August 19 2005

Crystal Palace

It was a new experience for Jamesey, listening to the Norwich away game radio link on the internet and reading HOL posters' ongoing comments...

Carrow Road is on my list of must-go grounds but the game against Norwich (Aug 13, 1-1) was not a possibility.

And before I build up a head of steam in this column, my planned away trip to another must-go stadium, Elland Road, looks to have gone belly-up.

A helpful box office operator told me that due to international call-ups the match is unlikely to take place on Aug 30 and other sources seem to confirm this.

So that that's two deleted from this season's wish-list and it's not even September yet.

Anyhow, for the Norwich game, I stationed myself at my computer and tuned in to the link kindly provided by "dicky boy" and simultaneously logged on to Palace Talk to see what the members were saying.

It seems churlish to take the rise out of a free radio commentary (which was greatly appreciated). After all, it was probably being sent out out by football lovers - like many of us here on HOL - who give their time freely to bolster their clubs in any way they can.

But many of the posters listening to the report were being cracked up by the commentator's nebulous grasp of the pronunciation of players' names.

Gary Borrowdale varied between Barrowdale, Berrowdale and Burrowdale although at least Mikele Leigertwood was consistently called Leegerwood.

Joonas Kolkka was obviously a mouthful too far for the commentator, so he became Corka or Kooka.

Your man had big problems with the letter R (he didn't know his Rs from his elbow?) and one wag pointed out that we now had an oriental goalkeeper - Kee-Wah-Lee.

Andrew Johnson's goal was greeted with the news that Gary Johnson had scored and Emmerson Boyce was rechristened Andy Boyce.

Norwich didn't escape the mangling either, with Dean Ashton and Robert Green, being rechristened Asston and Gween.

My apologies to members for only "lurking" but the hilarity was such good quality, I sensibly kept out of it.

I will definitely repeat the exercise soon.

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

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