been vaguely coherent. The reality is that a game at Clarence Park, no matter what the result is never an afternoon wasted…well I might be a bit wasted when I leave.

With no international break for the Conference South, there was a quick chance for Saints to get back to winning ways at Boreham Wood on the Monday. When I realised that we are talking Elstree and Boreham Wood I did get a bit excited – film studios! Star Wars! Some film and telly glitz! Maybe some some element of Strictly sparkle might give my Monday night a bit more than a SEVERRRNN.

But no. The high street has as much glamour as Ann Widdecombe, the ref was as generous to the mighty Saints as Craig Revell Whosit and their punctuation is shocking.

Crimes against apostrophes

A gutsy performance from a team that played the whole second half with 10 men but sadly nil points for the yellow and blue army.

Fox Forsyth

Match stats
St Albans 0 Chemlsford City 2
Attendance: 694
Goalden goal tickets and raffle tickets: See illustration above

Boreham Wood 2 St Albans 1
Attendance: 538
Lager consumed: 1 can Stella and 1 half time bottle San Miguel. Shame on Boreham Wood for serving Carlsberg in San Miguel glasses….that is NO way to manage expectations
Pre-match snacks: 1 packet bacon fries from the very fine London supplier of savoury snacks and Stella; Temple Stores

There are times, and I am almost ashamed to admit it when I do conduct a bit of an internal debate about whether to go to football or not. I’m not biased towards the mighty Saints or Lesta in this matter, it just sort of happens and there I was on Monday night having that “shall I or shan’t I?” debate. Slightly lazy “get me to the settee” Fox was distracted by thoughts of:
• It’s a skool night
• You’ve got a revue to rehearse, direct and perform tomorrow you fool (we don’t like to over-prepare our stage work)
• You’ve still not quite finished updating your CV
• You should spend more time with Mr TLF
• The England game is on telly

At which point EDPTS Fox (evil doubter & part time supporter) Fox made a beeline for Clarence Park. I suppose having missed the low ebb defeat by Ebbsfleet (BOOM!) I had little excuse to go AWOL.

I did miss kick off by a few minutes but was assured by Davy that I hadn’t missed much and it did initially look like the mighty Saints were starting as they had finished in the last game with things not looking too great. Ray was in residence behind the goal and I think speaking for all of us as he attempted to marshall the Saints defence and up the team’s workrate from the terraces. For a long while I didn’t think they were listening. And when the best terrace praise available was, “we’re not as bad as we were.” (copyright Davy) I did start a further debate; “shall I go and pay a visit to Andy the burger now? Or stick it out until half time and then have to queue?” At which point, right on cue (BOOM!) James Kaloczi rose like the proverbial salmon to plant a gracefully arcing header into the back of the net.

Cue a half time celebratory pork steak in a baguette (ooohh posh!) followed by a packet of bacon fries. That is excess pork in a 15 minute window BUT I didn’t want to shirk the responsibility of my lucky snacking to ensure the right result. Sure enough in the second half we weren’t the best, it wasn’t always pretty, but there was some welcome effort and we came away with a 2-2 draw and a TLF who had made all the right Monday evening choices.

Decisive Fox

Match stats:

St Albans 2 Bromley 2
Attendance 403
Raffle tickets purchased NONE…too late
Losing golden goal tickets purchased…see above
Bacon fries consumed 1 packet
Additional item from Andy’s van 1 (well actually the overspill Andy’s marquee by the park end). Pork steak in bauguette
Lager consumed 1 Amstel (while in London, contemplating whether to go to the game) 1 half-time Stella