Going Down To Liverpool
Went up to Tranmere yesterday for Lionesses first World Cup qualifier v Russia. Got a sad message while on the bus to the station : Kathy was unwell so she and Angela wouldn't be coming. Messaged her 'get well soon'.
My foot had flared up a tad so it wasn't easy making the half hour walk from Rock Ferry station to the restaurant close to the ground. The restaurateur wasn't happy that I'd arrived at 2.15; he said the booking.com email should have said not to come between 2 and 5, but after a grumble he let me have my room key. The room was very nice, if not much bigger than a shoe cupboard. As I left the restaurant to head for the pub, I noticed Steak Diane on the menu and thought I'd have that after the match. Little did I know...
I moseyed down to the Birch Tree pub, next door to the ground, and had time for a chicken burger and chips with a portion of onion rings before Lynsey arrived. Martin wasn't far behind her and was hungry, so we all made football chit-chat while Martin had his pie, mash and peas. Flis, an eccentric lady we'd met in Holland, spotted us and came over to our table. Later Julia and Alice arrived with Julia's friend Michael and we all moved over to a longer table and talked some more till, with 20 minutes to kick-off, we made our move.
We had a pretty good view, sitting in the third row of the upper tier of one of the long sides. Jordan Nobbs got us off to a dream start in the second minute then it wasn't long till, to my delight, Jodie made it two. By half time it was 4-0; when Lucy Bronze volleyed home a beauty for our fourth, Lynsey turned to me, winding me up over how I'd said qualifying from the group wouldn't be certain and that Russia would be a real threat.
It ended 6-0. Julia, Alice and Michael exchanged goodbyes with me and went to drive home to Blackburn. Lynsey wanted to hang around to collect autographs but said she wouldn't wait on her own. I agreed to accompany her, since one of the staff said the players would only be about 25 minutes so I thought I'd be able to get to the restaurant and eat in time before they closed at 10...
We did meet a dozen players. We also met Rachel Brown-Finnis, who'd been one of the BBC pundits, and Jen from She Kicks, who gave me a quick hug and kiss then rushed to catch her lift back to her hotel. But the whole process took an hour, meaning the restaurant was shut. And at the end of that hour, local heroine Jodie, the person a lot of the people waiting there were particularly wanting to see, and whom I wanted to see more than anyone, was got away through a side entrance, where the stadium staff wouldn't let us go, and bundled away in a car with tinted windows without us getting to see her. It was apparent that Laura Bassett had also sneaked out that way earlier.
I was incandescent at having wasted an hour standing in the cold and missed out on a steak meal. Lynsey said she appreciated my hanging there with her and that she felt bad about me missing my dinner, but she remained indifferent as we walked along and I vented imprecations against Tranmere Rovers FC and lamented to her "2 holidays and £90 down the lavvy."
She was good enough to Google a takeaway for me - there was just the one nearby, "Captain Tony's". Then she went to get her bus. I walked, disconsolate and radged off, to Captain Tony's and found it was a pizzeria. Pizza was the last thing I felt like. I walked on for half a mile hoping to find a kebab house or something, but there were just a lot of shut shops and a late opening McColl's. Sighing, I headed back to Captain Tony's, scanned their handful of non-pizza options and settled for a chicken burger and a portion of garlic bread. Went back to my room and ate, surfing the channels for anything worth watching, settling on the No Hiding Place episode of Whatever Happened To The Likely Lads? It was only the 507085th time I'd seen it.
Woke up to the news that Laura Bassett has signed for Canberra United. I'm delighted that she isn't retiring but gutted that I will never meet her again. I guess, at least, I met her in Breda knowing that it might be the last time I met her, and that meeting is a nice memory - me holding her two cups of tea while she signed me an autograph. And yet...
On phone to a fellow fan, she said she thinks Aussie W-League games are streamed live online. Fingers crossed.
Oh, and Mark Sampson got the sack today. I've never formed strong views on the whole business as I wasn't there so don't know what really happened. I'm just saddened that British women's football has been dragged through the mud, and hope that now, under a new manager, we can move forward and concentrate on the football.
