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Post by bringbacklenwhite on Apr 23, 2014 14:26:49 GMT
Ciao, County Chums.
Week C of "CHAOS - Too" commences. Come and commit compositions of complexity and comprehension, concerning concocted confessions and congenial conspicuousness.
Cordial constructions of crazy content or credulous codswollop ? Continue to converse and create condensed, classic clamourings.
All yours, mateys.
Update:- Sir Rog dons the Mantle of Brilliance for this week. Time to impress him.
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Post by sandbachhatter on Apr 23, 2014 15:30:21 GMT
Carrow Road
The home of Mrs Sandy's beloved Canaries and, more importantly for the purposes of this story, the last minute venue for our wedding reception in the summer of 2004.
Our wedding was initially due to take place on the first Saturday in August, 2004. Sadly, the original venue for the reception - the Sainsbury Centre near UEA - let us down with only a few months to go when they decided to knock half the building down in a renovation. We told them where to stick their offer of a 25% discount.
Step in my soon-to-be-wife's uncle, who has some posh season tickets at Carrow Road and knew which calls to make. They couldn't accommodate us on that Saturday, but if we could move the wedding to the weekend before - Saturday 31st July to be precise, we could have the Top of the Terrace Suite.
Fortunately, despite us getting married in the colossal Catholic Cathedral (well, it is Week C) in Norwich, they happened to be free that weekend so the wedding was brought forwards.
The next bit we didn't find out about until after the wedding as it was decided we could do without the additional stress.
Norwich had just been promoted to the Premier League and, due to a mix-up, realised only a few weeks before the wedding that they had also arranged to play Coventry City (2 more C's) at Carrow Road on the same day. Due to it being a 3pm kick off, we wouldn't be allowed the Suite until well after 7pm. No good when our wedding was due to take place at 3pm. The photos weren't going to take THAT long. Sorry, said the person at the club when they phoned my Mother-in-law, we'll have to cancel the booking.
As you can imagine, my Mother-in-law went mental and made all sorts of threats (including one, in the heat of the moment, about going to the national newspapers) and slammed the phone down.
Just as she reached maximum panic levels a few minutes later, the phone went again.
"Is that ****?"
(in tears) "Yes"
"This is Delia Smith from Norwich City. I've just been told what has happened with our mix-up, and there is no way I'll let us ruin your daughter's wedding day. I've just got off the phone with the Director of Coventry City, and he's agreed to switch the fixture to Highfield Road instead."
To this day, I'll never have a bad word said about Delia, regardless of her on the pitch drunken antics. She didn't need to step in that day, but she did and the wedding went ahead as planned. If you check out Norwich's 2004-05 pre-season results, you'll notice that they played away at Coventry City on Saturday 31st July 2014.
But for our wedding, and more importantly Delia, that fixture would have been at Carrow Road.
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Post by bringbacklenwhite on Apr 23, 2014 15:56:49 GMT
What a lovely story. Where are ya ?
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Post by Admin on Apr 23, 2014 16:16:49 GMT
Cheadle End
What is a stand? Well in the Cheadle End it's a lot of cement and corrugated iron. It is however so much more than this, it's our Mecca, it's where we make the bi-weekly pilgrimage and sacrifice our hard earned money and time. It's where we offer thanks to the greats that have graced the park like Gannon, Francis, Ward, Flynn, Pilkington etc it's also where we are collective unit or joy for the great moments such as beating Wycombe to go to Wembley for the fifth time, to breaking long standing records all the way back to a record crowd against Liverpool and Ray Drakes 7 second goal.
It's also where we collectively sulk and cry after 5-0 stuffings by Hereford and Port Vale, after countless relegations and curse the names of former players who were naff for us but brilliant against us.
It's about the scarf, the clear blue skies. It's about Arthur Brownlow and Kenny Boxhall's booming voice. It's about flags and banners and noise. It's about being part of the County family.
Yes the Cheadle End is physically just concrete and iron but spiritually it is so much more.
post-script from bblw ---- I can remember when it was timber, corrugated iron and fresh air !
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Post by Epworth Hatter OLD account on Apr 23, 2014 17:11:48 GMT
If any of you have read some of my very early contributions to CH, you will understand that it is with some trepidation that I write an anecdote about one of my experiences of watching County about 10 years ago…Wednesday 20th October 2004. (Feel free to add any editorial comments if you were also at the game!)
