Reading another thread on here I noticed that New Jersey Swan is making a fair bit of a round trip to go watch us on Saturday. Fair play that's what you call making an effort. Neveroff is making the game as am I. What I was wondering is how many of you lot out there go away to watch the Swans and what you'd consider to be your best and worst trips. Also has anything out of the ordinary happened whilst going away. On my travels I've had drenchings at places like Yeovil and Gillingham and experienced amazing stadiums like The Emirates and The Etihad, not forgetting the various trips to Ninian Park and the CCS. I bumped into Kerry Katona in a motorway service station on the way to Tranmere before (right miserable fcuker) and got held up on the way to Norwich by a herd of bloody cows on a single track road. So please feel free and share your tales, Cardiff fans welcome too, no need to keep it clean as this thread is intended as a bit of fun so lets please keep it that way. FFS, you are excused because we are all on this board fully aware of your travel limitations due to the terms and conditions of your weekend passes from the Coed.
Left Swansea in 2004, just before the Liberty opened, and moved to the north of England, so my perspective on Away Days is completely different from most Swans fans. Ironically, one of the most difficult away days for me in terms of time, distance and cost would be to go see Swansea playing at home! Only been to the Liberty once - in 2005 I think. A grey, drizzly sunday morning League 1 game against Millwall, chiefly remembered for the post-match violence and abuse offered to the police by Swansea's numbskull element in the shadow of Landore viaduct. These charmers are probably frequenters of the Railway Inn. So, Away Days for me have, from a northern perspective, been many and varied over the last 8 years - ok, I might not get to see home games, but the huge number of grounds within 2 hours of where I live means that I have been able to see the Swans away at all sorts of places. The first game I went to was a League 2 game at Rochdale on a tuesday night - August 10 2004. Sun was still shining when it kicked off at 7.45pm! You get some strange and unexpected folk turning up at these games: eg. in front of me a well-dressed grandmother and her student-looking granddaughter, both with posh southern English accents, and well pleased with the 2-0 win. How or why they were there, I don't know. Impossible to imagine then that 7 years later we'd be in the Premiership. Too many memories really. A few, at random, spring to mind. That great day at Bury when 5000 Swans fans turned up to see us get promotion. Arguing with a Cheshire police officer (and nearly getting arrested) outside Chester's ground after he stood and watched a (stupidly) shirted and lone Swansea fan being done over in the distance by half a dozen blokes in the car park. Nearly crying with sympathy one Christmas for a frozen teenage Jack girl who was bent up on the terrace at Doncaster's old ground trying to keep warm in the most viciously, mind-numbingly, icy cold wind I've ever experienced at a game. No roof, no sides on our end. So cold that, even with gloves on, I was shaking so much 1/2 my tea ended up on the floor. Why the hell she turned up in just a skimpy replica Swans top I'll never know. A bald guy, about late 40s, prob an old hooligan, but amiable enough, sheepskin coat, several of his front teeth missing, deep Swansea accent. He'd turn up all over the place: Barnsley, Stockport, Tranmere - and most times, once the police had spotted him, they'd approach him, have a friendly word and remove him, smilingly, from the ground. Guess he must have had a banning order, but just couldn't stay away. Proper addict. Some other old geezer was a regular as well - he looked like he might be the father of the previous bloke. He just looked like an alcoholic, OAP tramp, wild-haired, shoving sausage rolls down his throat and haranguing the local coppers - they just ignored him, mainly because they couldn't understand what the f*** he was on about anyway. Seen this old boy at Huddersfield, Carlisle, Middlesbrough. Where the eff he got his money from to travel up from Swansea, I don't know. May have been a scrap dealer or summat. That glorious day at Wembley, of course, when we won the play-off final. My strongest feeling, oddly, was one of incredible flatness and deflation on the way home. Never been able to work that one out. Maybe I'd been hoping and waiting so long for it, then when it happened it felt like an anti-climax. Speaking of Wembley trips - the great win against Huddersfield (Cornforth etc) and the appallingly depressing last minute loss against Northampton. No one on the coach spoke on the way home down the M4. Awful. Being chatted up in a pub by a young woman in a hen party after a game in Preston. Lovely. Admiring the sheer nerve of a tiny, young, pretty, female police officer in trying to physically prevent a load of angry, half-drunk, red-faced Swansea men from leaving Leicester City's ground before the end of a game we'd clearly lost. They were mostly old enough to be her dad and should have known better. Christ, that's enough for now. My tea's ready.
............ I'll have to give that post some thought, at first I thought you might be a Cardiff Wum, but your description of the issues with 'Swansea's numbskull element in the shadow of Landore viaduct' is pretty much how I remembered things as I left the ground after that Millwall game, can remember the Police chasing the Idiots up the side of the Pick-up spares entrance on the corner, and some being chased up the side of the railway track!......... PS: Fiery your post reminds me of the time we were at whatever club, can't remember the name now, but it took us into the play-offs, and Leon Knight, and Fallon teamed up well that game, and scored I think three goals, two second half, it was a cold day then, and the ground was Victorian wooden shed! What the hell was the club name now? It will come to me................ PS: Just come to me () Chesterfield! 06 May 2006, we won 4-0, League One game, Leon Knight scored on 5 minutes, and Fallon got one on 33 minutes. Second half Leon Knight got two more goals, hell he was on fire that game, though Chesterfield were poor. Shaun Mac played a good game that day, so did Sam Rickets too, Roberto Martinez came on as sub at 90 minutes..............
