Away Day Alfie’s Guide To West Ham v Chelsea

West Ham away – Saturday September 11th – Kick off 3:00 pm

Allocation:   2,916 £46:00 adults £26.00 concessions – SOLD OUT

Travel:  Nightmare for this one – engineering works will cause havoc for those travelling by public transport; no District or Hammersmith & City lines due to engineering work. Options include Jubilee/Central to Stratford and then a bus, how they will get thousands of punters on the buses is anyone’s guess – plenty of room on top.  Leaving the ground will be even more fun!

By Car:  Is this part of East London the kind of place you’d want to leave your motor for more than 5 minutes?

Parking:  for the foolhardy park on side streets at least 15 mins walk away from the ground or park in Stratford and hop on a bus if you can get on one

Boozers:  Pubs in Liverpool Street are the favoured choice for those blues fans who like a drink before the game, Hamilton Hall being the most popular; for those who like a bit of nostalgia head for the Blind Beggar on Whitechapel Road scene of Ronnie Kray’s infamous murder of George Cornell (Don’t call anyone in there a fat pouf)

Police/stewarding:  Policing at West Ham is fairly laid back – stewarding is generally OK – look out for the steward in the shiny boots who patrols pitch side – always good to take the p*ss out of

Away end: Lower tier of the Centenary end – access via Green Street then left onto Tudor Road down the alley, bus garage on the left turnstiles on the right.

Home fans:  Cross between leftie students in retro hammers tops and the bling-ed up Essex boy giving it large. The famous chicken run is no more but a small group of West Ham to your left will stand and gesticulate at you in reverence to their more illustrious support of the 80’s. On the right of the away end the usual “west ham won the world cup” and “you aint got no history” songs will be chanted continuously until we are comfortably ahead and despair sets in. The Bobby Moore end will give it the blue flag and boo Lampard and Terry but generally you struggle to hear this stand.

Sadly going to Upton Park is not the nerve tingling, stomach churning experience of the 80’s, now more  a walk in the park – those in Chelsea colours will be barked at by the West Ham fans in the caged in area of the Queens Pub but generally safe walking to the ground. The redevelopment of Upton Park has killed the atmosphere but for those of us who experienced the old South Bank and Chicken Run heading there always puts a smile on your face for both good and bad reasons.

Memories of West Ham

In March 2008 Chelsea humiliated West Ham at Upton Park 4-0 ending the game with ten men after Lampard received a ludicrous red card which was later rescinded for a push on Boa Morte. West Ham fans were streaming out of the ground after 25 minutes with Chelsea already 3 nil up. Ground was empty at full time bar 3,000 celebrating Chelsea fans

September 1995 – John Spencer with his bandaged head after being stamped on by Julian Dicks, ran the West Ham defence ragged. Chelsea went on to win the game 3-1

On New Year’s Day 1986, a large group of Chelsea fans met up early in the morning at Liverpool Street to travel to West Ham. Whilst making their way through West Ham Park they were stopped by the Met Police’s finest and told that the early morning kick-off had been postponed due to a frozen pitch and that they would be escorted away from the ground to a place of their choice; the Chelsea fans were then escorted by over ground train to Highbury and Islington station and then taken to the away turnstiles at Highbury, and were told to get in the ground. Just about to kick off was Arsenal v Tottenham in the big North London derby. 

As the Chelsea fans snaked down the side of the Clock End a huge roar went up when the Arsenal fans in the North Bank saw what was happening; Spurs initially thought this was a late entry by a large number of their own, but they soon found out this was not the case as the Chelsea fans stormed up the middle of the Clock End scattering the Spurs fans;  The Chelsea fans were soon surrounded by the police, and they remained in the clock end for the whole game and were locked in at the final whistle – no doubt while someone tried to explain why they thought bringing Chelsea fans into a North London derby was a good idea. There were further disturbances at the same game when West Ham fans infiltrated the North Bank