TT GROUNDHOPPING

Clive Hayward – @Byehorse

Clive discusses his trip to North London

ENFIELD (A)

Another weekend, another batch of Weather Warnings. In the same week Bodo Glimt embarrassed Man City in Norway, Storm Ingrid gave Teignmouth Pier, Meadfoot Beach and the Dawlish Sea Wall one HELL of a beating. Saltash United Women probably feel much the same. More of them later.

It all started ominously but has finished pretty well.

Saturday dawned (if a change in sky colour from pitch black to dark grey can be described thus) still wild but not quite as wet as I had feared. I made my first mistake at 7:20am, setting off confidently for the bus stop with two phone chargers but no actual phone. Idiot! I still caught the bus to Newton, but only by driving down instead and leaving the car in a spot where a parking ticket was a live possibility.

The plan was:

· Bus from Torquay to Newton

· Rail Replacement Bus from Newton to Exeter

· Train to London.

It worked, but despite having decided on Friday morning to shut the line through Dawlish, Great Western had not managed to co-ordinate their buses with trains. A 45 minute wait at Newton hadn’t really been what I had in mind.

In fairness, there weren’t too many on the bus when we eventually set off at 9 o’clock. To be precise, there was one woman, four gentlemen and a small, wet dog. The retired chap in the front seat turned out to be a former coach driver. He took it upon himself to give detailed and ceaseless directions to our Somerset-based actual driver, who acknowledged them with the patience of a saint. Having also heard a lengthy tale about a broken accelerator pedal in 1978, I skipped off the bus at St Davids like Andy Dufresne on day release.

As luck would have it, there had been a shortage of “people who know how to join one train to another”, so despite it now being 9:30 the 9:15 hadn’t left Platform 5. I jumped on. It was blissfully empty, so the journey to Paddington was very comfortable. I had had the misfortune to get onto “the half of the train that didn’t have any catering service” but I did have a table, some sandwiches, a can of lager and The Guardian. I did the crossword and it felt like the 1990s again. A WhatsApp game of “Guess the age of the Celebrity” was my only concession to the tech era. Celia bossed that, going very close with Jules Holland (68) and Luis Suarez (39) before absolutely nailing Neil Diamond (85).

The Elizabeth Line continues to shrink the capital, and in no time I surfaced at Liverpool Street to link up with Matty. He had promised to bring his mate- one of the funniest men I know- but this proved to be optimistic. Alex had decided against NLS football, so we travelled alone on a Weaver Line train with migraine-inducing tube-style orange and green seats through several suburbs which won’t make any tourist map. I’ve no idea who Bruce Grove is or was, but it’s not somewhere I would want to live, even though it’s in walking distance of Premier League football at Spurs. Cambridge Green flatters to deceive as well, and you can shove Stoke Newington where the sun don’t shine.

Oh: did I mention the weather? Beautiful. Dry, sunny and warmish. Maybe a bit gusty but it was so lovely to have a few hours respite from frontal depressions and pissing rain. It was like being on holiday!

Enfield is a hard-working sort of place. It seems to consist largely of industrial estates and multinational fast-food outlets. I ranted about them for half a mile or so. Matty resisted what must have been a strong urge to throw himself in front of the white vans and we arrived at the QE2 stadium at about half one.

It is a lovely oasis of fun in an otherwise quite bleak landscape. There are rugby pitches adjoining, and we hung out in the car park with the likes of Matt, Pea, Paulie B and that nice chap from The Sky at Night, TUFC’s very own Professor Chris Lintott. In due course, we paid our £16 and paid a second visit to the quirkiest little clubhouse in the league. For those who’ve not been, it is a glorious Art Deco structure with “Café” painted on the brickwork and a cracking view of the pitch.

We had a couple of scoops and it was all rather lovely. I brough home a decorative Enfield Town plastic glass as a souvenir. Soon enough, it was what I believe some people call Game Time. Last season, we conceded a first minute penalty before romping to a 4-1 win. Saturday was a little different. Despite now having a squad that can cope with big suspensions (Kieran Wilson and Cody Cooke being more than competent replacements for Jordan Young and “Cuey” Dennis (it’s a pool joke), we soon found ourselves 1-0 down and under considerable pressure.

It looked for all the world like our comfortable away trip was turning into more of a Hinckley-style shambles. I changed ends very grumpily, telling anyone who would listen that it “wasn’t bleddy good enough United”. My Thursday colleague Guy Henderson nodded patiently as I vented, very much in the style of the coach driver I mentioned earlier.

Much as we eventually did at Aveley last season, we got our act together in the second half. First Dylan Morgan notched, then Wilson hit the bar, Foulston had a goal disallowed, Sundire announced his presence with a Lapsliesque Reducer (before bringing composure to our midfield) and finally our big, borrowed Jock took it upon himself to grab the three points, winning and converting an 88th minute penno.

So that went alright then. The manager kicked the woodwork, beat his chest and bellowed in relief like a bull who had just been told Jose the Matador has ruptured his hamstring and might be out for 6 months.

I know I write often about Post Match Cans, but homethere is genuinely nothing sweeter than a three point teatime train beer. Morrisons did the honours, and our journey home began swimmingly.

Back at Paddington with an opulent 45 minutes to spare, I nipped to KFC and chatted to Josh, who was loitering with content on the concourse. Admittedly the train bringing us home couldn’t go further than Exeter again and was pretty crowded, but it seemed all was well.

There was a sting in the tail though. Admittedly there are worse ways to spend Saturday evening than an unscheduled pub stop in Reading, but the events leading up to that were bordering on farcical:

“Good evening ladies & gentlemen, this is your train manager. You will probably know that our trains have been all over the place today because of the adverse weather conditions. We have just established that this train doesn’t have sufficient fuel to get to Exeter and is therefore terminating here.” I mean, come on. Really?

To cut a long story short, we had to get the last train home. Josh did four of us a huge favour by giving us a lift back from Exeter, and I got back to TQ1 just before midnight. It hadn’t been my worst TUFC transport tale. It’s probably not even in the top ten, but I’ll tell you one thing: it would have felt a lot worse if Kieran hadn’t nailed his penalty!

No spot kicks were required on Sunday afternoon, as the Women hit double figures against Saltash United. The Cornish keeper had an afternoon to forget, but the Gulls were in a ruthless mood. Their 10-1 win didn’t really flatter them, and it sees them go top of the league: on goal difference, funnily enough!