Football League Revisited

A trip down memory lane starting at a very busy Maries on Lower Marsh, near Waterloo station.  An excellent breakfast but I was a bit jealous of the blokes opposite us who had a wait for their food but it turned out to be liver, onions, chips and gravy. What a top breakfast!

And then there is the obligatory visit to Ian Allan bookshop opposite - a one-stop shop for all your transport and military reading.  It looks like train-themed Christmas cards for everyone this year!

We meet up with Jenny and Julia on the concourse of Waterloo station - a busy one too with a mixture of travellers, some gathering for the march on Downing Street and others decked out in their finery on their way to Ascot for the racing. I'm sure there is something ironic in that but I can't be arsed to give it much thought.

Chris T joined us at Clapham and we arrived in Aldershot just before midday.  It is a good 15 min walk to the White Lion dodging various road works on the way but it remains the best pub in the town and is worth the effort.

On offer at the bar was the usual offerings from the local Triple F (fff) brewery - Pressed Rat and Warthog. Alton's Pride, Moondance plus a guest beer from somewhere else.

My lack of interest in the guest was due to the fact it was in a barrel on the bar and would be far too warm to drink. It turned out to be free as they wanted punters to try it so they could decide if they wanted to add it to the regulars.

We got chatting to an ex-pat Blackpool fan who watches Aldershot when not following the Tangerines.  He was keen to know how their on-loan player was faring with the Millers.

I was pleased to meet up with another Aldershot fan, Quentin, who I've got to know over the years. As well as football, we also share an interest in beer and Hawkwind.  What a winning combination.

Pub dog Millie was still in attendance but was giving us the cold shoulder, preferring the company of those watching the Spurs-Chelsea game on the TV, barking madly as various punters celebrated the goals.

Triple f brewery now produce their beers in bottles - all bottle conditioned - and I tried the Moondance (for me the best of their wares).  It turned out to be even better in bottles although extremely lively but with a wonderful almost-saison taste.

The Millers left for the game whilst I finished yet another bottle of the Moondance.  Eventually Quentin and I departed for the ground about 20 mins before kick-off and got into the ground seconds before kick-off.

My early shouts about Steve Evans and his short-comings were not appreciated by the more neandethal of the away contingent.  I certainly know I would be disgusted if Darlo had hired him as manager - some Millers' fans feel the same but a surprising number are prepared to gloss over his illustrious past in pursuit of future glory.

I've always liked the Recreation Ground and what would Darlo give for a home like that now?  It still has three sides but it looked quite busy even with a sub-2000 crowd. The home fans seemed very quiet - no drummer today to buoy their singing.

It isn't surprising the home fans are not attending in numbers as Aldershot have been doing badly and today they were rubbish.  Rotherham took an early lead and from that moment the Shots seemed to give up. They went through the motions but a 3-0 defeat flattered them.

After the game we had a quick pint - Fullers Pride - at the nearby Royal Staff where we were able to digest all the day's results.  Nice to see Darlo's winning streak continue with a 3-1 home victory over Bedlington Terriers.

And then the train back to Waterloo - Liz went home to feed the cats whilst Jenny, Chris and I took the Northern Line to Euston and a few bevvies at the Euston Tap.  The colder weather means that it those who normally drink outside are cowering indoors.

For once I don't spend the rest of the night in there and head home at a reasonable hour to catch a curry before they all close.

As I head towards Euston Square tube I come across what must have been a nasty smash on the Euston Road.  A large tanker has collided with a car, ripping the roof off as it almost squashed it.

It looked like all the action is over - no ambulances or fire engines in attendance with just a few uniforms in place, presumably checking what happened.  You'd imagine no one would have got out alive but one of the police told me that there were no serious injuries.  Amazing.

Aldershot Already?

And here we are again - first game of the season - something which looked highly unlikely several weeks ago but thankfully we've still got a club to support. Whether we'll actually have much to shout about remains to be seen but for the moment, we're just pleased to be here.

As ever, I met John at Waterloo for the ever predictable visit to Maries for the first pre-match breakfast of the season.


The No 7 and chips was as good as ever - just look at that plate of greasy goodness.

(left) Look away if your arteries are squeamish

Trevor popped along to join us there but clearly had already had his breakfast - he simply makes do with a cup of coffee as he watches us defile our bodies.

On the train to Aldershot, we bump into Quentin - an Aldershot fan we've made the acquaintance of during the past couple of seasons and a regular of the White Lion. He's trying to play down their chances today but he simply can't compete with our tales of woe.

Unlike last season's visits to Aldershot (for Darlo and Rotherham games), it isn't raining and we have a pleasant walk to the White Lion, which is the brewery tap for the Triple fff brewery.

