Match Thirty-Six – Ipswich 1 – Brentford 1
This was another long day because of the works on the line to Ipswich. When am I going to get a season of football which has not been made miserable at some point by the trains?
I did travel in reasonable trains both way as I went via Cambridge, but it’s a long way round and I didn’t arrive back home until after eight.
The match was a ding-dong affair, that sums up as Mick said, the bonkers nature of the Championship. Either team could have won it with a bit of luck.
Match Thirty-Five – Leeds 2 – Ipswich 1
This was a disappointing match played in a cold Leeds.
Match Thirty-Five – Leeds 2 – Ipswich 1
It also flagged up, Ipswich’s lack of a regular penalty taker, owing to the injury to David McGoldrick. I think Daryl Murphy was a reluctant recruit and he muffed it.
Match Thirty-Four – Norwich 2 – Ipswich 0
This was a dreadful day as we lost to Norwich.
Match Thirty-Four – Norwich 2 – Ipswich 0
But what made it worse was the tediously long journey both ways due to the work on the Great vEastern Main Line.
I evetually got back into London at nine o’clock, after a match that finished at four, to find that all my normal routes home were suffering from engineering works.
Match Thirty-Two – Ipswich 0 – Reading 1
This was one of those matches that contributed to a tiresome day. It started by having to go to Ipswich via Billericay and a coach.
Ah! Billericay!
Reading scored one of those goals and then sat back and defended – Game Over!
Coming home was much worse, as I was dropped into the organised chaos at Liverpool Street.
Match Thirty-One – Fulham 1 – Ipswich 2
This was a strong performance, that gained all three points at Fulham.
We were all seated in the Putney End and you can see from the pictures that we were low down.
I’ve been to Craven Cottage a couple of times before, usually walking from Putney Bridge station. Today, I took a bus from Hammersmith station and it was easier. Going back I walked to Fulham Palace Road and then got the first bus going west, ending up at West Brompton station, from where I got a train home.
Judging by the small numbers of fans on the buses I would suspect that most home fans either live locally, drive or have their own short cuts to the ground.
Craven Cottage will always be one of those grounds, where watching football is a pleasure.
Match Thirty – Ipswich 2 – Sheffield Wednesday 1
Ipswich finally got their campaign back on track.
One thing that could be improved in evening matches like this, is a proper train home after the match. I don’t want to wait an hour or so in the cold for a rake of Mark 3 coaches hauled by a Class 90 locomotive. Instead we got a cattle class 321, which stopped everywhere on its way to Liverpool Street.
The train was really shown up by the Class 379 I rode on earlier in the day.
Match Twenty-Nine – Rotherham 2 – Ipswich 0
This was the most disappointing match of the year so far in what was the best smaller stadium we’ve visited.
Town are going through a bad spell, but they have had a tough sequence of matches since before Christmas and it just doesn’t seem to go right.
At lest coming home on the train from Sheffield, we got a lot of best wishes from Palace fans after their win at Leicester.
Travel First Class For Less Than Standard
I’ve just booked my train ticket for the Rotherham Ipswich match next Saturday on East Midland Trains.
Coming back, the First Class ticket was actually four pounds less than Standard.
It’s actually costing me £38.25 with a Senior Railcard for the First Class Return. Typically, I pay £35.45 for a First Class Return to Ipswich, which is a journey that normally takes under half the time of one to Rotherham.
Match Twenty-Eight – Ipswich 0 – Wigan 0
This match was always going to be a disappointment, as the travel was so chancy.
It did show though, how important Daryl Murphy is to the team, as we rarely do well if he’s not in the team.
I think that as he’s a very good talker, his effect on the team may be more than just what he does with his feet and head.
You Can Do Better Than This; Greater Anglia
There has been a lot of anger from Ipswich Town about the lack of communication from Abellio Greater Anglia over weekend closures of the Great Eastern Main Line. This report on the BBC gives full details.
I took the 12:03 train out of Liverpool Street for Billericay. I had checked on the Internet and knew that this train gave me an arrival in Ipswich around two. But there had been a decided lack of information at Liverpool Street.
1. The staff seemed to have not been well-briefed.
2. Where were the informational posters, saying something like This way for all Chelmsford, Colchester, Ipswich and Norwich passengers?
The consequences was that there was a lot of confusion and an elderly couple travelling to Colchester with me didn’t know whether they should get out at Shenfield or Billericay. I wonder how many passengers missed the stop at Billericay and ended up at Southend!
One thing to which I’m right to object, is that I was paying the same £25.60 for a Senior Standard Class single, that I would pay on Monday for a similar ticket on a faster train all the way to Ipswich in just over an hour. Compare this with the price of £35.45, that I typically pay for a Senior First Class Return.
Abellio Greater Anglia also provided a Class 321 train without a toilet. Or at least I couldn’t find one. Many passengers would have expected a proper train with facilities and a rather tired Class 321 wasn’t good enough.
At Billericay, the system was much better organised and I even found a toilet. But then the town is in Essex and the county knows how to live on scraps and hand-me-downs.
I can’t complain about the coach that was provided either, except that it took what seemed to be an age to get to Ipswich.
There wasn’t much chaos at Ipswich, and I was able to enter the station to get a much-needed cup of hot chocolate.
The journey had taken two hours as against a normal direct journey of just over an hour. And of course for no reduction in price.
Coming home, I decided that it was better to go the long way round via Cambridge, where I could get a snack and then a train to Tottenham Hale. At least I got a First Class seat all the way, as I had the unused return half of a ticket for the last time I went to Ipswich, when I got a lift back home.
But the train was a rather overcrowded Class 170 train, although I did have a comfortable seat in First. But judging by the number of passengers on the 17:20 train after a match with Ipswich riding high in the Championship, a three car train is not big enough.
I just missed the connecting Tottenham Hale train, so I had to wait in the cold. But I did have time for a pit-stop and to purchase a snack in the Marks and Spencer in the station.
Normally, I get home about seven, but I didn’t get home until nine.
,
The Anonymous Widower 