This week marked the end of my summer holidays. After two inset days, the kids were in today (Wednesday). An early night was in order to prepare me for the anticipated chaos. Instead, I decided a Tuesday night trip to Kendal would be the perfect tonic for my bound-to-be busy Wednesday.
I had 6 bottles of Stella left from numerous gifts off the children from the last academic year; as I'm a kind-hearted fool, I decided to bring them on the journey to be shared amongst the car load of people (driver exluded obviously). Pick up time was 6ish so after a quick scran, a brush of my knashers and a kiss on the forehead for my long suffering wife, I dashed out 5 minutes early so I could get some cash out to pay Sniffer his £15 bonus ball winnings (the other 15 squid was donated back to the club - what a lovely chap). At just gone 6, I was picked up by the brothers McGrath along with Matt Brown. After another scum bag (Burkey) managed to hitch hike a lift, the car was now full and off to Kendal we set.
As we barely reached Carrington Lane, Matt recieved a text from his wife - also long and suffering - to bring in the jeans from the washing line as it had just started raining. We weren't turning round and Matt wasn't going to bring in the now wet jeans*.
Beers were shared amongst the back benchers and conversations soon began about tonights game: what we thought the score would be (a Trafford victory was forseen with scores ranging from 1 nil to 2-1 and 3- 1), what we thought had gone wrong thus far in the season and a reminder of a couple of seasons prior when we'd also had a dodgy start and played Kendal away at a similar stage on a Tuesday night - that game saw us take a 2 nil half time lead, when I confidently told Tom Baker as he left the pitch (thinking the game was won), "This is more like it." We went on to lose 4 - 2 and I fully took the blame for cursing the team too early!
Other conversations touched on Brexit, the Tarzan yelp and other bits and bobs that mainly involved Matt Brown taking a lot of stick. As the rain was still coming and going, we also discussed possible places where we'd stand during the game, to which Muggsy boasted he'd be all dry as he was to be sitting in the media hub doing the 'official' match report for Trafford. As Muggsy's home game, media partner, Matt perked up and quipped "I'll come and sit with you in the media bit".
Muggsy simply replied, "Fu*k off!" Well that told him!
Twitter announcements of our teams arrival at Kendal and pictures from Liam and his crew had filtered through of our impressive flag set-up. This only heightened our excitement.
Anyway, after an hour and fifteen minutes of absolute gobble-de-gook being spoken, we were exiting the car and walking towards the ground and up the stairs to grab a pint and some grub. We then ventured over to where our flags had took camp and stood in the pouring rain cheering on our beloved Trafford.
I blinked a few times and before I knew it, we were 4 nil up and the ref blew his half-time whistle**. We were playing some great stuff and I was very confident of the outcome but I was still not going to curse it with any cheesy comments to the management team as they left the field of play.
As more beers were downed and more exotic football was played in the torrential rain, I had to literally wipe my eyes (mainly due to the rain on my specs) as I glanced at the final score to read Kendal 2 Visitors 7. We were the visitors, and it felt glorious.
Celebratory pints were sunk and the Trafford players and management entered the bar area with a bounce in their step. Everyone was buzzing. We raided the Kendal fridge of some bottles of beer in exchange for cash for our trip home and off we set.
The journey was as loud as it was hilarious. A story about someones mother-in-law, Liz and Jim McDonlad anecdotes and Burkey's Northern Irish accent had us in stitches to the point I nearly wet myself... literally! If the choice not to have a wee before we left for home was bad then turning down the chance to visit the Lancaster Service Station's WC's was almost catastrophic. I thought I could wait until we got home. I was wrong. The wee was now within a millimetre of bursting free. Sniffer was also on the brink. It wasn't pleasant. Burkey's continued Jim Mcdonald impression was not helping. 10, 9, 8, 7 miles until the next services. I could've cried. It felt like an hour but within 10 minutes we were pulling into Rivington Services. I couldn't even wait for the car to stop before I bolted and headed for the bogs. The relief of finally allowing my bladder to breathe was just as big as our first league win!
Back on the motorway and I could finally drink the rest of my beer. More laughs were had before we decided on our man of the match: Lewis Salmon. (Declan and Darius were equally outstanding).
I arrived home full of excitement and still wanting to discuss our victory. Luckily I had the sense to keep fairly quiet and get my head down. My first day back with the children went well, despite the headache. And the best part of the day: telling year 6 all about how Trafford had won 7-2 last night!
*Don't worry, Matt rang his son to save the wet jeans.
**For a more in depth match report, check out Trafford FCs website.
Glinks
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