Although as any regular matchday goer will tell you, three pints are better than one…
OK, it took about six games longer than it needed to, and I can’t deny it’s been getting hairy the last few games.
But we’re safe. And that is so nice to write that.
You can spend the next week sighing heavily with relief, inbetween a smug inner smile.
You can already start planning your trips to, er, Oxford alongside just how one gets to the King Power Stadium.
A venue that your editor has been to already, by the way. It’s an identikit stadium, although I think the distance to it from Filbert Street is around the same as it is for Plough Lane versions 1 and 2.
And yes, it’s Leicester. As in, that Leicester that won the Premier League under Ranieri just a mere decade ago.
How the mighty have fallen.
But the vibe this morning has been one of undeniable joy as well. And I think the players deserve a lot of credit this very Sunday as well.
Your editor wrote the following after Burton away:
But I’ve long believed this season that if we need the points, we’ll get them. It’s a belief that’s been tested to the limit right now, but maybe I’ll be proved right?
And proved right I was.
Not just because it tested my belief, even though it was something I still held onto even after we lost against Plymouth last week.
I won’t say that I knew we’d win yesterday, because I didn’t. But I did have that strange premonition that we’d get something from the fixture.
Hearing beforehand that the squad (and coaching staff?) took some time away to socialise last week could have backfired, if it felt they were getting bladdered before such a crucial game.
I think it was just them resetting themselves, realising they had two games to save our L1 status, and knuckling down.
Not that yesterday sounded brilliant for the most part. I wasn’t there (was at Fulham v Villa and wasn’t impressed with Villa’s goalscorers…), and that second half in particular was long.
Not to mention getting the 163 from Wimbledon station to SW19 Towers for the last 15 minutes, and that journey feeling twice as protracted as it normally does.
I didn’t give a fistpump when we scored, because I was expecting the Livescore app to change score to 1-1 as soon as I looked at it.
Well, that and looking at scores elsewhere.
I did do one when the full times came in, though I don’t think anyone on the bus noticed. If they did, and they’re somehow reading this – no, I’m not sorry.
Full credit to Hackford (and Nelson and Sasu too) for combining at the exact right time, in both senses of the word.
Our goalscorer showed a lot of early season promise but went off the boil a lot. So it’s a good thing he found the net like that.
And while this might sound ultra-picky, would yesterday have been even better had it been a 96th minute scramble off Bauer’s arse?
You know, a proper save-your-season type effort that is as dramatic as it is scrappy?
It doesn’t really matter either way, and you almost certainly don’t care. All that needs to be said is that the post-game celebrations say it all.
JJ’s reaction certainly did, and he deserves every bit of that spring-uncoiling-in-real-time moment.
It must have been a horrible few weeks for him, being utterly pissed on by the amount of injuries that almost piled up out of nowhere.
Having to battle to keep us in the third tier with more than half a first XI missing, coming close to a relegation that he and we didn’t really deserve.
Make no mistake, had we managed to keep even Lewis and Omar fit, I don’t think we would have quite got in the state we did.
Do I agree with him that this feels as good as Wombley II? Actually, it might be more of an achievement, simply because the odds sharply increased against us staying up.
We may have won yesterday, but there’s still a lot of weakness in squad depth that we need to figure out this summer.
And lest we forget how many wrote us off before a ball was kicked, even – or especially – from our own fanbase.
I don’t doubt JJ and co have forgotten that, so you can understand the celebrations mean more than just the result yesterday.
We were thankful Hippo returned, that Ryan Johnson and Bauer were able to link up, and we were in a position to drop Reeves.
He’s been a good servant, but I don’t think it was a coincidence that our good February run coincided with him being on the bench, the same as yesterday.
He lives over Swindon way, doesn’t he? I wouldn’t be surprised if he ends up at his nearby club again, or somewhere like Barnet.
Or anywhere in League Two. Which we won’t be playing in next season, just to remind you.
One thing that did jump out at me, which has gone almost under the radar – McDonnell came in for Bishop.
Now, you maybe would think that Bishop’s niggle that kept him out earlier this season has reoccurred, and he’s one of those ones JJ said was playing through an injury.
But our manager mentioned this in his post-game quotes:
Joe’s got the experience. He’s been in this position with this football club. He’s got the experience and the calmness that I felt was required today. So he got his game.
Is there something about Bishop that we don’t know about, in that comment?
To be fair to McDonnell, he’s not done badly when he’s been called upon, and it was only really a miscommunication with Bauer in one particular game that dropped him to the bench again.
Could we do better than him and Bishop, goalkeeper wise? Certainly, but as Owen Goodman proved, it’s not always easy being a League One shotstopper.
One does wonder what kind of team we’ll put out for Huddersfield now. Obviously, there’s no need to risk Browne, or anyone else who we were keeping in reserve for next week if we really needed them.
Anyone out of contract and who is fit is likely to feature, although there will be one or two who hopefully are going to re-sign PDQ.
Seddon is worth another one-year deal, certainly.
There’ll be plenty who I won’t be upset to see depart, on the basis we could probably do better even without our 99p budget in the summer.
It will be a nice occasion at Plough Lane anyway, especially if the weather is good. No pressure on us, and that rare beast of an end-of-season dead rubber that will produce something like a 5-4 scoreline.
Your editor won’t be there, by the way. I’ll be at Leyton Orient v Burton instead.
I mention that, because I allowed myself to look at the league table after we secured safety, and didn’t realise the Os were in that much shit.
Ditto Peterborough too, though I expect like us they’ll find enough to get out of that pretty quickly.
But it’s going to be nice for me to be writing about a team that could genuinely go down without them being close to it up until it really matters.
Or, more accurately, writing about a team that could genuinely go down without them being close to it up until it really matters that isn’t AFCW.
While next week becomes an end-of-season pissup for us, across London it’s going to be very nervy. Especially if Orient go behind and Exeter somehow go ahead.
If the Os go down, the post-game interviews will be very interesting. Especially with Richie Wellens, who can make JJ look like a master of Zen.
But yesterday proved that it really isn’t over until it is. The Grecians are now two points behind with one game left.
It’s not completely bleak for them, but it seems like they’ve finally run out of steam.
Now, think of this time last week, when they got that 97th minute equaliser through their keeper, and the way they celebrated like they’d just stayed up.
That’s how quickly things can change, and it’s nice it benefited us for once.
We can now think ahead, too. Sadly, we have to deal with Franchise again in 26/27, although to be honest that doesn’t piss me off quite so much these days.
I’ll still give all games against them a very wide berth, I’m still scarred by that Friday night at KM against them.
The headfuck will be Bromley as a L1 side. Not just because they’ll end up beating us on Boxing Day, but them hosting Leicester and Sheffield Wednesday at the same venue as us facing Coney Hall.
Maybe some of the knuckledraggers from that evening back in the day will turn out for those two fixtures?
I can’t begrudge them for their achievements though, they’ll likely fall out of the division when financial reality strikes, and they’ll probably end up like Sutton in five years.
But here’s one for the Guardian’s “Football Knowledge” page if anyone wants to send it in .
We’ve played Bromley in Ryman League One, Ryman Premier, Conference South, League Two and from next season League One.
What fixture between two clubs have been played in the most divisions? I bet us against the Ravens will be close to it.
Oh, and one final thought as we enjoy the week and the close season – if Luton stay down, they get to go to Franchise…