Sunday at the seaside

A journey to Brighton and all the fun that entails.

A week after Bonfire night and we’re playing our last proper match before Boxing Day. There’s nothing more to be said about this idiocy that hasn’t been said a million times already, but we signed up to it so we have to make the best. And so we’re off to Brighton on a Sunday afternoon, in November. Last season it was in February and the forecast’s not bad so I suppose that’s an improvement.

What won’t have improved is getting to the ground, which is awkward at the best of times and Sunday afternoon isn’t one of them. If you’re driving down good luck getting parked within twenty miles and if you’re getting the train you’ve already missed it.

Brighton were, incredibly, sixth in the table at the start of the weekend, ahead of Chelsea and Liverpool. While this is undoubtedly funny, it also shows how under-achieving we are because their squad isn’t that much better than ours. They’ve got a new manager who had to leave his previous job because the country got invaded, which is a bit different to being bottom of the league or copping off with the physio’s wife. As a player he spent most of his time with a load of those Italian clubs who come from a village and have one season in Serie A, playing in front of three hundred ultras before being disbanded in a corruption scandal. His haircut makes him look like he’s permanently in a wind tunnel.

They’re doing well, we’re crap away, but being in a new era makes up for that so we’re bound to get something out of the match. God knows who might get a convenient slight injury that means they can’t be risked before flying to the International Football Sportwashing Convention but if one of them is named Martinez then all bets are off. See you on Boxing Day.