Aston Villa v Tottenham Hotspur – Sunday 20th October 2013 – Premier League

So back from Belgium the week before, and then off to Villa Park for Super Sunday, it’s not a bad life really!

The good thing about a 4pm kick-off is you don’t have to leave until late and you can get a decent lie-in so it was a leisurely train ride up to my favourite train station, Birmingham New Street (Yes I have a favourite train station now), and then onto Witton on a train weighed down by Spurs fans singing about West Ham. A quick walk round the corner, where I found out my Wales coat isn’t as waterproof as I’d hoped, and Villa Park came into view.

Fair to say I was looking forward to the trip, Villa Park looks like a top stadium with a big history after hosting World Cup and European Championship matches as well as over 50 FA Cup semi-finals. However, first impressions are brown, beige and also brown. Probably the least impressive looking stadium from the outside I’ve encountered, kind of office block-like, except for the massive ‘Aston Villa Football Club’ sign. Distinctly underwhelmed, I headed across to the Villa Store which is literally a full-on store rather than a club shop. It’s completely separate from the stadium and, after getting past the massive queue waiting for shirt printing, inside it’s huge!

Villa ‘Brown’ Park

A very wet Villa StoreInside ‘Macron World’

Now, the stadium and the shop are all well and good, but there was really only one reason I wanted to visit Villa Park and, as I’m sure sounds really normal, it was to walk up a flight of stairs. There is of course a back story, they aren’t just any stairs, they’re the stairs on the Ford advert before Premier League games on Sky. I think most football fans out there will know the ones I’m on about. I was hoping to see them on the essential lap of the stadium before the game, but I realised that actually my entrance to the stadium was at the top of them, moment of the day (I’m normally a really cool guy, but that goes out the window when Super Sunday steps are involved).

After ticking off the lifetime ambition of walking up the stairs, I had to negotiate what Aston Villa appeared to class as the most difficult part of a matchday, entering the stadium. Accompanying my ticket was a leaflet on how to use the ticket scanner on the turnstile, a system used by a large enough number of clubs that it is not an unusual system. Obviously Aston Villa have assumed that their fans and people visiting the stadium are not in possession of brains, therefore the step by step instructions are necessary to avoid fans just walking into the barrier until somebody lets them in.

THE ACTUAL STAIRS!!!!

As the outside of the stadium was so pants I was slightly concerned what the inside would be like but thankfully it was much better, certainly better than the rubbish burgers (the less said about that the better). One of the bigger stadiums in the country with a capacity of 43,000 it is impressive, with a classic 4 separate stands rather than the modern bowl stadiums. I was sat in the top tier of the Holte End, a decent seat for £20, considering I pay more for every Cardiff home game now.

The never-to-be-spoken of snacksMy view for the afternoon

Onto the game, the secondary reason for the visit, after the stairs which I love, and it on paper was a decent game. Last time at Villa Park Aston Villa had beaten Manchester City in a thriller, whilst Tottenham looking to bounce back after losing 3-0 to West Ham the previous week, despite spending £109m over the summer to replace Gareth Bale. With the teams announced Spurs started with Andros Townsend after starring on his England debut, and Villa put Benteke on the bench on his return from injury.

Chances were few and far between in the first half, Villa had an Ashley Westwood free-kick saved by Hugo Lloris in the Tottenham goal and an Andreas Weimann shot found the side netting, fooling large sections of the Villa Park crowd. The deadlock was broken somewhat fortuitously by man of the moment Townsend as his shot-cross snuck in at the far post. Unfortunately what followed wasn’t brilliant for Spurs fans and football in general as a smoke bomb was thrown from the away section and hit the assistant referee on the back of the head. Fortunately he was not seriously hurt and carried on the game.

Tottenham went in ahead at the break and could’ve extended it a few minutes into the second half but for Brad Guzan in the Villa goal denying Paulinho. Aston Villa needed to get back into the game and on the hour Paul Lambert bowed to the pressure from the Villains fans to introduce Christian Benteke. He almost immediately made an impact as he met a cross from the ever dangerous Bacuna but it was just too high for him and the ball went over the bar. Benteke and co were punished not long after as Soldado won the ball high up the field, slick passes from Holtby and Paulinho put the ball on a plate for Soldado inside the 18 yard box and the Spaniard finished neatly.

That was the last real action of the game and Spurs showed glimpses of the quality their squad possesses but still struggled to maintain their performance for 90 minutes against an industrious yet quality lacking Villa side. The main talking point of the day for the majority would be the incident involving the smoke bomb, but I was just pleased to walk up the Super Sunday stairs, did I mention the stairs at all in this blog?

The necessary kick-off picThe swimming pool aka pitchsideSpurs celebrate their first goalPerfect photography, capturing the moment the assistant gets hit.Spurs and their fans celebrate their second goalMatch ActionMatch ActionMatch Action

Fulham v Cardiff City – Saturday 28th September 2013 – Premier League

The blog is back, and it’s made the big time, the Premier League!

Apologies for not blogging the first few trips of the season, basically, I was too lazy. But worry not, I will be blogging from now until the end of the season!

