Chesterfield 1 -v- 0 Wednesday

I’d ruled this game out totally as we’d not been able to get tickets when they went on sale…I mean I did leave it late so it’s my own stupid fault for not realising we’d sell out in an hour.

Anyway when I got back from the Stevenage game on Tuesday night I had a message on Twitter from @Damo_Pac. The Stevenage game had totally sickened him off and he didn’t fancy the Chesterfield trip anymore so kindly offered me the tickets. EXCELLENT!

Most of the lucky pre-match routines went out of the window this morning as I freestyled the morning away in readiness for the early start and the drive over to Damians for the tickets en-route to Chesterfield.

The Young Un arrived nice and early as I’d given her the wrong time again just to make sure she wasn’t late and off we went. I’d had a bad feeling about this game all week but suddenly on the morning of the game I was full of it and convinced we could get a result today.

As we pull up outside Damo’s house I turn around and there’s Sean and Jane walking down the street…I did a double take and shouted over to them…yeah they’d tried to ignore me and just amble past undetected, I got the impression they were trying to avoid me if I’m honest but that never works and collared em for a quick chat.

What you doing here? I ask.

‘Well I only live round the corner but you know that, you’ve been to my house’

Well yeah I might have but I haven’t got a Scooby doo where I am at the moment, I certainly didn’t know I was near your house and let’s be right here…I’d found my way to this spot but I doubt I could do it again and was still in a state of confusion.

Sean wanted regular updates from me during the match and said they’d best be good and frequent as he’d had a bet that they would be better than Tommo’s….it was a tap in for me really. No way was the uber competitive Tommo gonna outdo me on the update front…NO WAY!

We waved em off and went over to meet Damo and collect the tickets…a little natter later and a lot of thanks for thinking about us for the tickets and we were on our way again.

20 minutes later we’re at the ground and parked up. Great system they have in place here…all car parking slots are numbered and you get allocated one on ya way in and unlike most away days, a decent price too. I don’t mind paying a fiver for parking anywhere if it’s gonna avoid the chances of a ticket. We walk round to the turnstile and we head up to our seats…a good view, cheers Damo.

Mindstya, the pitch looked chuffin dreadful. If Chesterfield like playing passing football then why play on a ploughed field? It was probably the worst surface we’ve seen all season and that included the bald muddy pit they have at Walsall. At least with Walsall it’s a FLAT bald, muddy pit, this had a surface like an old settee, an old button studded Chesterfield settee and the ball was never gonna fly across this.

We settled in for the game…
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THE MATCH
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What a start we had here…from the stands and on the pitch…

The noise from the Wednesday fans right at the start was incredible and the players couldn’t fail to be bowled over by it…

WE LOVE YOU WEDNESDAY…WE DO
WE LOVE YOU WEDNESDAY…WE DO
WE LOVE YOU WEDNESDAY…WE DO
OH WEDNESDAY WE LOVE YOU

The players walk over to us in a line and applaud…

All the noise was from us and on the pitch all the good football was from us as despite the playing surface being as bad as it was we played some outstanding football.

I heard someone from Chesterfield on the radio after the game trying to suggest we hoofed it… He had obviously spent the first 45 minutes doing his shopping over the road as he missed a lesson in passing the ball on a bubble wrap surface… Had it been on a decent surface it would have been even better.

They’ve clearly talked themselves into believing they really are a passing, good to watch football side. They aren’t.

In fact I’d say this Chesterfield side aren’t playing as well as they were when we beat them at our place. I don’t know what it is but there’s something gone from them.

After the game at Hillsborough Sheridan was on the radio saying how they battered us, well in this first half he must have loved watching us play as he was shown what a proper battering is as we set about them for pretty much the whole 45 minutes.

We were incredible and whenever JJ got the ball we looked outstanding…he tore them a new arsehole with every touch, he sewed it back up with every run, and just for the hell of it tore it again with every cross…he was so much better than them on his own it was ridiculous.

In the opening few minutes Chesterfield must have wondered what had hit them…

We got Prutton down the right, he crosses and Lee in the Chesterfield goal punches clear…the ball comes back in and this time the keeper holds on tight…

Within seconds of him booting the ball out we attack again, this time Lowe down the right who picks out a good pass to O Grady in the box but he has his back to goal. He’s bundled off the ball and falls over, a halfhearted shout of PENALTY! Goes up from the Wednesday fans and when the ref blows his whistle, for a moment we thought we’d got it but he saw things differently and gives a foul by O Grady on their player…THAT’S POOR REF!

Never mind, barely a minute goes by and JJ nicks the ball from their defender…anyone for a new arse hole?

YEAH! You heard right….JJ NICKS THE BALL FROM THEIR DEFENDER!

