Internet Football Ground Guide - Away Days, Ewood Park

Ewood Park - Blackburn Rovers
Sunday 6th October 2002
V Tottenham Hotspur, Premier League, 4.05pm
By Philip Harper

I was looking forward to this game for a couple of reasons, one, Spurs were overdue a good away performance, and two, id witnessed Robbie Keane's debut against West Ham, and had done enough to suggest I could be making a long, but fruitful journey to Lancashire from my South Oxfordshire home. Also, a bitter aftertaste still lingered after that fateful day in Cardiff when Spurs chose to put in arguably their worst performance of the season to virtually hand Blackburn a Uefa Cup place, so there was the proverbial motivating factor.

I actually made Blackburn in 3.5 hours which I felt was good going, especially as I had made the treacherous M40,M42,M6 interchanges without encountering any traffic problems, a minor miracle in itself. I usually get delayed in Birmingham if I am heading to the North West, so that was a relief, and hence my 8am start time.

Once i was on the M65, Ewood Park was clearly signposted and it was off at junction 4 to pick up the Bolton Road, and then past Ewood itself to find a car park (calling it that is giving it the benefit of the doubt it was more akin to a paddyfield) and a Ł4 charge, which compared with Ł10 opposite White Hart Lane was cheap for the day.

Both my friend and I actually walked past the ground before we realised it, because the ground is set back from the main road, and the buildings on our side of the street obscured it.

Having had a brief glimpse of the Darwen End, we then proceeded to a McDonalds outlet 2 minutes away, where a good mix of Spurs and Rovers fans were to be found, and I received several curious stares as I was sporting our new 3rd yellow shirt, and most other fans had not yet bought it.

Afterwards we decided to have a closer look at the ground, and i have to say the Jack Walker stand looked very impressive indeed and it made me realise that just 7 years earlier this team had won the Premiership.

Once inside the ground I was overall impressed with Ewood Park, the only gripe I had was the Riverside Stand, it looked like Graeme Souness had stolen the away end from Filbert Street and stuck it in Blackburn! However, the other 3 stands were impressive, we were in the upper tier of the Darwen End, where we commanded an excellent view of the playing surface. One curious thing I noted was the fact that the pitch sloped away from the playing surface, meaning players had to run uphill in order to take corners or throw-ins.

The seats at Ewood were very comfortable, and I had plenty of legroom (at 6ft 3ins this is no mean feat), the stewards were helpful, and I even managed to coax one into admitting he was a Sunderland fan!

The other thing that stuck in my mind was when Blackburn scored, a huge inflatable man, wearing Blackburn colours, suddenly reared up out of nowhere, most bizarre!

To the game itself, I was not disappointed as after 6 mins Keane raced away from half-way to hammer into the top corner. But in a way, this served to dampen the atmosphere somewhat, as the Blackburn fans became easily frustrated, and thus the more "imaginative" Spurs fans started barracking them. At least the atmosphere in the away end was lively! Around 15 mins into the 2nd half Blackburn equalised through Ostenstad, and then the game opened up and the atmosphere, when it got going, was superb as both teams tried for a winner.

When it came it was a complete fluke, but it was worth it as Redknapp completely fooled everyone (not least Brad Friedel) to claim the winner for Spurs. I have to confess I was so delirious, that I started singing obscenities, hugged my mate and tried dancing with a steward!!

Getting away was easy as I went the opposite way out of Blackburn to avoid the horrendous queues building on the Bolton Road, and I got on the M65 at junction 5, coming back past Blackburn and to the M6. However, stop start traffic from Stoke to Birmingham meant my return journey lasted about 5.5 hours.

Still, I had achieved my 2 objectives for the day, to see Keane score his first Spurs goal, and for us to put in a gritty performance and come away with 3 points.

Overall, I thought the ground was nice, very homely, it was a very relaxing day out, and the people we met in Blackburn were nice. The stewarding was efficient and helpful without being over zealous, and the result made it a memorable "away day!".