For anyone who has never visited Goodison Park, it is possibly the most badly designed sporting arena still used on a regular basis.
That may be an exaggeration but then again, there is barely an uncomfortable wooden seat in the away end where you have an uninterrupted view of the pitch. Massive pillars hold up the roof and make it impossible to see all of the action on the pitch.
This was not a problem for a not-so-small-minority of the Boro fans however, because the match was of very little interest to them!
I understand that for some fans, an away match, particularly a cup match, is a good excuse to get drunk and be legitimately rowdy. I have no problems with that, I love the atmosphere at away matches. I love the fact that we can create a wall of sound to drown out the home fans but mostly, I love the football and it annoys me when somebody is sat three seats down from me and who barely glances at the match. Why bother traveling? Why buy the ticket?
These particular 'fans' were simply there to shout abuse at the opposition.
There is a line in the film 'Stand By Me' which goes something like "finding new and preferably disgusting ways to degrade a friend's mother was always held in high regard."
The same principle seems to apply to opposition fans.
A bit of craic between the fans is great fun, particularly when the match lacks lustre. The majority of the Everton fans were silent throughout the match and were dutifully treated to "Shall we sing a song for you?" and "2-1 and you still don't sing" by the Teesside faithful.
"We've got Afonso, you've got our stereo" and "Sign on, sign on, with hope in your heart..." were also sung loud and proud.
And when David Wheater scored, the rousing chorus of "David Wheater, he's one of our own" was deafening. The Boro fans have also discovered that the Aliadiere song works better if you use his actual name 'Jeremie' in the middle rather than 'adiere', although that got lost halfway through.
My sore throat forgotten, I happily sang along, clapped my hands and stamped my feet (partly in excitement, partly trying to stay warm!) but then the atmosphere changed.
Some of the chants became incredibly offensive. Fixating on a particular fan and making disgusting proclamations about his girlfriend are, for me, taking it too far. Any mention of sexually transmitted infections are obviously in bad taste and designed to humiliate. The stewards seem to be escorting some of the ring leaders out of the stadium but there were far too many to weed out.
When the fans switched back to "If you're proud to come from Teesside clap your hands" I hesitated because, right then, I wasn't.
The actual match was like most of Boro's season. We started brightly, we were the better team for most of the first half and we even took the lead, albeit through one of our defenders. And then Everton scored. And that was it. At the moment, Boro are programmed to believe that if the other team scores, they have already lost. As such, most of them gave up after about fifty-five minutes.
Justin Hoyte kept trying, but he was putting balls forward which Aliadiere could have run on to. That is, he could have run on to them, had he not already left the pitch with yet another injury. As usual, the Frenchman had tried to continue and attempted to run off his latest knock but to no avail.
Tuncay and Downing are not exactly slow players but they lack the lightning pace which Ali possess when fully fit. What Downing was doing on the right was anybody's guess, but by then no one in a Boro shirt was doing much of anything anyway.
Everton on the other hand have taken a squad decimated by injury and made it stronger.
With strikers like Yakubu out for the long haul, Moyes put his trust in midfield duo Mikel Arteta and Tim Cahill and they repaid his faith. Cahill finished last season with ten goals and looks to be on course to equal and probably excel that achievement this time around. Arteta was in great form and was scoring for fun but sadly he recently joined the ranks of the injured at Goodison and will be out for the remainder of the season.
Meanwhile, Marouane Fellaini and Louis Saha capitalised on atrocious mistakes from Brad Jones - both times he left himself utterly stranded as the ball sailed into the net.
The Toffees will probably get hammered by Manchester United in the semi but aside from the fact that it was us they knocked out, I am pleased that they are progressing in the Cup because I am impressed by their organisational skills and impressive work ethic. Having said that, they did not play much football on Sunday, they simply waited for Boro to screw up and then kept their nerve to make us pay.
Our exit from the FA Cup was neither unexpected nor premature and I sincerely hope those supporters who were so vocal in their abuse of the Everton fans last weekend will be in such fine voice to encourage their team against Portsmouth on Saturday.
First published on www.newsoftheworld.co.uk/sport/fanzone - Mar 09
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