On the YouTubes at the moment, there’s a very good series where the comedian Joe Wilkinson travels on trains across the south with famous friends such as Michael Sheen and the lead singer from Wet Leg.
The trains Joe and his celeb pals get on are sparsely populated and so quiet you could hear a pigeon fart on the platform. I’d like to see him try and pull off that series on the trains we travelled to Chatham on yesterday.
A cancelled train meant an earlier-than-planned sojourn to East Croydon, where we had to nuzzle our way on to an already vastly overcrowded train. If any of the five people in my immediate vicinity where murdered yesterday, I’m in a world of trouble as my DNA will be slathered all over them, so tightly were we huddled together in 30C heat. Forget Wet Leg, all of me was sweat-soaked after that monstrous journey.
A quick sprint across the platforms at Victoria meant we hopped on the Chatham service, where we found ourselves sat opposite two teenagers, who’d not only bought a full-blown PlayStation 4, but a desktop computer monitor with them, which they plugged into the socket beneath the table and proceeded to play FIFA 22 at ear-splitting volumes for the entire trip to Kent. By some strange coincidence, train fixer and Supporters Club secretary Mike had a much more sedate journey to Chatham yesterday…
We de-trained in Rochester, clipped the PlayStation scrotes round the ears, and set about trying to find the non-negotiable fry-up. You know you’re in a proper greasy spoon when the menu options are listed as A, B, C etc, although I’m not quite sure what the black-and-white photos of Bob Hope and Marilyn Monroe on the walls were adding to proceedings.
Goodbye, Norma Jeane
Though I never knew you at all
You had the grace to hold yourself
While those around you ate bacon, sausage, double-egg and beans
Doesn’t quite have the same ring to it.
Arteries fully clogged, we poured ourselves into a selection of superb local boozers and put in our best performance of the season with The I newspaper’s Saturday crossword. There was barely a box left unfilled and Batty The Cabby put in a man-of-the-match performance, proving his must read the odd book when he’s not listening to TalkSport with his engine idling.
Two Ubers (sorry, Batty) were hailed to ferry us from pub to Chatham, where we didn’t manage to get through the crowded turnstile before the Rooks were already one down. In our past few away games we’ve conceded in the first minute at Dartford, the second minute at Cray and the fourth minute here.
Still, at least it was going to be more eventful than the last time we came to Chatham for an end-of-season game in the 2016-17 season, a goalless draw which remains the most unremarkable game of football I’ve ever seen. The most memorable thing about the entire game is they nicked a bag of balls we left outside our changing rooms.
That was when Chatham were on their arse, heading to the Kent county league in a terrible ground watched by six pensioners and (oddly) the future sports minister Tracey Crouch.
Now the ground is heaving, although I’m not having the official 3,018 attendance posted for yesterday’s game. I heard a delicious bit of gossip about Chatham’s (shall we say) inflated attendances recently and…
Hang on, I’ve got The Supporters Club’s libel lawyers on line one…
Apparently I’m not allowed to tell you that.
Back to the game, and as there was nothing riding on it, Pitts threw in a couple of kids, including under-18s starlet Dom Budgen and Mackenzie Richardson, with the skipper dropping to the bench with Charlie Walker, and Danny Bassett not even making the 16.
We played OK after the early setback, getting plenty of possession, but rarely threatening to do anything with it. The second half started much like the first, with us handing them a goal inside four minutes. Nile Ranger – who’s got more form than nicking a bag of balls – scored the free header from a corner.
We scored a late consolation, Bobby Unwin finding a bit of late-season end product to curl one into the top corner, but it wasn’t enough to dent their play-off party.
And so ends another season, which was pretty hard going at times, especially for the die-hards on the away trail. When are the fixtures out again?
Lewes: Rogers, Bernal (King), Paye, Hamstead, Enkh, Allen, Muirhead (Christian-Law), Richardson (Booth, then Watson), Unwin, West, Budgen (Walker)
Supporters Club man of the match: It has to be Bobby Unwin for the last-gasp banger, although this Jack Russel in the pub came pretty close.
