A Grand Day Out? One Fan’s Perspective on “The Richest Prize in Sport”

Aston Villa vs. Fulham - Saturday 26th May, 2018 

The EFL Championship Play-Off Final: 5 pm k-o

“... I know that was then; but it could be again.

It's coming home, it's coming home, it's coming:
Football’s coming home”

Well that’s been one heck of a season. I’m not quite sure how I survived it - nor how many of my blog posts you’ve followed and survived, either. Maybe just a few of the one’s I’ve written on Enfield Town; or perhaps the ones from Fulham FC, as well? [New readers are also always welcome!] Either way, my domestic season finally finished this fine Bank Holiday weekend; and what a weekend it was. After forty-eight games in Fulham’s Championship season, it all came down to 90 minutes more (and perhaps a little extra, on top of that - and penalties) in the play-off final. It was the absolutely last day of the second tier season. Fans of both sides went into the day with, theoretically, the same 50-50 chance of promotion – and with 100% belief in their own team's ability to win. Something had to give. Spoiler Alert! Let’s get the formalities out of the way immediately. After all, if you are a sports fan of any standing, you’ll probably already know the result of this particular game. Suffice it to say, then, that Fulham are back in the top flight (yes, that’s the promised land of the English Premier League) after what has seemed an interminable, four-year absence. “We’re coming for you; we’re coming for you … Man-ches-ter Ci-ty, we’re coming for YOU!”

Fulham achieved this promotion feat by securing only their second EVER play-off fixture victory, in 9 attempts; and by scoring the only goal the club has ever notched up at the home of English football. This was the perfect day to break that Wembley duck and to double their tally of play-off wins. Perfect not just because of the great company (Graham and Jeff, Matt, George et al) the glorious, hot sunshine (thermometers in the stadium reached over 32 degrees Centigrade) and the carnival atmosphere in the stands … but also perfect because the Championship play-off “final” is widely touted to be the most valuable single fixture in the entire football world. Globally. Full-Stop! As a Fulham fan of just less than 42 years standing, this was the first time I’d ever had the chance to follow my club to Wembley; but it may have been worth the long wait, after all. Estimates of the financial value of the outcome of this one game, alone, range from a mere £160 million all the way up to one quarter of a BILLION pounds … depending on whether little old Fulham F. C. (who still play their unfashionable football outside a quaint cottage, down by the river) can maintain their Premier League status, at the end of their first season back in the top flight, starting in August. But for true fans of the club, the supposed financial value of the game is entirely irrelevant, no matter how much it is obsessed over by sports “journalists”, looking to fill blank column inches. What really matters is that coveted top-flight status; being at The Big Show; dining with the Big Boys; watching your club pitting its wits against the best, etc. [The Pharaoh says: since completing this page, I have come across a nice background 'colour' piece by a fellow Fulham fan; whose dad, alone in all the world apparently, archly references the prospect of those lovely 'parachute' payments made available by a generous Premier League, awash with TV cash. Recommended further reading - nice one, Archie!]

The match saw two of the game's longest-established clubs, both with European titles to their names, going head to head, on a flaming hot May day. The weather was so warm that most fans seemed to need to drink their own body weight in fluids, just to make it as far as the turnstiles. Luckily, many licenced premises along the way were more than happy to help them achieve this goal. Some fans almost didn’t make it as far as the turnstiles. Aston Villa (founding members of the Football League; founding members of the Premier League and UEFA Champions in 1982) faced Fulham FC (London’s oldest professional club; Intertoto Cup winners in 2002; and beaten UEFA Europa League finalists in 2010). One curious, related stat which aficionados might like to reflect upon, is that Fulham remain unbeaten at home, in all European competitions; with 17 wins and six draws. We are also the last English club to have beaten Juventus (by 4 - 1, no less!) – a win which came on our run to the Europa League final. So Barcelona, Bayern and Real Madrid: Beware!

The last time Fulham fans had made this journey, in earnest, up the sacred Via Dolorosa of the Wembley Way (now officially renamed Olympic Way, by grey-suited officials, devoid of any empathy) the two biggest-selling UK songs of the year (1975) were “Bye Bye, Baby”, by The Bay City Rollers  and Rod Stewart's “Sailing”. By the very nature of the play-off final fixture, today each team’s fans would find one of these songs to be their appropriate anthem. Last time they were here, Fulham fans had said “Bye Bye, Baby”, to the FA Cup, as West Ham United’s supporters had gone “Sailing” home on clouds of ecstasy, with all the glory of victory.

