Retrospective: Daggers 2 - 0 Orient

It's back to Victoria Road for Orient with the JPT draw turning up an away game against Daggers. To get some perspective I hastily translated my match report from Svenska Fans the last time Orient played Daggers away, back in 2010. My how things change!

Daggers 2 - 0 Orient

Wonderful. Fantastic. Enjoyable. Three superlatives that didn’t fit Orient in yesterday’s derby against Daggers. To be honest it was poor. Really poor actually.

With five matches played in League One, Orient’s points average says relegation battle - again. If they play like they did against Dagenham it’s what they deserve. Fair enough, injuries did weaken the back four who were terrible. Especially in the first half. Sure Orient should have had a penalty in the second. But this doesn’t hide the fact that crap like this, against teams like Daggers, mean you end up around teams like Daggers in the table, i.e. near the bottom.

Two headed goals from one of King Arthur’s failed knights, Sir Romain Vincelot. One in each half. This gave Daggers their first ever win in League One. The home team dominated the first half totally, and after their 2-0 early in the second their main objective seemed to be advanced time wasting. Despite this, they were closer to a third by hitting the crossbar, than Orient were pulling a goal back.

Russell Slade choose to not start with Mike Cestor in the absence of Charlie Daniels. Instead he opted for Jimmy Smith since it seemed to work against Brighton. Against Daggers it didn’t work at all. Slade made Smith and Elliot Omozusi switch sides after the interval. This helped somewhat. For those who wonder were Michael Liddle is, I can inform you that he was injured in his first game for Orient against Yeovil and is back at Sunderland for rehab. Without Daniels the problem at left back scream out for a solution. Play Cestor I say. He may be inexperienced but he’s a natural left back. Smith is a midfielder and it shows.

Orient were poor. As a man really poor. Alex Revell showed some good intentions but came off injured late in the game. His replacement, surprisingly enough, Adrian Patulea who got a place on the bench instead of the injured Jonathan Téhoué. The Count didn’t get much time on the pitch but he was about as poor as the rest of the team.

Next week Orient entertain top team Huddersfield at Brisbane Road. Orient logic say that we will probably perform well against them. Hope! The last thing to leave an Orient supporter.

Dagenham & Redbridge - Leyton Orient 2 - 0 (1 - 0)
League One, week 5, september 4, 2010
Victoria Road, attendance 4.195

Goal scorers: Vincelot 8, 50
Yellow cards: none

Orient: Jones; Smith, Forbes, Chorley, Omozusi; Chambers (Jarvis 72); Cox, Dawson, Spring; McGleish, Revell (Patulea 89)
Bench: Brown, Butcher, Porter, Cestor, Beautyman

Where is Our Lagom?

With a new owner at the doorstep of Brisbane Road, the question is; How well do we want Orient to do?

I paid a fair amount of money to watch Dagnall miss that penalty at Wembley back in May. But being there, and knowing that some of that cash ended up with the club, made it well worth it. When the disappointment had worn off I expected a pre-season a little bit different than the one before. Success on field meaning that, instead of speculating about who would replace that half a squad of released players, it was more a case of which players are going to be picked up by bigger clubs. Boy was I wrong!

Someone with money wants to buy Orient. Words like investing in the squad, taking the club forward, are flying about. Question is how far do we, as fans, want to go?

I would have loved seeing Orient in the Championship even though a season like Yeovil’s was the most probable outcome. With a rich Italian throwing money at the problem of having a small ground and a limited fan base, staying up after promotion should be much less of a problem. But the things that drew me to Orient in the first place could actually be in danger of going away.

Even though I love English football, the Premiership never did it for me. I wanted another experience and found it with Orient. Great atmosphere, jaded fans that knew the reality of their club and therefore appreciated success when it happened. Firmly at home in the community with players and staff still regular people that you could interact with. Not some far off spaceship of a club with everyone involved believing they are somehow larger than life.

I know I’m not alone in looking for this. Hell, Adam Michie even wrote a great book about his search for that elusive feeling. That buzz you get watching football surrounded by other fans that get it! It’s not about world-class players showing of great skills. It’s about regular players who at rare moments produce a world-class move.

So I’m not really afraid of a new owner coming in, making a mess of things and then walk away. I believe Orient would survive that. What scares me is a Chairman that achieves all the goals he made for himself when he bought the club. When the first fixture of the upcoming season is a London derby against Arsenal. That’s frightening because I’m not sure my Orient would survive that.

There is a great Swedish word, lagom. It’s hard to translate but in one word it sums up something that is just right. Not too much, not too little, not too awful, not too successful. It’s lagom.

