Stamford Bridge
 Chelsea v Middlesbrough
FA Cup 3rd Round
Saturday, January 4th 2003, 3pm
By Robin Dalgliesh

For some reason, getting on a train at 6am to travel to London to see Boro play one of the favourites to lift the trophy in May seemed like a really great idea at some point. However, that point wasn't sitting on a deserted platform at Carlisle station, waiting for either the train to turn up, or somewhere selling coffee to open. The train arrived first.

Just over five hours later I was back in London. The last time I was here was just over two months earlier, when Boro had scored their last away goal. Although it was an area I knew well (I spent a year living ten minutes walk from Stamford Bridge), I was looking forward to my visit this time, as I had heard a lot about "Stamford Beach".

One of the things I dislike about Chelsea is that it always seems quite rough - which may seem like a bizarre thing to say when walking past posh houses with expensive cars parked outside, but the club still seems to have a hooligan culture. I know that it's much better than it was, and that the club has taken steps both by banning people for life and by "naming and shaming" in the programme, but I'm still concerned when you can buy "Chelsea Head-hunter" t-shirts from the market stalls on Kings Road before the match.

Not that everyone at Chelsea would happily rip off your head and spit down your neck (well, if we had been Fulham fans, maybe), and the fans we stood drinking with on the concourse watching Portsmouth try to hold off Man U before capitulating seemed quite friendly. The stewards on the other hand gave off an air of arrogance - I understand they won't take any nonsense, but they could at least be nice about it - and were not especially helpful. The away section had been moved, but there were no signs or announcements, instead every Boro fan had to ask the steward what was going on. Quite unnecessary.

Once I finally figured out where I was supposed to be, I saw that the two rumours were true. One was the state of the, erm, pitch (although I use that word advisedly) as it was more of a mixture of mud and sand, with a few blades of grass poking through (although they could easily have been weeds). Still, the state of the pitch didn't stop the traditional half time effort of replacing all the loose sods of earth (they didn't need to bother finding the grass, just squashing it until it looked flat).

 

The other rumour was one started by Sheffield United manager Neil Warnock, who said that Dean Windass would be playing some part in Boro's cup game and sure enough, there he was. Dean Windass - comedy name, crap footballer. Whatever possessed Terry Venebles to part with a million quid for him I'll never know (although Terry's "financial dealings" are well documented, so that might be something to do with it...), and what possessed Steve McClaren to try and counter Chelsea's slick, passing style with Dean Windass' they-don't-like-it-up-'em style wasn't immediately obvious.

Stamford Bridge is, by London standards, a large stadium. Two new tiers have been added to one of the stands since I was last at the Bridge, and the view looks like it should be decent from all of them (they're not like at Old Trafford where the top tier seems to disappear into the rafters). I'm told the stadium will hold around 45,000 when full, and I'm sure it's very intimidating. When it's just over half full, as it was for us, it's seriously lacking in atmosphere.

Boro went one down before the break, but still no obvious contribution from the lardy one. Then, in the second half, McClaren's tactical gamble paid off, as Cudicini punched Windass!!! Maybe. Whatever happened, no one in the ground, except the assistant referee, saw the punch/kick/unkind word about someone's mother. After the ensuing medley, Cudicini was sent off (seen the replay on TV, still don't know what for), and Dean Windass had finally made his mark on the game. Sadly, it wasn't the mark we needed, we went out of the cup and still hadn't scored an away goal since September (unless you count against some Mickey-Mouse team in the Worthington Cup, and I'm going to be a Doom-and-Gloom merchant and not).

One thing I was surprised about after the game was how quiet the local pubs were. Seemingly everyone headed for the closest tube station (probably to get back to Surrey or wherever they had come from), so I settled down in a quiet pub on North End road, to wait for my friends to join me and try to figure out the bright side of going out of the cup. I eventually decided that I didn't have the money to spend on a cup run this season, so I could afford another pint instead. Evidently, there is an up side to being rubbish.

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