I’m not going to bother and bore you with all the dull, dry, dusty details of a factual match report. The game has already been covered to within an inch of its life in the sports media; and I’ve told you the outcome, above. Rather, I will attempt to interest and entertain you with a view from just one common man who was on Wembley’s uncommonly over-priced, over-heated, under-respected, yet still fully-packed “terraces”.

“We’re the oldest club in London and we’re going to Wem-Ber-Ley! 

Wem-Ber-Ley! Wem-Ber-Ley! …”

First of all, let me comment on the stadium itself. MY team ended as the winning side. So it's easy to only remember the good parts of the day; of which there were plenty. But what does Wembley stadium contribute to the fan's match-day experience? Apart from the famously clear sight-lines that everybody mentions, what a total disaster that stadium project has turned out to be! Over-budget, over-leveraged, and built in completely the wrong place for twenty-FIRST century football - with vastly insufficient transport infrastructure to cope with an audience of 85,000 paying guests. It’s not too difficult to get to; but it’s almost impossible to get away from. “New” Wembley is England’s very own “Hotel California” … you can check out any time you like – but you can NEVER leave. Amongst the carnage and errors of its project planning and delivery nightmares, Wembley became the subject of the largest construction litigation claim in UK legal history – valued at £253 million. That probably tells you pretty much all you need to know about the FA’s mismanagement of the entire process. Not an ideal start for anybody’s new ‘baby’. Least of all when anybody with more than half a brain was queuing up to offer the opinion that it was the wrong location. When it was first built, the stadium sat in rural isolation. It cost £750,000 and took 300 days to complete, ahead of the 1923 FA Cup Final. The same financial, time and location objectives should have applied to its replacement, some 75 years later. Sir John Betjeman (born 1906) had known that part of 'London' well from his youth, before the stadium came to town; and and summed up the area neatly:
"Beyond Neasden there was an unimportant hamlet where, for years, the Metropolitan didn't stop. Wembley: slushy fields and grass farms." (from "Metro-Land")

The Rural construction site for the Empire Stadium, Wembley (in 1922, when Wembley was still all "slushy fields and grass farms"; and Britain HAD an Empire - rightly or wrongly)

"New" Wembley was always going to be the wrong solution to the FA’s problem; but they just wouldn’t be told. The FA board seemed obsessed with and influenced by OLD Wembley's “heritage”; caught in the dazzling headlights of sepia-tinted Pathé film footage featuring the twin towers; PC George Scorey on his white horse, "Billie"; Stanley Matthews; Ferenc Puskás; 1966; Eusebio; the Charlton brothers; Moore, Hurst & Peters with Jules Rimet; Jimmy Armfield; Johnny Haynes. They were mesmerised by grainy, early colour TV footage of Charlie George (does he really "wear a bra"?); of Bobby Stokes & Bob Stokoe's hat; of Mick Jones's dislocated elbow, Keegan & Heighway; of the Crazy Gang beating the Culture Club and much more, besides. But most of that cast are long-dead; and the world has moved on to multi-billion pound TV deals, hi-tech communications networks, social e-media, "TOWIE" and "Love Island". Instead of making a clean break from the shackles of their outdated, black & white past, when they finally had their chance, the FA made a deliberate point of ignoring all the many nay-sayers; and bloody-mindedly sticking to their mis-firing guns. A "fail" of epic proportions; achieved against the tide of all modern trends - and logic. A stadium designed by committee will always end up a 'camel'.

Spot The Difference: steel arch for twin towers; but still the same old location.
No "slushy fields and grass farms" here, any more; and no Empire!

In recent weeks, the FA may not have actively put the world’s largest “For Sale” sign on their ‘crown jewels’, exactly; but that hasn’t stopped Fulham’s chairman putting in a cheeky little bid for the place. The fact that they are even considering his offer speaks volumes about their desperation to be shot of one of the worst ideas in the history of world sport. It is a “White Elephant” to lead the herd. A proper, tough-skinned tusker. Here’s a thought: let’s knock down an outdated stadium which has outgrown its (originally semi-rural) location and replace it with an “improved stadium” (i.e. a characterless concrete and breeze block over-sized urinal) in the very same, inappropriate location. To the best of my knowledge, nobody responsible has yet done any “time” for this crime against all logic and common sense – a trait which of course, apocryphally at least, is not as common as it ought to be, nor as its name suggests.

