CHAOS - Too. Week T

Torquay United - April 2006

Having made the initial trip down to Devon for the must win game against the Gulls only for it to be called off, I came home wet, annoyed and somewhat dismayed at the long journey that was all for absolutely nothing. This didn't however dampen my spirits for the re-arranged game in April 2006, we'd been on a decent run beating Wrexham and Shrewsbury at Edgeley Park and a win against our hosts would have all but guaranteed our safety. A loss however could've been hugely devastating.

The game was on a Tuesday night so I actually had to pull a sickie from school that day (one of only 4 days of school I actually missed in my whole time there!) and we set off around 10am, the first pitfall came just outside of Sandbach near a place that I only now describe as 'The Pies' as the bridge inexplicably has 'The Pies' sprayed onto it, when my Dad's car went over some shattered glass and plastic in the road and burst!

Thankfully we had a spare so by around 11:30am we were on the road again and went along problem free until we hit South Birmingham. When there was an almighty traffic jam caused by roadworks which we didn't worry about and assumed we'd be soon past them, we hit them around 1pm and left them at 4pm! So much for our plans of stopping for lunch outside of Birmingham!!

We then made steady progress onto Torquay looking like we'd make it just in time for kick off, this is until we couldn't find a parking spot everywhere! It seemed every driver in Britain had made their way to Torquay just to ensure we didn't get a parking spot, 7:40pm we found a parking spot a good 20 minutes walk from the ground. We heard cheers as we got in but, naively in retrospect, didn't realise who they were from.

So we made our way in only to discover that cheer was Torquay going 3-0 up we were only in the 25th minute. The game continued and County were not impressive at all, in the second half we conceded another goal and ended up losing 4-0 overall, the feeling of dread that relegation would happen was slowly descending on us. Thankfully in the remaining games we managed to get a point each of Barnet and Carlisle to clinch our place in the Football League for another year.

It was without doubt the worst journey I've ever made to any football game ever and since that day I've never been back to the Town of Torquay!

Tamworth Away: 16th August 2014

I do feel rather wretched for not having brought a great deal to the CHAOS - Too party. The original project, it has to be said, used up pretty well all of my memorable match-stories and left me anecdoted out! But 'Chapter T' brings with it the opportunity to tell a more recent tale - of the afternoon when Radio Macc went officially digital!

I was invited to join County's Media Team in the close season, and on the strength of a telephone-interview that committed me to continue getting along to most of the team's games and to promise to be reasonably literate. Having accepted, I then promptly swerved the first two matches of the season, whilst on holiday, before commandeering the not-terribly-trusty Macc-mobile for the trip to Tamworth. County, after a woeful start to the new campaign, had yet to get off the mark - either points-wise or goal-wise. No-one honestly fancied their chances against a team that had been in the Conference Premier for the previous season, either. And, knowing that my live match tweets would be going out to a much wider audience than the text-updates I had been used to sending to a dozen Heavener mates forever ready to forgive any 'on-air' gaffes, I was, not to put too fine a point on it, feeling as nervous as hell.

Thankfully, as the game progressed, there didn't appear to be much to tweet home about - and so I settled down, unhurriedly, into my new role, taking my Twitter-time to ensure that only sentences of proper English were released into the community. Not only that, but County were actually looking decent value for a first point of the season - even if a goal might be a little too much to expect.

And, then, in the dying minutes, there was excitement. Something I had been secretly hoping to avoid on this afternoon. Jack Ryan went to ground in the box - controversially in the eyes of many of us there - and County were awarded a penalty. Composing myself at my keyboard, I tweeted that the spot-kick had been given and, as Jamie Milligan made it known that he would take this, posed the question as to whether the Captain could convert. So far, so professional...

But when it did indeed go in, the tweeting, in immediate response to that question, threw caution to the wind with a "YES! YES! YES!". County had won - but I had publicly lost it.

Fortunately, the followers of 'Scfcmedia' appeared to like this kind of outpouring, and I was asked to turn up and do more of the same the following Saturday.

A couple of Heaveners - to whom I shall be forever grateful - had advised me before the game simply to be myself when composing the updates to a waiting County World. Did we but know it, turned out that I had an inner Meg Ryan... !

County Thunderbirds Are Go!

Joe Turner

Josh Thompson*
Andy Thorpe
Alan Thompson
Lee Todd

Greg Tansey
Jason Taylor
Paul Turnbull

Billy Thompson
Steve Taylor
Rhys Turner

* Tunnicliffe was there with his first spell, but had the door slammed in his face for antics second time around.

Time to tell us the winner, Sir Rog.

Whenever.

OK, we have the two finalists.

On to the final.

Both great entries and both deserve to win. However, the flip of the coin will decide the outcome.

I'll be back.

This week's winner of 'T' is therefore, Downy.

Terrific.

Back to you, Len, still in the European Ryder Cup Celebrations