Saints came marching in, and left with three points!

Tuesday 16th August 2011 Ipswich Town 2 Southampton 5, Championship - Portman Road




Tonight I will be mostly crying!

Good start did not last long

Saturday 13th August 2011, Ipswich Town 0 Hull City 1, Championship - Portman Road

Good start did not last long, and Roy Keane was right! Lee Martin is not good enough for Ipswich or the Championship.

Top of the league (but out of the cup)

Tuesday 9th August 2011, Ipswich Town 1 Northampton Town 2, League Cup Round 1, Portman Road

If we are not going to field a side that can win, why bother entering? Poor display!

The Eagle landed

Saturday 6th August 2011 Benfica 2 Arsenal 1, Eusebio Cup Estadio Da Luz, Lisbon




I might have had to miss the great opening day win by Ipswich at Bristol City but I still managed to get some football in. Lisbon was our destination for a few days break and thanks to brilliant hotel staff, we managed to get two tickets for Benfica v Arsenal.
They apologised that we would have to sit with the local fans, we soon explained to the staff we wanted to be with the Benfica fans as we would not want Arsenal to win.

Estadio Da Luz, was our destination and just an 8 stop journey on the metro deposited us in the neighbouring shopping centre, as we left the centre we got our first sight of this superb stadium.

Loads of fans were situated at local stalls selling beer, hot dogs and special scarves. The beer was popular as inside the ground it is Alcohol free lager only! The scarves are also popular as a souvenir of the game as no programmes are on offer.




We were situated in the top tier of this impressive stadia above the tunnel. What a view and the atmosphere soon built as the game got closer and that was with hardly any Arsenal fans making the trip, only a few were seen and most of them seemed to be visiting holidaymakers.



Just before kick off the scarves began to wave and a great cheer rose, why? We soon saw why, as a bird of prey flew around the stadium before landing on a cart on the pitch, slightly more impressive than someone dressed up as a pantomime horse!

The game started and it was hard to pick out who was who- and that included the Arsenal team, Van Persie was noticeable as he came closest to scoring in a first half where Benfica had most of the possession but Arsenal looked the more dangerous. Van Persie eventually opened the scoring and Arsenal went in at the break looking very comfortable.The usual mass substitutions at half time seemed to benefit the Portuguese team more and the second half soon saw Benfica on top with the Brazilian Aimar the most impressive of the new players. Arsenal seemed to have no answer to his trickery and soon resorted to needless fouls, but this negative tactic did not work and Benfica soon took the lead and go onto lift the Eusebio Cup.

The usual TV induced fireworks saw the cup handed over to the Benfica captain by the legend Eusebio himself.

Hard to predict how Arsenal will do this season from watching a pre season game but I was impressed by their new acquisition, Gervinho.

For Benfica, a number impressed, their captain and defender, Luisao and the brilliant play maker Aimar.

The stadium? Five star- visit if you get a chance both the city and the stadium are both worth the short trip south.

Almost there!

Saturday 30 July 2011, Ipswich Town 1 Wolverhampton Wanderers 2, Pre season friendly - Portman Road

Under a week to go now till the real competitive football starts, a not too impressive pre season finished with a game against Premier team Wolves at home.




Only just over 5,000 turned up to see the best Town game so far, the last two signings of Emmanuel-Thomas and Stockdale look like they will add plenty to the team and it was also good too see Ingimarsson playing. Battling midfield of Leadbitter and Bowyer (with Hyam in reserve) and Chopra up front with a rejuvenated Lee Martin were all pluses, but still in desperate need of an extra centre back plus a right back - but all looking much better than last week.



Flash back to 70's football games - 'Jesus saves, Mariner nets rebound!'

Old style ground, old style bad habits.

Friday 22nd July 2011, Southend United 1 Ipswich Town 1, Pre season friendly - Roots Hall

A short drive to the Essex coast for a visit to Roots hall as Southend took on Ipswich Town.




A drive along the seafront showed that some money had been spent on how the resort looked, but it was quiet obvious that nothing had been spent on the ground, or the area around Roots Hall. Even the pubs looked run down and would probably felt more at home in some East London backstreet.




The game, started well, a great goal from Lee Martin, but then Chopra went off injured, Martin went back to spending most of his time hiding from the ball and then the defence showed that they could be done under the trade descriptions act! Please tell me how Tommy Smith found himself playing in the World Cup Finals in 2010?



The Southend 'Shed'/Tardis

Best bit of the day? The un-friendly nature of some of the midfield tussles and the Southend Groundsman's 'Shed', counting the amount of the people who entered the 'shed' it may have been a tardis!!

Summer is over, football starts

Tuesday 19th July 2011, Cambridge United 2 Ipswich Town 2 - Pre season friendly.

What a start, two down in 4 minutes!! Still need a centre back, right back, midfielder, left back --- but at least we have a goalscorer - Michael Chopra!




It was funny to be back at the Abbey Stadium (or as it is known now - the R Costings Abbey Stadium), my last visit was also for a pre season game in 1980, 31 years ago! We then stood in an open end but today behind the same goal we sat in a very smart stand, but the rest of the ground has not changed much. On my last visit in 1980, we were just starting a season that would see us play our greatest football ever, since then both clubs have had their ups and downs. United may have suffered more as they are now back playing non league football.

Other changes? we probably had more fans at the game this week than we did in 1980, and no hooligans!



Still a very quaint ground to visit and as it is Cambridge, plenty of bike racks - and all being used!