I can’t let the small matter of ticket pricing go unmentioned, either. I went to the game in a group of 10. Each of us paid sixty-seven of your English Pounds for the privilege of attending (yes, £67, including "booking fees", whatever they are) and that was just for mid-priced tickets. The pricier seats cost considerably more. Before anyone starts thinking about trying to justify that level of pricing, let me quickly remind you that this was NOT for a World Cup match, or an FA Cup final. This was for a Championship fixture. One which represents entirely incremental revenue to the FA, above and beyond their regular league season income. Being held in a stadium built specifically for the purpose of hosting football matches. So it must be a super-efficient and super-profitable venue, no? And what did we get for all that ticket price amount, exactly? With seats in the back row of the lower tier, we found ourselves beneath a low, suspended ceiling, in airless seats. Stifled, on the hottest day of the year so far, stuck under an over-hang, on what seemed to be radio-active concrete; it felt very much like being placed in a microwave oven, on high power, for two hours. Thanks – for sweet FA! And thank The Lord there wasn’t extra time. They would have been carrying us all out on stretchers with heat-stroke. Or possibly in boxes. Not that I ever did actually do any sitting. My expensively-rented, sweaty, plastic chair remained a curious ornament, for the entire time I was inside the building. I wasn't just being a rebel; nobody in front of us sat down either. So Wembley's famously perfect sight-lines would have been rather lost on me, if I had actually sat down on my over-priced piece of red plastic.

Pre-match beer (and I use the term only very loosely) costs £5.50 per pint for lager and £4.50 for a can (i.e. for less than a pint) of bitter. Both appeared to have been brewed specially, with almost no alcohol; boasting little more % ABV than any self-respecting shandy should. In the case of that can of bitter, I very roughly estimate the margin (Profit on Return) being made by the stadium bar to be something close to an eye-watering 90%. This gives some sense of the desperate levels of fan-fleecing which are required to keep one of the world’s largest white elephants in business – or at least in iced buns and bananas. Unsurprisingly, as a result of these costs (and the soulless environment, inside) most fans stay away from the stadium for as long as is humanly possible before a fixture, without actually missing the kick-off. Many, in fact, are happy to miss the kick-off as well; something that TV cameras regularly demonstrate. Yet another glorious own-goal by the body responsible for notionally running / ruining (* delete as you see applicable) our national game. I say “notionally” because, as most football fans have by now realised, it is in fact the country’s four of five biggest clubs who are really running / ruining football. Unsurprisingly, given the massive cash hand-out on offer, Villa and Fulham couldn’t wait for the opportunity to try and work their way up the greasy pole, into that golden circle; which is strangling its very own golden goose, even as I type.

And as for “security”: don’t make me larrff! I had an opened bottle of water in a plastic carrier bag. It got a cursory glance and an orange “Cleared” sticker, almost before I’d even offered it up for inspection. If we’d been boarding a jumbo jet, I wouldn't have been confident about our prospects of staying in the skies for very long. On this showing, the stadium might be about as safe and secure as some areas within the Afghan capital, Kabul.

Not Just a Match; but One Big Family Day Out …

Fulham Fan Mark Harcombe's‎ grandson walks up the Wembley Way for the first time. Hopefully NOT for the last time! Would it be a day to remember - or to forget?

Children's writer Michael Morpurgo famously knows a thing or two about people, families and 'belonging': "Fulham Football Club ... are a lovely crowd ... very much a family club, compared to the big brassy, money clubs". It's difficult to argue with that view, which you'll hear repeated often, elsewhere. The day would be a big family day out for South Londoners everywhere; from as far afield as Australia. When Fulham missed out on automatic promotion back to the Premier League, at Birmingham City, on the final day of the 'regular' season, many fans were down-hearted; but not me! I never doubted we had enough quality to make it through the play-off process. And why would anybody give up on the chance of a sunny, May, family day out at Wembley? Transport and other logistics matters excluded, that is. I suspect Villa fans may feel differently about this, now; but, unless you are a follower of one of the biggest English clubs, trips to Wembley to see your team play are likely to be as rare as hens’ teeth, or a fully functioning UK rail network.

