(Published in the Percy Main v Blyth Town programme on 11th September 2010)
Depending on your point of view, I’ve either got a brilliant or a terrible sense of timing. As my articles in the last two programmes explained, I was in the Basque Country in mid July to see Spain win the World Cup, which displayed a pretty astute choice of holiday destination I thought. However, despite 12 glorious days in Euskadi, my wanderlust had not been sated in its entirety. Hence, when it seemed certain that Percy Main and Heaton Winstons would be without a fixture on August 7th, I booked a return flight to Dublin, on the basis that this would probably be my last free Saturday until June 2011.
Drawing a veil over Percy Main 4 Wallsend Town 3 and Houghton Vets 2 Heaton Winstons 1 (who organises these last minute games anyway?), I chose Ireland as I could doss with mates for free (Declan in Dalkey, South Dublin and John in Maynooth, Kildare, both of whom have visited Purvis Park before) and get to see some football. This was my fifth trip over to the land of my ancestors and the country I feel to be my natural home since Summer 2007; the fact I managed to do some groundhopping made it even more special, but this is, I suppose, where my bad timing comes in.
Declan moved to the affluent south side of Dublin in 2007 and the journey to his house involves a half hour trip on the DART (Dublin’s equivalent of the Metro). About 5 minutes from the city centre is what was known as Lansdowne Road stadium, where English hooligans disgracefully rioted in February 1995 because Warren Barton had been given his full debut, or something. Ever since Declan had moved out that way, Lansdowne Road had been a building site, but now it was finally finished. Lansdowne Road wasn’t the official home of Irish football; that was Dalymount Park, home to Ireland’s oldest club Bohemian. It isn’t the biggest ground; that is the 82,300 capacity Croke Park (home of the GAA and blessed with the Cusack Stand), where football and rugby had controversially lodged these past few years. However, the 53,000 seat redeveloped Lansdowne Road (dismally rechristened the AVIVA Stadium), is supposed to be a partnership venture between Irish Rugby and Football. Suffice to say the Irish economic meltdown, which has made the British recession seem like losing your small change down the back of the sofa in comparison, has resulted in some fairly harsh words about funding and further financial viability.
In the short term, that means Trapattoni needs to get his side winning games to get the crowds in during the upcoming Euro 2012 qualifiers, which they did with a 1-0 win in their first game away in Armenia. I’m writing before the second qualifier in this international week, but if they fail to beat Andorra at home, it will be a seismic shock. In the long term, well considering the preponderance of ghost estates of half built luxury houses that are scattered all across Ireland, the AVIVA Stadium could end up as decaying monument to the folly of venture capitalism, if the playing side goes wrong.
To be fair, there were very few empty seats on the opening night on Wednesday 4th August (I was at Pelton Buffs 1 Percy Main 3), when a Manchester United side completely destroyed a League of Ireland Select XI by 7-1, with the overwhelming majority of those who had paid e60 or e45 being locally based Man United “supporters,” who were openly decrying and ridiculing home based players for their lack of skill. The AVIVA stadium is an impressive glass bowl that has been stylishly and artistically decorated, but I’m glad I wasn’t at this game as I’ve never been a fan of treachery (well except by Sir Roger Casement, but that’s a different matter).
The first game of my trip should have been the top of the table big Dublin derby between Shamrock Rovers and Bohemian at the Tallaght stadium on Friday night. However, here’s where the bad timing really comes in to it; the game was actually played on the Sunday, when I was already at the airport. The reason for the delay had been Rovers’ success in knocking out Israeli side Bnei-Yehuda from the Europa league qualifiers, to set up a lucrative clash with Juventus. The first leg had seen a 6,000 sell-out in Tallaght when “La Vecchia” strolled to a 2-0 win. The return, played on the Thursday I arrived, was not held in Turin, as Stadio Olimpico was hors de combat while AC/DC performed their leaden, irrelevant pomp rock there, but in Serie B Modena’s ground.
In fact, it could have been held in Atlantis as the Biblical rainstorm made conditions a farce, with pools of standing water making anything resembling football seem impossible. For much of the first half, it was water polo without hands. Presumably the weather was a great leveller, as Juve only won 1-0, courtesy of a tremendous 35-yard free kick from Alessandro Del Piero. Now, I have to say I’ve no time for Shamrock Rovers (I follow Bohemian as my Dublin team, who trail Shamrock Rovers in the title race by 7 points as I write), but I have to say this result and their performance was a great credit to the League of Ireland and something I hoped the 49k Man United “fans” at the AVIVA Stadium on the Wednesday should have seen and perhaps been inspired by, but no such luck.
On the Friday, after an enjoyable day out in the Wicklow Hills, Declan and I headed for the Carlisle Grounds, home of Bray Wanderers, for their clash with Sligo Rovers, to be part of a crowd later reported as 527, including former Carlisle manager Roddy Collins. I’d been to Bray before, in summer 1998, when Didi Hamann made his debut for Newcastle in a 6-0 friendly victory, but I have to say, this competitive match was far better than that one. We chose this ahead of second place St. Pat’s versus Drogheda (2-0; att 1,290) as I was at Richmond Park last time I was over and fancied seeing Sligo, who are managed by implausibly husky Paul Cook, the former Wolves, Coventry and Tranmere midfielder.
