August 31 2003

The Den

After an interval of seven years, Jamesey returned to the New Den for a league game and has mixed feelings

I am totally torn between satisfaction and irritation after Saturday's performance at Millwall. OK, we had a depleted squad, we could have hung on and won but, even so, a draw ain't a bad result at all.

But wouldn't it have been ecstasy to have hung on for another couple of minutes and taken the three points home to Selhurst.

Still it was not to be and I did feel that sitting back and letting them attack us would be more disastrous than it turned out to be.

With a small, easily knocked over bald man and a midfielder as our strike force we were never going to threaten up front very much. I still wonder why SK didn't give Gareth Williams a run-out. It would have been so nice to see us attack them a little more.

Well it was glorious weather for football and I got there very early without any problems ouside the ground. Here I must confess that I did leave a few minutes before the final whistle and missed the Millwall goal. Old habits die hard.

I just wanted to put some distance between me and the potential loonie Lion hordes which I have experienced many times over the decades.

Despite all the propaganda about us not taking our full quota, the Palace North area was packed to bursting as far as I could see and was in very sound voice with some pretty good songs which the neanderthals probably didn't understand.

Nevertheless the New Den does seem to be a much safer place to visit and the programme notes about strict membership and zero tolerance of idiots made encouraging reading.

Finally, maybe someone can illuminate a point for me. On entry into the North Stand, the stewards stopped me and asked me to open my shoulder bag.

Those of you who know me would surely agree that I am not exactly hooligan material. Still, rules are rules, and the steward fished out my quarter-litre water bottle and removed the lid. "No bottles with lids allowed," he said smugly.

One can only assume that a bottle with a lid represents a more serious missile threat than without. Can you imagine? Jamesey rises from his seat and hurls the vicious weapon, in full view of thousands of fans, stewards and general jobsworths, at Kevin Muscat's brain-challenged head.

Anyhow my Millwall blue block is over and I'll be back next season (unless they get relegated or we get promoted)...

Email Jamesey with any of your comments to Jevans3704@aol.com

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