Chesterfield I think Phil. Ps, way too much detail there no way is Fiery anything but a Jack. Top post Fiery I must say
Dilli must try and meet up on Saturday. You won't be able to miss me I'll be wearing my bright green coat!! My biggest memory was playing Torquay when the playoffs were over two legs. It was pissing down and the old bill kept us in the ground afterwards for ages with bricks raining down on us. The team actually left the ground before we were let out. Another biding memory was us loosing to Northampton in a play off final at Wembley, when the ref made them retake a free kick and me turning to the lads and saying that he'll probably score now and promptly curling over the wall and into the corner of the net. Had some happy days following The Swans, remember sitting in the main stand at Ninian Park when away fans were banned. (Brother in law is a Cardiff fan) When up pops Keith Walker to volley in from 18 yards for a Swans win, I just couldn't contain myself promptly jumping to my feet cheering, then realising where I was with brother in law dragging me back onto my seat, great days!!!
Northampton play off final away with TITS ,all my mates together stripping the local off liecence clean of beers and drinking them out side the swans pub in wembely all jacks on one side northampton on the other side and the coppers were sound as fook that day as well,had a real good laugh with them and one took some pics for us with our inflatable sheep.. Hapiness turned to misery when they RE took that free kick,i Think we all knew it was going in for some reason,heading "simply the best " with total numbness and pain standing There in silence. Back onto the bus and watching the northampton fans give us the v signs and laughing..until our bus stopped!! A day that had almost every emotion from total hope to total devestation. Bristol rovers away when cuzack was manager sticks for some reason,just a car full of boys. Brum at home ,in the builders when Brum tried to smash up the Queens and didnt realise the trolly they threw was hitting perspects and boy ved off and flattend the bru my dummy! There Are loads really, away at bounmouth witnessing darren perret getting stick off his own fans and i got into bother with the cops for being too chopsy.. almost didnt make it home that day which was the 1st of january if i remember correct. Basically all the good days for me were when tHe swans were hard core 2,500 There was just a great buzz being small time back then as the whole prem league didnt mean **** all to anyone unless it was a cup game like west ham home and away !! I remember that game up at west ham, RE ener the west ham fans saying "look at this lot coming here for their big day out" cocky ****s! How times have changed!
Yes your right Dilli, it was Chesterfield! can remember staying in the travel lodge, not far from the ground!............
I'll have to find out our travel details and let you know what they are. I'm going on the coaches from the Liberty at 8.30am and I was told the pub stop is in Winchester before then heading down to Southanmpton
Re-reading my earlier post can sort of see why it might in places appear to be the work of a Cardiff Wum! But no. Have some vividly unpleasant memories of going to Ninian Park in the early 80's. Not nice. Pretty bloody scary. Went to one game - think it was a 2 legged affair - about 82 or 3. A night game. Went on a clapped out, overcrowded, under-policed, football special from High Street. A lot of the "lads" were drinking flagons of cider and sniffing glue! No way could this happen today, thank God. The whole night was full of tension and the threat of aggro, not just from Cardiff nutters in the streets around the ground, but from, I'm sorry to say some of the madder Swans fans on the train on the way back. neveroffside - yeah, that re-taken free-kick of Northampton's was a sickener. Bizarrely, the Swans defender who conceded it, was Jonathan Coates, who was - well, is - a cousin of my stepdaughter. Have to come clean, though. I can't in all honesty claim to be a proper Jack. I was born in England, have no family connections with South Wales, and am not Welsh. However....On the plus side, I moved there when I was 18, lived there for 25 years, and spent 20 of those years with a woman who hailed from Pontarddulais - and still go back a couple of times a year to visit her, the step-kids etc. and must have been on the North Bank 100s of times. So guess I might be half a Jack, at least
Was that the trip when that idiot Spielberg was videoing everyone ? I'm no hooligan and never have been but I remember a few weeks later being in Martha's and seeing that idiot putting the video on calling it "Swansea Hooligans" and seeing my face on the bloody screen. I wasn't too bloody happy and had it out with him there and then. A few weeks after that a load of the real nutters were rounded up because the Police bought a copy of the video and then charged them. Mad times they were and that was with Cardiff fans nowhere near
I'd have no problem with that mate, be nice to put a face to the name. You can't be any worse than FFS
That name takes me back "Spielberg" can't remember his real name but he's the same one that ran on the pitch against Liverpool in the FA Cup replay and put the ball past Grobbelar. Remember thinking that John Hughes had scored jumping up and down (yes it was a consolation goal) and falling under everybody's feet then being dragged bag off the floor to be told stop messing around as he'd hit the post.
Dilligaf - you've just given me a memory flash! That Spielberg bloke - completely forgot about him. If he's the one I'm thinking of he was a short, tubby bloke who went around weilding a big eff-off camera on his shoulder. Think he was half Italian or something. Not sure. But bit of a weirdo. Used to go around bars and clubs just randomly filming people. Don't think he'd get away with it today. Used to see him in places like the 4J's on Northampton Lane - a rough old place if I remember right.
Yes that's just about the perfect description for him. I could be wrong but I think his name was Tino. He's got an older brother who is well known for working on the taxi's in town, which in turn reminds me of an old mate of mine working the taxi's called Newt. Now he was one of the idiots causing trouble at the time. He was one of the clowns arrested after the Cardiff trip because of that video doing the rounds. He was one of the Panathanaikos one's too
