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Knowing us, knowing Crewe, there was nothing we could do
- Arlene Finnigan
- 2 days ago
- 7 min read
Ah well, we had to lose some time, it’s not the end of the world. It was a kick in the minge, though, wasn’t it?
We had good reason to be optimistic that we’d continue our winning run at Crewe. The starting line-up was unchanged, and Kavanagh was back on the bench. Woods has a shot deflected over early on; Daniels nearly got on the end of the resulting corner at the near post. Fondop nearly nicked in after a mix up between Connolly and the keeper, Lawlor. Sutton played a good ball into the box which was headed over the bar by Stevens; it looked like a foul on Fondop in the box, which became a depressingly familiar theme throughout the afternoon.
Andy went for a pie just under than half an hour into the game, and you can guess what happened next. Sutton (who’d been making some good runs forward) intercepted the ball, played a 1-2 with Fondop then gave the ball to Payne, who once again played in Drummond to score with a very neat finish on his left foot. You’re all welcome.
📸 Oldham Athletic
Alas, we couldn’t hold onto the lead for five minutes. We’ve been superb at the back, and maybe it was fitting that it took such a good goal to break our run of clean sheets. Daniels was hesitant on the ball and should have either played the ball back to Hudson, hoofed it or put it out for a throw-in, but instead we lost the ball, Holicek played it out to Hutchinson, and it was an excellent long-range shot into the top right corner. (Andy missed that one as well.)
We were struggling a little bit to break Crewe down, so it seemed to make sense to bring Kavanagh on for Payne. His performance suggested that he wasn’t quite ready to play 45 minutes, though.
The referee did not have a great game, and we weren’t happy when Hutchinson brought down Drummond, having already been booked, and no second yellow was given. Sutton hit the bar with a header from the resulting free kick, and at that point, we’d have been disappointed with a draw, but would have taken it as a fair result.
I thought at the time that Fondop got the ball with his challenge in the 90th minute, and having watched the highlights, I still do. There’s a doctoral thesis to be written on The Colonial Roots of the Unfair Treatment of Karl-Michael Fondop-Talum, if any fellow sociology graduates want to pursue it. We should have defended the free kick better, we didn’t, and it was a great finish from the edge of the D by Holicek. What a sickener. And I’m still pissed off that the referee blew for full-time and wouldn’t let us take the corner.
📸 Oldham Athletic
Mellon wasn’t too downbeat after the game, pointing out that the game was won by two sensational strikes, one of them wind assisted. He paid tribute to the ‘superb support’, as always: “terrific, second to none, always are”. He refused to dwell on the loss, or to reflect on the end of the unbeaten run: “I’m not even reflecting on it, to be honest, now, it’s all about what we do going forward”. Quite. Onwards and upwards.
The policing after the game was utterly ridiculous. They formed a cordon to prevent people turning left down Nantwich Road and tried to force everyone back to the train station. Thoughts with the family of PC 3835, who was screaming at people to “GET ON THE FUCKING TRAIN”, I hope he got the anger out of his system before he went home. He was also asking to see people’s ID. Despite the best efforts of several politicians, we still live in something approaching a free society where it isn’t compulsory to carry ID, thank fuck, and Maggie Thatcher’s attempts to force travelling football supporters to carry photo ID cards failed some 37 years ago.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m very aware that it wasn’t the case that everyone behaved impeccably all day. As a fairly small middle-aged woman, it’s one of the downsides of a sold out away game that you’ll spent a fair amount of the day being barged into and knocked about by blokes who are a lot bigger than you, many of whom are pissed and/or coked up, some of whom are unpleasantly aggressive. I don’t recall seeing any actual trouble all day, though, and the heavy-handed approach by the police was always going to cause more trouble than it prevented.
Anyway, we hung about until the police looked like they were getting bored, headed back towards the pubs, and, when asked “are you Oldham fans?”, Andy sighed in exasperation and used The Force, and we were in (well, outside) Ebenezer’s half an hour after the final whistle. I appreciate we’re fortunate in being able to do that, but it is pretty infuriating when me and Andy have to emphasise that we’re just a nice middle-aged couple who want to go for a civilised drink – which we are – and have to play down the fact that we’re football fans – which we also are. It’s 2026. Any chance of us leaving the archaic attitudes towards citizens who happen to like football behind in the 1980s any time soon?
I won’t be at the game today. My exact words when the fixtures came out last summer were “there is no fucking way on God’s green earth that I’m spending my birthday in fucking Colchester”. If you’ll forgive me being self-indulgent, I walked 100 miles in March to raise money for the Roy Castle Lung Cancer Foundation; if you’d like to make an old woman very happy on her birthday, you can donate here.
