By Carl Blakemore
Destination: Exeter
Ground Admission: £7 (cons) £10 (adult)
Departure time: 9.10am
Programme: £2
Distance: Approx 170 miles
Food/Drink: £1.30 for a bottle of pop & £1.65 for a pie
Method of transport: Train
Journey time: 3hrs 56mins
Cost: £13 (return journey)
Being a regular follower of Town away from home I normally travel to away
matches by minibus with the away supporters, and play football in the
morning, which means a very early start. However, this week they opted to
stay in Torquay for the weekend and with finances being tight I chose
against this idea and preferred just to spend the day in Devon, travel by
train and have the luxury of a ly in! It's not the first time this season
I've travelled by train to an away match as I also went to Oxford and Leyton
Orient courtesy of Virgin trains. In all fairness to Virgin, they do have
some cracking offers if you purchase your tickets in advance off the
Internet. I managed to get a return to Oxford for £7.50, a return to Leyton
Orient for £2.50 and a return to Exeter for just £13!
Five of us departed Shrewsbury train station at 9.10am on Saturday morning,
in high spirits as Town made the journey south on the back of two straight
wins over Swansea and Halifax respectively. It crossed our minds that Town
have yet to record three wins in a row this season however we were confident
this was to change today. As we took our seats on the train we noticed a few
other Town fans who had also decided to take advantage of the prices Virgin
trains were offering. It was a pleasant ride to Birmingham, where on the way
we stopped off at Wellington, Telford Central (where we were joined by
Schizo) and Wolverhampton. We arrived in Brum at around 10.05, so with half
an hour to spare we took the liberty of using the Internet machines at New
Street station, to see if we could find any last minute team news etc etc.
At around 10.30 we boarded our train which was destined for Plymouth,
stopping off at, Cheltenham Spa, Gloucester, Bristol Park Way, Bristol
Temple Meads, Taunton and Exeter. As we sat down we were asked by the bloke
working on the trains buffet, ?What shirt is that?? when we told who we
supported he replied, Ah, you're playing the scum today!?. It turned out he
was a Plymouth fan, we rubbed our hands with glee as we enjoyed some
friendly banter with him regarding our superb double over the expected
champions this season. We left Birmingham and headed for Cheltenham. To pass
time we read the morning papers, talked about Town and what we expected from
today's game and the remainder of the season, as you do. As dinner time
approached I became rather peckish, and after witnessing the prices of food
on the train I was glad I brought my own from home. After all you can't
expect Virgin to offer cheap food prices aswell as cheap train tickets, you
cant have everything in life! We'd been on the train for about an hour when
a guy with a strong Lancashire accent started chatting away. He lived near
Rochdale and surprise, surprise he supported Man Utd. He was telling us how
he liked to place bets on footy matches and asked us for some tips for a bet
on our game at Exeter. We told him to place a bet on us to win 2-1 and
Rodgers to score the first goal, at one stage of the match this looked like
being a brilliant piece of advise! As he was a Man Utd fan and knew nothing
about Town we were thinking of telling him to put a bet on Bavo scoring the
first goal, but being the kind people we are decided this was too cruel. We
arrived in Bristol and our friend from Rochdale left us and we were joined
by more Plymouth fans, well for at least 30 seconds until they saw our
shirts and chose to sit in the next carriage! The train pulled out of
Bristol and we spotted the Memorial Ground, home of surprise strugglers
Bristol Rovers, but this became a blur in the distance as we picked up speed
and before we knew it, arrived in Exeter.
We departed the train at 1.05 and were greeted on the platform at Exeter St
Davids station by herds of police, but we were soon on another train, a
regional service which stopped at St James' Park. Here we met up with a
certain Ian Evans and entered the ground at around 2.20ish. We all managed
to pay concession prices which was a lot better than the £13 we paid at
Rochdale! The away stand its self is situated behind the goal but with no
roof we were lucky the weather was better than it had been for most of the
week. St James' Park has under gone some nice changes with a large terrace
behind the opposite goal to the away end and a beautiful main stand to our
right. The first half was fairly dull but we were happy to go in 1 goal up
at half time. The second half brought Exeter to life and their fans behind
the goal were extremely noisy and roared them on and it came as no surprise
when they equalised. Moments later though, much to the delight of Town fans,
Redmile fired home to regain our lead but the joy was short lived as we were
pegged back to 2-2 having failed to hold onto our lead just like at
Hartlepool and Darlington last month.
We left the ground a tad disappointed but made our way to the train station,
where we found an Off-License, and stocked up on booze for the long journey
home. We also discovered that just down the road there was a Chinese Take
Away so we grabbed some much needed grub! We left Exeter at around 6.20pm
and headed back to Brum. We were lucky enough to be accompanied by Chris
Murphy who had chosen the train ahead of the team coach to get back home to
Lemington.
The booze started to kick in and was shown when Evo started to sing his head
off and came up with a great new song, which I'm sure he'll sing on the
Riverside if you ask him nicely! It was an eventful trip home and was made
even funnier when I told the story of our trip to Oxford on the train
earlier this season, when Schizo decided to stick his head out of the
window, only to realise there was a train coming the other way, and he just
managed to pull it back in before it flew off his shoulders into a near by
field! i'm glad to say he's learnt his lesson and did nothing of the kind
today. The journey home flew by and we arrived in Birmingham at around
9.15pm.
We made our way to the train back to Shrewsbury where we were departed of
Evo's company, as he went home via Liverpool. The train pulled into
Shrewsbury station just short of 11'o'clock and we made our way to the
Meadow where the car was parked. It had been a tiring but enjoyable day out
and we now look forward to Rushden next Saturday where we continue our quest
for the play-offs and a defeat is unthinkable.