Chesterfield Away
It was the 2004/2005 season and we were playing in League 1. It was a Wednesday night in October and it was extremely foggy.
I was meeting my brother at the ground to watch the game and we agreed to meet just outside.
The evening got off to a good start. I parked up in a carpark at just after 7pm. I walked over to pay and to my delight there was free parking after 7pm. From then on, it was downhill all the way. As I was walking back to my car this young guy appeared and asked if I had any change for the car park. I had three very good reasons for not doing so: 1) Car parking was free after 7pm, as I’d just established 2) Mine was the only car in the car park 3) Without trying a judge a book by its cover, I’m pretty sure any money I gave him would be a donation to his personal recreational drugs fund.
So, having cheered him up by enthusiastically extolling the generosity of Chesterfield Town Council for providing free parking after 7pm and that there was no need to thank me for saving him £3.50, I headed off the ground.
I met my brother and we took our place in the away end at Saltergate. The fog was getting worse, so the goal at the other end was quickly disappearing.
We were rubbish. With about 5 minutes to go we were 4-0 down and then they got a penalty (I think - did I mention the fog?). The penalty was saved, much to our delight. As is so often in these situations, the gallows humour takes over and the song from the County fans was: “5-0, you couldn’t beat us 5-0”. A quality song that sums up what it can be like being a longsuffering County fan, especially that season as we were relegated by a county mile
The game ended 4-0 and at the final whistle the chants turned to ‘We want McIlroy out’ from a group of County fans. I thought it was out of order (even though he was hopeless for us). My opinion was confirmed when I turned around to walk out and saw a bloke standing there with his son, who was aged 8 or 9, both in their County scarves. The lad had tears in his eyes and he looked up to his dad and sobbed, ‘Why are they singing that? We like Sammy, don’t we Dad? Why are they singing that? He’ll be really upset.’ The lad was devastated that the manager of his beloved County could be treated in such a way by its own fans.
Ah, the innocence of youth. You'll learn soon enough, lad, I thought. Especially if you follow County for the rest of your days.
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Post by Epworth Hatter OLD account on Apr 23, 2014 18:36:59 GMT
Sandy - a most excellent story
Fudge - boodiful!
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Post by gazz on Apr 24, 2014 13:41:56 GMT
CHAOS: County Heaven's Anecdotes Of Sport: Back in December 2011 on the old Yuku forum {shudders}, our resident Limerick God, Lennie came up with an inspirational idea, which is best described in Lennie's own words: "Starting in the new year you will be invited to add your own personal stories, anecdotes, jokes, trivial knowledge and memories about anything to do with sport and its personalities.
This will follow the "Sesame Street" format of concentrating on one letter per week in alphabetical order. This should provide an encyclopaedia of Heaveners' shining wit and take us through to the European Championships providing a diversion from events on and off the field at Edgeley Park."So letter by letter, Heaveners built up a brilliant collection of tales which was successfully transferred to our new home here for all our visitors to enjoy, new and old. However, it didn't stop there. Two years later in September 2013 Sandy and Lennie came up with the fantastic idea of publishing the best of these in a book. Not just any book though, that book would be for a worthy cause, The British Heart Foundation. A charity very close to Lennie's own heart as it happens (pun very much intended in the best possible way!) The response from Heaveners was superb, and thanks to a phenomenal gesture by Sandy in covering the printing costs in advance from his own pocket, the book finally started dropping on doormats in October that same year, and boy was it good. The last time I checked with Sandy he only had a small amount of copies left to sell. So if you have yet to buy one, what are you waiting for? Send a PM to Sandy now and see if you can get your hands on a piece of CH history, and if he's not down for any of those shenanigans, ask him for a copy of the CHAOS book, and be chuffed with yourself at having helped raise money for a fabulous charity. If it wasn't for the success of that book, we probably wouldn't be doing this thread today. So a big "thank you" to Lennie, and to Sandy for the incredible amount of work he put in to making the book such an amazing reality, and to everyone who has kindly bought a copy and made it all worthwhile! If I had a hat I'd be taking it off to you all right now!  PS by bblw - Please don't forget the certain individual (who shall remain nameless) who did the graphics for the CHAOS book. I doff my fedora to you young man. Also a big thanks to Sandy for editing and marketing the project, and to everyone who bought the book. Those of you who didn't don't know what you are missing !!
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Post by Admin on Apr 24, 2014 16:24:52 GMT
Fantastic Gazza!