Good to see that their full range of their beers are available today and even better the fact that my favourite, Moondance, is on special offer at £2 a pint. Result!

It isn't long before Millie, the pub terrier, has her little eyes on our group as prospective playmates.

She offers her tennis ball to us so it can be thrown and retrieved though she occasionally forgets to bring it back and then just looks at us forlornly. That's dogs for you.

(right) Millie wondering how many pints went into that?

Eventually Millie decides she's going to sit with me much to the bemusement of John and Trev though she occasionally jumps off to greet pub regulars as they come in.

We notice that one such regular bears a marked similarity to Paul Weller in his dodgy two-tone barnet phase - and so we're not totally surprised to later see him drive away in a van which suggests he's part of the Wellalive tribute act.

More DAFTS join us - John Bell and his mate Rod, Paul Brown and Iain Swalwell along with his son Robert on one of his rare visits to a Darlo game.

Quentin pops in too and during our conversation we discover that we're both keen Hawkwind fans (well I knew I was and he knew he was...) and that we're both off to see them for their 40th anniversary gig later in the month. How nice it is to find someone else with such taste. Cue a long chat on various space-rock nonsense not fit for you mere mortals.

Eventually it's time to leave for the big kick-off. We trudge up the slope to the away end through the trees and find one Darlo fan has collapsed before they've even got in - luckily St John Ambulance are in attendance.

There's a bit of a queue at the turnstile - only one of which is open - and by the time we get in they're halfway through the minute's applause for Bobby Robson.

By the time we've got ourselves settled on the paddock and checked out the many new faces in our squad, we're already a goal down. Damn and blast!

(left) Gavin on the bottle already

The first half doesn't improve and soon turns into a repeat of last season's visit when Aldershot put us under the cosh for long periods - the defence looks frail and new keeper Knight looks very unsure of himself (and not very tall from where we're stood).

In fact it's Knight's mistake in failing to gather the ball that leads to the Shots doubling their lead - the Darlo fans shake their heads, shuffle their feet and start to fear that a rout is in the offing.

Up front for Darlo, Thorpe wins quite a lot of headers but none of them go in the direction of Dean Windass who looks a bit lost. In midfield, it's Mark Convery who makes most of the forward running but we don't create any clear chances until almost half-time when one of the Smiths fires in smartly only for the ref to rule it out for a foul of a defender - looked very soft to us and we feel we're not getting the rub of the green from this ref.

If the disallowed goal suggested that we were getting back into the game, our hopes were dashed when Aldershot took a 3-0 lead just minutes after the restart. A breakaway on our right flank- where their player looked blatantly offside - lead to the ball rolling across our six-yard box before it was neatly slotted home past Knight.

A number of subs - Convery and Thorpe off, Dowson and Chandler on - come on in the hope that we can create some chances. We do look a bit busier - we soon get a free kick on the edge of their box - Windass takes it and forces a very good save out of their keeper.

We're still under the occasional bout of pressure and Knight makes one very good save to show us that he does have some talent, certainly as a shot-stopper.

(right) Trev can't watch

In addition Steve Foster was visibly tiring and getting left behind by the their nippy forwards. The only cure for this is more games under the belt.

Darlo then breakaway as a clearance from Miller reaches Windass who neatly flicks through the ball through for Dowson to smash home past their keeper - something positive for the 214 Darlo contingent to cheer even if it is a case of too little, too late.

It's clear that the team have a long way to go before they're playing as a unit and it is a waste of breath to be negative after this performance - things are going to be tough and I'm sure there'll be some more poor performances - however we're just going to have to hold our tongues and try and be positive (although I may not be able to stop myself having a go at the alice-band wearing Smith).

After leaving Trevor at Waterloo, John and I retire to the Wheatsheaf at London Bridge for some post-match chilling - a pint of something-or-other from Phoenix and then an excellent pint of Patrick's Porter from Brysons of Lancaster (even if John though it tasted like the bottom of an ash-tray!).

I Predict A Riot

Despite a London fixture, it was still a relatively early start to the day as John Wilson and I popped to Maries by Waterloo station for breakfast - not up to the high exacting standards that we're used from here to but still better than most.

As we got to the tube, the place was swarming with people clutching various banners and placards - all going to a demo in the centre of London, possibly against the G20 thingy - they all looked quite reasonable folk and not the hard-core protesters that are predicted for later in the week.

It reminded us both of that fateful day back in March 1990 when we beat Barnet 2-0 in the Conference after which we were given a Northern Line express tube journey back into central London to find out that anarchy (or as close as this country gets) had broken out in the form of the Poll Tax riots.

Perhaps this was a good omen for the day?

On arrival at Barnet, we met Steve Duffy and Trevor Rutter and we headed to our first point of call, a Fullers outlet, the White Lion. We were very disappointed to find it only had one beer on - Pride - but it was in very good nick.

