BFC Nightmare away days

One of my favourites has to be the club bus that took em to CRYSTAL PALACE . Bearing in mind we were playing at QPR. Lol. They missed a fair bit of first half.

 

Remember going to Leicester and the coach took us to the Rugby ground instead

 

Ditto Hoyland reds bus. worra nightmare day.

 

Plymouth 1980. went on special from barnsley.police confiscated everybodys beer in train station & said dont worry lads it will be still here waiting for you when you get back.No beer on sale at the ground.Got back around midnight,all day without a drink,& obviously our beer had disappeared.

 

Halifax away. Night match. Brother was late home from work. Cousin driving a mini cooper s. I think we broke the record speed limit for a mini. Arrived late. Missed our only goal . Set off back after the game. NO BRAKES. Proper 5hittin missen. Drove all the way home using gears and handbrake. Backwhacks route. Can't remember how long it took. But we made it.

 

On a similar theme. A Bus driver took us to vetch field. We were trying to tell driver that his sat. nav. Had been set wrong we needed the liberty stadium. Cost us half hr of the drinking session.

 

Anyone go to Coventry in 10/11?

Half of us didnt arrive until 55th minute of the match

 

As Max Boyce used to say - I was there!

 

Loads of nightmares, particularly with called-off games - even ended up watching an old Fourth Division relegation battle between Rochdale and Workington after our game at Bolton was cancelled. Stuck in a traffic jam on the M6 just outside Preston for hours, missed the game and just drove home.

But two trips to Carlisle stand out for me. First one was a midweek game. No transport disasters, just the game. With 5 mins to go we’re 3-1 up & cruising. At 90 mins we’ve lost 4-3 and their striker, Rafferty, has scored all 4. That was nearly 50 years ago and I still have nightmares about it, was a very quiet bus travelling home. Second one we travelled to in my mates XR3. Pulled into services just before Carlisle as there was something clearly wrong. The front wheels were glowing as we had a wheel bearing gone. If we called the RAC they’d either take us the few remaining miles or take us home. We decided to wait until they cooled down enough and drove in. After the game, we returned to the southbound services and called the RAC. Got home at 7:30 the next morning.

My favourite though wasn’t a nightmare for me, but was for a mate. We were playing at Shrewsbury in a midweek cup game. Load of mates had gone up earlier in the day and got holed up in a pub, as you do, and we joined them later. We set out for the game from the pub and walked through a park. It was absolutely pitch black, no lighting anywhere. Now, after having sampled the local hospitality for hours, nature took its course and we needed the loos. As it happens, there was a toilet block in the middle of this park so off we trot. My mate is leading the way as he was up there hours earlier than us and really needed to go. Now he’s someone who takes great pride in his appearance and is always immaculate. Really immaculate. The building is in two sections, male on one side, female on the other with a covered corridor area separating. He disappears down the dark corridor and all we can hear is a loud aaaaaarrrrgh! We’re tentatively looking for him as we can’t see a thing and can hear a groaning. Turns out someone has taken off the lid to an inspection chamber and my mate is up to his neck in an open cesspit. Got him out and washed him under an external tap. He still went to the game but no-one would stand next to him because of the stench. Glad we travelled up separately.

 

Bielefeld away friendly a couple of years ago a few of us flew and stopped in Cologne which was all going great until we got the train from the airport to where we were staying.

We all got off stood on the platform and I said has everybody got everything bags etc... My mate looked at me and turned round to jump back on the train where his bag was still in the luggage rack as the doors slammed in his face.

At this point his bag passport the lot were heading to Dusseldorf meaning we spent an age trying to speak to someone who might be able to locate it and somehow get it back.

An hour later still none the wiser we decided to call for a couple of pints in Cologne which ended up being a ten hour session that turned into something off the hangover!

The next morning we met up all a bit worse for wear still no clue where the bag was but sure it was in a better state than us we headed the 3 hours to Bielefeld or most of us were.

The lad who's bag had gone missing received a call his bag had been found he could collect it what a relief. So we found out where he could get a connection on route and catch us up.

Off he went the wrong way dressed as a Cologne cheerleader (forgot to mention that) but his bag had been found hadn't it? The bag they had wasn't his it was full of womens clothing but as he was dressed in a skirt I'm not sure he had much of an argument.

Turns out his bag is in Cologne where we started its a mix up so he headed back to Bielefeld where we are waiting in a bar by the train station just in time for the worst rain I've ever seen to accompany our walk to the ground.

So the games finished we are soaking wet its raining and lightning again the train comes and we get on thank god full steam ahead to Cologne to collect his bag ready for the flight home in the morning.

Then the ticket man came our tickets aren't for that train you've got to get off! Working out the time our train gets in and the lost property office shuts we've got 6 minutes once we arrive to find it and get his bag back.

We made it described the bag and there it is in all its glory but they wouldn't release it without ID which was in the bag that they refused to open.

We both burst out laughing he's stuck it was nice knowing him! The only ID he had was his work swipe card that they spent 10 minutes looking at before agreeing to release the bag with one last caveat it was €20!

Unbelievably we checked his bag everything was still in it but someone had nicked his socks!

 

Brilliant

 

Rochdale away in the League Cup, Aug 1996, start of our promotion season. Happily rolling along in the outside lane of the M62 in a Mark 2 VW Golf, with my mate Gav and @Sheriff when an absolute monsoon started. Cue wiper fuse blowing and my passengers hanging out of the windows giving me guidance on how close the car in front was, when to move into the middle lane and then into the first lane. By the time we were able to get onto the hard shoulder, it became the slip road into Hartshead Moor services, couldn't have been timed better.

That continued a weird start to the season for me, as I'd got smacked outside the Hawthorns on the previous Saturday and the journey back to Barnsley finished with me getting a fractured cheekbone sorted back in A&E at Barnsley, and then going to a housewarming party where I met my future in-laws for the first time with a black eye and cheekbone like a cricket ball.

 

I finally found a lonely farmhouse and stopped to ask for help....that's when my problems really started M'lord.

 

We were there for that....crash on the M1 if I remember rightly, the only bonus was there were no attendants on the car park opposite the ground so it didn't cost us the tenner that it would have had we been on time.

 

Was on that fvcking bus.

Just got sat down, 10 minutes into the game, when they scored.

End of the road for the manager the next day.

Edit: no, I was on the bus which took us to, I think it was QPR, when we were at Selhurst. Season after we beat Swansea in the play-offs.

 

Probably any one of the occasions I slept through my stop on the train and ended up in Blackpool. Four or five times it happened.

Last time it happened, I rang the missus at 1am or whatever and instantly she said "you're in Blackpool again aren't you?"

Great days.

 

My worst day was at infamous 7 nil defeat at Reading , having endured 90 minutes of torture I return to my van to find a parking ticket nestled under the windscreen wiper ,thinking I had trod on a Robin or two I set off back only to get 20 yards & realise my passenger front tyre was as flat as a fart with a puncture , they say it comes in threes , happy days !

 

I was on that train lol... seem to recall being stranded just outside Birmingham for a good hour too.
Frank said "sod it" and jumped ship so to speak, walking along wasteland towards the bright lights of Birmingham city centre.

 

Liverpool in 1982, M62, couldn't see my arse in front of my face.