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Post by gazz on Apr 24, 2014 16:28:27 GMT
Cheers, fudgie, and cheers also to Lennie  |
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Post by sirroger on Apr 24, 2014 16:51:57 GMT
Team of C's!
Neil Cutler
Brian Carrigan (I know, but he's a one off defender for this team sheet)
Joel Cantona
Joe Connor (sorry Joe!)
Dean Crowe (as with Carrigan)
Gordon Cowans (whilst with us)
Lee Cartwright
Wayne Collins
Nick Chadwick
Bazza Conlon
Adnan Cirak
I just love that forward line!
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Post by archie on Apr 25, 2014 17:39:55 GMT
Shamelessly recycling from the original CHAOS:
Cringle Fields
Playing fields in Burnage/Levenshulme where I polished my nascent genius as a goal poacher supreme. Played a few primary school matches there but it was more often the kickabouts with anything from 3 to 13 a side, rush goalies etc etc. We could usually be found there on Sundays watching the local pub or wannabe (Real Madrid United comes to mind) sides kicking lumps out of each other and acting as unpaid ballboys.
The fields later achieved a certain amount of backdated fame as the place where the Gallagher brothers kicked any convenient ball while waiting for their mother to come home from the adjacent McVities factory.
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Post by archie on Apr 25, 2014 17:53:20 GMT
But now, something original: Cardiff/Connelly/Cooper
Never been very fond of Cardiff City but it's currently the home of two genuine County heroes. Sean Connelly - a Danny Bergara signing who never gave less than 100%. Played in, arguably, the best County squad of all time and was sensible enough to look beyond his playing days at an early stage. From the Cardiff City website: 'Sean Connelly MCSP SRP Head of Physiotherapy A full-back during his playing career, Sean began with non-league Hallam before joining Stockport County in August 1991. In March 2001 in moved to Wolves, later joining Tranmere. His final club was Rushden and Diamonds with who he spent the entire 2004/05 season playing nearly all of their games. He reached the 500 career-appearances figure towards the end of that season. Throughout his career, Sean made sure he passed all of the necessary qualifications to become a Chartered Physiotherapist. It was in this roll that he joined Cardiff City in the summer of 2006, linking up again with Dave Jones who was his Manager at Stockport and Wolves.' My own favourite moment involving Sean was a headed goal against Tranmere when we turned out to be unlikely winners after Martin McIntosh was sent off early on. Kevin 'Coops' Cooper was one of the last survivors of the great Dave Jones team. Very like Sean Connelly in that he was a 100% man, he went on to have a decent career and has, like Sean, ended up in Cardiff. www.cardiffcityfc.co.uk/team/ac_mgmt/Favourite moments would be his first goal for County against Crewe securing a vital 1-0 win and a stunning strike away at West Brom that gained an unlikely draw. |
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Post by gazz on Apr 25, 2014 18:01:42 GMT
Good entries, archie!
If I remember correctly, didn't Sean used to muck in with Rodger during the week while studying Physiotherapy?
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Post by bringbacklenwhite on Apr 25, 2014 18:50:21 GMT
Cricket Coaching
My first teaching practise, Summer 1973 Coventry. 1600 pupil all-boys secondary school (some of the 3rd year sixth formers were older than me !!)
It was a glorious hot sunny day (Yes, we used to have those sorts of Summers in those days). My class of 30 thirteen year olds were out in their pristine white tee shirts, shorts and pumps hanging on my every word. The college tutor was sitting on the grass banking enjoying, hopefully, my first observed lesson of the month long placement.
15 bowlers with 15 hard cricket balls, 15 wicket-keepers and 15 single stumps to aim at in line. In order to make a point of technique I planned to demonstrate a beautiful side on overarm bowling action when I made the mistake of saying "OK, one of you throw me your cricket ball".
Cue - all 15 lads decided to take me at my word and dispatched their ball in my direction !!! To which my tutors voice came drifting across the field - "I bet you never say that, ever, again".
Two minutes later, with order restored and my bruises rubbed away, I managed to persuade "You, David". "Bring your ball and place it in my hand - gently". I took the ball, duly demonstrated the action I was looking for and, with a very fortunate bounce, hit the singe stump first time of asking". Again, my tutors dulcet tones came floating across the ensemble --- "Quit, while you are ahead".
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Post by gazz on Apr 25, 2014 18:53:05 GMT
Brilliant, Lennie, the stuff CHAOS was made for!  |
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