And I can’t say I’m particularly sorry, either.
So, another day/week/month, another game/week/month without a victory. Twenty-two games now, isn’t it?
But wouldn’t yesterday have been the perfect time to get those unicorn-esque three points?
First things first – I wasn’t at Plough Lane, but I wasn’t working either. I went to Carshalton v Margate instead.
It was 0-0 and I don’t miss that level of football one bit.
Normally I would have been there and done a proper writeup, but attending that game on the Friday night at KM a few years ago still puts me off.
I didn’t particularly want us to shit the bed against them, and them gloating/laughing at us, in my presence.
That does seem quite a common attitude with people of a certain age, and I guess still waters run very deep still.
Which might explain why the official attendance was below 8000.
I’m sure you’re here for the reports of nawtyness and all round ne’er-do-well behaviour.
Sadly, it does seem a bit more went on than I first realised, and one has to think the police got it wrong.
Still, there were a couple of moments. A Frenzy getting twatted on the pitch is always funny. Yes, violence is wrong etc, but it’s a Franchise fan getting put on his fat arse. He got arrested too, apparently.
There’s a picture of a Mong bragging on social media that he broke one of our seats.
It takes a special lack of intellect to also post the evidence in public, which is exactly what he did.
A ban, a fine and a hefty invoice going his way, one hopes. I’m sure you’ll find that a massive shame.
Obviously, anywhere a Frenzy goes, so does the Chernobyl levels of defumigation afterwards.
No doubt a poor pigeon got subjected to one of their supporters getting their dick out, and promising it a good time.
Though more likely, the bird pissed itself laughing at it, and regaled the rest of his flock with tales of something smaller than a worm.
It does appear a few of our fans seem quite pissed off that two certain pubs “welcomed” their support.
While I’d not rather allow them to drink in our vicinity full stop, it’s not like they’re regular haunts of our fans to begin with.
It’s as much to do with the local police as anyone, and this is one of those occasions where they have it right.
We’re not doing bubble games** any more, so it’s best get the away mongs into a boozer or two away from where we’d normally go.
** – and that was mainly done at KM simply because it wasn’t a suitable venue for this kind of fixture. Plough Lane is.
After all, would you prefer them to be wandering around Wimbledon itself? On second thoughts, don’t answer that…
As for the game, it’s as much a point gained as opposed to two dropped.
Franchise are at the wrong end of the table for a very good reason, and it appeared we made them look quite ordinary in parts.
Were they simply uncomfortable playing in front of a crowd that legitimately hates them? Hopefully, they were.
Bowen himself was content enough, though again I notice he mentioned about switching off.
He’s certainly bullish about our chances, and we’ve actually had quite a decent(ish) week.
Results went our way a bit yesterday, we drew two games against sides that we could easily have lost against.
And it could have been three draws in a week if we had just concentrated one more time at Hillsborough.
It’s still difficult to survive, and boy do we need to find a win from somewhere. But it’s more do-able.
Our focus is now 100% on beating Crewe on Good Friday. Nothing else matters.
Mark Robinson was there yesterday as well, apparently. I wonder what he was thinking?
I would have hated him being in charge of this game, as it goes, because it would have got seriously toxic when we lost.
Think of how the mood has changed to one of, we might be able to survive after all. And just think what it would be like if we kept him on.
Some still clearly can’t get over Robbo departing, but it’s definitely given us a chance of staying up. It was just a couple of weeks too late.
Back to Franchise, and yesterday was yet another milestone against them.
It was the first time for us properly back home, in front of fans, and what’s struck me this morning is this.
It’s not much what a big deal it was – it’s what a big deal it wasn’t.
As SW19 usually points out when we play them – games against them will never be “normal”.
For some, and I include myself in this, it will continue to leave a repugnant taste in the mouth.
But considering the occasion yesterday, it was almost as close to a run-of-the-mill game against them as it could ever be.
It didn’t have that emotion of the FAC tie at the Frenzydome, nor did it even have the watershed of beating them at KM.
Even if we’d won yesterday, it might not have had quite the outpouring that Lyle Taylor provided us way back in March 2017.
Maybe it’s because we’ve crapped ourselves so often against them in recent years, that the sting has been taken out of the whole shebang?
Or perhaps it’s because we’ve now got a guy in charge who isn’t weighed down with the emotional baggage of it, and can therefore handle it better?
To his credit, NA managed the whole thing as best as he could, but like the rest of the club – he declined since that glorious evening.
The biggest disappointments in facing them will always be under Walter and GH, the former in particular shattering the belief that it was the 1980s all over again.
Robbo tried, but ultimately failed, but we look more like we should do under MB.
I’d still rather never play them, and this might be one of the plus points of going down (because I sure as hell hope they don’t go up).
At some stage though, we won’t have nearly the complex of facing them as we’ve previously had.
The next time they come down to SW17 will be different again, and the more we play them the more “normal” it becomes.
There’s still a couple more watershed games we’ve yet to have. A game where we need to win to avoid relegation, for example.
But the ones I’m thinking of will be the first time we play them in a playoff semi-final – or, Satan forbid, a final at Wembley.
Imagine losing that? Hell, imagine winning.
Finally, I understand it when people say that because they’ve played us in the league at Plough Lane, we’ve “won”.
And we have. But there needs to be more to it now.
We need to develop ourselves so we can not only compete on the pitch but give them a good fisting in the process.
We’ve proven our point that we exist and can flourish. We know that, and deep down so do they.
After all – a thousand of their lot came down to us yesterday and proved our point. And they paid us money to do so…