No sooner has he got it than he’s tearing down the left and he cuts into the box, he has a defender in front of him…he does a step over…he does another… His feet are a blur as he does 5 million more step overs (I counted em all) and the defender must have had them cartoon eyes where his pupils are bouncing all over the place… JJ glides past him whilst the defender waits for his pupils to settle down and the big cartoon question mark above his head to disappear…

Jayj looks up and we have players in the box…he puts in a cracking ball but to be fair to Chesterfield they defend it well and get it clear.

We’re not done though…O Grady to Reda and he puts a lovely ball into the box where Lowe gets his head on it but fires over the bar…a little too high for him but a good attempt nonetheless from the titchy striker.

It was non stop from us…Reda shows Lines where he wants the ball, he gets a shot off but it’s saved…JJ again in from the left gets a cracking shot on target that is saved again…

FFS! COME OOOOON!

Ball back in straight away and Lowe gets another header…and once again it’s straight over the bar.

AAAARRRGH!

Chesterfield are like a rabbit in the headlights…they are being battered into the middle of next week and just can’t get a foothold in the game…

You’d think with all the action that’s gone on so far we’d be heading towards half time but we’ve barely had 15 minutes of the game yet.

It was around that 15 minute mark that Chesterfield had their first possession of note and they managed to attack and get a poor header off at our goal but it went tamely wide and didn’t cause any concern for us at the back.

It was also noticeable at this point that when we did attack and we played the ball about that our passes had to have some right beef behind them. You simply couldn’t tap the ball to a teammate or it wouldn’t reach them, such was the shittiness of the playing surface.

We continued to dominate and take the game to Chesterfield and through free kicks and corners we went close without scoring and still we’d barely gone over the 20 minute mark… It suddenly became apparent that JJ wasn’t doing the running he had in those opening few minutes though and just before the half hour mark our worst fears were confirmed as he limped off to be replaced by John Bostock. That’s not good, not good at all and Chesterfield must have been very relieved to see JJ go off…

Still, from what little we’d seen of Bostock so far maybe he could endear himself to the Wednesday hearts and make a name for himself.

The referee was starting to make himself more noticeable now too…he’d already booked Lowe for what looked like a reasonable challenge on the keeper and now there were all sorts of niggling decisions going against us.

When we got a decision our way it was a free kick around the 30 yard mark. Chris Lines stood over it and we have the box packed out…he delivers a superb ball that eludes everyone, all of our big lads and all the Chesterfield defenders and keeper as well and it lands out the back door where Ryan Lowe is waiting a yard out…

THIS IS IT!

We lean forward in an instant waiting for the inevitable outcome…

The ball goes out for a goal kick!

FOOK!

Somehow it got tangled up below Lowe, almost like it caught him unaware and he couldn’t adjust his footing to tap it in, and that’s all that was required to put it in the back of the net…the chance went begging…

LORDY! LORDY! LORDY!

What do we have to do?

Within a heartbeat of that incident Chesterfield had their first really meaningful break and they did it at pace…we were caught flat footed and they homed in on our goal…

The Chesterfield lad, forget who it was is running down their left when the ball comes to him…if he hits this chuffer early he’s gonna score…

He does hit it early…

BANG!

What a fooking shot, heading right in the top left corner…must be one nil…

WHAT A CHUFFIN SAVE!

Bywater launches himself and tips it over the bar…stunning play from both players.

Undaunted by that and unbothered by the corner that followed we attacked Chesterfield again…a good ball in by Bostock is met by Prutton who heads it into the mix…every single Wednesday fan in the stand lurched forward to try and head the ball goalward…we needed as much help as possible…the chance passed us by again and again our hearts sank…this was getting very frustrating now and we needed to make this incredible dominance count, no way could we allow another Exeter result to happen here.

A couple of minutes later and Ryan Lowe is running into the box and is clearly fouled by the keeper, it’s an easy decision and all eyes turned to the ref…he took a moment…come on, you know it’s the right decision…

It was one of those hanging moments….

Come on ref….

You could see the tumbleweed blowing across the pitch (Obviously held up by the rougharse surface)…

Come on…What’s to think about? It’s easy ref!

It was almost silent…it was probably less than a second or two but felt like an hour…

NO FOUL! He says…

WHAT? WHAT THE FOOK ARE YOU ON REF?

YOU’RE HAVING A FOOKIN LAUGH MATE!

There were a lot of murmuring and chuntering around us that he’d bottled it and it was difficult to argue with them…it looked an easy decision.

Moments later our chuntering is interrupted as down at the other end there’s a big shout from the Chesterfield fans for handball by Rob Jones and once again the ref waves it away…

It’s been an entertaining half and not without incident, though the ref obviously thinks nothing has happened…

As we closed in on half time we were definitely missing JJ and Chesterfield were starting to edge their way into the game but we were still getting chances and a Semedo shot is blocked but falls to Lowe in the box but the chance passes by yet again…he gets one more chance just before the whistle as he spins in the box and shoots wide…those two chance sandwiched a shot by Chesterfield that went wide and Prutton finished the half for us with a long range effort that went a mile and a half wide.

