16^th August 2025

Tardy. Remiss. Slack. Disappointing.

These are just a few words you can use to describe my lack of post updates since the Euro final. After detailing, often in quite some depth, the planning of our Swiss adventure and then many of the events that occurred once we were in Switzerland, I’ve not yet got around to finalising my account of the DadLadTour to Euro 2025. Sorry, folks, it will come. And, when it does, you will be able to relive those magic moments once more.

Today’s blog post is a shortie. Hoorah! You all shout. No more of his long-winded nonsense.

It’s currently a little before noon and in just over an hour I will be getting on a bus to Bradford Interchange. Why are you getting on the X63 to Bratfud I hear you ask? Well…I am going to Valley Parade (VP) to watch Bradford City (BCAFC) take on Luton Town in League One.

Today will be my first visit to VP in a good few years – maybe, four or five – and I admit to feeling quite anxious about returning to a place I once considered my spiritual home.

This is City’s second home game of the season. I didn’t go to the first match against Wycombe as I had tickets to see a documentary about a pioneering women’s team called the Manchester Corinthians and I chose to watch that instead. I didn’t regret my decision either. Despite learning that City got all three points in a 2-1 win on their return to League One action.

I don’t know how many times I’ve been to that ground in the years since my first visit in the 1980-1981 season. 

Hundreds? Thousands? I really could not say. I suppose I could do a rough calculation by multiplying the various numbers of home games in each season. That would give an approximate figure. But I would then need to add in cup games, friendlies, pre-seasons and any other miscellaneous fixtures that the club have had in those four decades. Play-offs too.

And then there is the times I’ve been to VP that have not involved an actual match. There were a lot of those events.

I have no idea how many times I’ve been to Valley Parade. Suffice to say it’s a heck of a lot.

Today, as mentioned earlier, I am feeling quite anxious about going. Why….I don’t know. I shouldn’t feel nervous yet I do.

I suppose this uncertainty is tied in with my original confusion about why I fell out of love with BCAFC.

So many questions.

Will I “feel it” when I get to the ground?

Will I feel at home again as I once did for so very long?

Or, like the last match I attended, will be unable to stay and walk out before kick-off?

It must sound to you like I am making a mountain of out a molehill. Most likely I am but these are my molehill and mountain to conquer. I don’t know if I will be successful but hopefully, beginning today, I can make a start.

Maybe I should just stay home and potter about with setting up the irrigation kit I have bought for the garden? A sound idea if I had not already purchased my ticket via the bus company’s online app. That’s £2.50 I’d be wasting!

At least the bus journey should be okay. I quite enjoyed the bus ride into town when I previously attended matches. Bus rides are okay when it’s you who is the proverbial “nutter on the bus”.

So. Alongside tardy, remiss, slack and disappointing you can now add confused.

Wish me luck.