Last Saturday was a lovely sunny day so I decided to make the most of it and some vouchers from our local football team St Albans City FC, and take Fifi and the boy to their first football match. As always, it wasn’t that simple and we were lucky to have had the discount vouchers- the club had informed the school on Monday 10 March that it had these special vouchers that got kids in free and parents half price but the school only decided to inform parents via email at 2pm on Friday!
Still, we were lucky that wifey picked up the email and we got some vouchers. It was turning into a busy day for the boy, he’d already been to Young Archaeologist Club in the morning but it was such a nice day we couldn’t resist. My chum Danny is the stadium announcer at Clarence Park, which made the whole experience a bit surreal as I normally hear him on Radio Verulam’s Drive Time show.
This was my first experience of non league football in a good few years. Way back in the mid 90’s I used to be a semi regular at Morecambe’s Christie Park as our student house was about 100 metres from the stadium and they used to let us in at a healthy discount. I remember once seeing a 6-1 scoreline with Morecambe scoring all 7- it was that sort of club.
There was a healthly turn out at Christie Park for the visit of Bedford Town, bottom of the league, and there were quite a lot of kids about. Apparently there were over 700 of us, which must mean the stadium can hold thousands as it didn’t look remotely full.
The kids enjoyed the first twenty minutes or so, even if I did has to continuously explain to Fifi which was “our” team and which end they were shooting at. Towards half time the pair of them started fidgeting, evidently not realising quite how long a football match actually was. I made them sit through half time, when Danny kindly dedicated a song to them- “You ain’t seen nothing yet” AND the first fifteen minutes of the second half. Just as I finally caved in to demands to go to the playground next to the stadium, St Albans second goal went in. The match finished 2-1 to us, which was a fitting final score but by that point we’d sprinted back to my work offices because both the kids suddenly realised they desperately needed a wee…
It was good fun but I’ll probably leave it another year or so before taking the kids again as it was a bit long for them. Lots more Match of the Day for them in the meantime…