Even though it had finished goalless it had been a very entertaining half especially for Wednesday fans but towards the end there was enough for the Chesterfield fans to think they had a way back into this game.
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If Megson could get them back out and fired up to start the second half as they had the first then there was only gonna be one winner here…and it wasn’t the home side.

As it turned out we weren’t fired up and we clearly missed the pace and skilful wing play from JJ as we had absolutely no width at all now and Chesterfield were inching ever more into the game.

Just to hammer the frustration home we had a situation where a ball was clearly put behind our goal line by a Chesterfield player only for the lino to give a corner…it wasn’t the first time he’d got it wrong this game and even the players were surprised at the decision, most of em were heading upfield for the goal kick…of course is sent me chuffin mental as I questioned the quality of his eyesight and suggested his visit to Specsavers is long overdue…I may even have questioned his parentage at one point too…the rest of the Wednesday fans weren’t too happy either and from that moment every knock that went behind for a blatantly obvious goal kick we shouted CORNER!

If we were missing JJ this half we definitely weren’t helped by the performance of John Bostock…in fact, even allowing for my piss poor memory I’m struggling to recall a worse 45 minutes by a Wednesday player.

When we had possession he lost it, when he passed, it went astray…he didn’t run, he didn’t tackle and he didn’t look as though he wanted to be involved in anything. He refused to go and make things happen and preferred instead to wait for things to drop in his lap… He roamed around on the fringes of play without a care in the world and of course one thing Wednesday fans will not forgive is a lack of effort and as the game wore on most were turning against him…

Megson changed things after quarter of an hour and replaced O Grady with Madine…he was right to do so too. O Grady had done little wrong but we needed something to freshen things up, someone to have a go…someone with a point to prove…

It almost paid off straight away as with virtually Madines first touch we go very close…a few minutes later he does even better…

He’s just inside their half as the ball comes to him, he has his back to goal and he has 3 Chesterfield players surrounding him, there’s absolutely nowhere at all for him to go, they have him closed in, shoulder to shoulder and one round the back (WAHEY!) Somehow he controls the ball, turns and puts a pass through into the path of Lowe who is on it like a flash…unfortunately there’s a little too much weight on it and Lowe can’t get to it…the keeper scoops it up easily. Lovely bit of skill but still as frustrating as hell…

Chesterfield were starting to get the better of the half though and when Drew Talbot rifled a shot on goal from the edge of the box it looked a certainty we were gonna be a goal down… He’d been left in acres of space and it was a simple task for him, hard and low…get it on target… He did everything right but so did Bywater who was on it double quick…

It was the start of a few minutes of Chesterfield pressure and we needed to be strong to keep them out…we did just that and Megson changed things again. In an effort to get us going forward more and ease the pressure at the back he brought on Clinton and took off Lines…I’d have much preferred to see Bostock go off if I’m honest. I don’t give a monkeys that he was brought on as a sub, he was having no impact on the game at all but Lines wasn’t doing that bad and was always capable of delivering a good dead ball into the mix. Bostock was bringing nothing to the party at all.

Once again, no sooner had the sub come on and just as Madine had done minutes earlier, Clinton gets a good chance, turning and shooting from inside the box only to see his good shot blocked as it headed goalwards.

It was a brief respite for us though as Chesterfield attacked again and once more we needed to stand strong and keep them out…one of their players blasted a shot on goal, it was on target and again goal bound…

Most folk probably expected the worst but not Danny Batth…

He was having none of it and presented his plums front and centre to block the shot…the ball hit him square on, right in the middle of his little ‘Batths’ There was a huge CLANG! and after a very large gulp, down he went in classic ‘kick to the goolies’ mode… legs together, knees bent, hands cupping the jewels and after a slight pause, like a mighty oak tree… TIMBERRRRRRRRRR! Down he went.

I’m pretty sure his wee fellas, like a Gerald Sibon shot on goal, went flying over our heads and into the car park.

The ball found it’s way to Bywater and as he prepared to take the goal kick Batth was still down…he walked over to him and got right in his face…I’m sure he was shouting Sergeant Major like at him…

DON’T YOU CRY!

SUCK IT UP BOY! DON’T YOU DARE CRY YOU BIG SOFT MOTHERFOOKER!

THAT AINT PAIN! I’LL SHOW YOU PAIN BOY!

NOW ON YOUR FEET!

