Out West: Day 7

Today was a bit different. Match day at Millwall Football Club, who play in Bermondsey, south-east London, not Millwall, which is dockland on the other side of the Thames.

Dockers started the club in 1885 and had local rivals from the local ironworks in West Ham, who played in East Ham. Millwall FC found space for a permanent home in Cold Blow Lane south of the river, while another club, Woolwich Arsenal, moved from that side of the river to a home on the north side, to play in Highbury. Arsenal dropped the Woolwich part of their name and called their new playing field, Highbury Stadium, and were able to have the closest tube station to them relabelled from Gillespie Road to Arsenal, to make their home easier to find. Unfortunately, The Den, home of Millwall FC is not so easily found.

The ground is in a maze of twisty streets, shaped around unravelling railway lines that eventually stretch to all parts of Kent. The New Den sits underneath embankments and to get there from the City of London involves twists, turns, underpasses and bridges. Visiting as another club’s supporter, finding your way is daunting enough, but then you have to factor in the reputational fear of hooligans long associated with Millwall.

The best advice all travellers are given is to look as if you know where you are going, even if you don’t. I have frequently been confidently lost, striding goodness knows where, rather than bumbling around in a confused state as a potential target for petty theft, or violent assault by predatory gangs of opposition fans.

I believe that this approach has so far kept me safe, helped keep me fit, saved me cab fares and led me to some interesting pre-match-drinks establishments, in Oxford (The Golden Balls), in Stoke, (Fenton Private Tennis & Bowls Club), in Sunderland, (a fabulous Victorian era pub near Roker Park, neither of any longer exist), in Horwich, (a funeral wake for one of Bolton Wanderers’ top boys), and the wonderful Royal Oak, England’s finest Desi pub, near West Bromwich Albion.

Travelling with Dan and his two young guests from the youth football club he manages, we caught the train from Castle Cary that arrived at Paddington just after Noon. Before leaving the terminus, I gave the boys a very brief tour of Brunel’s magnificent station. We found the statue of Paddington Bear, the fictional hero of Michael Bond’s popular children and Peruvian bear stories. We then looked at the imposing and humbling war memorial to the 3,312 men and women of The Great Western Railway killed in the two World Wars. The statue is of a soldier standing in his greatcoat and rain cloak, reading a letter from home. Nothing about ‘Glorious Dead’, nothing about Victory, everything about family and connection.

From there we went down into the sparkling, spacious and shiny Elizabeth Line to zip under The West End, to Liverpool Street Station, where we jumped onto a red 47 bus to Bermondsey. We got the front left-hand seats upstairs, which meant excellent views of the old city, The Monument at Pudding Lane, The Shard as we approached London Bridge, then HMS Belfast and Tower Bridge, as we crossed the Thames.

The 47 heading towards Catford Bus Garage, turns sharp left before London Bridge Station, then makes its way parallel to the river, behind Hayes Wharf, past St Saviour’s Dock, along Tooley Street to Bermondsey tube. There was plenty to see for the lads, one of whom was making his first trip to Town.

Dan led us along to the Stanley Arms, adjacent to Southwark Park. This is a large, well-established formal park, with an ornamental lake, really a large pond with an island, a pavilion, cricket field and looping pathways, imported exotic trees, including towering London Plane Trees, which shed flakes of bark most year round.

These beautiful trees, which provide cooling shade for the locals at the hottest days of summer, have become home to a rapidly growing colony of Parakeets. The sound of these bright green birds fills the sky, echoing off the bricks of the terraced houses and the concrete blocks of flats.

One parakeet was making a terrible racket from the top of a tower-block as Dan and I and his two young guests enjoyed a pre-match drink on the patio of the pub. This bird’s noise might drive you doolally. By dusk, the chorus of screeching from high in the trees around the lake was relentless. Only the sound of police vehicle sirens racing through the neighbourhood was louder, or more intrusive. People of Portsmouth will tell you how wearisome young Herring Gulls can be when demanding food from their parents, but these Parakeets are something else, barely ceasing during daylight and dusk.

Talk about football with the lads was a good leveller. Dan and they were confident of a Millwall win, but I felt it was Pompey’s turn to win today. I had been to games at Millwall which had finished as draws: 1-1, 0-0, 1-1, 2-2 and as Millwall wins 2-1 and 2-0. As this was my seventh trip and I felt lucky.

Other signs of likely success were arriving in London via Paddington, designed by Portsmouth-born Isambard Kingdom Brunel, passing the Dickens Estate, (Charles Dickens was born in Portsmouth) and me treading in some dog poo on the way to the pub. I told Dan these were all signs of a forthcoming Pompey win, 3-1: Lucky Seven; Brunel; Dickens; dog doos.

Dan laughed it off, as Millwall lying third in the league were up against opponents placed nineteenth. Obviously, his team would stroll to victory. While I did what so many good Glastonbury people do, constructed my own reality, to suit my beliefs, using imaginative interpretations of coincidental observations. It works for them and today, funnily enough, it worked for me. It is what is some call ‘manifestation’, but I call it good fortune.

The teams turned round after an exciting, goal-less first half. I was standing just five rows from the pitch right behind the goal where Pompey scored all three goals. It was nice that Dan saw his team score close to him too.

Dan sent me a link to a fan video blog which gives a brief, honest and entertaining summary of the game. It gives insight to the character of Millwall, Pompey and what is popularly known as, ‘Proper Football’ as opposed to the nonsense of the English Premier League. The video also demonstrates how much noise we Pompey fans can make when supporting our team away from home.

The goals are the highs and lows of football, with the final score something you have to deal with when the whistle blows. Defeat can be gradually processed, but the buzz a big win generates can last for days. I left the stadium on a natural high, then slowly became calmer on the two hour train journey back to Somerset.

Dan dropped me at The Barton Inn, where I met the landlord, John, for the first time. He has supported Ipswich since 1981 and so the football day proceeded. After a good chat I headed off, up the lane home for a light supper of baked beans, bread and butter.

Tomorrow, it’s back to the land and the Wild Lea trees.

~

CLP 21/02/2026