Not a bad place to start either, for my first Premier League Away Day ever. Been a long time coming with Cardiff, having seen us play in every league from Division Three up and almost go out of business at least twice, it’s pretty surreal playing a team like Fulham on a level playing field, rather than a one-off Cup tie. Fair to say the whole Premier League malarkey hasn’t really sunk in yet.

So, at an almost warm Cardiff City Stadium with Lewis, aka Big Lew, the coach journey began. There were a few pointers learned from this leg of the trip, firstly, the breakfasts at Reading Services are overpriced and not very nice (£7!). Secondly, if offered a choice of DVDs, always choose Eddie Stobart’s Best Lorry Manoeuvres, which leads me onto the final thing, Cardiff v West Brom from the 2007/08 season is one of, if not the, most boring game that’s ever been played. Let’s just say there were no goals and Cardiff finished with Trevor Sinclair up front after Warren Feeney had come on and been subbed off. On the plus side Ricky Scimeca did play!

Anyway, when I’d woken up from that, we had parked up at the official Craven Cottage coach area, or as it is more commonly known, the bus lane on Fulham Palace Road where you can’t even see the stadium. After a stroll around the posh residential area we reached the stadium, although it easily could’ve been mistaken for an outbuilding at the Queen’s country estate or some courts of law,the only thing giving it away was the sign on the side of the actual cottage (hence Craven Cottage).

Emphasis on THE Fulham Football Club, rather than all those fake ones around!

After a walk around the sides of the ground, you can’t walk all the around because some plonker has put a bloody huge river in the way, we went into the stadium via the obligatory security pat down (Big Lew’s favourite part of the day apparently). Fair to say that they don’t really have a concourse under the away end, the Putney End, it’s just the back of the stand really. However, they were showing the Spurs v Chelsea game on BT Sport and there were more than enough food and drink kiosks so queuing was never a problem which is difficult when there’s 4-5,000 fans around. The food and drink itself was a bit on the expensive side, as per normal for football stadiums, although £3.50 for a pint before 2.15pm isn’t a bad idea on Fulham’s behalf. £4.50 for a burger however….

 

On going into the stadium the stewards were trying to make sure that supporters sat where they were supposed to, an impossible task when it comes to Cardiff away games, so we decided to ditch our actual seats, which were right on top of the corner flag and move somewhere behind the goal. This turned out to be a bad decision however, two words; neutral section. Yes Craven Cottage has two blocks next to the away end, un-segregated, where fans of the home team, away team and of any team can purchase a ticket. The neutral zone is the definition of ‘atmosphere killer’. The only bearable thing to come out of the neutral zone this particular day was seeing Ben Shepherd off’ve Goals on Sunday. But, overall, even that didn’t make the section worthwhile.

So after moving back across somewhere towards our original seats and actually in the away end the game began and quickly things started going well for Cardiff. After seven minutes Scotty Parker hobbled off to be replaced by 267 year old Karagounis, and then five minutes later captain for the day Steven Caulker thumped a Whittingham corner into the net. 1-0 and the Putney End went mad! For the next half hour it was all Cardiff, Sidwell cleared off the line from Taylor, Stockdale saved well from Turner and Caulker had a goal disallowed because Campbell had brushed Stockdale. City really should’ve been at least two or three up going in at half-time but just as the 4th Official put his board up Bryan Ruiz, who had only replaced Kacanikanalic (probably spelled right) two minutes earlier, curled a beauty into the top left corner of David Marshall’s goal and it was 1-1 at the break.

Cardiff had chances second half as Campbell scooped a deflected Jordon Mutch, more on him later, cross over from six yards and Gunnarsson wasted a great shooting opportunity trying to play a clever ball to Whittingham but it was Fulham who came back into it more as Berbatov finally started to play, and it was he who headed wide at the far post. Patjim Kasami (great name) fluffed a good chance after bundling through Cardiff’s defence while an inviting Richardson ball flew across the face of goal with no Fulham players there to apply the finishing touch. But it was the substitute Mutch in the 90th minute who came down with the ball from a Marshall punt and pinged into the same top corner as Ruiz had earlier to score his first Bluebirds goal and claim a vital three points.

I Think I can honestly say that the celebration to that goal and the final whistle, which consisted of staying behind for 15 minutes singing, was one of the best celebrations I’ve been involved with as a Cardiff fan, especially away from home. Having said before the game I’d take a point, to dominate and win the game was particularly pleasing.

Craven Cottage itself is a fair enough ground, an old fashioned stadium with it’s four separate stands, but does seem out of date in a league dominated by corporate people. I don’t see many people being attracted by the hospitality boxes which are actually just porta-cabins. It certainly could help the club on the pitch as the ground has the potential to be Ninian Park-esque with a great atmosphere and become a fortress for Fulham but the fans clearly have very little intention of making any noise, even when they scored the fans opted for polite clapping. They’re probably not helped by the types of people in the well-off local area they get in as fans.

A first Premier League Away Day made memorable by the brilliant Cardiff fans anyway, and some points to remember, always choose Eddie Stobart, and neutral sections are pants.