So, after the trip I spent weeks keenly anticipating turned into a downer, I'm back to the grotty office tomorrow with nothing to look forward to. Wish me luck.
My foot had flared up a tad so it wasn't easy making the half hour walk from Rock Ferry station to the restaurant close to the ground. The restaurateur wasn't happy that I'd arrived at 2.15; he said the booking.com email should have said not to come between 2 and 5, but after a grumble he let me have my room key. The room was very nice, if not much bigger than a shoe cupboard. As I left the restaurant to head for the pub, I noticed Steak Diane on the menu and thought I'd have that after the match. Little did I know...
I moseyed down to the Birch Tree pub, next door to the ground, and had time for a chicken burger and chips with a portion of onion rings before Lynsey arrived. Martin wasn't far behind her and was hungry, so we all made football chit-chat while Martin had his pie, mash and peas. Flis, an eccentric lady we'd met in Holland, spotted us and came over to our table. Later Julia and Alice arrived with Julia's friend Michael and we all moved over to a longer table and talked some more till, with 20 minutes to kick-off, we made our move.
We had a pretty good view, sitting in the third row of the upper tier of one of the long sides. Jordan Nobbs got us off to a dream start in the second minute then it wasn't long till, to my delight, Jodie made it two. By half time it was 4-0; when Lucy Bronze volleyed home a beauty for our fourth, Lynsey turned to me, winding me up over how I'd said qualifying from the group wouldn't be certain and that Russia would be a real threat.
It ended 6-0. Julia, Alice and Michael exchanged goodbyes with me and went to drive home to Blackburn. Lynsey wanted to hang around to collect autographs but said she wouldn't wait on her own. I agreed to accompany her, since one of the staff said the players would only be about 25 minutes so I thought I'd be able to get to the restaurant and eat in time before they closed at 10...
We did meet a dozen players. We also met Rachel Brown-Finnis, who'd been one of the BBC pundits, and Jen from She Kicks, who gave me a quick hug and kiss then rushed to catch her lift back to her hotel. But the whole process took an hour, meaning the restaurant was shut. And at the end of that hour, local heroine Jodie, the person a lot of the people waiting there were particularly wanting to see, and whom I wanted to see more than anyone, was got away through a side entrance, where the stadium staff wouldn't let us go, and bundled away in a car with tinted windows without us getting to see her. It was apparent that Laura Bassett had also sneaked out that way earlier.
I was incandescent at having wasted an hour standing in the cold and missed out on a steak meal. Lynsey said she appreciated my hanging there with her and that she felt bad about me missing my dinner, but she remained indifferent as we walked along and I vented imprecations against Tranmere Rovers FC and lamented to her "2 holidays and £90 down the lavvy."
She was good enough to Google a takeaway for me - there was just the one nearby, "Captain Tony's". Then she went to get her bus. I walked, disconsolate and radged off, to Captain Tony's and found it was a pizzeria. Pizza was the last thing I felt like. I walked on for half a mile hoping to find a kebab house or something, but there were just a lot of shut shops and a late opening McColl's. Sighing, I headed back to Captain Tony's, scanned their handful of non-pizza options and settled for a chicken burger and a portion of garlic bread. Went back to my room and ate, surfing the channels for anything worth watching, settling on the No Hiding Place episode of Whatever Happened To The Likely Lads? It was only the 507085th time I'd seen it.
Woke up to the news that Laura Bassett has signed for Canberra United. I'm delighted that she isn't retiring but gutted that I will never meet her again. I guess, at least, I met her in Breda knowing that it might be the last time I met her, and that meeting is a nice memory - me holding her two cups of tea while she signed me an autograph. And yet...
On phone to a fellow fan, she said she thinks Aussie W-League games are streamed live online. Fingers crossed.
Oh, and Mark Sampson got the sack today. I've never formed strong views on the whole business as I wasn't there so don't know what really happened. I'm just saddened that British women's football has been dragged through the mud, and hope that now, under a new manager, we can move forward and concentrate on the football.
So, after the trip I spent weeks keenly anticipating turned into a downer, I'm back to the grotty office tomorrow with nothing to look forward to. Wish me luck.