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I’m out with the kids, all day OK? I just don’t want to know the score. Not until I say so…

23rd April 2009 By Kevin Baldwin Leave a Comment

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On Tuesday evening, I cooked dinner for my wife, did some of her ironing and even sat through an hour of Hell's Kitchen with her. (Not as difficult as I thought it would be, having endured three hours in Hell's Toilet last Sunday…)

For this coming Saturday, I've suggested that we go for a family picnic in the park at midday and take a boat trip on the Thames later in the afternoon. I've even pledged to leave my mobile phone at home so that the children have my undivided attention.

These may seem to be the actions of a considerate husband and an exemplary father. At least, I'm hoping that's how my wife will see it. (Not that I've ever discovered where 'brownie points' are redeemed. And they seem to expire very quickly too.)

However, in doing these things I am actually engaged in a quite different activity. What I am really doing is avoiding the football scores.

We're going out at midday on Saturday because the Blackpool-Forest match is an early kick-off. And we're going to a quiet area of the park and on a boat so that we're well away from crowds of people and TV screens in shops, where I would run a greater risk of overhearing or seeing scores.

Obviously my mind will still be on the games; even as I was deseeding my peppers on Tuesday (not a euphemism), I was imagining the two dressing rooms at the Ricoh Stadium.

I thought of the Barnsley players encouraging each other and getting fired up for the game; I pictured the Coventry players comparing travel brochures in anticipation of their summer holidays. (I wasn't confident, you'll gather.)

But it won't be as likely to induce a coronary as following the scores minute by minute. And anything that keeps my wife from realising that she's married a man whose range of interests currently extends to one has to be a good thing. She's noticed, of course, that I'm somewhat distracted at the moment, but for some reason she hasn't twigged that I'm just going over the possibilities and permutations of the final fixtures again and again.

There's a degree of cowardice involved in avoiding the scores, I admit. It's a bit like looking the other way when a penalty is taken � as the chap in front of me did when Ipswich scored theirs on Sunday.

But I've generally found that when I cut myself off from news of matches affecting (but not involving) City, the outcome is more favourable. I did it twice during our historic 92/93 season, hiding at the cinema when Man Utd beat Blackburn 3-1 to prevent them from catching us in third place and again when Arsenal played Sheffield Wednesday in the FA Cup final which decided whether or not we would play in Europe.

In 1985, by contrast, I followed every minute of Coventry's final three games of the season, all of which they had to win to send us down � and we all know what happened then.

I even went to one of them: their penultimate match, at home against Luton. The visitors were the better side for most of the game, and I even heard a confident chorus of 'On the Ball, City!' from a small group of fellow Yellows in the away section. But six minutes from the end, a mishit Brian Kilcline shot from the edge of the area took two deflections before trickling into the net. Sickening.

But back to this coming Saturday. When we get home and I check the results after all the games have finished, there's a particular scenario I'll be looking out for.

If Barnsley fail to beat Wolves at home and Plymouth lose at QPR, a point against Reading on Monday evening will be enough to ensure that our survival is entirely in our own hands in the final game at Charlton (since Barnsley and Plymouth play each other on the last day).

I don't know why, but I just have a hunch that this will happen.

I'm not saying that we'll win at Charlton, not least because their form seems to have picked up lately. And there is the recent precedent of you-know-what. But given our current position, to be in full control of our fate on the last day would be fantastic.

In the meantime, I've been in touch with my QPR-supporting friend to ask her to use any influence she has at the club to inspire a win on Saturday. And if Mick Dennis could hold fire on the articles slagging off Rangers until next week, I'm sure that would help too.

______________________________________________________________

I've only just remembered this, but I once spoiled it for a fan who had been trying to avoid all news of a particular match � simply by standing up and walking across a room.

I once shared a huge house in Birmingham with about ten other people. Late one evening, I was sitting in the communal TV room waiting to watch football highlights on Sportsnight when a fellow tenant � a Liverpool fan called Steve � came in.

'Do you know our result?' he asked me immediately.

'Yes, I was listening to the commentary on the radio earlier,' I said. 'They�'

'DON'T TELL ME!' he snapped. 'I've been avoiding the score so I can watch the highlights without knowing.'

'OK, I won't say a word.'

The Liverpool highlights began. They went one up, then scored a second just before half-time. And that, I knew, was how the game finished.

Now, I had work the next morning (ah, I remember that�) and wanted to go to bed. But I knew that if I got up and left the room, Steve might realise that there were no more goals in the game.

After mulling it over for a bit, I decided to slip away as discreetly as possible. I got as far as the door before the penny dropped.

'B*****d! That's how it finished, isn't it?'

'I told you I wouldn't say a word, and I didn't,' I replied. He wasn't pleased, though.


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