The Wright family are hopeful that both Hereford United and West Bromwich will be in a higher league next season. They watched the victory over Wrexham on Tuesday evening. Below is Glynis Wright's account of their evening at Edgar Street.
Amidst all the media hype of our very own promotion (league title?) push, as far as the Wright household are concerned, there just might be a double-header on the way. You’ll find all the evidence needed within the oft-forgotten depths of what’s now the Second Division (known better to old codgers like myself as the Fourth Division, but hey – who’s quibbling?), where Hereford United have become little-recognised promotion challengers themselves.
The competition up there at the top is astonishingly fierce, making United’s elevation far from certain, even now – MK Dons and Peterborough definitely up, but the rest still scrapping it out for the remaining promotion place; with but two games remaining for The Bulls, courtesy last Tuesday night’s Edgar Street fixture versus Wrexham, the outcome still remains very much undecided – but even so, with United travelling to nothing-to-play-for Brentford this weekend, then rounding off their 2007-08 programme by playing host to Alan Buckley’s mid-table Grimsby, the atmosphere in the cathedral city is now very much one of ‘game on’!
Their personal claim for the wearing of the Tyrian purple was given a pretty massive boost, thank you very much, by them nabbing all three points at poor doomed Wrexham’s expense in midweek. By triumphing over Brian Little’s bunch of Welsh kids in such fine style 2-0, against a side created when Little effectively gave his experienced pros the Big Heave-Ho last weekend, and threw the kids in instead: not as daft as it sounds, actually. They were genuinely up for it, the only thing mitigating against them being their relative lack of experience at that level, which ultimately proved their undoing) they’re genuinely on board the Promotion Express, and heading for one hell of a bumpy ride from now until the end of the season.
As per usual at Edgar Street, amidst all the genuine human drama being played out on the pitch below, the spectators also contributed richly to the proceedings. Many of those I’ve mentioned before after similar trips to that cathedral city, so now isn’t a bad time to remind you of their various eccentricities.
First to greet us was Brian the Bluenose who in between visiting Edgar Street, he endures masochistic trips to St Andrews as part of his distinctly-schizophrenic football-watching lifestyle. Post- the infamous 5-1 mauling Villa, we had planned to supply him with a large paper bag with eyeholes cut to suitable apertures, but when Virgin telephone man suddenly paid us a visit about ten minutes before we were due to set out, that one got forgotten in the unexpectedness of their arrival. Bugger. Not that it mattered, though: we certainly reminded him of that hugely-embarrassing final score, last Sunday. And, with Blues still embroiled in their own battle to avert the dreaded drop, it could well be that we’ll be greeting him with much more than a cheeky grin, come Hereford’s Final Day Of Reckoning, in around seven day’s time. “Birmingham, Birmingham – Albion want your Premier League spot …” would do nicely.
As for the rest of the bunch, even if you couldn’t directly see ‘em, industrial-deafness-level vocals more than made up for that small deficiency. Take, for example, The Irritating One At The Back. A ghastly creature first ‘outed’ in this column after Hereford’s FA Cup game versus Cardiff, his principal ‘claim to fame’ consists solely of jacking up the decibel levels to unbearable proportions. Which wouldn’t matter diddly-squat, but for one small detail I’ve purposefully omitted: 99.9% of his vocal efforts consist entirely of a drip-drip feed of pure negativity.
He is not someone easily satisfied, no matter how heroic the attacking moves made by the Hereford crew. Even during spells when the home side were consistently playing pure football, the sublime standard of which would surely have brought a smile of knowing approbation to the face of our own manager Tony Mowbray (not usually a striking feature of games played at that level, believe you me!) Chummy at the back was still berating Bulls players for not getting the ball into the box quickly enough for his liking! Dearie, dearie me: where on Earth do they find such appalling specimens?
Contrast his splenic comments from the back with those of ‘Madame Defarge’, so ‘christened’ by me because of an unfortunate tendency to pass adverse comment upon refereeing and fourth official standards courtesy the simple expedient of loud and disparaging comment, and always coming in the form of cackling, ‘cracked-record’ tones. Why the name of a famously out-of-touch member of the 18th century French aristocracy? Simply read Charles Dickens’ ‘A Tale Of Two Cities’ to make the necessary French Revolutionary connection. No immediate access to said literary classic? ‘Think old lady knitting furiously in the front row as French aristos innumerable, the wonderfully-deluded Marie Antoinette included, lose their heads courtesy Madame Guillotine’ will just about get you there.
