Superstition

Watford 0-1 ITFC August 21st 2012

Along with around 1400 other Town fans we made a quick dash after work to Vicarage Road for the first away game of the season. Luckily the traffic was light on both the A12 and M25 so it allowed plenty of time to enjoy our pre-match Cod & Chips!

Pre-match meal

FRY DAYS on my mind

Plenty to choose from

ITFC fans not welcome!

New owners, new manager, new kit

I was surprised with the lack of enthusiasm around the place considering that the club has been brought by Giampaolo Pozzo the Italian who also owns Serie A club Udinese and Spanish side Granada. He has put Gianfranco Zola in charge and promised to invest millions of pounds in the club, perhaps they fear becoming a feeder club?

Heavy showers before kick-off

Ex Hornet Scott Loach

Ipswich dominated the first half with some great passing football making their hosts look like complete strangers meeting for the first time. All of this superiority counted for very little at the break with scoreline remaining goalless.

Watford looked a little better in the second half and had chances to take the lead mainly using their height advantage at set pieces especially when substitute Chris Iwelumo came on. Aaron Cresswell almost gave away an own goal when his defensive header looped over Scott Loach (the former Hornets keeper making his first appearance at Vicarage Road since signing for Town in the summer) luckily it hit the bar!

I thought that that we were going back home with a goalless draw but Michael Chopra had other ideas, in the 90th minute he ran into the box and slipped Carlos Edwards' low cross from the right past keeper Manuel Almunia thus ending our "Watford hoodoo", a fifteen game run without a win against the Hornets.

It was a happy journey back to Suffolk and a quick one, again there was very little traffic on the roads and we arrived home before midnight. 

Playlist
Superstition by Stevie Wonder - The ending of a hoodoo! 

Beautiful Day

ITFC 1-1 Blackburn August 18th 2012

The first day of the season is always exciting, everything is fresh and we all start level on points, we dare to dream. I know we had the midweek cup game but that doesn't really count, this is when it all starts.

I set the recorder to "series record" Football Focus, Match Of The Day and Match Of The Day 2, can you believe that I forgot all about The Football League Show! I registered us both for the TWTD prediction league and made a deal with Sharon that we would go to The Crown in Woodbridge in the evening as long as we didn't lose!

I took the programme from Kevin Beattie's testimonial that my dad gave me to the match for him to sign as I knew he was doing an outside broadcast of Radio Suffolk's "Life's A Pitch" with Mark Murphy on Alderman park (it was Alderman Road Rec when I was a kid!)

...........Delivered

Signed...........

The right weather for a Samba band

It was a really hot day around about 30 degrees in the afternoon not what you call football weather, a test of fitness for the players in that heat for sure. Before kick-off we had a lap of honour by the counties Olympians and Torch Bearer's including Debbie from The Bell! A crowd of just over 19,000 turned up and created a really good atmosphere, the best that I can remember for a while at Portman Road.

Blackburn took the lead midway through the first half when loanee Colin Kazim-Richards headed in from close range much against the run of play. It took until the 83rd minute for Town to find an equaliser, just when we thought it was going to be one of those afternoons. Jason Lowe intercepted Jason Scotland's pass to Michael Chopra (who would have surely scored) only to turn it into his own net. We played some neat passing football throughout the afternoon and created a host of chances, Rovers keeper Paul Robinson denied us several times and for their part Blackburn seemed content to sit on there lead. A draw with one of the favourites for promotion was a decent result to start the season on.

Thanks to Lowe we were able to have a nice meal in The Crown to round the day off. Get in there!!

Suffolk's Olympians

The start of a dream or the beginning of a nightmare?

Playlist 

Beautiful Day by U2 - Obvious reason, footballs back!

And The Beat Goes On by The Whispers - The legend that is Kevin Beattie 

Flowers

The only downside of the new football season is that my good friend and fellow big kid Kev is no longer with us to see the ups and downs of ITFC. He loved going to football and enjoyed the banta. Throughout his illness no matter what the weather or what kind of a day/week he was having he always wanted to go to the match.

The club are very good in making match days as easy and enjoyable as possible for their disabled supporters and their carers including free undercover car parking near to the ground. They also helped with organising tickets and parking for the away matches that we went to with him, the last one the long trip to Doncaster at the end of last season, at least the last match he attended was a win and also relegation for the home side something that would have bought a wry smile from him!

Since his death in June the club have been really supportive, I asked the club if we could take some flowers to the first home league match, they more than obliged by keeping Tracey's seat and his wheelchair space free for the match and allowing us into the ground on Friday evening to leave them. They also printed a small piece in the programme in memorial.

Sometimes ITFC is about more than what happens on the pitch.

From the programme

My Way

ITFC 3-1 Bristol Rovers 14th August 2012

It has been a long close season with no competitive action for Ipswich since the end of April. The Euro’s did shorten the break and the time has past really quickly, in fact I don’t really feel ready for football yet! I think that is partly down to the summer’s (what summer?) lack of decent weather, at least it stayed reasonably good for the two weeks of the Olympic Games.

At £12 a ticket we decided to sit in the newly named co-op stand

Because of the Olympics  the league season has been pushed back a week so it was a strange feeling going to a league cup game first, it felt a little like a pre-season game. Paul Jewell put out a strong side unlike the corresponding round last year where we paid the price for too many changes and were knocked out at home by Northampton.
A decent size crowd of over 8,500 turned up and although we shouldn't get to carried away put in a good performance. Michael Smith gave Town an early shock scoring for the visitors with a left foot shot from outside the box midway through the first half. Jason Scotland had us level before the break.

A new shirt

In truth the Blues dominated the game and took the lead through Olympian Tommy Smith, heading in a JET corner, following Rovers on loan keeper Sam Walker saving Michael Chopra’s penalty awarded for a trip on Luke Hyam. JET tried a few long range shots, he seems desperate to tryout his Usaine Bolt celebration. When he finally got one on target it was parried by Walker but Aaron Cresswell followed in for a simple header to put the game to bed.
The league season starts on Saturday, so we can maybe get an idea of how good we are or not!

Here we go

Playlist

My Way - Frank Sinatra. The song which will be played as the team enter the pitch and immediately before kick-off which was chosen by ITFC fans in a poll, it was also Sir Bobby Robson’s favourite.

Uptown Top Ranking

A new season and another blog. it's the time of the year we dream that our team is good enough to reach the promised land that is the Premiership. So here I go again with another load of twaddle which I hope will be amusing and not too heavy. This season my blog entry titles will all be song related with titles or lines from a song that will eventually make up a play list, hopefully with more uplifting tunes than melancholy ones!