Send in the clowns?

Swansea City 0





Scunthorpe United 2

I had brought tickets for this one a few weeks ago, as a birthday present for Tom. And so, with boyish enthusiasm coursing through my veins (and gene pool), I sneaked away early at 4.30. Alas, the early omens were not good. On the bus to the station I got in a flap, not knowing where my various bits and pieces were in my pockets. My lack of organisation at this vital juncture caused bad omen #1.

I dropped the "stadium whistle" travelbug I was carrying. But it was only after I'd left the bus that I realised I'd dropped my bunch of keys - arrrgh!!! Bad omen #2 occured as I brought mny train tickets from an automatic dispenser. On boarding the train I realised that I'd only taken the outbound portion, and would thus require to buy a new single on my return from Swansea. Arrrgh!

Bad omen #3 occurred as a train broke down at Neath, causing us to be held at Port Talbot for 15 mins. I suppose If the worse had come to the worst I could have called Tom out to pick me up from PT.

On arrival at Swansea, I needed replenishment. And so I proceeded to one of my haunts from the quondam days - Sizzles cafe, across the road from the station. Unlike Trumps, Sizzles DO do eggs, and so I had sausage, egg and beans for my pre-match meal.

Then I ambled out of the town centre towards the Liberty stadium, which is now located on the periphery of town. It's about 25mins walk from the station. During my walk, I noticed how quiet it seemed to be compared with other times I've made the walk. This was a precursor to another disappointing attendance - just over 10,000 which really isn't good enough for an important game against the top table side, Scunthorpe, at a time when the Swans are in flux after the departure of Kenny Jackett. I had expected a bumper crowd of 15,000+ for what might be Kevin Nugent's only game in charge as caretaker manager.


Stadium Whistle Travelbug


Before the game started, I wanted to get a piece of geocaching business out of the way. I've held on to Squirt's stadium whistle travelbug since the Cardiff midwinter social event cache. The object of Squirt's travelbug is to see as many football stadiums as possible.

I'm very pleased of this photo taken outside the Liberty stadium. It shows the whistle, the travel bug tag and the Swansea City club crest all very clearly. Not bad for 1.3 megapixels! And to think TCA once chided me for daring to go with a camera containing anything less than 3 megapixels!

Scunthorpe were involved in the first game I ever went to see, at Peterborough in 1982. Unfortunately this tussle against the 'Irons' was not going to be such a happy occasion.

As a football fan, I've always been very reluctant to criticise my own teams when they are playing. I have never booed any of my teams, no matter how badly they are playing. However, such was the ineptitude of this performance that me and Tom left a few minutes early so that Tom could catch his park and ride. I believe this is the first time I've left a match early of my own accord.

My hairdresser says that she believes in "Karma - what goes around comes around". Well, it seems that my Swansea City karma has come round to belt me in the face. Gone are the halcyon days of 2003-04 when me and Tom were treated to a succession of 3 and 4 goal matches, and the great FA Cup giant-killing comeback v Preston. This season I've gone 5 times, and here are the woeful stats...

Played: 5
Won: 0 (!)
Drawn: 3
Lost: 2
Goals for: 1
Goals against: 4