The Eagles Express

No doubt we shall be hearing from crowing Eagles for some time about their victory over Manchester United reserves.  Meanwhile, Rick Everitt had an amusing piece in the programme on Monday about the new Eagles Express service to bring fans from Kent to Selhurst Park.  Imitation is, of course, the sincerest form of flattery.  However, apparently some Palace fans claimed that we had no fans in Kent until we started the Rickshaw.

The Rickster also refers to Gillingham's efforts in this area.   These were satirised in the late lamented All Quiet in the West Stand blog as consisting of a clapped out Cortina going down the A2, although to be fair they could probably run to a few minibuses.

My ambition was to appropriate one of Racing Club Warwick's 'Racing To Get You There' minibuses for a Warwickshire Rickshaw, but their service went belly up with the decline of the club.

When we were in the Premiership, I used to enjoy going to away matches on the West Sussex minibuses which would pick me up en route through the Midlands.   The inimitable Brian Cole often drove, although one of the relief drivers drove a hearse in his day job with predictable consequences.  One Addick who passed us on the M1 thought we were actually going backwards.

The Rickster does make the point that Palace are getting smaller gates than us despite being in a higher division, but no doubt this will all change after their Carling Cup triumph.

I will try and do a preview of Saturday's cup game, but one of the paradoxes of being notionally retired is that your workload increases.   I was quite surprised to be given a role by the University of Oxford, given that I am not one of their graduates (or of the other university).   This is an issue for them as, although I have published three books with Oxford University Press and act as a reader for them, I was gently told over lunch that my provenance was disturbing the Syndics.

However, I do have to spend much of today and all tomorrow amid the dreaming spires, lunching in one college and dining in two others.  If you were doing a review, most colleges would get a top score for ambience, a very good one for wine and a satisfactory one for the food.