With possibly big changes at the horizon I think every Orient fans needs to think about where in the League pyramid Orient’s lagom is. Your answer to this question should give a clear indication about how you feel about Hearn leaving and Becchetti coming in. Do you like being called Little Leyton Orient or is your aspirations larger than that?

And, if anyone’s answer to the question of lagom is League Three, I will personally seek you out and slap you.

The Obliviousness Radius

The Orient half of Wembley Stadium fell silent when Chris Dagnall’s penalty was saved. A thousand thoughts went through thousands of minds. What to feel. How to cope. The why us of it all.

The play-off final was a pretty big deal for everyone at Wembley. It had been for the whole day. People from near and far had made their way there hoping for the best, fearing the worst. My gang of three included.

West Ticket Office?

The weather was nice as we made our way from hotel to stadium with detours to drop off our bags and some last minute shopping. We picked up our tickets, bought some playoff souvenirs, and went to the Green Man Pub. Surrounded by expectant fans you couldn’t help but smile and join in the chanting. Even though there was a tinge of nervousness in the air, the mood was a happy one.

I won’t dwell on the game. Others have done that better. We were there, we weren’t. Almost there, but not quite. So close we could smell it. But not. The thing that struck me as I made my way home amongst all the other Orient supporters, was how fast this momentous event faded away in the world around us.

As we walked to Wembley Central you heard the game being discussed. All around people with Orient kits, scarves and flags. But even here, this close to the stadium, you passed people looking surprised. They didn’t even know there had been a game.

On the train I ended up next to a jaded die-hard Orient supporter (seen all three play-off defeats) and his son. Opposite were two neutrals who wanted to discuss the game. One of them admitted to living in Leyton but supporting Man U. My Orient supporting neighbour said, You should support your local team, mate. That brought a smile to my face. Travelling from Stockholm as I was. The ref was biased and the result harsh, Orient deserved to go up was the next sentiment from the neutrals. Again my neighbour delivered, It was just a game of football. Beautifully, in those two sentences, summing up what being a football supporter is all about.

We parted ways at Paddington. Going home. Which in our case involved the Heathrow Express. As we passed through the turnstiles the guy working there, spotting Martina’s red play-off T-shirt, asked, Did you win? Martina, thinking she had broken some rule of the London Underground just stared at him. So I answered in her stead, No we lost - on penalties. He looked genuinely sorry for us as we continued into Paddington Station.

Walking to the train I didn’t see or hear anything Orient related. We had travelled just a few stops on the tube but here regular London life went by as usual. Was the obliviousness radius really this short? Wembley to Paddington. Surely not?

Leaving the Express making our way to the check-in at terminal 3 I heard a familiar cry. Up the O’s! Turning around I saw a guy talking on his mobile but spotting us as Orient fans. There’s always next time, he said. Where are you off to? Just like that the radius grew a bit.

A to capacity filled SAS-flight to Stockholm didn’t really trouble itself with football. What talk there was at this late hour turned to the Ice-hockey World Championships (Sweden finished 3rd, Russia won final against Finland) and the ongoing Swedish EU-elections. When we touched down at Arlanda it was well past midnight.

Next morning at work we were two guys covering for the rest of the department who was on their way back from a weekend conference in Riga (Latvia). A trip I missed opting for a day at Wembley instead. They arrived right before lunch. The first question I got was about the Orient game. As the day went on we swapped stories, pictures and videos. Drunken karaoke vs. orient chants. Latvian fish cakes with mashed potatoes vs. being 2-0 up at half time. Despite being the sole Orient supporter I had a lot of opportunities to talk about the game. Reflect on it. At the same time the radius expanded even further.

Later in the afternoon I got an e-mail from the Chairman of Norrtulls SK (support your local team remember), it started, too bad you losing on penalties yesterday. I have never hidden my double loyalties to him. But we didn’t discuss the fact that NSK lost a 2-0 lead to a draw against Handelskamraterna at the same time Orient played at Wembley. We talked politics.

With elections in september the smaller football clubs in central Stockholm have decided to raise awareness about the appaling lack of pitches. In Stockholm an estimated 19.000 people share one pitch compared to an average of 8.000 in the rest of the country. At the same time existing football pitches are under threat as they are prime targets for redevelopment. Ongoing projects show that building new pitches aren’t a priority at all. This has to change. NSK are starting a campaign and I have agreed be involved.

Radius is nil

On the face of it the obliviousness radius for an Orient play-off final at Wembley is but two to three kilometers. Further than that and ordinary life trumps your football club. But look closer and you’ll see that’s an illusion. Orient supporters rub off on people. I think we (yes I do include myself here) have been brilliant this season. The world weariness is still there but it’s been infused with a new measure of pride and hope. If you’re passionate about something it speaks to others. Makes them want to listen. Just don’t obsess about it, remember it’s just a game of football, mate!