Perhaps it’s just me, being something of an outsider. Regulars get used to and become at least partly immune to the peccadilloes of other regulars. I know what to expect from those at the Hawthorns … though admittedly the permanently enraged yet basically ignorant Old Fart in the row in front takes a lot of getting used to.
Mind you, Talking Bill’s not all that averse to chucking fuel onto the aforementioned serially-abusive fire himself, as and when necessity dictates. The night we visited, on those occasions when Madame Defarge really warmed to the task, Talking Bill’s retaliation consisted of throwing his arms high above his head and loudly shouting “YERRRRSSSS!” All those in our immediate vicinity were in on the joke, and positively heaving with suppressed laughter.
To be scrupulously fair, when judged against the backdrop of overall refereeing standards across all three non-Premier league divisions, I didn’t think the Edgar Street officiating trio had a bad game, overall. Sure, there were some clangers dropped, mostly coming from the linos, but isn’t that always the case in games, no matter how well refereed they are? Something called ‘human nature’, so rumour has it. Believe you me, I’ve seen much, much worse over the course of the present season. Perhaps it might behove our little friend well to observe black-clad creatures like the untalented Mister Miller at his worst (Tranmere v Hereford in the FA Cup was one of his better days) , then see what she has to say about it. Assuming he’s still on the League list next season, of course; personally, I doubt it, but it wouldn’t half be a wonderfully mind-concentrating exercise for the clueless Madame ‘D’, wouldn’t it?
Earlier, I made mention of “Talking Bill”, and mentioned in passing his eccentric streak. His claim to fame? Well, if nothing else, he certainly has something of a creative bent lurking deep within the murkier recesses of his brain. Some folks go about their daily business in a permanent state of mentally supping from a glass either half-empty or half-full, depending upon disposition. But Bill goes one stage further: his cup’s permanently full to the brim as far as United games are concerned. So richly talented is he at looking for the most advantageous takes on Bulls-related situations, he clearly missed his vocation. Tony Blair would have loved him as a spin-doctor: if anyone’s capable of presenting George Bush’s former bosom pal in a favourable light, it has to be Bill every time.
Look at his many talents in that direction this way. He’s the only football supporter I’ve ever encountered with sufficient amounts of never-say-die optimism – or sheer brass neck, take your pick - to conjure up “THAT WAS A CLEAR GOALSCORING OPPORTUNITY, REFEREE!” from a situation where a Hereford defender’s – note the last of those three preceding words, folks! - desperately trying to kick off his own line what looks to be a slam-dunk effort, and getting fouled by an opposition attacker in the process! And then gets all radioactive when the ref doesn’t bring said wish-fulfillment verbals to a satisfactory conclusion by immediately red-carding the errant opposing player involved! He’s also one of the most navigationally-challenged blokes I’ve ever encountered in my entire life. Stick him in the middle of Trafalgar Square, then tell him to find Nelson’s Column, and he wouldn’t have a sodding clue - but that’s another story entirely!
I can’t leave this particular clutch of Bulls-lover pen-pictures without making mention of Nick Brade, well-known gatherer of what Albion Chairman Jeremy Peace would undoubtedly term ‘revenue streams’, for the cash-strapped outfit he supports both home and away, along with his mum, supplier of break-time mints to those Edgar Street gentry seated within lobbing-range. Some of his various duties consist of flogging half-time draw tickets before – and, as I noted last Tuesday night – during the game. Midway into the first half, and I could still clearly see his yellow-brown matchday apparel, as he manically worked the Meadow End, purveying even more draw tickets to the faithful encamped there.
So busy was the lad in his worthy entrepreneurial efforts for his favourite club, he didn’t get back to his normal matchday perch alongside our bunch until about 15 minutes before the break. Now I’d do just about anything for my favourite football club, were they ever daft enough to ask, possibly up to and including, according to popular Black Country legend, a draughty (but hopefully-profitable!) spell displaying one’s principal sexual wares ‘at the back of Rackhams’, for the cause. But miss a sizable chunk of a vital end-of-season game, with promotion at stake, because of heavy ‘flogging’ commitments in the Brummie Road End, say? Thanks – but no thanks.
Text at top (next game etc)
Next Game: Scarborough In The League At Edgar Street On Tuesday 19th November At 7.45pm