Did He Really Mean It?

Jump to Comments

Ah, Essex. The county that launched a thousand jokes. Very few of them funny, some of them accurate, all of them easy. Like, apparently, the ladies of that fair county. See what I mean?

It was to the county of peroxide and stilettos that we ventured on Friday afternoon to continue this ridiculous quest upon which we have started. Situated on the very Eastern end of the District Line out of London, Hornchurch and Upminster have once before played a gracious host to my FA Cup whims. This time though, I wasn’t alone. This time, it meant slightly more than a Saturday afternoon out of the house. This time, it meant something important. The continuation of the run.

I abandoned plans to work Friday afternoon at a very early stage in the day, and decided to take from 2pm onwards as a ‘holiday’. Very few people, I’m sure, utilise their holiday entitlement to make foolish journeys to satellite towns with no noticeable attractions. But then very few people are as excited about non-league football, the FA Cup and drinking in new locations as I am.

The journey to Upminster Bridge tube station passed with little incident, and I managed to save the big bit of the ‘paper to read in the pub. Arriving in the pub nearest to the ground (the imaginitively titled ‘The Bridge’) I immediately felt slightly…well, out of place. Not just because of my slight northern twang of an accent, not merely because I was carrying a copy of the Guardian, not only because I’d ordered a bottle of Pear Kopparberg cider (something which I have reason to believe had rarely, if ever, happened in that pub. I had to ask for it three times and raise my voice to an inordinate volume to make clear to the barmaid what I wanted. The one thing I wanted to avoid, drawing attention to myself, was rendered instantly impossible by the barmaid making me shout ‘BOTTLE OF KOPPARBERG’ over the generic R&B chart fodder being pumped out of the video jukebox. What a result).

No, I felt out of place because I was the only person in the pub not wearing work clothes that were in some way soiled by plaster dust. My and my cushy office job, meaning that I could wander in wearing pristine jeans and shirt, instantly marked me out. So I hastened to the far corner of the pub, and took up residence with my newspaper and bottle of cider. I’d ordered a bag of Pork Scratchings as accompaniment to try and make myself seem more ‘one of the boys’, but I feel that this simply marked me out as a fat Northern bastard rather than working class stock who’d manage to get out of a hefty afternoon’s dry-walling to down as much Stella as I could.

Life passed by uneventfully for a couple of hours as I sank myself into the Guardian’s Opinion columns for the first time in my life. I had slight banter with the young lad behind the bar. I knocked back a few bottles of tasty pear cider. The most incredible scene of the afternoon arose at around 5pm ish, as the massed crowd of builders/plasterers/assorted labourers responded to a song that had appeared on the video jukebox. Arm-in-arm, around fifteen of these burly workmen started singing along to ‘The Drugs Don’t Work’ by The Verve. Standing under a cloud of plaster dust that had risen into the air, they bellowed along with all the passion that only emotional drunk chaps with a few Stellas under their belt can muster. It was reminiscent of a rugby team bellowing along to their national anthem. I half expected tears at one point. Incredible stuff.

The rest of the FA Cup team (a mighty six members this week, we’re a growing band!) joined me, and we made our way to the nearby ground at around 7.30ish. Which gave us enough time to see the local DJ start up a set with some 80’s classics and baffle us all. It’s been a long time since I heard ‘Breakout’ by Swing Out Sister and ‘Seven Seas’ by OMD. Just two more footnotes in an incongruous pub atmosphere.

The game, as usual, I shall let others describe. It finished 2-1 to Hornchurch - a spirited performance from Dulwich, bearing in mind the 9-0 drubbing they’d recieved the last time they visited this ground. Horchurch had opened the scoring, and I have to admit that when Dulwich equalised through Billy Chataway just before half-time, we all got slightly excited. We’d been listening to the Hornchurch fans banter all through the half, and enjoying it thoroughly. But when Dulwich scored, their banter turned on to us. One of our number let out the exclamation, in a less than manly voice ‘Come on Dulwich!!!!’. From then on girly voices mocked everything we said. Oh, what larks.

The AFC Hornchurch fans banter was superb throughout. Favoured chants included that quite magnificent ‘Hornchurch! We’re gonna win! Hornchurch FUCK YEAH!’, the slightly bizarre ‘Yeah mate yeah, yeah mate yeah, yeah mate yeah…’ and the factually incorrect ‘AFC Hornchurch FC…’

Little comments to the linesman (’You look like Neil Kinnock!’ and, wonderfully, ‘What monk cut your hair??’) were coupled with the wonderful insulting shout to the referee ‘You sausage pocket!’.

We spoke to some of the lads who were standing next to us at half time, where I’d decided that introducing myself as my nickname (bamos) or my real name (Stefan) would only end in disaster and more piss-taking that I would never live down, so I introduced myself to them as Steve. It was like being at primary school again and being ashamed of my own name. Oh, self-confidence…

Hornchurch bagged a penalty just after half-time, and they held that lead until the end. They threatened to extend it on numerous occasions but were held back by some quite magnificent ‘keeping from the much-maligned Sheik Ceesay. But 2-1 it finished. We’re now on the FA Cup trail with Hornchurch.

After the game, we went back to The Bridge, where the party DJ was still in full effect. The pub was actually empty inside, but for some bizarre reason there were trays of buffet-style food sitting atop the bar. So we sat, for about twenty minutes, listening to some early 90’s house anthems (having moved on from the 80’s, the DJ was now regaling an empty pub with long-forgotten top ten anthems like ‘Gunman’ by 187 Lockdown. Yes, them…) eating platefuls of quiche and whole sausages. We left sharpish after draining our drinks remarkably quickly as some of the looks we were getting suggested that six out-of-towners wandering in and caning all the free food wasn’t exactly what the buffet organisers had in mind. Who’d have thunk..?

Anyway. I have, in previous posts, voiced displeasure at having to visit Hornchurch. After the banter with the local fans, the free buffet, the chat at half time and the conciliatory handshakes at full time, David Laslett walking into a bollard on the way back to the station and the fabulous smiles on everyone’s faces despite the result, I’ve changed my mind.

It will be a pleasure to be in with Team AFC Hornchurch FC in the next round. An away draw would be nice, giving us the chance to explore pastures new once more, but if we have to go back to Upminster, it will be far from the worst thing in the world.

Another incredibly enjoyable step on the FA Cup ladder. The draw for the Fourth Qualifying Round takes place in an hour or two. I’m incredibly excited. Yeah mate yeah.