So when they do come about (in Fulham’s case, that's about every 43 years; for Network Rail it's somewhat less frequently) you’ll probably want to spend a bit of time planning a big day out, like Pee Wee Herman. Ours started at The Horse and Groom, in Great Portland Street, around lunch-time. Strangely, there were no other Fulham fans about. Although I did see a few folk wandering around Oxford Street in Villa shirts, they just appeared to be lost in the Big Smoke - or “… In Translation”, like tennis reporter Jonathan Pinfield, of Yorkshire's BCB Radio, this week. One reason the Horse & Groom wasn’t busy (there were just 2 people inside, apart from the bar staff) is because it's a Samuel Smith’s pub: an acquired taste, for those who like such things. Nobody had a good word to say about the beer (“all head and no body!”); but the location could hardly have been better. After a few scoops, enjoyed while basking in the warm sunshine of the Beautiful South, we took a gentle stroll up to Great Portland Street station. From there, a Metropolitan Line tube train whisked us off directly to Wembley Park. As we neared our stop, I couldn’t help reflecting on those lyrics, penned by the Eagles. It couldn’t be easier to arrive at Wembley; but how bad would getting away be, later that day; and what sort of mood would we all be in?

Being English football fans, it was clearly time for some more beers. We avoided the Fan Zone (of course!) and headed north up Bridge Road to The Torch public house, via a convenience store selling comparatively cold beers at relatively reasonable prices. The corner shop pit-stop was well-advised. Although The Torch had been designated as a Fulham fans’ pub for the day, the security cordon at the entry gate was far more effective than the equivalent checks at the stadium itself. So effective, in fact, that there appeared to be more people outside the barriers, on the pavements and grass verges in front of the pub, drinking from cans, than there were within the barricaded confines of the venue. Although the photo below might suggest otherwise.

Fulham fans leaving it as late as is humanly possible to head for the soulless concourses of England's National Stadium (source: Archie Rhind-Tutt)

There was a loud wall of noise generated by pre-match singing and chanting; but it grew super-humanly louder still, whenever a bus full of fellow supporters (or, more rarely, a lost Aston Villa coach which had come the wrong way) passed by outside. There was dancing on the picnic tables, flag-flying, an occasional plastic glass which chose to go airborne - and a growing sense of pre-match hysteria. Was this for real; or were we still dreaming?

Many fans had posted in the run-up to the match that they were “buzzing” and having trouble sleeping. I suppose we all respond differently. Personally, I slept untroubled sleep. Long before I made it to the bizarre white tubular arch over Wembley (and no, it doesn't trip off the tongue, like "The Twin Towers", does it?) this play-off final lark already had me behaving like an 8-year-old, again. Actually dreaming about football in my sleep. First of all I dreamed that Mitro was on fire (not literally, of course) and scored Fulham's opener. Then I dreamt that the second was scored, after a mazy run from the right-back position, past most of the Villa side, and after a cleverly disguised cut inside, onto his left by … 

me!

Now, back in the bad old days of the early '90's (when Fulham were, briefly, the second worst team in the Football League) if I'd bothered to bring my boots along to Craven Cottage, I might have quite fancied my chances of getting a game. It had been an easy decision to leave them at home today, though, as I set off for Wem-Ber-Ley. I reckoned Ryan Fredericks starting place was fairly safe. I'll stick with my Over-50's Walking Football side, for now. Unless Slav needs me next season, of course, if Ryan F moves on, at the end of his contract.

"He Comes from Ser - Bee - Ya. He'll F** - Kin' Mur - Der Ya!"
Slaviša Jokanović: the man with a plan, which doesn't include me. Yet!

Some People Are On The Pitch! They Think It's All Over - It Is Now!

The match itself felt far more exciting to me, at least, than its eventual scoreline (0 – 1) might imply to the neutral. That was in part because it was filled with so many of the various dramas that devotees of The Beautiful Game seek out on a weekly, fortnightly, or other basis. There were heroes and (pantomime) villains; there was, indeed, a tight score-line; there was a sending off; there were penalty appeals and (other) controversial refereeing decisions; there was a singing duel held by fans throughout; and there was nail-biting aplenty – especially during the six minutes of added time, at the end. This was Shakespearean tragedy, writ large. Villa’s Grealish gamely tried to deliver Prince Hamlet; but was mostly reduced to a cameo as King Lear’s fool. There were strong hints at the deadly jealousy of Othello and Iago; but we had come to bury Villa – not to praise them.

