So last Saturday I almost thought I might have found a 4th club to add to my sympathies - The Mighty Rooks, Lewes FC. My friend Max has been to watch Lewes a few times in the past, and as it was his birthday coming up he decided to invite some friends along, myself included, to join him in enjoying a day at the footie. The attraction he said was that you were allowed to drink beer on the terraces, there was a plethora of comedy chants on offer and you were allowed to drink beer on the terraces (sic) (hic). Alas, only one of these was true, as I discovered before leaving to meet the guys at the station on the club's Twitter feed that due to this being an FA Trophy game, and thus having to abide by different rules regarding the consumption of beer. Did we let this stop us? Well, there were some murmurings, but away we went nonetheless on the train armed with a can of cider each to watch Lewes.
On arrival at the Dripping Pan (one of my favourite ground names, up there with Gay Meadow and Spotland) we paid our tenners and made our ways onto the Phicox Terrace with the game already kicked off, no goals and found a place between fans of, we thought, the Lewes denomination. I have to admit I was shocked to find the fans in front starting singing "We are the famous Salisbury City" after a few minutes - experiences in professional football tell me that away fans in the home area can only result in one thing, violence. However, none seemed forthcoming, and that despite the fact that the 3 lads in question in front of us seemed rather inebriated. And, while I'm not one to judge books by covers I was sure not adverse to a bit of rough and tumble, as was borne out a little later....
The Dripping Pan, Lewes
We moved across the stand to more Lewes-friendly territory (we were Rooks now after all) but it was the group of maybe 10 Salisbury City fans who sang the loudest for the duration of a first half. Max said the Lewes fans seemed low on the ground by comparison to normal either due to lack of cup interest or just maybe the lack of terace beer, and thus were a bit less audible. However the Salisbury fans' enthusiasm for being the famous Salisbury City kept us amused, and amongst my group we amused ourselves by trying to come up with witty retorts. Max had accidentally offended a Salisbury City fan earlier by referring to them as Salisbury Town, so we thought of shouting 'TOWN' or even 'VILLAGE' after they sang City would be good and it amused us briefly. Due to their pride in their cathedral "You're just a town with a big church" was belted out to some amusement. I put forward "Small town in Stonehenge, you're just a small town in Stoooonehenge", and then my own personal favourite "You can shove your f***ing Stonehenge up your arse" (Ouch), but these were rejected by the majority. Somewhere in front of us a game was going on, but as Lewes had gone 1 down (Kelly, 21) and were being outclassed by the imaginatively nicknamed "Whites" we nipped in 15 minutes before half time for a quick half in the bar.
When we came back out one of our number went to the toilet to find 2 of the aforementioned Salisbury fans being pulled out of the Portaloo along with a Lewes fan with his crutches. It seemed there had been some kind of altercation and the Lewes fan, despite his protestations and clear disability, was being kicked out. I walked past shortly afterwards when the stewards were talking to the 2 Lewes guys - both seemed very worse for the wear from at the very least alcohol - and they were ejected shortly afterwards. Given the friendly 'bantery' nature of things at the Pan, with both sets of fans mingling together and having a laugh this was quite a turn up, but it was the only sign of anything happening, and a source of some mirth purely for it being so out of place in the situation.
At half time we hit the bar and grabbed pints (I of course went with some of the local brew from Harvey's brewery) and chatted about the game and anything else that came up. We could have been anywhere in honesty, a good friendly pub atmosphere and good beer, and we remained in the bar as the second half kicked off finishing our pints and chatting to one or 2 more loyal Lewes fans. Some of us caught through the bar windows that Salisbury had doubled their lead (Clarke, 49) and things did not look good for lacklustre Lewes. We resumed our position on the terraces and listened to further Salisbury chanting and tried desperately to think of more of our own. Lewes though came back into it and finally started getting some confidence going forward. One of the best goalmouth scrambles I think I've ever seen occurred right in front of us, and we started to Believe. The local fans, us included, got into full voice - "Leeewwwweees" was the chant, and ref and players started to get some verbal heat. The Salisbury fans were quiet, worried indeed, and they were right to be after another slightly smaller scale scramble Lewis (not that one) Hamilton (72) poked home from an angle. Game On.
Alas, it wasn't to be. Lewes petered out and in all honesty Salisbury were the better side and with 4 minutes remaining Clarke got one on the counter attack to put the game out of reach. The final whistle rang out, the Salisbury fans cheered and continued to sing their hearts out and we pissed off into town for a pint.
It was great fun and I'll certainly go again. There was the feeling that the football wasn't quite as important as the good time to be had (or was that just us), and Max tells me that addition of further beer to the terraces has a great enhancing effect on the quality of the football. I'm not saying that the fans don't take it seriously, but the great thing is there is perhaps a realisation that at the end of the day there are more important things in life (well, for all bar 2 or 3), and as long as there's a pleasant distraction to be had that's all that matters.
Why do I think you should go? If you're a football fan its to realise and appreciate the grass roots of the game where small towns like Lewes, Corby and Truro take a little pride in a team however they're doing and enjoy the football and the atmosphere regardless of the pay packet of those on show. Also I certainly didn't begrudge the tenner I paid going towards a small community club like that, far less than the 20-odd quid I've paid to watch drab & disappointing League 1 football. If you're not a football fan it's not just about the football at all, there's the banter, the beer and the interesting sociological experiment of placing 2 opposing groups of fans in one area, and it's a friendly (generally family friendly) atmosphere and you can possibly start to appreciate some the thrills and rushes possible from the game of Association Football.
