Dinner Is Served

There’s a lot of nonsense talked about how everything to do with Britain is comprehensively rubbish, but there’s one area of which we can always be proud, and that’s the large and varied number of eccentrics you see on your travels, going about their business unmocked and unmolested. Take the couple who take their seats next to Jenny and me on the train out of St Pancras. They’re dressed up like something from an Agatha Christie mystery: he has a topper, cane and the most impressive ginger handlebar moustache, and she has a little fur stole, a neat cloche hat and dainty gloves. Turns out they’re going to a wedding somewhere in Leicestershire, and in keeping with the theme, they have a book of home management from the 1930s as a gift for the happy couple. The woman can’t help reading out extracts as it’s fascinating stuff, though much of the thoughts on beauty and fitness for well-brought-up ladies aren’t that different from the kind of thing you’d read in Cosmo today. Tennis is recommended as an ideal pursuit for young gels, because all that looking up at the ball when you serve is just the thing for getting rid of a double chin. Must remember to try that one some time...
When we get to the Fat Cat, our usual table near the fireplace has been colonised by three beer tickers – an eccentric pursuit if ever there was one. We think at first they’re Shrewsbury fans, because they’re talking about the correct pronounciation of the town’s name (Ted and I argue about this all the time, and he always tells me I’m wrong because Shakespeare never wrote a play called ‘The Taming Of The Shrow’...) but it’s just part of a conversation which meanders via ‘Cadfael’ to Derek Jacobi to the Master and all things ‘Dr Who’. It’s a bit like being inside Toddy’s head. As he’s run out of excuses for not making it out as far as Shalesmoor, we finally have Phil’s dad with us, enjoying the pub for the first time. I think he’ll be back.
There’s no hanging out of the flag at the DVS today, as I didn’t have room to fit it in my bag along with the frock, high heels and all the other things I need to get ready for tonight’s end of season dinner. After all, it’s not as though I haven’t already had the importance of glamour and etiquette stressed on me already this morning.
Despite their relatively high position in the league, Shrewsbury have a truly appalling away record, having won only one game all season. So we should really guess how this one is going to go. Having acquired their new ground (the Prostar Stadium or, as Tim calls it, ‘Butch Meadow’) and spent some serious money on players, they seem to feel they are entitled to success. Having watched Peterborough spend their way out of this division last season, you can see why they think they have a point. However, they’re by no means the best team we’ve seen, but what they are good at is imposing their physical presence as, according to my brother, they did at their place before Christmas. Sadly, the Rotherham players let themselves be bullied out of things a little, and Shrewsbury take the lead just before half-time when the defence seem really slow to react in challenging Nick Chadwick and he slides the ball past Don almost in slow motion. Of course, the Shrews/Shrows fans are quick to tell us just how rubbish we’ve got to be if they’re winning away from home, so it’s a beautiful moment halfway through the second half when Ryan Taylor turns skilfully and equalises and we can give them some stick. Unfortunately, Shrewsbury are soon ahead again – we let one of their players have a run at us, and as Ian Sharps tries to cut his cross out, the ball loops off his foot and into the net. This sets the Shrewsbury fans off again – though is it really that we’re rubbish or they’re just spawny?
At the final whistle, they celebrate as though they’ve won the league. Admittedly we’ve done the same when we’ve ended a poor run of results, but even though this win gives them a great shot of cementing a play-off place I still have the feeling that, along with Bradford, we’ll be seeing them again next season.
Back at my parents’, it’s time for a quick wash and brush-up before the taxi arrives to take the three of us to Hellaby Hall, where the dinner is taking place. It looks like the evening will be over before it’s even started when a fire alarm starts ringing as we find our seats in the function room, but we’ve barely made our way to the evacuation point in the gardens before the panic is over. ‘Probably some Wednesday fan setting it off,’ mutters one of the other guests as we file back in.
Former Wolves player Steve Daley is the guest speaker tonight, and he wanders over to check with my parents that they’re not going to be offended by any of the choice language he may come out with. ‘Don’t worry,’ my mum assures him. ‘We don’t use the words, but we have heard them all before.’
We’re sitting on a table with some of the club’s younger employees, including Matt, the media officer, who’s actually been sitting bang opposite us in the press box all season, commentating on games for Millers World, without our actually realising who he is. All the tables have also been allocated a couple of players apiece. Those who’ve bought the VIP tables have had their choice of the most popular first-teamers (Sharps, Warrington, teeny tiny Stephen Brogan), and the rest have been divvied up around the room. The very dapper Marc Joseph appears to be at a table which consists almost entirely of women, which for some reason doesn’t surprise me at all. Unfortunately, one of our players is a no-show – poor old Mickey Cummins, who had to have an operation yesterday on the knee he damaged at Port Vale. The things men will do to avoid having to sit next to me at dinner! Someone, however, takes advantage of his absence, as suddenly Drewe Broughton bounds up to our table, looms over me (I’ve never realised until this moment just how enormous he is) and snaffles the unwanted bread roll off Mickey’s side plate.
