Face Of Cheam

So the football season is well and truly underway. Saints started dreadfully, which is what you get when you haven’t got any centre-backs. At least Thomas has now been bought off of Burnley and looks like the commanding sort you want at this level. Besides the nice barmaids in the Royal Oak before the home games, there has been a few pleasant trips so far in our three games away from home. Peterborough was a place I hadn’t been before. There was a lovely blonde barmaid called Nina in the O’Neills here before I sampled a few excellent pubs. The Wortley Almshouses is a very old world pub with separate rooms and two bar areas. A Samuel Smith’s place where it was less than £1.50 for a pint of lager. The Brewery Tap is apparently under threat from Peterboroughs redevelopment. A shame as this is a large spacious pub with a large choice of ale although Budvar was the most extravagant lager on tap. Good lighting and a nice place to relax in. Finally nearest the posh was Charters. This advertises itself on real ale and is actually on a barge on the river. The riverside doubles as a large garden area which is bigger than the barge itself and as you’d expect the barge lends itself to a long narrow bar, although there was enough room to allow plenty of seating should you wish to stay afloat.
Norwich is a fine place and I managed to find several places I hadn’t actually done before. The Red Lion is a tourist pub (if Norwich has tourists?) set in the old town. A nice horseshoe pub by the river with an old fashioned feel to it. The Jubilee had an estate feel to it with its Tvs and two bar areas. However, there was a large conservatory extension giving it a slight country feel. I was starting ale territory with Summer Lightning on tap. The walls were donned with signed photos to the pub from such people as Phil Collins and even Paul McCartney. I doubt the signatures are genuine but you never know. The Rosary Tavern is a typical small spit and sawdust place. Again real ale is the theme here and I had a pint of the award winning Straw Dog. Affectionate to Norwich City FC, they were showing a video if their 100 greatest goals on their TV. Jeremy Goss against Munich was obviously was up there!
The Coach & Horses is a huge pub that has it’s own brewery call Chalk Hill. Their beer was drinkable and although the pub was packed pre-match this was a fine place with a rustic feel to it. After the match I popped to the town centre where I found the pub called The Murderers. Here I was surprised to see Carling Premier on draught, a drink I hadn’t seen for years.
QPR is always a good trip and this is where we had our first away win. I did the two chains by the Empire music venue (Walkabout & O’Neills) before the Shepherd & Flock which is a small irish corner pub and The Goldhawk, a pub recently turned into one of these gastro thingymyjigs where they had a good selection of lager such as Amstel, Koppers Kolsch and Erdinger.
As for Saints, after a dodgy start (three defeats), Burley appears to have turned it round with the home game against Stoke and away to QPR seeing us putting in the type of performances that should see us challenging. If Rasiak, Bradley and Saga keep scoring as they can and the girl with ‘Siany’ on the back of her Saints shirt keep chatting to me then I’m going to enjoy this season!