blogs

About the author

Dave Thompson

Posts: 8

I have followed the Blues for 40 years through good times and bad. I now live in Canterbury, Kent, and travel up and down the country in all weathers to take our season ticket seats in the Main Stand.

View articles

Having found out that our Academy side had reached the final of the Premier Academy League and since we were heading up to West Bromwich anyway, we decided to break our journey in London and stay overnight and head out to watch the youngsters battle it out against a very strong Fulham set-up.

The trip took an added delight for us as one of my staff member's husband was appointed as linesman for the match and so we were given the opportunity to watch not only the rising stars of the Blues but also a rising star in black - neither disappointed.

Heading to the ground you would not have guessed there would be around 2500 attending as there was not a football shirt in sight. But at the ground I was delighted to see lots of blue shirts and excited Scouse voices - there must have been 200 or 300 blues in the ground so well done you!

The first half was very entertaining with lots of goal mouth action and either side could have gone in with a half time lead. Whilst Everton controlled the game Fulham were very fast and skillful when breaking forward.

The first 30 minutes of the second half were quite slow and in truth slightly dull, but the game exploded into life on around 75 minutes when a couple defensive errors left Fulham to score the opening goal.

And while we thought that was that, the young Blues sprung into life and showed great character equalising with a clinical finish and then with minutes on the clock a lovely bit of skill, a neat lay-off and a fine cross left a simple nod in. 2-1 to the blues.

Bitten nails for the last five minutes and then a couple of scares in the four minutes added time but the Blues held on and the cheers from the Blues supporters at the final whistle was well deserved.

It was a proud moment for both the young linesman and the Blue boys as they collected their medals. And a proud moment for the friends and family of the lads as they lifted some silverware for the Toffees, well done all!