Peanuts

iTrader: (15)

I want to recall a fans view of the Portsmouth Arsenal game the other night. It was a special night right from the outset with Pompey having secured premiership football for another year (despite Andy Townsend’s punditry- *******!) and Arsenal having been confirmed the champions the week before and you could smell that everyone was up for it. It was tipping it down to which gave juicy prospects for some tasty challenges, which always get a good roar from both sets of fans!
The game was a belter as well, flowing moves, slick passing and plenty of attacking play from both sides, it was turning into a top night out.
Then when Yakubu got a goal the pompey fans went crazy and started to party like we had just one the league.
We started to chant around the different stands and they all responded with song, we chanted for ‘Arry and Jim to give us a wave and they did with real passion. We always sing a song for our chairman, Milan Mandaric who has transformed us from a bottom six div 1 side I three short years to where we are today. Then we sang a song for Thierry Henry after he had praised our fans during the 5-1 FA cup quarter.
We asked him to give us a wave and he did, we sang to sign him up and he always smiled and clapped with each song, he really seemed to appreciate our efforts and recognition that he is indeed the best player in the world today.
Then it really got silly with chants of “Henry is a Pompey fan” and “we’re gonna buy Henry” and the like but it was always in great humour and taken that way as well.
At the end of the match all the Arsenal players went to their fans and clapped because they were still unbeaten.
Now, I am neither a manc or a goner, I have always been unsure of who is the best striker in the world and to be honest; my view has changed on a weekly basis anyway But today I can quite categorically say without shadow of a doubt it is Thierry Henry.
Not just because of the amazing runs he makes off the ball that you only see at the ground, not just because of his unerring accuracy of finish. Its because above the great football he also posses appreciation. To respond to the home fans in a game may well be unprofessional, but it made a special night into one that I’ll never forget and Im sure it’s the same for the other 20,139 who were there as well. Henry has stated in the past that he thought the Pompey fans were amazing, the best he’d ever seen, we sang at 5-1 down louder than we’d ever sang before. Both he and Patrick Viera were quoted in the press after the match as singling out the fans for praise and we will never forget that. Yesterday in the papers Arsene Wenger reiterated the point by commenting that if there were a league for the fans that we would be top by some way. All of this really makes you proud to be a football fan, despite trouble in the past, (although these people are not real fans) and we at Pompey have known a bit over the years there are moments when it really is the perfect game. The real reason though for the celebration around the city and the electric atmosphere is because after the final whistle, when the whole crowd were celebrating for two entirely different reasons, Thierry Henry donned a Pompey shirt and came over to the Fratton end and just stood clapping for what seemed like ten minutes.
That is when it dawned on me that I had just witnessed something incredible. As a mark of appreciation he wore our shirt after we sang about signing him up and we just chanted his name over and over (original huh?).
Its in the press today with an interview with Henry in the sun, but I thought I would give you a first hand account of events.
He had dazzled us with his skills on the park and he had instilled himself in our hearts forever, not enough that he just came over to applaud us (and a vast majority of away players don’t even do that) he did it with our shirt on.
It’s a moment that I will never forget, sad as that makes me, and one that I will tell to my kids.
I saw the best player in the world, Thierry Henry at Fratton Park. I also saw something that I will never get to see again unfortunately, Henry in a Pompey shirt!!
Sorry it’s a long story, without much of a point really either. I’ve never been moved to write about football before but I wanted to share my experience with you.
I guess you had to be there.

Ted Maul

Thanks for that Peanuts, I'm a gooner so it's nice to hear inside stories from away games.

As they said on TV, he often looks like a man playing footy with boys in the playground, and you never know, when he's 35 he might have a season down your way!