What Happens at Woking FC

Among the many things that happen at a place like Woking FC that don’t happen at a place like Chelsea or Tottenham, the most important for me was when Dan recognized my Timbers cap and said hello.

I was in the “Fan Zone” at Kingfield, in the fifth tier of English football, a half-hour west of Central London by train, and in a completely different world from that of international stars, transfer rumors, chatting analysts, and shiny new stadiums.

One day I’m having all-you-can-eat in the lounge at Tottenham, and the next I am ordering the chicken strips at Woking. I had a chuckle when the kid at the register told me they were out of chicken strips — but would chicken nuggets be okay? Since a chicken naturally possesses neither strips nor nuggets, I said that would be fine. I am not even sure what he produced came from any part of a bird.

The Woking FC Fan Zone

Al fresco dining

I was hoping to grab a corner of a picnic table when Dan (not his real name), walked up to me and said, “Portland Timbers?” I said “Why, yes!” I guess he had an old girlfriend from Oregon. Anyway, thus did I find myself a terrace buddy for my evening in the National League.

Perhaps you have heard of the National League, if only from the first season of “Welcome to Wrexham.” I often tell people that what you see in that first season no longer exists at Wrexham, a club which is covered in glitz and glamour and now three divisions up the league pyramid with a new season of the “documentary” being filmed as we speak. I always tell them that the National League is still there, so you can still visit that world. They all say no thanks, which is a shame, because even at Wrexham now — and certainly in the Premier League — it’s virtually impossible to make a terrace buddy for the day just by wearing an MLS cap. You’re more likely to run into another MLSer in the hospitality lounge who wants to tell you about the other stadiums he’s been to.

Walking to the ground, mainly past apartment buildings.

Woking looks like a bedroom community for London; the 6 pm train from Waterloo was packed with worker types staring at the their phones. The only indication of impending football was three young lads at the station, each with a bottle of beer in their back pockets, and apparently each with a few already down. As I started the leafy 20-minute walk to the ground, I heard one of them shout, “C’mon Woking!”

I had bought a ticket for a stand actually called Moaner’s Corner, perhaps the greatest stand name in the world, just above one at Wolverhampton known as the Gene Kelly Stand because it’s uncovered and you wind up “singin’ in the rain.” But that’s just a nickname; at Woking it’s literally the name of the place, cafe and all!

Sadly, Moaner’s Cafe was closed for a Tuesday night fixture.

Not a big night for ice cream, apparently.

Dan assured me it would be more fun in the Kingfield Road End, the covered terrace behind the goal, so after a little introductory chatting, off we went. We arrived just in time to join in for the pregame rendition of Elvis’s “Can’t Help Falling in Love With You.”

Onto the Kingsfield Road terrace.

Pregame intros, soundtrack by Elvis.

Kingfield — officially now the Laithwaite for “sponsorship reasons” — is the perfect National League ground. One end is the “KRE,” where I was. On one side is a tiny terrace crammed up against what looks like a tennis center. On the other side is three different stands: the uncovered Moaners, an ancient-looking one with a roof, and another covered one next to what looks like a garden shed with a garden shed on top of it. And then, inexplicably, behind another goal is a big all-seater that looks totally out of place and modern — because it only dates from 1995.

It’s all kind of pieced together on this side.

The “new” bit across the way.

Woking has played on this patch since 1922, by the way. They’ve been around since the 1880s and never made the Football League. Their high point was the 1990s, when they won a few FA Trophies and made the Fourth Round of the FA Cup after winning away to West Bromwich Albion. Dan said the biggest club he could remember coming to town was Watford, who won 2-0.

Other pregame music was all by a fellow named Paul Weller, of The Jam and the Style Council. Aside from him being from Woking, it’s said that both HG Wells and George Bernard Shaw briefly lived there. It’s the kind of place there the top 10 things to do in town, according to Trip Advisor, are not in fact in town.

For me, it was back on the Soccer Road after a few months off, and everything was comforting and familiar: the old guys watching the warmups, people greeting the stewards by name, somebody bringing a sandwich to a pitch-side photographer, the guy selling tickets for the 50-50 raffle, the teenagers looking a little stressed in the food stand, the old guys trading stories in the club bar under photos of the promotion season a few years back.

Glamour of the National League

Keeping an eye on warmups.

The club timeline, featuring that time they got out of the sixth tier again.

And, once the game started, literally within one minute, the sounds of anger and frustration from the lads on the KRE. They might moan over in the corner, but on this terrace they just cursed. It didn’t take long for players to be called asleep, too slow, too passive, fucking useless, and worse. And to be fair, to this point in the season the Cardinals had played two, lost two, scored one and conceded five. It wasn’t inspiring stuff out there.

The visitors were Wealdstone, and the main thing I wanted to know about them was how to say it. Everything from “welds-tun” to “weelds-tone” was on the table, but it turned out to be something like “WEELDS-ton.” I think. They had won all three games, and the difference showed. When they scored a penalty in front of us in the KRE, the mood turned even more sour around me.

View from the KRE, away lot in the distance.

Woking did, in face, wake up eventually, and they got a goal from nothing, then dominated for a few minutes and would have gone ahead but for a terrific save by the visiting keeper. But that passed, and Woking’s new manager received some, let’s say, negative feedback for waiting too long to make substitutions. One of the gospel unspoken truths among supporters is that they know more about football and specific squads than the people paid to assemble and coach those squads.

It all changed back to the visitors favor, and just as the new guy was “finally” lining up some Woking subs, Wealdstone got the winner with a few minutes to go, setting off quite the little bouncing and running scene among their dozens of supporters over by the tennis center.

Here are the highlights, with entertaining home commentary:

And by the way, right at the 11:10 mark in that video … there we are!

Clapping them off after the loss.

After the game, Dan did the classic English thing: After two hours together, trading stories, singing, analyzing the game, and and asking questions about each others’ sporting cultures, we got outside the ground and he tossed me a quick handshake, no eye contact, said “Nice to meet you” and was gone. I guess what happens in the ground stays in the ground.

The way back to London was filled with many of the usual sights: a delayed train, a pocket of Wealdstone fans singing “Top of the league,” and their own personal police officer telling them to sing all they want but do not go to the other platform where the little pocket of Woking folks were. A few accusations of loserdom and wankerdom aside, everyone played their roles subtly and it was all chill at Woking Station. And another ground was ticked off my list.

Footnote: Just had to say that this statue at the station is … weird. And considering the sign next to it, somewhat surreal.