An Educated Right Foot

Strange what football tells you about yourself and others. Today Sheffield United lost to Burnley in the play-off final, thereby missing out on a place in the Premiership next season. My brother's reaction as we watched the match conclude? "Oh, keep this on. I want to see people crying."

And me? Well, I left the it on, naturally.

I still hate that bias cheating Manchester-based w****r of a referee Halsey, who cheated us out of our victory. What really rubbs insult into injury was he was elected to the Premier League the next season and is still stitching teams up today!

Gillingham face Shrewsbury today in the League 2 play-off final. It's only the second time I've seen Gillingham play ball. The first time was in another play-off, the 1999 Division 2 final against my team, Man City. Not yet a teenager, I flew over to London with my Dad. We had no tickets, but expected to find a scalp outside Wembley with ease. No such luck. In contrast to today's final, where empty seats stare down at the action, the Division 2 play-off final was a sell-out, and I ended up watching the match in an empty restaurant in central London.

Two-nil down with all of one minute left to play, Joe Royle's City got one back. It looked like a consolation goal until the fourth official held up his board which signalled 5 minutes injury time. Needless to say, we got another one back, and won the penalty shoot-out. Nicky Weaver went nuts. The drizzle cleared. The day, which for a while had looked like being the worst of my life, had quickly transformed into the best of my life. It was the beginning of the end of City's spell in the lower leagues.

Referee Mark Halsey was later seen boozing with the victorious City fans. True blue!