Villa's play-maker goes airborne (yet again!)
It was just about the only way through Fulham's dominant defence.

Grealish spent much of his energy, throughout the match, diving around unnecessarily (like Olympian Tom Daley on the ‘reality’ TV show “Splash!” – but with an even worse barnet) yet still found time to play many other roles, besides; like Alec Guinness in “Kind Hearts and Coronets”. At one point, just before the half-hour mark, he even managed to impersonate a  beached octopus, by throwing himself to the ground (yet again!) and flailing his many limbs about, in front of the referee. In that particular incident, Grealsih filled so much of the available, hallowed Wembley turf that there was nowhere for Fulham’s poor old Fredericks to put his feet – so he just had to step ever so lightly and carefully onto Grealish’s leg! The latter’s reaction to this moment, alone, was worthy of several Oscars. Some fans thought he had actually died.

If the same Villa midfielder had got the straight red card that his late, studs-up "tackle" from behind on Tom Cairney had deserved (after 63 minutes) then Grealish wouldn't have even been on the pitch, seven minutes later, to over-react to Denis Odoi's clumsy challenge on him, which earned the diminutive Fulham central defender his second yellow card and an ‘early bath’. 

Grealish takes out his opposite number, Cairney - and somehow avoids a red card.

Despite the obvious bias of TV commentators and highlights editors, they could not influence the actual result; and the better footballing team won, on the day. Villa managed just ONE goal in their three play-off matches (and that was from a set piece) and spent most of the first half of the final trying to stop Fulham from playing, rather than getting on with an attacking game plan of their own. They never really looked like scoring; even against “ten-man Fulham”, in the last 26 minutes (and they still only ended up with 49% of possession, even then; despite that extra man advantage). The best players on the pitch were ALL on the Fulham side. Grealish would have struggled to make my top 5, ahead of Cairney, Sessegnon, Bettinelli, McDonald, Mitrovic, Ream and Johansen. Two of these had combined for the decisive goal, demonstrating their individual brilliance as well as their team ethic. Sessgnon battling to secure a ball he should by rights have lost, after a heavy first touch, before turning and delivering a slide-rule pass through the Villa defence, in front of Cairney's intelligent and incisive run.

Captain Cairney finds space behind Villa's AWOL back four and slots past a slow-to-react Johnstone, combining with teenager Sessegnon for the game's defining moment of brilliance. Stourbridge were NOT happy!

Yet many sports writers were having multiple orgasms over the genius of Grealish's performance. Several said, bizarrely, that he was unlucky to be on the losing side when, in fact, his poor match-day was probably THE decisive Villa factor in the result. He barely got going, “bottled” his side's best three goal-scoring chances and, otherwise, mostly just generally failed to turn up. Instead he expended his valuable energy, on a stifling-hot day, executing perfect, Daley-esque swallow dives; and generally looking enraged at the "attention" he claimed he was getting from his Fulham markers. At this point, The Pharaoh simply scratches his head, sighs and walks away to prepare for next season, in the English Premier League. Where the standard of match reporting will (surely?!) be so much better and less biased - and the standard of diving will be more professional.

... and cue the goal celebrations 

One SKY TV commentator neatly summed up Fulham’s season: “Nowhere, in November; then half a season unbeaten. Now Fulham are at their desired destination”. Followers of last season's Chris Martin debacle will know that our destination, infamously, "is not a train station"! Elsewhere, the Sport Witness website summarised the media's under-whelming confidence in Fulham FC’s new, hard-won top-flight status: “… now they need to start planning for at least one season in the top tier of English football.” Fans will be hoping for many more than just ONE season back in the world’s best and most exciting domestic league.

A former England Captain searches for Mitro's wallet. No foul here: now move along!