When he struggled manfully to his feet he had that look of a little lad trying to hold the tears in…bottom lip all aquiver…trying like fook to be the brave likkle soldier…Bywater patted him to say well done and Batth wiped the tears away before they rolled down his cheek…it took him quite a few minutes to get himself right but he did just that and as he had been before his spuds were flattened, he was magnificent again…

The game started to open up a bit and although it was quite scrappy with not much good passing football on display it was end to end stuff…Semedo puts a lovely ball out wide for Clinton, it was well spotted by the Portugeezer and Clinton makes the run and puts a good cross into the box but it’s well defended by the Chesterfield back line…straight away they attack us and it takes the man with steel sweetbreads to put in a breathtaking tackle to keep them out

With 10 minutes to go Jack Lester attacks down our right and because Bostock is nowhere to be seen Lewis has too much on his plate…not the first time this half that Lewis had been left with the work of two blokes and Lester skips past him and into the box at the precise moment that Bostock arrives…very late on the scene and keen to make up for that late arrival he delivers a perfect example of how not to tackle inside your own area and the best way to give a penalty…it was a no brainer for the ref…even though he’d not given ours first half which was just as good a shout you knew which way this was going…

There was a collective gulp from the Wednesdayites

The ref pointed to the spot.

BOLLOX!

There can’t be many of us that thought Bywater would save the penalty but it didn’t stop us all murmuring the penalty chant….

Come on Bywater, come one, come on, come on, come on, come on

SHIT!

Bywater dived to his left and the ball went to his right, in off the inside of the post…

BASSAD!

As the Chesterfield fans woke up and raised the noise level the entire away end slumped dejectedly back in their seats.

We weren’t down long though as we went up the other end and tried to level the score…it was quite frantic for a couple of agonising minutes as first Jones had a header cleared, which was accompanied by a loud shout from our players to say it had gone over the line…I BELIEVE EM! GIVE IT REF!

He didn’t, obviously and we had another shot blocked…Clinton next, his shot blocked behind for a corner…

COME ON WEDNESDAY! COME ON! Megson called Prutton over and handed him a piece of paper, he immediately ran back onto the pitch to show it to a few players…surely the only thing he could have put on it was SCORE A FOOKIN GOAL! Love Meggy

We get into another good position, our players have piled forward and Bostock saunters forward with the ball, he seems to think he can take as long as he wants and be as sloppy as he wants…he can’t and Chesterfield relieve him of the ball to huge groans and several choice words from the desperate Wednesday fans.

We rescue the moment and pile forward again, this time Danny Batth running in from the right has a go with a piledriver….it’s hard and fast but it flies over…if any fooker has earned the right to shoot on sight today it’s that lad.

We tried…as the clock ticked all too swiftly down we tried…but it was all for nothing and Chesterfield held firm…of course their fans celebrated like they’d won the cup…we’d have done the same had we won so fair play to em, they were making the most of the moment…

We trudged our weary arses down the stairs and to the car park and we pass a woman singing to herself…

‘WE LOSE WHEN WE WANT…
WE LOSE WHEN WE WANT…
WE’RE SHEFFIELD WEDNESDAY…
WE LOSE WHEN WE WANT’

It made me smile anyway…

As we walk across the back of the stand I kick a couple of round steel things under a car…no idea what they were… We go sit in the car and wait for the traffic to clear and settle in for a good moan about football and Wednesday and how everything’s shit…

By the time it’s all cleared and we’re on our way it’s out of our system and we’re back on side…

I refuse to be dragged down into the shitty vibe that’s going around Wednesday fans at the moment and I’m not gonna beat myself up over a Steel City Derby defeat before a ball’s been kicked.

We’re our own worst enemies as Wednesday fans…it doesn’t take much for us to invite a bit of doom and gloom in…

Doom and gloom was only passing by to start with but we always invite the bassad in, make the fooker comfy and let him become part of the family.
YES the result was shit
Yes we’ve had some shit results of late
Yes everyone is worried about next week

But it’s not the end of the world and if ever we are gonna get back on track then it has to start with us…THE FANS

WAWAW?

That’s what we love to say…we love it…even just writing it down it beautiful

So why aren’t we all Wednesday no matter what?

WAWAW NMW!

When we’re on a bad run and things are hurting like a bastard, when the club and the team need us most let’s be our glorious best?

I know I’m gonna take some flak for this and I’m battening down the hatches as I speak but we aren’t playing anywhere near as bad as some people think we are or as bad they would have you believe…we’re not as bad as the results would suggest.

The only change since the days when none of the players could do any wrong and the manager was the darling of the terraces is we aren’t scoring goals.

EVERYTHING ELSE is pretty much the same.

In fact…we’re probably creating more goal scoring chances now than we were back in those heady days when everyone was on board the promotion train and willing to shag everyone at the club…the difference…the ONLY difference is we aren’t putting the shots away.

When we do, someone is in for a hiding.

Let’s try and hold it together as we enter the serious part of the season and lets show everyone that we’re stronger than Danny Batths bollox!

Things don’t come much stronger than that

Steve:Beastie
Owls Alive
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