After a couple of pints, we moved onto another new place - the Lord Nelson - which is a Youngs pub. Already ensconced were Colin, Argyle fan Geoff plus John Bell and a couple of his buddies, including Rod who had already savoured one Darlo victory this season - at Dagenham - so hopefully he'd be another lucky omen for us.

Our final pre-match pub was the Olde Mitre - the quality and variety of beers here have been very disappointing in recent years though comments on beerintheevening.com had suggested the place was improving. Nevertheless, we decided to just have the one in here.

There seem to be three regular beers - Black Sheep, Adnams Broadside and GK Abbot - plus a guest beer which on this occasion was Mr Tod from the Fox Beer Company so we opted for that. It was a 4.2% beer - produced by a former head brewer at Tetleys apparently - quite a light beer, not much taste and of a rather dull condition - which was not really surprising as it went off just after we'd bought our pints.

We managed to get to Underhill just in time for kick-off and we made sure that we were stood with Colin. The reason was that the referee for the game was Premiership official, Alan Wiley, and since Colin is well known for his loud ranting at officials, it would be interesting to see how he coped with one of the top refs.

During the first-half there was ample scope for him - Danny Carlton was taken out at one point whilst poor Ricky Ravenhill was on the receiving end of some nasty tackles on several occasions (though unkind commentators might say that is karma in action). Wiley was lenient in the extreme and Barnet were lucky to keep eleven players on their famous slope.

Barnet had gone closest in the first half, hitting the woodwork (which is off-target in my book) whilst Calyton Fortune skied a good opportunity at the other end.

In the second half, Colin found that Matt Lockwood, formerly of Orient, was down our side and he proceeded to give him a load of gip. Surprisingly, Lockwood took it well and even shouted something witty and polite back which rather non-plussed our Eastwood Dynamo.

We were also privy to some excellent play from Abbot - including the odd nutmeg - and he was on the end of some good work on the left-wing from Danny Carlton to put us in the lead.

Thereafter we were under the cosh somewhat and the defence stood up to most of it with Alan White playing a blinder - what they missed was either saved by Oakes or blasted over by the Barnet forward line.

Oakes was taken off with an ankle injury with towards the end of the game after what looked to be an innocuous clash with Paul Furlong - cue reserve keeper Kazimierczak and a severe bout of jitters for the Darlo fans - would our young Pole rise to the occasion?

Oh me of litte faith! He did us proud with at least two wonderful saves which along with a goal-line clearance from Rob Purdie saw us run down the clock for our first win here for 13 years. Very sweet.

Post-match celebrations were held at the Wenlock Arms, just off the City Road, which is a very well-known pub for we beardy-weirdies. Suffice to say it had the usual array of interesting beers and we were able to watch England trounce Slovakia. Various DAFTS drifted off to catch trains home leaving just John, Geoff and myself - when the jazz band started we called it a day...

Aldershot #2 - The Liquid Lunch

We caught the 10:53 to Aldershot and bar a fleeting chat with John Hopps in his smart new Lichtenstein shirt on his way to find other Loidlanders on the train, we arrived without incident and on time just before noon.

At Aldershot station we met John Grey and Rich Parker who'd managed to get down to London before the torrential rain in the north had disrupted train services between Darlo and York. Seemingly some people took over three hours to travel to York from Darlo and services back north had been suspended.

As we walked from the station to the recommended pub, the rain started to get heavier and so we were rather damp by the time we reached the White Lion.

The pub is owned by the Triple fff brewery in nearby Alton and had four of their brews on offer (after some changing of barrels - very busy the night before apparently). Normally there are a couple of guests as well but according to our friendly local, the pumps were US.


I went for a pint of Pressed Rat whilst the others all had Alton's Pride. My pint turned out to be the last of that barrel but was fine - a very nice mild with plenty of flavour.


The concensus on the Alton's Pride was that it was OK but no great shakes - we're not sure how it got to be Champion Beer of 2008 but it's preferable to GK IPA.

I moved onto the Moondance - a fresh barrel - and this was the best pint of the day despite having a slight haze - similar to the Alton but hoppier and with a nice bitter edge. I stuck with it for the rest of the session.


The pub started to get a bit busier - as happens to league new boys (or returnees in this case), a few folk had come along to tick off Aldershot for their 92 league grounds. This included Ginge Stimson - a Colchester fan with two of his friends plus a couple of Wolves fans who were combining football and real ale to good effect.

Local DAFTS Paul Brown and Iain Swalwell dropped in too - they'd brought along their Fijian friend who was wondering why they'd brought him out in this awful weather.

All too soon it was time to leave the comfort of the pub and head onto the Recreation Ground. At least it has stopped raining...