As for John Terry: how the once-mighty have fallen. Almost 11 years ago, the first game involving the full English national team at this New Wembley stadium was a friendly against Brazil, on 1st June, 2007. The match saw the England captain (JT) become the first England international goal scorer at the new stadium, when he notched the opener, in the 68th minute. For the record,  the full-time result was a 1–1 draw… and, as Max Boyce used to proudly boast, “I was there!” JT was much vaunted as a possible deciding factor, ahead of this play-off final; but he turned out to be mostly a passenger - and he is now no longer even on the Villa bus. 

Cairney & McDonald share the spoils of victory, with some friends

The After-Math

Fulham FC were the third-best team in the Championship this year, measured over 46 regular season games. For much of the last four months they had topped the league's form table. Now they had reconfirmed their status as the third-best side, through the ordeal of those three extra post-season play-off fixtures. There was an hour or so of post-match celebrations in the Fulham half of the stadium; somewhat less in the Villa end. The players partied; 38,000 Fulham fans partied; GK Bettinelli carried a streaming black flare around the stadium, like an Olympic torch-bearer; red-carded Denis Odoi partied on the Wembley cross-bar, in scenes reminiscent of a visit by Scotland fans, 41 years earlier – though with less tartan on display and with less turf stolen. There were ‘official’, stage-managed celebrations on a hastily-erected sponsor's stage; there were rather more instantaneous celebrations pitch-side, in front of the fans; there were mad scenes in the (Fulham) dressing room. Every player on the winning side was interviewed to within an inch of their lives. And then we all went home; at first VERY slowly, down the STILL over-crowded Wembley Way (see above - "... you can NEVER leave!"); before eventually continuing, still slowly, via the welcoming hostelries of Central London.

When it's party time, down South

On returning home late that night, I also received a welcome, if somewhat surprising, compliment from Mrs. Pharaoh: “Wow! You’re hung like a horse!” I must have still been a little deafened (and perhaps also somewhat ‘tired and emotional’) at the time; since it later turned out that what she’d actually said was “You’re a little hoarse” … but, then again, she is not a sports fan of any standing. I’m still buzzing now!

Odoi Celebrates, Scots Wa Hae Stylie, in front of the Villa Supporters
(source: Getty Images)

The Premier League's own website could not help but heap praise on Fulham's achievement AND their style of play. In their official preview of next season, they say: "Fulham look well suited to Premier League football ... the Cottagers pass and move with confidence ... Fulham remind me of a Pep Guardiola team. They play attractive football, based on movement and domination of the ball ,,, It will be tougher to repeat this in the Premier League but ... Fulham are set to be a delight to watch." You heard it here first! AND you can still get odds of 1,500-1 from some bookies for Fulham to win the Premier League, next term. Similar odds, in fact, to those for finding Elvis alive, at the back of your wardrobe.

There is, however, barely any respite from the Beautiful Game, these days, for true fans. Almost before the ink was even dry on John Terry’s misspelt letter of resignation (there are at least TWO 'K's in "knackered", John!), the CONIFA World Cup was getting under way at non-league football grounds across London. Including the prestigious, primary venue of Enfield Town’s own Donkey Drome – the QEII Stadium … refurbished just a few years ago for less than the price of a round of drinks, at Wembley. More details will follow from this fascinating tournament, soon, I suspect. And then, before the over-paid stars of the EPL can regroup in August, there will be the small matter of Russia’s (allegedly) corruptly purchased FIFA World Cup; and the disappointment of watching England’s early exit.

“Three lions on a shirt; Jules Rimet still gleaming.

Fifty-two years of hurt never stopped me dreaming.”

I leave you with one final, intriguing football statistic, from this near-perfect Championship season. Fans of other teams regularly justify their status as a “Big Club” by highlighting the size of their fan base; particularly their away support. Thanks to the incremental impact of their epic, final away day, at Wembley, little old Fulham topped the league table for away support, this season. Ahead, even, of those “Bigger Clubs” (e.g. Leeds United, Wolves, Middlesbrough, Sheffield Wednesday – and Aston Villa). If size matters, then perhaps “now you’d better believe us …”? But I suspect that many still will not. See: https://www.footballwebpages.co.uk/championship/attendances/away 

So many jokes, so many sneers;

But all those "oh-so-nears"

Wear you down, through the years ...

It's coming home, it's coming home, it's coming,

Football's coming home.

All the best from The (Fulham) Football Pharoah

Photos: mostly sourced from the FFC website - plus some fan snaps, credited where possible.