It’s a match day and in some ways a match day with a difference, I am genuinely looking forward to seeing Messi play tonight. I have made a thread of this and it is a very self indulgent thread but matches like tonights don’t come around very often and its got me thinking about my love of the beautiful game, and I feel inspired to share this with like minded people. I have attended over 1200 matches in various capacities – Player, referee, parent (often running the line), and supporter. From the highest level which I guess is International tournament football – I was at England v Scotland at Euro 96, down to grass roots youth football, and I still love the game as much as I did when I fell in love with it at about the age of 7. The first matches I recall all centred around the man in my avatar – The Big Chiv his brace in the 71 league cup final and a diving header v Nottingham Forest both of which I saw on the Big Match, and that was me hooked. It would be another 18 years before I would actually get to the Lane to see a live match a 1-1 draw with Charlton. Since then I have seen us play many times, but there was a quite a gap between seeing the first match of 1990-91 season when Lineker and Gazza led us out following their exploits at Italia 90 and promptly put Man City to the sword to seeing a 1-0 win over West Brom in 2009, during which time I spent 15 seasons as a season ticket holder at Gillingham, whilst also going see Ashford Town (now United) and refereeing ashford district league matches and watching Spurs lose on Sky. I was lucky enough to go to Wembley 3 times to see The Gills in play off finals and they were great days out – even the one we lost to City. I played in one cup final myself and have seen my boys lift trophies too all of which has enhanced my joy of being a football fan, and even as a long suffering Spurs fan I have never lost the passion for my team and even with all the time spent elsewhere – I have probably seen 5 x as many Gills matches live at the stadium as I have Spurs, but I have always remained a Spurs fan, with The Gills always 2nd in my footballing affections, though I am glad that the footballing gods have generally kept us apart, the one meeting in the league cup 2 seasons ago I enjoyed going to the game with my mate (@AshfordGill), I sat with spurs fans he was in with the Gills fans, but he has been to Spurs with me too at other times. We have also been to matches at Blackpool, Charlton, Palace, Wimbledon (Plough Lane), Leyton Orient and QPR for matches that we had no direct interest in. But that match v West Brom was a turning point, seeing Modric and Van Der Vaart play that night was a revelation, they played the same game as I had been watching at Priestfield, but they didn’t, this was football as it should be played and I was hooked again on football at the highest level and that’s why the arrival of Messi tonight is one that I am so looking forward to, I did see Ronaldo last year but I am a bigger fan of Messi, so tonight will be great, it will be even better when we win.
The excitement of seeing Messi, in Barca colours, coming to play against your team, is entirely justified. He is one of a handful of players in the history of the game, like Puskas/Pele before him, who presence has been utterly seismic for the game and an utter joy for the supporters who got to witness them in their prime. If I could guarantee a 7-6 win for Spurs tonight with Messi at his imperious best, then I would.
I’m with you on this, TCM. I came back last night from East Devon. Me and some family are there for a little holiday and to also see other members of my family who live there. I’m going to the game today and then heading back to Devon first thing tomorrow morning. The sole reason I’m coming back is because of Messi. At 28 I’ve been going to Spurs games since I was 15. In that time, I’ve probably missed a total of about 8 home games, that includes Prem, cups and Europe. Most of what I miss is because of holidays and today would’ve been one of those but for the fact it involves who I consider the greatest player to have played the game, and for that reason, I was willing to cut a day and a bit out of my holiday. Naturally I want Spurs to put on one of those glory, glory European nights but I can’t deny that a part of me does want to see Messi do something spectacular.
Buffon and Ronaldo were the two that I wanted to witness last season and this year we get to watch Messi. After that we can all look forward to the visit of Colin with Cardiff.
I think I need to stop “wanting to see players”. Last season, it was Ronaldo and Dybala. This season it was Messi. Every one of them scored against us...
You are entitled to your opinion............................................................But you are wrong
So you have seen both 'Super Bob' Taylor and now Messi at Wembley -now be honest who really is the better player! And whose goals gave you the greater pleasure
I've had a house in Ashford since 2001 but have never seen them play. I'm generally in Africa. I don't even know where their ground is. My house is very close to what would have been their old ground Essella Park, but that is all redeveloped now. I know where the Rugby Club and the Cricket Club is, but where the hell is the football stadium?
'Homelands' the home of Ashford United is out of town just outside Kingsnorth on the Hamstreet Road, if you don't drive I am not sure how you get there. 2 of my 3 sons have played for Ashford at youth levels and I once played there in a charity match against the Goons ex pro and celebrity XI
Very near the Cricket ground then. It's a nice area because it's been bypassed so that road is quiet apart from all of the bikers using the bike shop along there. Come to think of it, it's not that quiet because of all of the bikers using the bike shop along there. Excellent for the kit car as well, no fekking cameras last time I drove it although it was a while back. Things might have changed so don't take my word for it.