I recently read a novel called 45 Things to Do Before You’re 45 by Julia Tuffs. It’s entertaining, if deliberately cringe-inducing. The protagonist attempts to work her way through a list of, well, 45 things she wants to do before her 45th birthday, with chaotic results. I haven’t got the energy for that kind of mid-life crisis, but here’s 45 things I did do before I turned 45:
1. Watched us play in the Premier League – tick. See, I told you there were advantages to being middle aged.
2. Saw us get relegated – ugh. Tick. Four fucking times.
3. Learned a new word at the match – tick. ‘Cuckold’?!?
4. Skipped school lunches to save the money to go to the match – tick.
5. Got bollocked for phoning Clubcall in the close season – tick.
6. Stood on the old crumbling Bloomfield Road terrace, trying to avoid being hit by a blow-up doll – tick.
7. Sat a university final exam hungover because I’d been drowning my sorrows after losing in the play-offs – tick. I’d have got a first otherwise.
8. Queued for hours in the rain for play-off tickets, long before Future Ticketing – tick.
9. Watched Chaddy the Owl rob a kid’s shoe and throw it onto the pitch – tick.
10. Watched an away game in the home end – tick. I had a great view of Gary McDonald’s goal from the Gwladys Street.
11. Watched in bewilderment as someone dressed up as the Screwfix catalogue walked around the pitch – tick.
12. Renewed my season ticket when Dave Penney was still our manager – tick.
13. Lost money betting on us – tick. Why did I keep betting on Gregan to score?
14. Won money betting on us – tick. Cheers, Chris Taylor, that was a great day out at Elland Road.
15. Seen us beat both Everton and Liverpool in the FA Cup, while still living in Liverpool – tick.
16. Cheered on Chaddy the Owl in a penalty shootout against Barci the Nando’s chicken – tick.
17. Took Chaddy junior to the Camp Nou and the Stade Bauer (home of Red Star Paris) – tick. (We decided against taking him to Lazio or Juve Stabia.)
18. Laughed at Millwall’s ‘firm’ offering a gingerbread man out for a fight – tick.
19. Watched a game on the scaffold at Gillingham and survived – tick.
20. Saw Urko Vera score – tick.
21. Been ‘treated’ to a tour of pubs mentioned in Macc Lads songs after Macclesfield away – tick.
22. Muttered “bloody hell I saw his dad playing” on seeing a young player start for us – tick.
23. Sung “cod’s not sustainable, pies are sustainable” – tick.
24. Been screamed at and called a ‘keyboard warrior’ by a Senior Director’s daughter – tick.
25. Helped to clear snow off the Boundary Park pitch – tick
26. Shouted “FUCKING GET IN!” at a wedding on hearing the news of Queensy Menig’s late winner v Blackburn – tick.
27. Been told to “keep your knickers on, love” by a Latics player – tick. (Sorry not sorry, Andy.)
28. Been kettled by the police – tick. Both before and after a game.
29. Spent 11 hours on a coach to and from Forest Green, only for us to play Chris O’Grady up front on his own and play for a draw – tick.
30. Sung “Fulham’s a shithole, I wanna go home” – tick.
31. Walked out of a match in despair after 20 minutes – tick.
32. Worn a tangerine clown wig to an away day – tick.
33. Taped a handwritten message to the main entrance inviting the club to ban me – tick.
34. Had a date night in watching the video of the fans’ forum at Royton Cricket Club – tick.
35. Attempted to watch us be relegated from the Football League, only to be prevented from doing so by stewards blocking fire exits – tick.
36. Drunk champagne in the car park while Frank Rothwell sang The Wanderer – tick.
37. Helped to clear the rubbish and debris out of what’s now the fans’ bar and begged Binman not to drink from a dusty, abandoned bottle of whisky – tick.
38. Covered Barry Owen’s brick up with Frank Rothwell stickers – tick. And I’ll do it again.
39. Questioned my life choices on a coach back from Boston on a Tuesday night – tick.
40. Been paid to write about Latics – tick. Not by Matt Dean or by the club, before you ask.
41. Got an owl tattoo – tick. (OK maybe I've already had my mid-life crisis.)
42. Messaged a Teesside radio station telling them how to pronounce Jesurun Uchegbulam – tick. They refused to sing it to the tune of 99 Red Balloons.
43. Drunk a York pub dry of prosecco – tick.
44. Written a piece for a Wembley final programme – tick.
45. Watched us win a trophy – finally, finally, thank fuck finally, tick.
📸 Adam Davy
Who knows, maybe I’ll see us win another promotion before I turn 46. I can live with it if I don’t. I’m confident I won’t have to wait another 34 years.
Safe journey if you are heading to Colchester. Mellon assured us that “we’ll dust ourselves down and we’ll go again.” Here’s hoping another unbeaten run starts today. KTMFF.
Written by Arlene Finnigan
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