Forest Green
A day trip to the the greenest football team in the world.
Football is a funny old business. For many of us Irish people football is our game, played by Gaels and involving hand passes and points scored from your hand. When the English fans sing of football coming home we think it already is, in Ireland, and that soccer game is universal. For this article football is soccer as I visit my neighbours land I will talk in their language but with my accent.
Forest Green Rovers have interested me for years since Dale Vince took over the football club. He veganised their operations and as the owner of “ecotricity” he tried to add sustainability to everything they do. This puts them on the precipice of sarcasm and leaves them open for ridicule. Years later this is still the case as Braintree Town make the trip from Essex. For the Braintree fans that we see this doesn’t mean sampling the vegan donuts and burgers on offer outside the ground. They aren’t averse to the vegan brewdog beer on offer and even had a sing along to some of the covers on offer by the resident band outside. Being football fans there felt like an obligatory need to chant so when the individuals made it back from queuing for their beer and stickering the toilets with “Keir Stamer, send all your sausages to Forest Green” the chants started. As we all munched on some glorious food in the glorious October sunshine the 25 lads (and they were all lads) got together “if you love fucking burgers clap your hands” they proclaimed smiling and laughing as if this was the first time such words were spoken by opposition fans. I was gonna clap as my FG devils kitchen burger was very tasty but I guess this wasn’t aimed at that delicacy. Before they entered the stadium there was one more chant of “Bar-b-cue” to the tune of Keith Allen’s “vindaloo” ditty. I searched in vain as I gulped my Vegan Mac and cheese down to run and see what the ‘bar be cue’ had on offer. Of course there was none. It was just the hilarity of the away fans.
We went in to the stadium, a delightful old school set up with small stands on 2 sides and terraces filling the empty spaces. It reminded me of Tolka park or even St Pat’s Richmond Parkstadium.
This was a Saturday afternoon. This was in England and a football match was on. This is the thing of tradition.
Braintree took the lead and the 25 lads had great fun goading the opposition fans. I was wondering what the problem was. It’s a football game, no one is dying. I guess my perspective is not suited for this as I cheered on my new favourite team. We (can I say we at my first game?) got an equaliser as I tried to see who the Irish players were on the pitch. Of course Forest Green Rovers don’t do physical programmes so I didn’t get to check properly. I did recognise that former Sligo rovers manager Steve Coterill was In the home dugout pointing to his players frantically as if he was using sign language in a crisis.
Half time and it was time for some dirty fries. I didn’t want them but felt obliged to support the vegan food stalls. One of these days I, like the Braintree fans chants, will realise the folly of this thinking and stop, but for now I had to get some chips at half time.
The second half started and I was reminded why I switched away from watching soccer. Time wasting galore and players going down like they were victims of sniper attack’s. Forest Green were doing all the attacking and joyously it was at the end we were watching from. We saw all the action in front of our nose as wave after wave of attack came from the home team. Braintree had players going down at all times and the Forest Green goalkeeping coach had to remind his ball retrievers to try and get the ball back as quick as possible.
Late in the game a thrown was awarded to Forest Green. Right in front of our seats. Braintree mustn’t have had a good pre season campaign as theirs players kept getting cramp. One such case happened in front of the throw. The Forest Green fans were encouraging the Braintree player to forget about his woes and play on but his comrade with no number on his jersey (Braintree number 3 – Clampin) helped him stretch his leg and decided to goad the fans. In the meantime the Ref said to play on so the throw was taken. Cramp boys leg was thrown to the ground as Clampin rushed in vain to get back into position. Too late and bish bash bosh three passes later Forest Green got a goal. 2:1. We clapped, we danced and we smiled as if it was a delayed reaction to those 25 lads goading earlier. Braintree tried in vain to get an equalisers and soon it was the reverse in players fortunes. Forest Green then slowed the game down. 7 minutes of injury time became 10 and “we” held on.
Our first game, lots of vegan food, sunshine, laughter and a victory. Can all matches be like this??
Niallhope
