Its all tongue in cheek and part one of the journey to Pune. I really hope you all enjoy it?
As I am luckily enough to be one of the chosen 9 Rovers supporters to visit the land of the clubs owners , I thought I would detail the visit in a blog
PEAS AT HALF TIME
Day 1 - THE FLIGHT
Arrived at airport and we were welcomed into the exclusive golden VIP waiting area , complementary drinks and snacks and a wall of 52 inch plasma screens, I don't think these screens were working correctly because all they did was keep flashing up images really quickly. I recorded one of the screens on my video camera and played it back slowly, every three seconds a picture flashed up first of Steve Kean , then it said love Kean, then a picture of Balaji which said love Balaji then the same with his brother and sister and finally the venkys logo which said love venkys, then it went back to the beginning.
Anyway as I said think they were faulty because i didn't understand that, but had an overwhelming desire for a chicken leg, luckily there was plenty on offer.
With chatting to the other supporters and listening to the gentle womb like celestial music with whispering in the background coming from the Walkmans that venkys had kindly supplied to us, time flew and we were ready to board the plane.
Transfer flight to London was pretty uneventful, good job really as Balaji had put some of his bollywood movies on the in flight video system.
Imagine our surprise when we boarded the India bound plane and all the players were sat there, the 9 of us were directed to a section in 5 rows of two seats, with instruction that every half hour somebody else had to sit on their own, unfortunately every time somebody new sat alone this bald drunk bloke staggered up and sat beside them and started rabbiting on about the grass not being wet enough and stuff like that, didn't really make much sense until you gazed at his eyes then everything seemed clearer.
After he had spent what seemed to be a lifetime talking at everyone twice , he went over and sat next to Michel Salgado, luckily I overheard some of the conversation, Salgado was explaining the importance of having cover as a right back, but the bald bloke wasnt interested and was chatting to his friend Jeremy? jeromey ? or something like that ,on the phone think they might be in business together because all I heard was "how's it going" "yeah can't believe we've got away with it this long" "how much" then burst out laughing
A long flight but the monotony was broken by Jason Roberts, he got the songs going, "Steve Kean's blue and white army" " we love you keano we do" and an hilarious version of the the spitting image chicken song before doing a touching rendition of "the wing beneath my wings" whilst kneeling in front of the bald bloke.
I was impressed by Dunny he can really turn on the charm when he wants to, while all of us got one bag of nuts, Dunny got two ,a bag of nik naks, and a wagon wheel, sure that air hostess in the yellow and blue chicken suit with the words eat me on it, fancied him.
I saw Yakubu looking over at Dunny , don't think he was impressed but he got his own back by slying off to the catering deck and eating everybody's Wild Salmon & Spinach Fish Cake and Chive Mayonnaise starters. Never mind feed the Yak and he will score, after that lot it was feed the yak and he will sleep
Don't think Samba likes flying, he was sat there in a 1971 Arsenal cup winners shirt looking grumpy all flight and only laughed once when Vince got up to get something from the overhead locker and pulled a muscle in his back. Because Chris is such a dominating figure all the rest of the lads were too scared to ask him could they have a go on FIFA 2011 that he was playing on the in flight entertainment centre.
I didn't know, but think Venkys had run a competition for somebody to spend some time with professional footballers, the lucky winner was a lad called Myles, think he had learning difficulties because the bald bloke seemed to like him and kept saying he was a late developer. He arranged for Myles to put on the captains hat and visit the cockpit, lucky sod.
It was all merry until the red wine ran out and the bald bloke had to drink Budweiser, by the end of the flight there must have been 20 half full bottles around the plane , and he was going round to everyone shouting, "what have you put in this" before finishing them off, must admit I got a bit scared when he pulled the pilot off his seat and tried to fly the plane whilst singing Gloria Gayners "I will survive"..
Think Venky's have sorted this trip on the cheap, the air stewardess came round with a dreadful wine a Chateau Mouton Rothschild think it was called, must be one of those bulk job lot wines because don't recall ever seeing it in Bargain Booze
The rest of the players were having a game of throw the peanut at Robinson, Paul was diving all over his seat flipping the peanuts all over the place, Unfortunately Jason spoilt the fun by wanting a go , he didn't get one peanut within 10 feet of robbo, rest of the players looked away in embarrassment. Stick to singing Jason!
After this Hoilett and Olsson started a race down the aisle it was supposed to be there and back , but once they ran forward they didn't seem as interested in coming back, Hoilett's a funny lad he was convinced he wanted to sit in seat number 6 but then stated if somebody offered him number 15 he would move, don't know what that was about.
Poor Ryan as club captain one of his duties involves looking after the creche on away trips so it was him who dealt with the constant shouts of "are we there yet" and "I wanna go toilet" which started 10 minutes after take off, once he stopped Junior and Martin running around the plane he arranged a game of pass the parcel with the rest of the young guns, it went well until the parcel got to Rochina and he wouldn't pass it on and opened it himself..Nzonzi not happy he didnt get his turn jumped up and started break dancing, then spinning on his head, not to be outdone Formica started some Latino moves down the aisle. at this point Ryan shouted over to Big Chris , Samba got up from his seat walked over to the creche and slammed a copy of the London property guide 2011 on the back of a seat and glared at the young uns who all rushed back to their seats , I did notice Jason Lowe giggling behind his hand and when samba turned his back pulling his tongue out.
The stewardess called that lunch was being served , the Yak and Dunny suddenly woke up, as the yak had eaten all the starters we had a choice of standard main course fair of Herb Crusted Rump of Lamb Thyme & Red Wine reduction with Scallion Crushed New Season Potatoes or Roasted Cod on a bed of Creamed Garlic Mash With Saffron Cream & Wilted Young Spinach, Goodwillie was not happy he wanted chips, I chose the herb crusted lamb, it was nice but if Venky's are trying to curry favour with us , they had better up their game. Choice of desserts was nice and a good touch for the lads in the creche is that they could put their own hundred's and thousands on their Ice cream. All of a sudden the creche erupted into giggles apparently young Slew had arranged his hundreds and thousands into the shape of a man's bits and was shouting "Im a goodwillie" in a scottish accent. Ryan had had enough and sent all the creche to bed.
By this time everybody was feeling a bit tired so the lights dimmed and as I was getting settled looked over at the seat across the aisle and saw Jason placing a blanket over the bald man , and softly singing a lullaby to him , he Lent down to kiss him on the forehead but missed and banged his nose on the seat headrest, I closed my eyes quickly put my in flight headphones on and pretended to be asleep. Funny it was the same smoothing music as on the walk man's that Venky's had supplied .
When I woke up , the plane was descending at the airport a sense of excitement in the air, before entering immigration imagine our surprise to be met by Anuradha and Venkatesh, I managed to capture this on my video camera.