Thinking about that Charity match - that was the only time ever played in front of more than a handful of people - we sold over 1200 tickets and close to a 1000 turned up. Unfortunately as we were a little way from London we didn't get many well known celebrities, Tony Hadley and Roland Butcher (the ex England cricketer) were the only 2 I had really heard of, though apparently there were 3 or 4 actors in the side who were in (or had been in) Casualty, Londons Burning and The Bill! The ex pros of note were David Court (who was 20 years older than me and played in the centre circle but never missed a pass), Brian Sparrow and Brian McDermott (who we all know now as a manager) but who was still playing at a good level of non league football at the time. Roland Butcher was a miserable sod, who I marked at a couple of corners, and who when I spoke to him in my normal jocular manner dismissed me with a 'I am here to win not have a laugh'! And maybe my greatest claim to fame is that towards the end of the match I took Tony Hadley out as he was about to run past me, but he was a properly good bloke who signed 100s of autographs and put money behind the bar for all of our team to have a couple of pints. We lost 3-0, but we played by their rules and maintained 4 players over the age of 40, whereas they bought in three youngsters in the last quarter who we later learned were on their books and scored goals 2 and 3 as we tired. In their match report they claimed we had 5 Ashford Town players, we had 2 one of whom was the one the over 40s!
Back in the early eighties I was working the beaches in the South of France, Port Grimauld, Pampelone etc. and employed many Brits, some students, some like me just killing time and having fun, to sell drinks, ice creams, donuts, sarongs and anything else that we could make money out of. Some of my employees were Swedish and as Sweden were not EEC, they said that they were Danish so that they could work. To cut a long story short, they challenged us to a football match. The problem was there was 11 of them and only 4 brits who could be bothered to play. Then I had a stroke of luck, I was driving back from the beach and saw 3 dudes hitch hiking. I always stopped for hitch hikers in those days, and so I offered them a lift. In jumped 3 mousers, about 16 or 17 years old and we got talking. It turned out that they were Everton apprentices on holiday, so I immediately asked them if they fancied a game. They jumped at the chance. Next day the 'Danes' all 11 of them turned up wearing brand spanking new Sweden Kit including boots expecting to win. We turned up in t shirts, cut off denims etc. I played in goal with bare feet. They only got the ball in our half from kick offs. I didn't touch the ball and kept a clean sheet, in fact I spent most of the match drinking wine and rolling spliffs. We were about 20-0 up when the Swedes threw a huff and walked off accusing me of cheating by recruiting professional footballers. I wish I'd got their names, I'd like to bet at least one, if not all of them went on to be house-hold names.
Can't really ever say I've played with any household names before. I went primary school with Jay Simpson, who played a number of games for Arsenal, then went to WBA, QPR and Hull but then dropped into deeper tiers, just a couple years ago he was League 2's top scorer with Orient. He's now in America I believe. In my Sunday League days, I'd often played against (and once with!) Terry Dixon, who was once one of the most highly rated youngsters in the country, when he was 16 he got called up to the Ireland senior squad. Unfortunately he was never able to live out his potential with us - or anyone for that matter - due to the fact he picked up two horrific knee injuries that resulted in him eventually being released by Spurs, he had a short spell at West Ham and after that just faded into obscurity. Not sure if he still plays, the last I heard of him he was at Dover Athletic and that was a good 5 or so years ago. Tragic shame, I considered myself a very decent football in my youth but this lad was something else, you could go as far as saying he was a Sunday League Messi except played more centrally, he had so much hype some were even labelling him "the next Rooney", football can be cruel with injuries. Truly believe had he not suffered any problems he could've gone on to great things. I also played against and with Michael Noone, trained with him numerous times as well. He was another promising young player, had a style similar to that of Carrick with regards to just pinging some pin-point passes. Was on the books at Millwall and then went to the Glenn Hoddle Academy, think he joined a third tier club in Spain but this was years back, not sure what he's doing now. Terry and Michael were mates and they were mates with one of my mates (ooohhh football friends!). One day during my club's annual tournament, a number of players fell ill and we were short on numbers, it was only 7 a side and by this time, both Terry and Michael were at Spurs and Millwall respectively so essentially weren't allowed to kick a ball outside of their clubs without any special permission, however they offered to play for us in the tournament... We won every single game by a clear margin, Terry must've scored about 20+ goals in about 8 matches .
