Pompey Travel Nightmares
Posted on | May 27, 2009 | No Comments
Whilst we all digest the news of Portsmouth’s seemingly imminent takeover by an Arab billionaire, I’d like to point you in the direction of a fantastic source of Portsmouth blogs, Vital Pompey. This story caught my eye, and made me realise we must ALL have had a day like this in following Pompey:
Thanks go to tracyc for allowing us to share this story which she wrote last year before the semi final with West Brom.
“It was towards the end of the 1987-88 season. Alan Ball’s Pompey were pushing for promotion to Division 1. I was a modern languages student on my ’sandwich’ year, and was staying in Mainz, Germany. But through the ancient technology of the day, i.e. the BBC world service and the availability of English newspapers, I was still in touch with all things Pompey.
I can’t tell you the exact date now, I think it was a mid-week game but I’m not even sure of that now. But what I do know is that if Pompey won their match at West Brom and another result or 2 went their way, they’d be promoted.
I couldn’t bear to miss it. Missing it was not an option. I had to go. So I got the train to Frankfurt airport. I paid a small fortune (especially for a student) for an air ticket to Heathrow. (I think it was about £300). Then I got on a train to Birmingham.
I had no real idea exactly where West Brom’s ground was in relation to central Birmingham. I bought a cup of tea and some chips in the main shopping centre, the Bull Ring, then asked directions to the bus station. When I got to the bus station, I asked again. It seems I was in the wrong bus station, for the wrong bus company. I will never forget the kindness of the man who walked with me to the correct bus station, and due to him, I managed to catch a bus out into the suburbs to the Hawthorns.
Amazingly, as I approached the away end and the turnstiles (very few matches were all ticket in those days) I saw one of my friends just going through, they’d just got off the supporter’s coach. I hadn’t actually told anybody, my friends, my parents, anybody that I was going. So they were a little surprised to see me, to say the least.
Of course, typical Pompey (of back then, anyway) they lost the match and didn’t go up that day. They did go up later that season and it happened when Shrewsbury won a midweek game, when we weren’t playing, meaning their opponents (Oldham) couldn’t catch us.
I was able to get a seat on a supporters coach back to Pompey and then rang my Mum when I got to Cosham, to say ‘guess where I am’.
So now you all know how completely barking mad I am.”
Thanks Tracy for allowing us to share your story. The date was actually 29th April 1987 and Pompey were awful that day (was it worth the trip?) as they were the next week at Crystal Palace when a massive Bank Holiday following travelled up the A3.
My own nightmare goes something like this:
I set out to Ashton Gate for the away game at Bristol City on 19th March 1994. I was living in Preston at the time and got a lift with three Man United supporting mates. They were playing at Swindon Town the same day. They dropped me off there and I duly got the train on to Bristol. We lost 1-0 in a pretty dire game, but the worst was yet to come as the tannoy announcement was heard: “Away supporters will be detained for 20 minutes after the match.” That didn’t help me catch my agreed train back to Swindon for my lift in the days before mobiles! I ran all the way from Ashton Gate to Temple Meads station but, inevitably, I was destined to end up in a sweaty heap on the platform, forlornly watching my train pull away. The next step was to persuade the staff to announce my predicament over the tannoy at Swindon, which they duly did, although I was later to find out that my lift had heard no such announcement, and driven back to Manchester. As I discovered this information on arrival on the next available train at Swindon, I was almost immediately hit with the double whammy that it was now too late to get back home to Preston. The match certainly had not been worthy of this, and I had to ask my Dad to come to the rescue and pick me up from, yes, you’ve guessed it, Manchester.
Any more of these gratefully received. We must all have one! More on the Arabs tomorrow!
Tags: Alan Ball > Arab billionaire > Ashton Gate > Bristol City > Crystal Palace > Manchester United > Pompey > Portsmouth > Portsmouth blogs > Portsmouth takeover > Shrewsbury Town > Swindon Town > The Hawthorns > Travel nightmares > West Brom
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