Confessions Of A Neutral Supporter Part Five

With no trip arranged to our game at Bradford today, I’m taking the chance to take Gwenn over to Dagenham for their game against Bury. I’ve been turning Gwenn into a Rotherham fan very slowly over a very long period of time, and she’s come with us on both occasions we’ve played at Dagenham, but this will be her first time at a neutral game. Our excuse is that we’re going to check out the new arrangments in the away end, particularly regarding whether their legendary burgers are still up to snuff. It has nothing to do with a certain Mr Cutler being part of the Bury set-up. Oh, no...
First impressions of the new stand are good, even if they’re now charging twenty quid to sit there. The seating starts about ten feet up, so you have a decent view, and the players’ and officials’ facilities have been built into the stand, so they now enter and leave the pitch from behind the goal. Most importantly, the new tea bar is round the back of the stand and, yes, the burgers are as good as ever. The range of food has been expanded, with one Bury fan wandering past us with what looks like a foil dish of lasagne – how dangerously continental! However, points are lost for only having cold water in the taps in the ladies’, which is not what you want when the thermometer is hovering somewhere around zero, as it is today.
We settle in our seats and I have the joy of watching someone other than me attempt to tie a flag in place when there’s a gusty wind blowing. Mr Cutler is putting Bury keeper Wayne Brown through his warm-up routine, but he does take the time to do some pointless stretching and posing for our delectation. The other players are taking shots on goal, some of which are so wayward we begin to fear for the safety of our faces and our cups of tea. Gwenn wonders whether they’d come and check you were all right if they accidentally hit you with the ball, and I tell her Trevor Berry did that exact thing at Ashton Gate once, after he’d managed to clout some bloke on the back of the head so hard he knocked his glasses off. I’ve never seen anyone look so concerned and apologetic...
As the game gets under way, I have the joy of explaining to Gwenn various vital bits of knowledge, such as why Efe Sodje is wearing that bizarre piece of headgear. The Bury fans give her plenty of opportunity to learn all the words to ‘Alan Knill’s barmy army’, though she’s already familiar with Knilly from his Rotherham days. The teams appear to be fairly evenly matched, and I’m hoping they’ll cancel each other out as a draw would be the best result from a Rotherham point of view, but Dagenham take the lead when a spot of slapstick defending involving Sodje and Tom Newey (last seen here getting a load of stick from his own fans while playing for Grimsby) present the ball on a plate for Paul Benson to score. Sodje’s misery is compounded when he takes a blow to the head and has to go off for a couple of minutes, returning with a huge bandage under his bandanna. There’s disgruntlement in the away end, with words exchanged between one of the flag minders, who seems to be the stoic, ‘watch it with your arms folded because you’ve seen it all before’ type, and another bloke who’s more the ‘find a scapegoat and blame everything on him’ type. Dagenham think they’ve scored again, but it’s ruled out for a foul on Brown. As the half draws to a close, Nardiello misses a superb chance to equalise, but makes up for it a minute later when Bury get a corner, heading over mad Welsh goalie Tony Roberts, and the teams go in level.
During half-time, Mr Cutler takes Brown down to the opposite end to get him used to the goal he’ll be defending for the second half, while the Tannoy announcer tries to whip up support (and votes) for some girl called Stacey who’s from Dagenham and in the last three of The X-Factor. It obviously doesn’t work, as that evening she’s voted off the show. When the half-time results are read out, we’re 2-1 up at Valley Parade. I’d rather not know that, as it means I’m just going to spend the second half fretting about whether we can hold on to the lead.
Bury have clearly had a talking-to, as they step it up in the second half, just as they did when we played them. Gwenn goes to get more teas in and misses Dagenham having another goal disallowed for offside, but it’s Bury who look more likely to score. Andy Morrell has a one-on-one with Roberts and chips the ball over him, but it lands on top of the net. Sagely, I tell Gwenn that’s probably their best opportunity of the afternoon. Nardiello gets a booking and argues with the referee so fiercely he’s in danger of getting a second. Knill promptly substitutes him before he can get himself sent off. The group of fifteen or so grotty teenagers who gather as close as they can to the away end so they can indulge in banter rile one Bury fan so much he shouts, ‘Shut up, virgins!’ at them. Then Dagenham score a bit of a scrappy goal from a corner. Roberts does the world’s most rubbish forward roll (unlike Alfie’s at Wealdstone, this is intentional) and dances in front of the grotty teenagers, who love it. Gwenn and I have never seen anyone celebrate so hard who hasn’t had anything at all to do with the scoring of a goal.
Bury press for another equaliser but, deep into added time, Dagenham get a third, scored by the magnificently named Nana Ofori-Twumasi, who’s on loan from Chelsea. Again Roberts does the rubbish forward roll and dancing, which really is rubbing it in. The players troop off the pitch, with the new arrangements at least offering the away fans the chance to abuse the referee/opposition player/home player of their choice as they approach. Not that I’d ever condone this, you understand.
The final scores come in and we’ve won 4-2, which puts a little smile on Gwenn’s face as well as mine. I have trained her well...