Bray, managed by former Doncaster and Carlisle striker Eddy Gormley, were rock bottom of the Airtricity Premier Division with 7 points and seemingly required snookers to stay up. This isn’t their fault as last season they were relegated after a play-off loss to Sporting Fingal from north Dublin and had cut their cloth for 2010 accordingly. Of course, Irish economic anguish played a part and both Derry City and Cork City were relegated for financial impropriety, reprieving a woefully ill-prepared Bray side. They lost again, 3-1, at this game, but at least they gave it a go.
Sligo brought about 50 fans and were cheered up when Padraig Amond nodded them in to a 10th minute lead. The home crowd stayed supportive, but had no cause for optimism until Sligo’s former Mackem midfielder Richie Ryan was harshly sent off for a sliding tackle on wet grass on the half hour. His team are nicknamed “the bit o red” and after he’d seen something similar, the home side gave their all, though it took a woeful keeping error by John Gibson, who kicked the ball against Bray’s Kelly when attempting to field a pass back, to get them level.
However any hopes the home side had of a morale-boosting win were snuffed out by two Sligo goals, both orchestrated by the best player on the park, Cameroon international veteran Joseph Ndo and the latter expertly lobbed in by Benin international Romauld Boco. Sligo played some lovely stuff and thoroughly deserved their win. The only down side being I failed to get any memorabilia to display for our clubhouse, being confused when asking what the pennants cost and getting the response “Three Hail Marys” (it works better aloud; trust me!).
On the Saturday, Declan and I, in the company of John, struck out west. Travelling through 8 counties, namely Wicklow, Dublin, Kildare, Meath, Westmeath, Longford, Roscommon and Lovely Leitrim, we arrived at Flancare Park, home of Longford Town, via pint stops in Carrick on Shannon (Leitrim side) and Boyle in Roscommon (John’s home spot) for their home game with Salthill Devon in Airtricity Division 1. Salthill Devon, playing their home fixtures at Drom Soccer Field, are the third side from Galway, after Galway United and Mervue (who arrived in 2009 to replace Cobh Ramblers), in the Airtricity League. They beat perennial wooden-spoonists Kildare County in a play off and have replaced them at the bottom in their debut season, proving that 3 clubs from a place as small as Galway is nonsense. If the FAI had any sense, there would be a single 16 team division, with two regionalised leagues below this to give stability and permanence to a league that seems to be in a constant state of flux.
Longford Town were formed in 1924 and won the FAI Cup in 2003 and 2004, causing them to upgrade their stylish and smart Flancare Park to a 7,000 capacity all seated stadium. While they had a cup quarter final at home to Shamrock Rovers to look forward to, which they lost 2-0, there is no danger of any games selling out, as tonight’s crowd, including 4 visitors from Salthill and us 3 jokers, was reported as a less than staggering 170. The views of County Longford from the stand are fine and impressive ones, with verdant fields stretching away in all directions, with our westerly location meaning it was daylight until almost 10pm. Sadly the game may have been enthusiastically played, with Salthill manager Emlyn Long displaying Oscar winning histrionics on the sideline, but it was comically terrible in execution on a pitch with extremely long grass.
Longford captain John Lester missed an early penalty, harshly given for hands, before Salthill’s Victor Collins scored quite a presentable striker’s goal to give them a half time lead. A rapid double by Jason Odalele seemed to have turned things round, only for a mad scramble in the last few minutes to give Salthill an undeserved equaliser, which the manager celebrated as if they’d won the Champions’ League.
Interestingly the Longford programme included an impassioned article slagging off the AVIVA stadium opener, especially Irish Man United fans who don’t support the domestic league. It was accompanied by a photo, captioned “Man United international striker JOHN Owen scoring in Wednesday’s game at the AVIVA Stadium.” What can you say?
We headed back to Maynooth in Kildare to drink fine pints of black porter until 2.00am, before I awoke hungover, malodorous and dehydrated on the Sunday, to news of Irish Senator Ivor Callelly’s imminent arrest on corruption and fraud charges, having claimed thousands in expenses from a non-existent mobile phone. More cheeringly, Andrea Byrne of Leixlip has won the All Ireland Karaoke Championships, so it’s good to see the cultural traditions of The Clancy Brothers, Liam Kelly, Ronnie Drew (and his niece Hartlepool Drew) are continuing, as well as the political ones of Charlie Haughey and Bertie Aherne.
Heading back to Dublin Airport, we passed Croke Park where over 40,000 gathered to see Kilkenny beat my ancestral county of Cork (and their famously gay goalkeeper Donal Og Cusack) 3-22 to 0-19 in the Hurling semi-final. I must get to see a match at Croke Park next time I’m over. I also need to see Sporting Fingal’s Morton Stadium and Tallaghtfornia, as it is ironically known, but not today as Shamrock Rovers beat Bohemian 3-0, in front of a very healthy 5,200 onlookers. Perhaps my timing wasn’t that bad after all, though I would imagine Eddy Gormley disagrees, as he was relieved of his duties immediately after the game against Sligo.
Roll on next June!
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