Mr Broughton, it has to be said, completes our share of eccentrics for the day. There’s always one player at Rotherham who dresses badly – I suppose every club is the same. In the past we’ve had Ian ‘Trigger’ Gray, who my dad described as looking ‘like a bag of rags tied up with string’; indeed, we once spent the best part of half a season watching the sponsor’s name slowly disintegrate off the back of his tracksuit top and wondering exactly what he was doing to make that happen. Then there was Michael Proctor, whose tie and neck always appeared to be waving at each other from opposite sides of the room, and Shaun Barker, who gave the impression that he was wearing whichever suit he’d just pulled from a crumpled heap at the bottom of the wardrobe. With Drewe, on the other hand, everything appears to be just that little bit too tight. He’s also a terrible fidget, up and down like Paris Hilton’s undies between courses. ‘Why, he’s crackers!’ my dad says as we sit and watch him, fascinated – and it’s not very often he can say that about anyone else...
Fortunately, the one player who has joined us tonight is our token foreign signing, Omar Garcia. Although I’ve been warned in advance that his English isn’t great, he’s actually very fluent and I don’t have to fall back on any of my A-level Spanish. He turns out to be lovely, and he and my dad bond. Omar’s a fan of Barcelona, which enables my dad to trot out his spooky anecdote about the time he was on holiday over there and took the official tour of the Nou Camp. At one point, they were in the stand, looking at the pitch, and the guide asked them to sit down – at which point my dad realised he was in the exact same row and seat number as his season ticket at Millmoor. Then there’s their shared love of arroz con leche, the Spanish rice pudding which is traditionally served cold. ‘Oh, my God,’ says Omar, ‘my mum makes the best arroz con leche in the world!’ After that, they get on to the subject of how long my dad’s been watching Rotherham (his first game was during the war, since you ask). Omar wants to know if John Breckin, the club’s assistant manager and a man who made his debut for the club in the early Seventies, was playing at the time. ‘This was before John Breckin,’ says my dad, and Omar is clearly unable to conceive of such a time. It’s a shame that it hasn’t worked out for him and that he’s being released at the end of the season; when we leave at the end of the evening, my dad wishes him all the best in whatever he does next and means it sincerely.
Meanwhile, Richie Barker, no longer on the crutches we saw him using a few weeks ago, wanders over and enthuses to Matt about the chocolate fudge cake. Good to see all these finely honed athletes eat so healthily!
The evening is being compared by comedian Malcolm Lord, who is most definitely ‘working blue’ tonight, and once the meal is out of the way, the entertainment begins. There are speeches from Tony Stewart, Mark Robins and Chief Operating Officer Paul Douglas. Much of what we’d actually like to know regarding the location of the new stadium still can’t be revealed, but Douglas in particular speaks very well about the past and future of the club, and praises the efforts of everyone who’s worked so hard to make this season as successful as it has been, when we could have been down and scrapping to get away from the bottom of the table as long and as hard as Bournemouth had to.
Then comes the voting for the Young Player and Goal of the Season. Our away kit sponsors, Redtooth, are using us as guinea pigs for an interactive voting system. My favourite goal of the season, Jamie Green’s stunner against Gillingham, hasn’t actually made the shortlist, so my vote instead goes to Mark Hudson for his volley against Bournemouth. The winner, which my mother reveals she voted for, is Danny Harrison’s from the League Cup against Southampton. Jamie Green, however, does win the Young Player of the Year. Again, my mother has voted for him; something to do with her liking goalkeepers and full-backs, apparently, but it’s safer not to go there...
To round off the awards, Ian Sharps collects the overall Player of the Year title. Almost all the leading candidates in the voting were among the first choice back five (Sharps, Fenton, Warrington and Tonge) and it’s nice to see the award go to someone other than a forward, as is usually the case.
Next up is Steve Daley, but though his anecdotes, if a little rambling, are entertaining, some joker decides to heckle throughout and he gives up before the end of his allotted time, angry that people haven’t had the courtesy to listen to him. As it’s getting on for quarter to 12 by now, we decide it’s time to make a move ourselves, so I ring for a taxi. As we’re waiting for it to arrive, I take the opportunity to introduce myself to Andy Warrington, whose kit I’ve been sponsoring for the last couple of years. He’s a really nice bloke and we have a bit of a chat; he asks me my opinion on today’s game, and tells me the team is very much intending to push on and achieve promotion next season. That’s his sponsorship assured again!
There’s almost no traffic, apart from the stream of taxis and players’ cars departing Hellaby Hall, and we’re back in the house by midnight. It’s been a thoroughly enjoyable evening, and my parents have certainly had a good time. Who
says I don’t know how to treat them?