So it's my youngest son's birthday soon and I wanted to arrange for him to go to a game with some friends. Anyone with kids will know just how busy weekends are – his own football team, his brother’s team and our location mean getting to games is really difficult and consequently quite rare. A trip to COMS would have been a great present for him, so I was eager to get something arranged.
I called City about group tickets for the Liverpool game but the only option was hospitality at £95 per child! Instead I tried a different tack and got through to someone who said that Scunthorpe had asked City if they could do player escorts (one child per player) as Scunny wanted to do it. The lady I spoke to explained that while City don't do it for any home game, they are happy to arrange it for 11 kids if the away opponents want to, and so I booked it up!
As I said, getting to games is rare these days, so I wanted to make the most of it and asked my mum and my wife’s folks if they would like to come too. My mum would travel with us, but the outlaws would go separately. I managed to keep it quiet from the kids that we were even going to the game (not sure how, as I texted and emailed anyone I'd ever met to tell them!) so on Saturday evening over dinner, I casually mentioned that there was no point recording the Scunthorpe game, and when they asked why, I told them I had tickets! My wife and I had packed enough for a week in to the car, including boots, a change of clothes, autograph book, cameras etc, etc. As it turned out the only thing we forgot was the tickets!
Sunday morning, everything went swimmingly until 35 mins into the journey we realised we'd forgotten the tickets so had to go back home again putting us over an hour behind. Thanks to my trusty right foot and a casual disregard for the speed limits on her majesty's highways, the time was soon made up. My Father-in-law slowed his progress and we convoyed from Grantham to Scunny to the ignorance of the kids.
Frankie and Benny’s provided a perfect car park and meal solution plus the chance for the boys to gaze in amazement as Grandad parked up next to us. Once settled with food ordered, I gave the boys the letter from City to read but it still took some explaining as there was a lot of stunned silence. We had to throw down our food to meet the people from City in the club shop which we did with seconds to spare...
And this is really the whole point of this drawn out tale. The team at City were absolutely brilliant. They gave the kids everything they needed including shorts, socks and commemorative t-shirt, a ball, book, bag and loads of other goodies. But it was the care they took of the kids that was so impressive and how they made them feel like the most important people in the ground. They drew lots as to which child would walk out with which player - my eldest walked out with Boyata and William with Taylor. The six-goal game providing the icing on the cake for the boys and their very proud family.
(I'm looking round Google at the moment to see if I can get any pics of them with the players - any help gratefully received.)
Thanks, City. A brilliant day and a memory the kids will have for the rest of their lives.
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